Violence Against Apostates is Exclusively the Domain of Islam

Leefbaar Rotterdam (Livable Rotterdam, LR) is a local political party in Rotterdam. It was the party of Pim Fortuyn back in 2002 when he did so well in the municipal elections in Rotterdam.

LR has recently announced a campaign to protect ex-Muslims. One of the people interviewed in the video below is Ehsan Jami, an ex-Muslim who produced a movie called An Interview With Muhammed (VERY long-time readers will remember when we featured the launch of his movie almost eleven years ago). Due to his blasphemous actions, Mr. Jami was badly beaten and was given police protection for several years.

Many thanks to C for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling:

Video transcript:

00:15   Leefbaar Rotterdam (LR) [party] launched a campaign to protect ex-Muslims. Why?
00:21   Well, in Islam it’s very different from any other faith, for example.
00:26   the Reformed Church, which is my background, or the Catholic Church, if you say
00:29   you’ve stopped believing, then it’s a public announcement. In Islam renouncing your faith is a sin.
00:35   In some countries you get corporal punishment, if not worse, and
00:39   in Rotterdam we know, in many families there are “painful discussions”
00:43   if children say they no longer want to be part of this.
00:46   You left the religion of Islam, how did the people around you take it?
00:51   Not so well, because I needed personal protection for three years.
00:55   Protection? That’s really something. —Yes. That’s the reaction you get from the Muslim community.
01:02   But I have to add, what we want to do as LR is to help Muslims.
01:07   Especially for Muslims who want to speak up and say they want to come out of the Islamic closet.
01:14   I compare it to homosexuality or LGBTQ.
01:18   It may always be the case that people meet with resistance
01:23   when they want something that’s not considered normal or desirable in their system.
01:28   I know for many examples of people who become Muslim
01:32   and also experience problems with their family.
01:35   I don’t know the numbers, but maybe there are many Christians “in the closet”,
01:38   why don’t you want to extend a helping hand to them?
01:41   Well, look, we get that question too, but what we know now
01:46   is that in the case of Jews or Christians,
01:50   you don’t get sent flowers when you leave the church, but you don’t receive death threats either.
01:55   Nobody will use violence against you. That is exclusively the domain of Islam. Unfortunately.
02:02   Most Muslims wouldn’t necessarily sympathize with your party.
02:06   Isn’t this something for NIDA and DENK?
02:09   To put this on their agenda, since they already have a bond with the Muslims.
02:14   That would be a very good thing, if they did, but they won’t.
02:18   Because preaching the faith is the basis of their party.
02:21   Of course I hope that Muslim parties like NIDA, like DENK, might join us,
02:27   but also many left-wing parties will say: yes, we support this,
02:30   like LR, we want to put this on the agenda and speak out.
02:34   If 24% of the Muslims who convert or lose their religion aren’t welcome at home anymore,
02:42   is that a problem that for example NIDA could do something about?
02:46   You can have a conversation about it, but it’s not a matter for government.
02:50   I mean, people divorce. And sometimes they cut off their ex-family-in-law, for example.
02:56   You can’t force them to keep seeing each other, because they have children or whatever.
03:00   On the other hand, politics is also society, right? —Politics represents society, absolutely.
03:06   In some sense I get that this could be a part of the job description of a political party.
03:13   Listen. If we were to talk about a serious social problem, which it isn’t,
03:17   because this, and I’m telling it straight, in any case
03:22   in the communities I talk to, this isn’t a big problem.
03:27   That believing or not believing is up to the person, which is also an Islamic principle,
03:35   that you can’t impose something, can’t coerce. So I don’t hear cries for help from people
03:39   that they have a problem. If it is a problem, the solution lies in the communities themselves,
03:45   because a political party that’s anti-Islam
03:48   won’t provide a solution for a group they say is a problem.
03:52   I have no faith in that. That’s not going to work.
 

4 thoughts on “Violence Against Apostates is Exclusively the Domain of Islam

  1. The second speaker, whose name is obscured by the subtitling, says (at 3:27 above):

    “That believing or not believing is up to the person, which is also an Islamic principle…”

    This is not true.

    “Leaving Islam is the ugliest form of unbelief (kufr) and the worst” (Manual of Islamic Law, “Reliance of the Traveller” o8.0).

    In Saudi Arabia atheists are beheaded.

      • This “no compulsion in religion” pap is the first thing trotted out by smiley imams and other Islamic apologists. I wish more people would read ibn Ishaq. They would then be in a position to challenge the claim:

        https://archive.org/stream/TheLifeOfMohammedGuillaume/The_Life_Of_Mohammed_Guillaume#mode/1up

        On p.256 Mohammed writes to the Jews of Khaybar calling them to Islam saying:
        ‘God says to you O scripture folk, and you will find it in your scripture “Muhammad is the apostle of God”…’
        and
        ‘Do you find in what He has sent down to you that you should believe in Muhammed? If you do not find that in your scripture then there is no compulsion on you, “The right path has become plainly distinguished from error” so I call you to God and his prophet’.
        Therefore the famous “no compulsion in religion” statement in Koran 2:256 is only conditional here, and since (according to Mohammed) that condition has not been met compulsion is not proscribed.

        Further details here, including a similar debunking of the supposed example of Mohammed’s religious tolerance in the “unto you your religion, unto me my religion” verse (109:6):

        https://ecawblog.wordpress.com/2017/07/06/alfred-guillaumes-life-of-muhammed/

  2. The RC church has also had its share of ugliness. Time was, even in Mexico, that you kept your mouth shut and dutifully showed up on Sunday, or else. The state of Oaxaca has been a particular hotbed.
    May I therefore suggest that religion is used as a mask and justification for human ugliness. I will agree that I-slam has raised this ugliness to a fine art, as in Saudi Arabia where religion has become a means of enslavement.
    Let’s consider who and what the source of human ugliness is and then deal with that instead of the peripherals.

Comments are closed.