Cops are hella incompetent. Any success they have is almost always because someone talked.

Source: absolutely any “true crime” show.

So, SHUT THE FUCK UP. This isn’t CSI. They’re lazy af and they will LIE TO YOU. So, SHUT THE FUCK UP.

And reverts? Converts? I hear your anger. But writing off entire global communities as ‘insane’ or ‘abused’ ignores the reality of human agency, diversity of interpretation, and the courageous work of people, including LGBTQ+ people of faith who are reforming traditions from within. Dismissing them isn’t ‘objective’ or make you ‘better’ it’s another form of erasure. You’re repeating a lot of dogmatic, dehumanizing and brainwashing rhetoric yourself, so I’m going to leave you to sit with that. Hope you can find closure.

So firstly, I am not a theologian. There are people who literally dedicate their lives to questions like these. I am not one of them. I also am not interested in discussing the merit or lack there of of Buddhism, I merely meant my oversimplification of its tenets to serve as an illustration of my point.

As to the Abrahamic “critiques” you shared, my gut reaction to the slander of the Prophet Abraham (Ibrahim) completely misses the mark on the entire purpose of the story. The practice of sacrificing children to gods was unnervingly commonplace across human societies (take a look at any archeological record globally.) The switching of his son (either Isaac or Ismail) and a ram is meant to serve as an alternative to a long standing damaging cultural practice. It was a “hey, kill a ram instead of a kid then eat that ram. It’s better for everyone.” Scenario. In that light Abraham was miles ahead of his times and it was meant to illustrate the mercy of God, not cruelty.

It’s like taking this verse “And when the female infant buried alive is questioned: For what sin was she killed.” And saying holy shit Islam buries baby girls alive! No. Full stop. **This was a horrific and unethical practice. ** Islam said fuck that. Do it and your daughter will testify on your day of judgement for what you killed her. She will give testimony on why to bar you from Paradise. It advocated for ending infanticide. Not for promoting it.

These are just some very simple examples that conveniently prove my point. You can certainly take fine toothed comb through generations of religious literature but there are believers who are doing this as well. Just because some man wrote something doesn’t mean it always makes it into canon and modern practice. A lot of the scriptures are challenged and discussed to exhaustion in religious settings. Much like your nuanced defense of Buddhism is a prime example of your own quick version of it.

I’m not saying there aren’t questionable things in religions. I’m saying it’s easy to throw the baby out with the bath water with pretty much every religion when you start nitpicking. Context matters.

But, this forum is probably not the appropriate place for an entire nuanced discussion on the ins and outs of theology. This topic is way too large and complex for addressing under a post that’s meant to center women and LGBTQ+ liberation movements. I’ve probably already overspent my welcome on said topic. (If you find a forum more appropriate for this sort of discourse feel free to tag me there to continue this topic.)

Yeah, that was not what was said. It seems you’ve had some deep emotional reaction here and I’m sorry if there’s some underlying religious trauma that was triggered. But reducing billions of people worldwide who experience faith or some form of spirituality to “insane cultists” isn’t a whole lot better than the extremists you’re hoping to lash out at.

It’s also ignoring the agency of the individuals at the frontlines of reformist movements within their home countries and communities. I doubt that was your intent, but rather you’re struggling with your own inherit bias and potential past negative experiences. But I’ll remind you gay marriage and LGBTQ+ pastors or churches didn’t spontaneously appear. They were spaces created from within groups of people who experience faith. Those parallel discourses are integral to systemic and long lasting change.

Buddha abandoned his family and obsessed over suffering. Encouraged people to give up possessions and be happy about it which ultimately aids the state in oppressing people. He also encouraged people to harm their body through starvation and created entire sects of followers who self-mummified through self-inflicted harm. Also his wife was 16 when he married her, and that’s a very generous analysis. I could say even worse things but I won’t.

Because I’m not saying this as an attack on Buddhism or its followers. I’m saying this as an example that you can misinterpret or willfully misrepresent any religion to meet your own goals and bias. That doesn’t prove inherit evilness, it just proves the ability to reenforce bias through bad faith engagement.

I hear you. But, I would say not any more than wage gaps in the US are a Christian problem. Fire can be used to cook or used to burn down your house. It’s not fire that’s inherently good or bad. It’s whose hands it’s in and how they’re using it.

Reducing the argument to “if Islam/religion was gone everything would be fixed” is simply oversimplification of complex socio-cultural problems between the sexes that exist across the entire world, often where Abrahamic faiths don’t even exist traditionally. I mean places they’ve abolished religion should be women led utopias accepting of all genders and sexual expressions right? But we don’t see that. They just change tactics using biological sciences or dogmatic “hunter gatherer, this is how it’s always been” conservatism.

Also, faith and religion are not automatically synonymous. Religion implies societal hierarchy, whereas faith is personal. I stand by Islam in and of itself existing isn’t the primary problem here. She may be provoking power with antiquated laws surrounding it, triggering an unevenly applied ‘blasphemy’ law, but that’s not Islam, that is the patriarchal machine whirring to life to oppress a woman challenging their systemic and deep seated cultural bias.

See: Fatema Mernissi and Asma Lamrabet (they are Islamic feminists of Moroccan origin that can do a better job of explaining this than me.)

I’m struggling to understand your argument here because it appears you have none. Only a visceral hate for Islam. You’ve already determined your prejudice and are blinded by that. Completely missing the nuance of what I’m saying. You’d rather your black and white understanding of the world be true than address the larger picture. Or have I missed something?

There’s something larger at work here than simply “Islam bad”. Islam is used by power structures as a tool. I’m not saying there aren’t followers who believe this. I personally find her shirt very offensive, Allah SWT has no gender, but that’s the entire point of the shirt. To upset, disrupt and challenge norms and powers that be. I respect her courage at challenging centuries old practices. But I’m also from the West and understand free speech and liberation comes at the cost of sometimes being offended. Just like people will wear slurs for certain lifestyles. I respect her right to wear something that I find offensive and more than anything what she’s attempting to do overall. (I could go into the various levels of what this shirt is saying but I think it’d be lost on you as you seem to be operating from a very limited space on Islamic scholarship.)

If you care to know there are many women, some of the most notable from her own home country, that are feminist scholars of Islam. They’re hard at work within their faith and society to advocate for systemic change. Feminism in Islam may not look like what you’re used to but that doesn’t make it any less important. Women should be able to advocate for their needs within their context- not just replicating Western values. Muslim women don’t need rescuing and one-size-fits-all top down ascription of values from outside. They got this.

See: Fatema Mernissi and Asma Lamrabet

Women are oppressed everywhere men are found. That oppression just manifests differently culture to culture. This is a governments law being enforced by a government. It may be based on perceived religious principles but it’s still man’s law, one that was heavily designed by medieval interpretations and applied unevenly by a patriarchal system (also, not unique to Islamic dominated countries).

Also, she is being jailed for blasphemy. She wanted to make a statement. She did and her government is throwing the book at her. She’s confronting her own country’s inequities just like suffragettes did in the West. Something that is not inherently without risk. She’s working towards reforms in her home country like many women globally do every day. (Which I might add many women are working within Islam for reform as well, just as they have within sects of Christianity in the West.)

This isn’t an Islam issue, or even a religion issue, it’s a systemic patriarchal issue that hides behind religion to dole out oppression. Using faith as a manipulation tactic to serve political agendas.

This made my day

Ah yes but what about the parenthesis inside of the parenthesis inside of the parenthesis?

Pie feds aka “the feds”

Well, they’re about to sink the SS United States… I thought it was satire but it’s an actual thing they’re doing. They’re sinking it in Florida which seems fitting.

Holodeck haircuts??

It would appear we’re being held hostage by a death cult