discussion Muslim extremists intimidate and chase out LGBT students at a high school in Belgium

[A.R.L]

3 hours ago, ClashAndBurn said:

Not even remotely what I argued. Christianity hasn't even evolved either. It's still just as oppressive and violent. It's just not the dominating force in governing that it was even two decades ago, and has lost some of its influence and edge as people have secularized more. Countries that are under constant duress, facing coups and illegal invasions constantly while under the thumb of Western intelligence agencies and militaries, do not have the ability to secularize and often resort to seeking authoritarian demagogues that promise them safety and security from America's christofascist thugs.  

 

And that matters HOW? You're just full of non sequiturs and irrelevant arguments aren't you?  

 

The point is, "Good Christian people" like Obama, Joe Biden, and Clinton imposed their will on another country's population and left them far worse off than they were under a literal DICTATOR. "Good Christian people" like Bush, Cheney, Colin Powell/Condoleezza Rice did the same when they began their decades-long bombing campaigns in Afghanistan as they tore the country apart looking for Osama Bin Laden, only to fail and have him be found by the next administration NOT EVEN IN THAT COUNTRY. Neoconservative christofascists like them have been continuously destabilizing the world as a whole since the end of WWII. And you're surprised that the Muslim world doesn't take kindly to the West invading them and overthrowing their governments to bolster America's global hegemony? PLEASE.  

1- There was a same sex marriage in a church here in my country. I dare you to give me one example of that with a mosque.. 

 

2- Christians being secular thanks to the freedom of expression, something that islamic countries have failed to achieve since like 1400 years ago, because of the same religious text that still influences people's minds and that's what I was talking about here before.

 

3- Full of non sequiturs and irrelevant?! thank you for describing yourself .. I mean you even brought politics and the Lybian war to the subject, what else? Bringing in politics and politicians like Bush, Hillary and Obama whom I'm sure they don't even believe in god even if I were to see them praying inside church one day, now tell us what is the real religious dudes, who apply islamic rulings in their country, what have they done for humanity or even for their own people? What would they do for the world if they had the power?
 

I’m curious as to what haibatullah who applies 100% sharia law or even a less restrictive muslim leader who doesn't even allow lgbt flag would do for me as a gay person? Enlighten us, sis

Edited May 15, 2023 by A.R.L

[Hurem]

Mental gymnastics in here to somehow defend Islam  Truly vile.

[Namie-Knowles]

People thought they were being slick in this thread by generalizing Muslims and using dog whistles only to get clocked. Lmao, I say this as an atheist who is anti-religious. I don't think religion is necessary but it is a fact of life I deal with. Just like capitalism or **** like racism. Never going away in my lifetime. Y'all need to stop acting like your intentions aren't clear when it is the opposite matter of a fact. This generalization and islamphobia is so nasty.

 

I feel so bad for the child though. It sucks that some ancient dusty book is used to hurt, kill, rape, and torture LGBT population. This is the worst thing ever. But this isn't just those who follow Islam. Damn near any abrahamic religion does this. And some others as well. Not all religions are the same, some less problematic than others. But Jesus Christ the big 3 religions on this planet have done more harm than good. Hope anyone struggling under a theocratic regime is able to escape to somewhere where they can be themselves more openly. Stay strong!

Edited May 15, 2023 by Namie-Knowles

[Headlock]

12 hours ago, karma police said:

Maybe because Ukrainians are not migrants, but war refugees

Girl. Seriously?? 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refugees_of_the_Syrian_civil_war

[ClashAndBurn]

29 minutes ago, A.R.L said:

Bush, Hillary and Obama whom I'm sure they don't even believe in god even if I were to see them praying inside church one day

Bush doesn’t believe in God? Are you ******* kidding me?! He’s THE evangelical president. You have no clue what you’re even talking about, which isn’t remotely a surprise.

 

CHRISTIANS are not secular people. Christianity is what fuels most terrorism in the United States, as it’s generally based in far-right ideology and white nationalism. Their countries are secular because their societies have had the opportunity to liberalize which has led to Christianity losing SOME of its influence. They are not under the constant duress that places such as Palestine are. Your choosing to ignore this for the convenience of your narrative is also noted.

 

Anyway, Iran was fairly secular until the US tried to impose regime change to prevent the Soviet Union from spreading their influence. Another fact Islamophobes choose to ignore

[Raspberries]

On 5/14/2023 at 7:57 AM, LikeATattoo said:

This thread…why do gays do this? I get that most queer people are left-leaning and as such, will discourage seemingly sweeping generalisations of other marginalised groups (Islam obviously being marginalised in the West). That being said, at what point do you stand the hell up and recognise the reality of a situation for what it is?

 

There are really people in this thread shouting, “But what about white Evangelicals being awful too?”, as though that group of bigots isn’t even more called out for their awfulness than Muslims are lol.
 

By and large, these “kind, warm, open-minded” Muslims that y’all are waxing lyrical about in here, only make nice with y’all because they’re constricted by the societal rules of the West. The grand majority of your Muslim friends are not willing to defend people like you (even passively) in Islamic spaces. Most of them won’t even make the grand leap to defending you to their families.

 

I’d rather urinate kidney stones for a month than defend followers of a doctrine that demonises my very existence. I can’t fathom being so hopelessly devoid of integrity and basic self-awareness. Y’all are disgraceful beyond redemption.

Pretty much. That Ariana stan is embarrassing 

[LikeATattoo]

2 hours ago, Communion said:

The Muslim population *WHERE*?

The Muslim population across the globe. How do you think that the UK is so constantly able to use the “Islamic extremists” talking point against British Muslims? The UK weaponises the extremist behaviour of Muslims in Islamic countries against British Muslims. That’s how the mistrust and paranoia is able to continue.

 

And yes (since I know that you’re going to ask me how I feel about the aforementioned bigotry), that is obviously unfair.

 

2 hours ago, Communion said:

This line you keep pushing that progressive Muslims are only progressive as a product of living within the West denies people their agency and falls into dog whistles about the West "civilizing" others.

 

It is completely offensive and nonsensical to claim that most London Muslims are not progressive by choice but by political opportunity or social pressure. That's the literal implication of your post. 

1. You’re going to keep projecting onto me the viewpoint that Muslim liberalism only exists as a survival mechanism for living in the West and can’t possibly exist with any semblance of sincerity, and I’m going to continue to tell you to stop putting those words in my mouth, because I absolutely haven’t even inferred that to be the case.

 

2. Muslims are exponentially more likely to be queer-accepting when they’re situated in the West. Even more so if they were born and raised in the West. Acknowledgement of that fact (which you, inadvertently, have also performed in this thread) does not a white supremacist dogwhistle make. Sorry.

 

3. I didn’t say that the British Muslim MPs in question cannot be genuinely pro-LGBT, and I definitely didn’t say that British Muslims in general cannot be genuinely queer-accepting. I said that it’s silly to pretend that the British Muslims MPs in question have any other choice but to be openly pro-LGBT if they wish to politically progress in any way, considering the fact that Islamic homophobia is one of the UK’s favourite talking points against Islam. And I’m unambiguously correct in that statement. Again.

 

Could they be genuine? Sure. And they hopefully are. But we don’t know if they are and it’s utterly moronic to pretend that skepticism towards any religious (particularly Muslim or Christian) person seeking political gain while waving rainbow flags, is unwarranted. The skepticism is both logical and healthy.

 

2 hours ago, Communion said:

And when you routinely make these accusations against and only against Muslims…

Very quickly; who said that I harbour these suspicions (not accusations) solely towards Muslims and no other group? How many times do I have to acknowledge Christian bigotry before you stop trying to save the Muslim collective from these imagined calls for deportation and travel banning? Why would I fixate on the queerphobic practices of non-Muslims in a thread about Islamic homophobia? Why is whataboutism such a guaranteed response from people like you?

 

And who said that I attribute any form of queer acceptance solely to the West? I don’t believe that queer acceptance is inherently Western, what I do believe however is that the West, by and large, has been quicker to accept (or at the very least, evolve to a point of civility towards) queer people than the Islamic world has. Is that incorrect???

 

None of that constitutes a belief that queer acceptance is a Western concept in nature. That’s just you mindlessly throwing rhetoric onto my lap, again.

 

2 hours ago, Communion said:

You'll respond - like you did before - with "oh, who cares Muslims in THAT country are supposedly progressive, they will never represent Muslims in [country 5000 miles away] because [insert dog whistle]". Why should they have to?

It’s less a case of US/Western Muslims “having” or being obligated to do anything, and more a case of spotlighting the queer-acceptance of what is probably less than 1% of the total Muslim population as a means of “proof” that queer people are unjustified in being fearful of the idea of Islamic growth happening in proximity to them, being completely and utterly nonsensical.

 

2 hours ago, Communion said:

If Western society was so culturally at odds with *every single Muslim in the world*…

I dare you to point out where I said this. Where anyone in this thread said this. You’re operating within the framework of me having said that the entirety of the West is a pro-queer utopia after which the entirety of the Islamic world needs to model its template, and that never happened. I’d still rather be queer in most Western countries than I would in most MENA countries. And behind all of this virtue signalling, so would you.

 

 

(For the record, there’s a difference between believing in the incompatibility of Islam itself with most of the West (or really, any area of the world where queerness is accepted), and believing in the incompatibility of every single Islamic follower with most of the West. Personally I don’t believe in either of those things, but that’s neither here nor there.)

 

2 hours ago, Communion said:

And when confronted about this, you again do the whataboutism of "be serious - would a gay person rather live in Poland or [insert random country that might not even reflect the ethnic background of most Muslims in said country being referenced]???". You have literally co-opted the rhetoric of the European far-right.

Juxtapose the five most homophobic nations in the Islamic world with the five most homophobic nations in the West, and tell me which set of countries is more inhabitable for an openly queer person. You can demonise the question until you’re blue in the face, but can you answer it?

 

2 hours ago, Communion said:

In your desire to somehow "protect queer people from Islam," you have found yourself downplaying the inherent violence and queerphobia found in the neo-nazi ideology at root in much of Europe and have co-opted their language. "You're calling [insert European country]'s conservatives homophobic for hating groomers? In [Muslim country], they'd throw you off a roof." Congratulations. This is the end point of your personal grievances.

Nope. This assertion only works if I was glamourising Europe in its entirety (as opposed to describing it as predominantly safer for queer people than the Islamic world). I actually never denied (let alone defended) any European practices of homophobia whatsoever, but again, you can’t help but place words in my mouth (or in this case on my fingertips) because you have a particular trajectory in mind for this conversation.

Edited May 15, 2023 by LikeATattoo

[byzantium]

I’m not reading through this whole thread but I feel like there is nuance here that is probably being lost because it is atrl of course.  I feel like there is a trend of right wingers using the queer community as a Trojan horse to express anti-immigration sentiments.  As a gay myself, I don’t quite appreciate being used like that and find the vast majority of immigrants to be better than these conservatives anyways.  
 

At the same time, I don’t necessarily like the institutions of Abrahamic religions.  They all seem to be used as vessels for hatred which to my reading off all the texts for the religions is antithetical to their core tenants.  Thus to follow the faith you pretty much need to reject the institution.  
 

Thus I am opposed to a country becoming dominated by religious groups like the US, Israel, or Iran, but if you avoid that, I think everyone can benefit from learning from one another.  

[LikeATattoo]

1 hour ago, Raspberries said:

Pretty much. That Ariana stan is embarrassing 

Man. That person is gay and an Atheist scolding people here for being fearful of Islam like most Muslim countries wouldn’t hate him for two separate offences lol.

My favourite part of his routine is when he pretends that it’s morally incorrect to state that the West is generally safer for queer people than the Islamic world. Like his privileged American self would willingly live in most Islamic countries lol. It’s doubtful that he even desires to visit them, never mind migrate.

Edited May 15, 2023 by LikeATattoo

[RunUpDoneUp]

What's with this embarrassing thread? Please stop pretending to live in fear for your life of muslim takeover, like be so ffr.

 

This is literally an isolated incident and people acting like the winds of winter have begun are literal goons for propaganda, worst of all, for free!

 

Belgium is not some paper-thin country that's gonna run a mock because homophobic kids committed harassment and assault. Please stop pretending this isn't idiotic reactionism because y'all are bored.

[Riverbank]

20 minutes ago, LikeATattoo said:

Man. That person is gay and an Atheist scolding people here for being fearful of Islam like most Muslim countries wouldn’t hate him for two separate offences lol.

And yet his heartrate triples when you bring up the on-going genocide of the Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities committed by the CCP, which of course he's quick to dismiss  

[Communion]

40 minutes ago, LikeATattoo said:

Could they be genuine? Sure. And they hopefully are. But we don’t know if they are and it’s utterly moronic to pretend that skepticism towards any religious 

If someone works their entire career to support gay people, it is literally racialized paranoia fueled by personal greviances with Muslims to pretend as though you can't *truly* know if they're being honest by virtue of being Muslim. "We can't possibly know the operation of their mind" is both hysterical and unserious. Stop coddling Islamophobes. 

[LikeATattoo]

17 minutes ago, Communion said:

If someone works their entire career to support gay people…

[Communion]

1 minute ago, LikeATattoo said:

There is no material benefit to queer people to grab your chest and shake in fear that you think this man at any time can turn around and hurt you:

 

You have every right to hate conservatism. You have every right to disagree with conservative Muslims. You are though objectively promoting bigotry when you suggest that to be a Muslim is to inherently be conservative and that it is safe to assume all Muslims you may encounter are conservative until shown otherwise; and even then, you suggest that constant """skeptism""" of religious minorities is fine even if they show you nothing but full-throated support for queer people or women.

 

It's reactionary paranoia. And I'm very sympathetic, but resenting Muslims as a demographic because a Muslim uncle or classmate or cousin was cruel is not political praxis.  Such is no different than those who have a negative encounter with someone who is a traveller and then become bigoted to Roma as a people - another form of bigotry common on ATRL. 

 

You are literally benefiting and aiding conservatives when you suggest the fight against conservatism as a political movement can easily be swapped in as a fight against a demographic based on a personal identity at large. Progressivism's fight is not one against Islam or Christianity or Judaism or any other identity- it is a fight against Conservatism.