Archive for the ‘islam’ Category

1 in 5 think Obama’s a Muslim?

Thursday, August 19th, 2010

Frankly, I don’t believe the recent Pew Research poll that indicates 1 in 5 Americans believe President Obama is a Muslim.  Sure, there’s some percentage of abjectly ignorant people who think that, but what this poll shows, IMHO, is the willingness of people who simply hate the president’s policies–or his race–enough to claim the worst about him in any category.  Had the Pew poll asked “Does Obama smell bad?” 20% would probably say yes, even though they’ve never been in downwind proximity to the Commander in Chief.

I’m more inclined to believe the 43% of Americans who say they are unsure of the president’s religious affiliation.  Since the president’s public falling-out with his Chicago church, the first family have not regularly worshiped with any particular congregation.

  • Share/Bookmark

Podcast #98 – The Crescent and the Moonpie

Monday, August 9th, 2010

In our live presentation to the Atlanta Freethought Society, “The Crescent and the Moonpie: Islam and the American South,” we look at the history of Islam in the Antebellum South, then jump forward to discuss  how Muslim communities are being received in 21st century Dixie.

Mentioned in the presentation:

US Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan and former heavyweight champ Muhammad Ali.  Both men are native-born Southerners (Hasan in Virginia, Ali in Kentucky).  Both are adherents of Islam, yet they took very different paths.

(more…)

  • Share/Bookmark

Guilty and 100 times more

Monday, June 21st, 2010

Apparently Faisal Shahzad is making it easy for the American court system–and, ironically, validating the notion that American citizens who commit crimes of terror are CRIMINALS and not soldiers or “enemy combatants” (whatever that means).  The would-be Times Square bomber pleaded “guilty and 100 times more” to several counts in a Manhattan court today and made it abundantly clear that he was acting in the name of Islam.  Many of the counts against him carry mandatory life sentences, so it’s a certainty that Shahzad will never again be a free man.  What I’d like to know is…why do we have to wait FIVE MONTHS before the judge sentences him?

  • Share/Bookmark

Podcast #89 – World Ends – Miss USA is a Muslim

Sunday, May 23rd, 2010

OMFG and other exaggerations.  The new Miss USA is Rima Fakih, who hails from Dearborn, Michigan by way of Lebanon.  According to Ms. Fakih, her family is not terribly pious–apparently they observe both Muslim and Christian holidays, for example.  But to hear the conservative blathersphere, you’d think the selection of  an Arab-American as one of our foremost icons of cheesecake is either political correctness run amok, or part of some elaborate master plan by Hezbollah to lower Western civilization’s defenses before they come in for the big kill.

(more…)

  • Share/Bookmark

Everybody Draw Mohammed Day

Wednesday, May 19th, 2010

May 20th is, in case you hadn’t heard, Everybody Draw Mohammed Day.  A Facebook group has been created as a form of free speech protest.  According to the creator of the group:

“We are not trying to slander the average muslim , it’s not a muslim/islam hatepage. We simply want to show the extremists that threaten to harm people because of their Mohammed depictions, that we’re not afraid of them. That they can’t take away our right to freedom of speech by trying to scare us to silence.”

Normally, I would not be in favor of gratuitous denigration of another’s beliefs.  However, if another’s beliefs are inherently irrational; to wit, threatening to kill someone because they draw a picture–even a respectful and flattering one–of your favorite prophet, then gratuitous denigration on a mass scale may indeed be called-for.

(more…)

  • Share/Bookmark

Podcast #88 – The cross stays (for now)

Sunday, May 9th, 2010

The Supreme Court has ruled that a Christian cross erected on federal land in the Mojave desert can say (for now).  Among other things, certain justices (<cough> Scalia <cough>) have decided that crosses are a universal symbol for the dead.  Never mind the only dead people you’ll find one planted over are Christian and never, say, Jewish or Muslim.  For more google Salazar v. Buono.

(more…)

  • Share/Bookmark

Prepare for…boobquake!

Sunday, April 25th, 2010

Now, this a freethought initiative I can get behind; or rather, in front of.

This Monday, April 26th, freethinking women around the world are encouraged to sport their decolletage in order to trigger…an earthquake.

SRSLY.

Boobquake” is the brainchild of Jennifer McCreight (rhymes with “right”), an atheist and genetics/evolution double-major (no pun intended) at Purdue University who blogs at the popular Blag Hag.  Bookquake is a response to this recent comment made by Iranian cleric dumbass Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi: “Many women who do not dress modestly… lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which (consequently) increases earthquakes.”

(more…)

  • Share/Bookmark

No god but God

Sunday, April 11th, 2010

Review by John C. Snider © 2010

To say that Islam has been getting a bad rap these last few years would be a massive understatement.  All religions–all cultures, for that matter–have their ups and downs, and for the last few decades Islam has definitely been seen by the West as “down.”  9-11 didn’t help matters.

It’s been extremely easy for the Western media to build a black-and-white case against the whole of Islamic civilization: they attacked us; they’re evil; it’s East versus West; we need to kick ass.  This oversimplification of things is made all that much easier by the shocking ignorance of Islam and Islamic history displayed, not just by the man on the street, but by our elected officials and influential policymakers.  One need only look at the complicated and bloody history of Christianity and Western civilization to sense that the history of Islam and the Middle East is no less complicated.  Only a fool would believe that every Muslim is a rabid jihadist determined to destroy Western freedoms, and that every Christian is a saintly martyr who just wants what’s best for everybody–yet that seems to be the worldview espoused by all to0 many of our fellow citizens.

(more…)

  • Share/Bookmark

Bible v. Quran: The Ultimate Smackdown

Thursday, March 18th, 2010

Which is more violent–the Bible or the Quran?  That’s a tough one to answer, but National Public Radio (of all places!) has tackled the question.

  • Share/Bookmark

Violence continues in Nigeria

Tuesday, March 9th, 2010

Agnostics continue to slaughter atheists in Nigeria.

Ah, who am I kidding?  It’s Muslims slaughtering Christians (and vice versa).  Nigeria’s Acting President–the ironically named Goodluck Jonathan–has promised to quell the violence, but I suspect he’ll do no more than tamp it down temporarily.

  • Share/Bookmark