Reading Time: 4 minutes The Islamic Research Foundation International (IRFI)— registered in the UK in 2007 with the aim of “advancing the faith and religious practices of Islam”—was shut down earlier this month after several run-ins with charity and broadcasting regulators. This move has been lauded by those who have tried for years to silence the hate speech emanating […]
Islam
Posted inHuman Story podcast
My tangled feelings at Ramadan | Eiynah
Raised in Saudi Arabia in a Muslim family of Pakistani background, and now an atheist living in Canada, Eiynah knows something about displacement, and disorientation, and the yearning for the lost familiar. Although she left Islam under her own power and is a strong critic of religion, her childhood and culture are intertwined in Islam. […]
Posted inReligion
Fascism in India: The weaponization of religious custom
Reading Time: 8 minutes Where I live, Navidad and Semana Santa are significant religious affairs, times when the hustle and bustle of city life eases for a month and a week respectively: to observe Catholic customs, to be with family, or simply to travel to nearby towns and farms. One side effect, though, is the impact of reduced foot […]
Posted inWar and Peace
A horrific ‘gay purge’ in Chechnya shows the limits of our moral attention
Reading Time: 4 minutes In 2019, a brutal ‘gay purge’ took place in the Russian republic of Chechnya. It was not the first. Since 2017, gay men have been hunted, abducted, and tortured by the Chechen authorities. Some have been murdered. The story was briefly covered by Western media. Thinking that the return (yet again) of concentration camps to […]
Posted inReligion
Eid al-Fitr is a celebration for all, not just Muslims
Reading Time: 3 minutes Today marks Eid al-Fitr, the day that Muslims await each year. After performing fast for a month during Ramadan, they finish it with celebration and family reunions. Special dishes are served, and kids receive money from older relatives. Most importantly, it’s a day for many social aspects and messages. But Eid is not just for […]
Posted inHistory
Fascism in India: The role of Nazis in Hindu nationalism
Reading Time: 7 minutes When writing on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s role in Hindu extremism, I committed the cardinal sin of not defining a key term: fascism. This was a conscious choice, because I’ve written before on how quickly we mire ourselves in political word games. Better to start with the government figure that Western media keeps centering, as […]
Posted inHistory
Fascism in India: Who’s ‘in charge’ of 1.4 billion?
Reading Time: 8 minutes There’s something fascinating, if also disturbing, about Western incuriosity around the world’s largest democracy. 1.4 billion of our world’s 7.8 live in India, a country a third the size of the US, which has under a quarter of India’s population. How can the fortunes of so many mean so little? Nevertheless, India exists in the […]
Posted inTrue Story
The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu
Reading Time: 4 minutes The true story of the librarians who risked their lives to rescue a priceless cultural heritage from the destructive rampage of Islamist fundamentalism.
Posted inPolitics, Religion
Saudi state executes apostates. Is U.S. immune to such religious brutality?
Reading Time: 6 minutes I can confirm firsthand from past decades I spent living and working in Saudi Arabia that the desert kingdom’s citizens are—as most Americans are—generally warm, generous, and kindly folks. Extraordinarily so, in fact. But the Saudi government and presumably most citizens also vigorously support the death penalty. Saudis are the Semitic Muslim, political equivalent of […]
Posted inReligion
The dabbling, ‘mad alien’ God of Richard Swinburne
Reading Time: 7 minutes In this piece, I will present the views of British philosopher and leading Christian apologist Richard Swinburne, paraphrased by often using his words, in italics. The first question is, which god? He says it is that of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The Christian god is called God, which distinguishes him from Yahweh or Jehovah, and […]