Misconceptions about Islam:

[HaLi8993]

There are many misconceptions that exist within the field of Islam one being the topic of women. Unfortunately due to ignorance and lack of knowledge of some people and the ever growing propaganda and Islamaphobia that exist today, including the ever growing media agenda’s that govern the way people think and act, women are deemed as being unequal to men in Islam.

We are all aware that women and men are not alike so I don’t understand when someone makes the statement that Islam should practice equality, what do you mean by equality??? This word – equality – which many thinkers in both the east and the west advocate in various fields of life is a word which is based on deviation and a lack of understanding, especially when it is attributed to the religion to Islam. One of the things that people misunderstand is when they say that “Islam is the religion of equality�. What they should say is that Islam is the religion of justice.

Here we should note that there are some people who speak of equality instead of justice, and this is a mistake. We should not say equality, because equality implies no differentiation between the two. Because of this unjust call for equality, people start to ask, what is the difference between male and female?’ So they made males and females the same. We are all aware that the Male is not like the female.

God says in the Quran:

“And the male is not like the female�[Quran Aal ‘Imraan 3:36] The male is different from the female in many ways, in his strength, in his body, in his toughness and roughness, whereas women are soft and gentle. Women are like men in some aspects and they differ from them in others. Most of the rulings of Islam apply to men and women equally.

In cases where a distinction is made between the sexes, the Muslim regards that as a mercy from God and a sign of His knowledge of His creation, but the arrogant people see it as oppression and injustice, so he stubbornly insists on claiming that men and women are the same. So let him tell us how a man can carry a foetus and breastfeed it? He stubbornly ignores the weakness of women and how they bleed during their monthly period, and he stubbornly refuses to accept reality.

But the Muslim is still at peace with his faith, surrendering to the command of God. “Should not He who has created know? And He is the Most Kind and Courteous (to His slaves), All Aware (of everything)� [Quran al-Mulk 67:14 ]

[HaLi8993]

@ Autodidact

QUOTE: "Well of course not since True Islam does not exist, and the people-who-say-they-are-Muslims are lying. 

But what we do know is that there is a strong correlation between saying you're a Muslim and being miserable"

ANSWER: Here we go...

QUOTE: "Oh no, all of these play into it, no doubt. And of course, wherever we find Islam, we find all of these things. Coincidence?"

ANSWER: ???? Islam is Everywhere, what's the point? There aren't any Muslims in Western countries??

[HaLi8993]

@ Autodidact

QUOTE: "So is it common for people-who-say-they-are-Muslim to lie? 

btw, what religion are you? 

Who decides who is a True Muslim, and whether these p.w.s.t.a.m's really are?"

ANSWER: Who said they are lying when they say they are Muslim, God will decide if they are true Muslims. Care to share what the abbreviation is?

QUOTE: "I understand. You disagree with reality. That has no effect on reality. YOu have a right to your own opinion. You do not have a right to your own facts."

ANSWER: Your beliefs are for you my beliefs are for me, the fact of the matter is there is a God and you don't believe in Him.

[HaLi8993]

@ Autodidact

QUOTE: "According to me...and reality"

ANSWER: What ever makes you happy, we will all come face to face with reality when we have died and placed into our graves.

[Autodidact]

@ Autodidact

QUOTE: "We have already established that there is no such thing as True Islam, and that people-who-call-themselves-Muslim lie a lot. I have no idea what True Islam is or whether they practice it. What I do know is that they call themselves Muslim, attempt to practice what they think is Islam to the best of their abilities, and as a direct result, commit atrocities, while atheists go about their business peacefully, being killed by Muslims merely for expressing their opinions. 

For example, do you see Muslim clerics hiring bodyguards to protect themselves from being shot by atheists? No. While Ayaan Ali and Wafa Sultan have to pay for round the clock protection, because they had the courage to criticize Islam."

ANSWER: With all due respect you have chosen to establish this understanding of Islam without attempting to understand it,

I keep telling you, it is not enough to just announce your views. This is a debate site. It is your job to show that this is the case.

why criticize Islam in the first place??

Because it is barbaric and harmful. Because young girls have acid thrown on their faces, and writers have to live in hiding. Because people are being killed for their beliefs. Because women are living in abject subjugation. Because "Violence erupted again on Monday as militants carried out suicide attacks on two police headquarters, as well as assaults that left 20 people dead — three police officers, an Afghan prosecutor, two children and 14 attackers, according to officials. At least 60 people were wounded." Because devout Muslims burned down buildings and killed innocent people over some cartoons they didn't like. I could go on and on. But most important to me is this: It is wrong.

The problem with this is you claim to be peaceful and go about your business but at the same time you say the most unimaginable things about someone's faith, and then you expect Muslims to not defend themselves, this is outrageous. 

I have the right to speak the truth as I see it, and so do you. You do not have, and should not have, the right to kill me over it. That is not self-defence; it's repression and it's wrong. Is it Islamic?

QUOTE: "Because they are bad laws, and cause Muslims to suffer needlessly in poverty, ignorance and violence, especially Muslim women. And I care about Muslim women, because, like me, they are human beings"

ANSWER: They are Gods laws the best laws for all of mankind, Islam actually fixes these problems it does not create them like man-made laws do.

I beg of you, think. This is a debate forum. I am an atheist. Do you really think that announcing as if it was fact that "they are God's laws" is an effective argument.

Now it is incumbent on you to demonstrate that this is true. Good luck with that.

QUOTE: "Maybe in your mythical True Islam, which does not exist. Meanwhile, in actual Islam, she cannot take any job or even leave her house without her husband's permission"

ANSWER: Have you looked into Islamic History before??

Yes, and I don't think you want to review the last 14 centuries of conquest and slavery, do you? But I thought you wanted to cover one subject, slavery. Why do you keep bringing up other ones?

QUOTE: "So that's the rationale for the discrimination. It's still wrong"

ANSWER: Everything I say is wrong so why you here lol

I'm here to debate, why are you here?

QUOTE: "Protects herself in what way? By buying a gun?"

ANSWER: By covering up this prevents many immoralities that exist within societies, adultery, fornication etc.

It should be up to the woman how she wants to dress. If you feel like wearing a tent, feel free. If I do not, I should also be free, and should be neither beaten nor raped should I choose to do so.

QUOTE: "Thank you again for clearing up any misconception we may have had about Islam permitting equality for women. 

Obviously, if men are a danger, then it is men whose freedom should be restricted, not women"

ANSWER: Any time!, men are a danger only if they do not worship God the way they are meant too, both are responsible for their actions, both are commanded to practice modesty

.
So then among Muslim men, women can wear what they like, go out in public, and have any job she likes?

QUOTE: "Please, do go on with your sexist stereotypes that have no basis in reality, you're doing wonders for clearing up our misconceptions that Islam is not sexist"

ANSWER: Islam makes this very clear, a man's job is not the same as the female, as stated previously Islam does not impose unwanted burden on the opposite sex more than what it can handle, and who is more better in knowing this, humans who think they can do everything and anything with no boundaries or our Creator that is all Wise and All-Knowing the one who has fashioned and Created us?

Yes, we've gone over that. Islam is sexist. I think we can agree on that and move on.

QUOTE: "But what I asked you for in not your bigotry, but evidence to support it. Do you have any? Because if you want evidence that women are just as intelligent and capable of men, I have reams"

ANSWER: What evidence would you like, from the Quran? There is no doubt that there are women just as intelligent and capable of men this has already been agreed, but the roles in society are different.

NO, the qu'ran is not evidence, it's gibberish.You do realize that you contradicted yourself again, right? First you said that women were not as intelligent or capable, and then that they are. Which is it?

[Autodidact]

@'Autodidact

QUOTE: "Oh, I thought you were familiar with the qu'ran, o.k. 
Quran 15: 19 And the earth We have spread out (like a carpet); set thereon Mountains firm and immovable... 

Many other verses, which I can cite if you like, assume a flat earth.

ANSWER: So how exactly is this talking about the earth being flat?? God is mentioning His creation of the earth and how He spread it out, and the firm mountains, valleys, lands and sands that he has placed in it, and the plants and fruits that He causes to grow in their appropriate locations.

QURAN: 15:19

"And the earth - We have spread it and cast therein firmly set mountains and caused to grow therein [something] of every well-balanced thing"

Yes, well, as I said, if you are going to read it to mean something other than what it says, you may as well throw it out the window. Carpets are flat, duh, not spherical.

[Autodidact]

@ Autodidact

QUOTE: "You need me to explain what I mean by "own?" Wow. O.K., if I own something, it belongs to me. I can sell it or give it away, as I want. I can leave it in my will to my heirs. It is mine. Does that answer your question? 

So, just to be clear, you agree that this is permitted in Islam?"

ANSWER: The principle of dealing with slaves in Islam is a combination of justice, kindness and compassion. If someone is a slave in Islam you wouldn't want anyone to give you away, that's how beautifully Islam treats their slaves so much so that they become friends with their masters and become part of Muslim families, your understanding of slavery is in reference to the contemporary European version of slavery this is not the case in Islam.

Wow, I wonder why you feel the need to be so evasive. My understanding of slavery is the definition of slavery, which is that one person owns another. In Islam, is it permitted to own slaves? Yes, or no?

As for how actual Muslims actually treat their actual slaves, do you really want me to cover that?

The enslavement of the Dinkas in southern Sudan may be the most horrific and well-known example of contemporary slavery. According to 1993 U.S. State Department estimates, up to 90,000 blacks are owned by North African Arabs, and often sold as property in a thriving slave trade for as little as $15 per human being.


Animist tribes in southern Sudan are frequently invaded by Arab militias from the North, who kill the men and enslave the women and children. The Arabs consider it a traditional right to enslave southerners, and to own chattel slaves (slaves owned as personal property).

Physical mutilation is practiced upon these slaves not only to prevent escape, but to enforce the owners' ideologies. According to an ASI report: "Kon, a thirteen-year-old Dinka boy, was abducted by Arab nomads and taken to a merchant's house. There he found several Dinka men hobbling, their Achilles tendons cut because they refused to become Muslims. Threatened with the same treatment the boy converted."

In a detailed article by Charles Jacobs for the American Anti-Slavery Group (ASI), Jacobs recounts how a 10-year-old child was taken in a raid on her village in southern Sudan, and branded by her master with a hot iron pot.

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/slavery1.html

Do you want more? Because I can produce reams of facts on how actual Muslims capture, maim, rape, sell and oppress their actual slaves, today.

And you wonder why I criticize Islam?

Tell you what. You be my slave, o.k.? I have some windows that need washing.

I may have to bow out of this conversation. When people start defending slavery, it makes me sick, frankly.

[Autodidact]

@ Autodidact

QUOTE: "I don't understand what you are saying. You seem to be saying that Islam permits slavery, but doesn't allow slavery. This is the definition of slavery. That's what slavery means. If Islam doesn't allow this, then it doesn't allow slavery. As I say, the more we talk, the more confused I become. Please clear this up for me. 

Using this definition "a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work," in that sense of the word "slavery," does Islam permit that? Yes or no. Thank you."

ANSWER: There is slavery in Islam yes, not according to this definition no, this is not the definition of slavery in Islam, this is the Western interpretation.

I realize, that you're Muslim, but please, try to make some sense. Please follow along:

Slavery means that one person owns another as property, can be bought and sold, forced to work, and does not have the right of self-determination. That is what the word slavery means. So, using that definition, not some other definition, but that one, the actual one, does Islam permit slavery, or not? Please answer yes or no.

Islam doesn't just make anyone slaves lol, capturing prisoners during war those fighting against you, was the most common way of acquiring slaves. Prisoners would inevitably be captured during any war, and the prevalent custom at that time was that prisoners had no protection or rights, they would either be killed or enslaved.

Yes, I know that was the custom in that barbaric time and place when Islam was invented. Meanwhile, the modern, civilized world has advanced beyond that level of barbarism that remains alive in the Muslim world.

QUOTE: " So no, Islam does not allow slavery?"

ANSWER: Unlawfully 

It allows slavery to be unlawful? Slavery is not allowed? Or it is.

You do realize that all the non-Muslims reading this thread are rolling on the floor laughing at your contradictions and evasions, right?

QUOTE: "Except that it does? 

This is just plain silly. The rights of a slave are not equal to those of a free man. A free man OWNS a slave. The slave is property. The owner can sell the slave or give him as a gift, and the slave has no say in the matter. 

Your utter confusion on this simple point, to the point where you are speaking gibberish, is telling us all we need to know, thank you"

In Islam, is slavery permitted?

There is no such thing as just and merciful slavery, any more than there is such a thing as a non-violent beating.

I find your ability to believe contradictions remarkable. Is this the result of an Islamic education? Please clear up my misconceptions. I thought Muslims were capable of the most elementary logic, such as that A cannot be not-A.

[Autodidact]

@ Burninglight

QUOTE: "lol, that was a good response. I would like to add that it is not a misconception that Islam teaches violence and condones it. The misconception is to believe it is a peaceful religion like Most Muslim want us to believe. Most western Muslims have no idea what Islam is about or capable of. These are not my misconceptions. Again, many Muslim have misconceptions of Islam."

ANSWER: Many things have been proven to be misconceptions on this page especially the fact that Islam is not a peaceful religion. 

In your mind.

Are we done with slavery, and ready to move on to violence, terrorism and conquest in Islam? Because you said you wanted to talk about slavery. At this point, I don't know if Muslims are allowed to own slaves or not. Can you clear up my misconception? Thanks.

[Autodidact]

@ Autodidact

QUOTE: "Well of course not since True Islam does not exist, and the people-who-say-they-are-Muslims are lying. 

But what we do know is that there is a strong correlation between saying you're a Muslim and being miserable"

ANSWER: Here we go...

QUOTE: "Oh no, all of these play into it, no doubt. And of course, wherever we find Islam, we find all of these things. Coincidence?"

ANSWER: ???? Islam is Everywhere, what's the point? There aren't any Muslims in Western countries??

There are, and they are the happiest Muslims in the world. Muslims living in Muslim countries are the most miserable. That is why Muslims flee Muslim countries to take refuge in western democracies.

[Autodidact]

@ Autodidact

QUOTE: "So is it common for people-who-say-they-are-Muslim to lie? 

btw, what religion are you? 

Who decides who is a True Muslim, and whether these p.w.s.t.a.m's really are?"

ANSWER: Who said they are lying when they say they are Muslim, God will decide if they are true Muslims. Care to share what the abbreviation is?

You did. You said that people say they are Muslim, but are not. Now you're saying that only God knows? Which is it, do you know, or only God? The abbreviation is people who say they are muslims. I got tired of typing it out. Can I just call them "Muslims?"

QUOTE: "I understand. You disagree with reality. That has no effect on reality. YOu have a right to your own opinion. You do not have a right to your own facts."

ANSWER: Your beliefs are for you my beliefs are for me, the fact of the matter is there is a God and you don't believe in Him.

Oh really, that's a fact? O.K., now demonstrate that to be a fact. Try not to use circular reasoning or special pleading, and maintain elementary logic.