Dear Bill Maher,
I like you for telling the truth. Not many celebrities are as intelligent and courageous as you. But I think, to get more truth, you should visit India and paint Hindu Goddesses naked like M F Hussain. You would most likely be killed by Hindu fanatics, or you would be imprisoned because of laws against blasphemy. Many cases would be filed against you by Hindus for hurting their religious feelings. It is a punishable crime to hurt people’s religious feelings in the Indian subcontinent and many other countries in the world. And if you speak against Christianity, catholic bishops will put your life in danger. You have to run away to save your life like Sanal Edamaruku. In Europe, ninety-nine individuals were convicted last year by the Maltese Courts for public blasphemy, and 119 were convicted previous year. You know three members of Pussy Riot, Russian Music group were sentenced to two years in prison for staging a performance at the Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior. If it were not a church or a cathedral, Pussy Riot members would not be in prison. Dear Bill Maher, why don’t you try to do abortion in some of the states of your country, and see what happens. You know how Christian fundamentalists kill doctors in the name of Christianity. Why don’t you go to Italy just to see how impossible it is to get an abortion?
It is true that Islam is the most rigid, and non-reformed religion in the world and young Muslims get brainwashed to stop their thinking minds and become terrorists. But it is not true that other religions were bad only in the Middle Ages and now they are all good and safe. If Christian/Hindu/Jewish etc. fundamentalists get the opportunities to be terrorists, like Muslim fundamentalists get, they will become as intolerant and dangerous as Muslim terrorists. All religions have the potentials to make terrorists at any time. Even Buddhism, a so called peaceful religion can make terrorists. I hope you know how Buddhists in Myanmar killed and displaced thousands of poor Muslims. No one should forget about anti-Muslim pogrom of Gujarat in 2002. 2000 innocent Muslims were killed by Hindu extremists.
Islam has been used politically more than other religions. If there were no enlightenment era in Europe, most European Christians would have allowed the churches to continue their barbaric inquisition or their crusades against infidels today. Islam has not been given much opportunities to get critical scrutiny like other religions have been given. Muslims have been prevented from going through the enlightenment process other religious communities have been gone through. If the right of ex-Muslim atheists to freedom of expression were not violated, many Muslims would become atheists the way many Christians and Jews became atheists in the West. The problem is, not only foolish Muslim leaders , many clever non-Muslim leaders also want Islam to stay stagnant in the darkness.
You are a visionary man. I am requesting you to broaden your vision a bit.
Humanistically
Taslima
You are so biased towards islam and muslims you are trying to portray them as the victims to everything that has happened, although you might say some things against islam but you to core have not adopted true atheism
You are just a Muslim hater Hindu fanatic. I do not think you know anything about atheism or humanism.
You know what you are a judgemental human being always driven by emotions and no thought provocation, how can you say that i am a muslim hater? You are a male hater as far as ive observed bcoz u reply only to female tweets and may reply to a male only on provocation… Just like now
I am an athiest fuck hinduism, islam, christianity, and all mumbo jumbos(are you now satisfied about me being an athiest miss judgemental) :X
Wow you are an atheist? What a good news! But you smell like a misogynist atheist. Zero value.
FYI, atheism is not about hating people who believe in religions, it is about opposing religions because they are myths, not facts.
Now i had to google for tht word ‘mysogynist’ – in short woman hater
Well now that ive said that you are a male hater you’re coming right back at me with the same thing?
Apparently i do know that and if that wud have been the case i wudve hated my parents bcoz they’re all so religious
“But you smell like a misogynist atheist. Zero value.”
Seconded.
@nayan sharma…..I second your view!
@Nayan Sharma, I can’t see how you could possibly say that Taslima is biased in favour of Islam/Muslims. This is far from the truth. This is evident from here and from what she has written elsewhere. As I understand it (and I’m bemused as to how one could conclude otherwise), she’s saying that all religions are prone to fanaticism. The very physically entrapped life she lives is ample evidence of the consequences of her critique of Islam, in particular, and other faiths, in general!
She’s a freethinking, humanist & atheist by her own admission. Once again, it’s plain to see from what she has written above that that is what she is advocating if we are to become enlightened human beings; we must use reason, evidence and our common humanity to create civic society, not some ‘divinely’ received hocus-pocus.
Please re-read her letter above and what she has written in the past.
@Nayan Are you kidding me? If anything, Taslima is far MORE critical than the vast majority when it comes to Islam.
@desmond and liokae maybe youve red her books but as far as this article is concerned its more of a sympathizer of muslims being targeted or maybe ive interpretated it wrong…
but as far as this article is concerned
So… You seem to be saying that in every single article she writes (and this one in particular) she must show deference to all your points of view, even if she has supported them elsewhere. Do you really feel that she owes that to you?
The second one. You’ve interpreted it wrong.
“It is true that Islam is the most rigid, and non-reformed religion in the world and young Muslims get brainwashed to stop their thinking minds and become terrorists.” While the author does a great job in trying to present equal views I feel some of her language used in the article prevents this. That she writes this particular statement came to a bit of a shock for me, her language doesn’t allow for a purely secular viewpoint- it’s still biased.
Can the author tell me how many people who offended Hindu religion were killed by the Hindu fanatics? When Bill Maher says that not all religions are alike he is stating the fact.
You are truly a disgusting attention seeker.
Your Bengali ancestors were untouchables ebe fore they found their absolution in Islam.
Muslims hate you
Hindus abhor you.
We Americans are disgusted by you.
As Bob has appointed himself as spokesperson for 312.8 million Americans, I shall appoint myself spokesperson for 47 million Spanish people.
We the Spanish, think you the Americans, are dumbarse, godbot, creationist idiots who do not even know the difference between the word “arse” and the name for the two perissodactyl mammals.
I am surprised and disappointed to find this article, showing how poorly informed you are.
You just go with the muhammedan propaganda about Gujarat.
Yes a lot of people were killed and not all perpetrators are convicted, and yes most of the victims were muhammedan. Most certainly not all of them. In total there were about 1000 victims of which about 75% was muhammedan. Most Hindus were killed by the police trying to stop the killing of the muhammedans.
The horror started with setting fire on a train by an angry muhammedan mob, killing 60 men, women and children. Hindus. In reaction to it terrible things happened. On the second day Modi got the army in, because the police could not handle it.
“And if you speak against Christianity, catholic bishops will put your life in danger. ” An absolutely ridiculous claim.
“Islam has not been given much opportunities to get critical scrutiny .. ” Have (not) been giving? By whom?
Taslima, I sometimes wonder how you keep (and not delete) some really hateful and disgusting comments!
I for one see the hateful comments as reminders of what we’re up against.
Not that that excuses or exculpates them. But “cleaning them up” would create an artificially peaceful impression of the discourse. So hats off to Taslima for showing a thick skin and letting the haters hate.
“it is not true that other religions were bad only in the Middle Ages and now they are all good and safe.”
“I am requesting you to broaden your vision a bit.”
A good message, Taslima. Thank you.
I’m with the sane people on this one. Good article. It’s difficult to balance the criticism, because when most people try to point out that other religions try to do the same things as Islam, it’s taken to mean they don’t want to criticize Islam. I don’t think you have that problem.
As for me, I’m glad you’re pointing it out, no matter what some ridiculous and mistaken people in the comments say.
Maher is infuriating. At times, he can be lucid and on the side of sanity, but he just as easily (and just as readily) puts his cranium up his rectum. He still “thinks” it’s funny to joke about beating women, and he gives air time to airheads like Deepak Chopra.
Taslima, I started following you on FTB recently….I was realy impressed by your blunt way of putting things…but somehow this article disappoints me….it’s more like sympathizer to Islam and to justify their wrong doings….I believe still there is a Islam left in some corner of your heart….your are not atheist yet….you are trying hard to be an atheist…!!!
Taslima points out that the political environment is a huge part of the continued radicalization of Islam, where other religions have been forced to clean up – somehow makes her a “sympathizer to Islam”? I think she’s in an awesome position to have a nuanced view on the subject…
Dr Nasreen is a very intelligent human being – so why is it that so many more dumbasses flock to her comments sections than to those of other FreeThoughtBloggers?
Yes, nayan sharma, Amnol, Nat, Raj, Bob, and Frans Groenendijk, I’m pointing the (middle) finger at you.
Mr. Butler. In my own book I wrote I about how mrs Nasreen was persecuted in Bangla Desh and then treated very bad thanks to the communists in India. That is why I wrote about my surprise and disappointment.
Her intelligence nor victimhood excuses for ridiculous lies about christian bishops and for a distorted presentation of what happened in Gujarat.
And no I am not a christian, I am an atheïst and yes I know kind and decent people from muslim descent.
Still I am really flabbergasted by this
Not been given.
What is that supposed to mean?
Is mrs Nasreen familiar with people like Tarek Fatah (member of “muslimsagainstsharia” when that organization existed) or Stephen Suleyman Schwartz of the -“they kill us first”- organization CIP?
Did she ever hear about the Mutazilites?
Frans Groenendijk @ # 16 – Thanks for a more reasonable reply than expected.
… ridiculous lies about christian bishops …
Are you saying Sanal Edamaruku’s life would not be in serious danger if he returned to India?
Do you have a link to a reliable English-language report of Gujurat to support your summary?
As for Islam’s “opportunities to get critical scrutiny like other religions”, from context it seems clear that Dr. Nasreen (why do you omit her title?) was looking at the European “Enlightenment”, a still-incomplete project of centuries. Islam as a whole has had less than one generation of internal rational criticism, which seems to have been well-concealed from the general body of believers, or distorted with shrieking frenzies of fatwas & demonization (e.g., Salman Rushdie). The long-overdue umma-wide dialog about facing the modern era in a constructive way has yet to begin.
“Islam as a whole has had less than one generation of internal rational criticism,…”
Arguably it had a long period of internal rational criticism — the Golden Age of Persian science, which reintroduced the Greek classics to the West (which had lost the Greek classics) and also invented algebra and made substantial progress in natural science.
This trend was actively shut down and suppressed by right-wing anti-intellectual religious fanatic during the post-Crusades period, for reasons which I have never fully studied.
This is arguably the second wave of internal rational criticism for Islam, and it’s being suppressed by groups who seem just like the last set.
http://home.gujarat.gov.in/homedepartment/downloads/godharaincident.pdf
I read this on this site, that is as symphatetic to his case as I am: http://thehumanist.org/march-april-2013/blasphemy-free-speech-and-rationalisman-interview-withsanal-edamaruku/.
Mrs Nasreen (I do not like titles, I don’t us mine either) wrote: “And if you speak against Christianity, catholic bishops will put your life in danger.”
Three years in prison is outrageous.
My adagium is ‘insult is in the eye of the whiner’. But ‘life in danger’ is something really different from three years in prison.
That kind of threat comes from other ‘religions’. More specifically when it is about things that only have been said or written then it comes down to the Orwellian named ‘religion of peace’ only.
About Gujarat I read both the official report from the government and the greater part of the REPORT By The Commission of Inquiry Consisting of Mr. Justice G.T. Nanavati And Mr. Justice Akshay H. Mehta (and websites and newspapers).
As part of the preparation for my own book (Islamophobia?, 2010, in Dutch only) I searched and in the last couple of years I have continued to search, for indications of serious reform of the religion of Mohammed in the last decades.
The best I could find until now was CIP.
Maybe you still did not get my crucial point: Not been given: by whom?
Writing this way suggests that there have been and still are some unknown actors that withhold the umma from that “long-overdue umma-wide dialog about facing the modern era”. These actors are known and they have proven to have the upperhand in the past and nowadays. Ibn Taymiyya, Al-Ghazali, Rumi etc etc And nowadays we have the likes of Tariq Ramadan, the wahhabites, you name them.
What are you talking about here?
Muhammedanism exists for almost 14 centuries and there have been attempts to reform it. What about this “one generation”? When did that generation start? When you started to get interested in the subject?
Please enlighten me about the well-concealed ‘international criticism’. I am not purely sarcastic here. In my vision the crucial problem with ‘the religion of peace’ is that Allah has no message, only a messenger’ (and he is dead).
I did not write much in English. This essay http://www.amazon.com/Islamophobia-Defying-Battle-Cry-ebook/dp/B00793J38G/ref=cm_rdp_product_img and this article are the most important: http://www.islamofobie.nl/index.php/blog/meer/terrorism_terror_and_some_statistics/
I don’t have time now to read yr .pdf report on Gujarat, but thanks for providing significant backup for your claims.
You make a valid point in reminding us that three years of imprisonment does not automatically equal a death threat, though I have to wonder if being confined among the violent and flagged as an infidel might not end up lethally.
… in the last couple of years I have continued to search, for indications of serious reform of the religion of Mohammed in the last decades.
The best I could find until now was CIP.
It seems, then, you agree with me that internal Islamic reform is embryonic at best (and, apparently, that embryo has miscarried, or been deliberately aborted).
Well Said Talisma
Yes, the world is under the burden of religious slavery, which is creating so much chaos, anarchy and bringing in destruction. Political freedom can’t be used for right purposes, unless there is religious freedom
Seema
“But I think, to get more truth, you should visit India and paint Hindu Goddesses naked like M F Hussain. You would most likely be killed by Hindu fanatics, or you would be imprisoned because of laws against blasphemy.”
What interests me most (in a depressing way) about this is that in the time of my grandfather and great-grandfather, naked paintings of Hindu godesses would have been normal — among Hindus. Hinduism has not been a puritanical religion historically. Where did the right-wing Hindu fanatics GET this stuff? They invented it.