Ben Affleck Angrily Defends Islam Against Bill Maher/Sam Harris - TYT

[WillyT]

[BuelahWitch]

1. Thanks for posting this

Cenk helped me understand this whole thing a lot better. I was and am on Affleck's side, but I couldn't understand for the life of me why Bill Maher thinks liberals should hate Muslims.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

2. He doesn't, of course.

He thinks we should condemn the views of most (not all) Muslims, not that we should hate them.

Affleck, meanwhile attempts to maintain the fiction that far-right and repressive views are only held by a minority of Muslims.

[Violet_Crumble]

4. He does, of course...

Fear, loathing, dislike. It doesn't matter what you call it, but when someone regularly broadbrushes an entire people, even though some of them do the 'oh, I'm only talking about most, not all, so it's okay!' routine, that crosses the line from being criticism of a religion to being bigotry.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

6. That's not a "routine", it's an overwhelmingly important difference.

"Most muslims hold exceedingly right-wing and illiberal views on many issues" is a simple fact.

"All muslims hold exceedingly right-wing and illiberal views on many issues" is rank bigotry; more importantly, it's not true.

If you don't distinguish between the two, it's no wonder that you take issue with Maher, but that's not his fault.

.
It is admittedly true that some bigots try to conflate the two, but there is no evidence that Maher is doing so.

[Rhinodawg]

21. Hold on...

""Most muslims hold exceedingly right-wing and illiberal views on many issues" is a simple fact. "

Question..bDo most Muslims follow the Koran ?

[Donald Ian Rankin]

28. What do you mean by "follow the Koran"?

Virtually all (I imagine there's a counter example somewhere) Muslims follow the teachings of the Qu'ran as they believe they should be interpreted, at least to some extent (most would probably admit that there are places where they fall short).

If you mean "Do most Muslims interpret the Qu'ran correctly?" - i.e you are asking me what the correct interpretation of the Qu'ran is - the answer is that I neither know nor care; it's not even clear to me that Mohammed's ideas and philosophies were consistent enough or clearly enough expressed for that to be a meaningful question. But what I think matters is Islam, the religion as it is practiced (in many different forms), not some platonic form of Islam - that would only exist if there were a god, and I'm an atheist.

[Violet_Crumble]

22. It is a routine, and yr 'simple fact' is nothing but opinion...

So you wouldn't think it was bigoted to make broad generalisations about an entire group of people as long as you stick the magic word 'most' in front of it? Want to give that a try when it comes to women, LGBT, Jews, Asians etc?

The fault with Maher is that he's a fucking bigoted piece of shit. He doesn't criticise religion (which isn't bigoted), but paints most or all of the people who practice the religion as being extremists. And *that* is bigoted. If you can't see that, it's not my fault...

I've got a question for you. Do you agree with Maher's view that there's no such thing as Islamophobia, and it's merely manufactured? I hope and suspect not, because anyone who holds that view is definitely a bigot, every bit as much as anyone who claimed that other forms of bigotry such as anti-Semitism or homophobia are manufactured. And even if you don't want to see his bigotry with anything else he's said, that one alone should send the alarm bells ringing in his most ardent fans who aren't bigots...

[Donald Ian Rankin]

29. I think that Islamophobia exists, but is not consistently defined.

Anti-semitism is a fairly consistently used terms; notably, it is generally *not* used to describe people who think - as I do - that the Jewish religion, especially Orthodox Judaism, is false and contains many deeply unethical teachings; it's usually (not always) used to describe attacks on Jews as a people or a race, not on the Jewish religion.

I think that a fair amount of hostility to Islam is motivated by bigotry; I'm reasonably happy to see the word "Islamophobic" used to describe such, but quite often it's used much more broadly - as you are using it - to describe all or most attacks on Islam, including perfectly reasonable and unbigoted ones.

So I think the thing described as Islamophobia exists, but for now I prefer the term "anti-Islamic bigotry" to describe it, because it's clearer what is and isn't being described (although even that isn't terribly good; "bigoted" is itself a fairly ambiguous word).

Vis a vis using "most" about other groups - I try to use "more than 50% or similar" when I remember, to try to make it clear that I'm not using "most" as a codeword for "effectively all", as some people do; but I don't think it's appalling not to, provided that you aren't. What *is* bigotted is when the sentence following a "most" makes it clear that it was being used as a code for "effectively all", and that happens quite often, but I haven't seen Maher do that (have you? if so, that might be evidence that you're right and he is a bigot; all I'm in a position to say is that what I've read of his discussion with Affleck was not inherently bigotted).


As to my "simple fact" vs "opinion" - I don't believe that you aren't aware that, for example, most (by which I do not mean all, in case it's not obvious) Muslims believe that gay people should not be allowed to get married and that women should be submissive to their husbands. So no, it's not just an opinion, it's a statement of objective fact with overwhelming evidence behind it.

[joeglow3]

12. Do you know how often that view is embraced on DU regarding Christianity

[BuelahWitch]

14. This post is neither about DU or Christianity n/t

[joeglow3]

16. But it is about hypocrisy

[GummyBearz]

25. Well said. n/t

[Rhinodawg]

27. Thats true.

[Union Scribe]

18. Mostly by the same people slamming Islam, imo.

They invariably betray loathing of religion in general as the real fuel behind their arguments that are ostensibly about specific practices or attitudes in Islam.

[joeglow3]

24. Probably. I don't really pay it mind to notice who is posting it.

[MellowDem]

13. Islam is a conservative, bigoted, regressive religion...

Lots of nice people identify with it because the main way it spreads, like any other religion, is childhood indoctrination. Many don't know or care what the texts say. In liberal countries, it's necessary to ignore a lot of it to remain relevant. Kinda like the Mormons no longer banning blacks.

But, it doesn't change the fact that Islam is a conservative, bigoted, regressive religion, and it's no surprise that most people indoctrinated into it have ideologies that are conservative, bigoted and regressive.

[Rhinodawg]

20. Interesting..

"Islam is a conservative, bigoted, regressive religion..."

And inherent in that bigotry, is it a violent religion given it's treatment of gays (hanging) and apostates (killing) ???

[Violet_Crumble]

23. So are all the major religions.

Does that mean you think most Christians, Hindus and Jews have ideologies that are conservative, bigoted and regressive? See, it's one thing to say that all those religions are horrible (which they are), but when it veers into attacking most or all followers of those religions and broadbrushing them, then that's where it turns into bigotry, and those who do that are indeed conservative, bigoted and regressive...

If yr interested, here's an article about some of the things Maher got very wrong...

5 Things Bill Maher Got Wrong In Latest Islam Rant

As a liberal agnostic, I might better enjoy my time critiquing religion with fellow skeptics. But when skeptics single out a particular faith or group for unfair demonization, I do feel compelled to respond. It is, of course, old news that Bill Maher is one of the skeptics who, while feeling antipathy towards religion in general, holds exceptional hostility towards Islam. However, the segment on Islam (below) in last weekend's episode of 'Real Time' went beyond typical antipathy and included 5 points that were simply dead wrong:

1. "Not a Few Bad Apples"

Bill Maher insists that extremism and intolerance are problems that afflict Muslims at large, and not just "a few bad apples." Of course, if anyone compiled a list of violent acts by Muslim extremists, the list would undoubtedly be troublingly long. But the Muslim world is far too vast and diverse to collapse into Maher's narrow perception of it. It is a world of 1.6 billion Muslims, so even thousands of extremists would be a fraction, and would in no way justify an indictment against Muslims in general. To think along analogous lines, there are more than 10,000 murders and 80,000 rapes every year in the U.S. The Ugandan fanatical Christian LRA group is responsible for the kidnapping of some 66,000 children (a lot more than Boko Haram). In the West Bank, hundreds of thousands of Jewish settlers live on stolen Palestinian land, and many carry out acts of vandalism and violence against Palestinians. But just as none of these facts justify broad indictments of "The Americans," "The Christians" or "The Jews" as being terrible people (that would be transparently bigoted), the same applies to Islam and Muslims. The acts of a relatively small group of extremists, even when they're more frequent than we'd like them to be, should never taint entire societies.

<snip>

5. Islamophobia

Bill Maher quoted Sam Harris mis-attributing to the late Christopher Hitchens the silly description of 'Islamophobia' as "a word created by fascists and used by cowards to manipulate morons." This turned out not to be a Hitchens quote, but a slogan created by a provocateur, and used by bigots to get cheap applause from idiots. You cannot be a sensible person and look at (a) the hike in anti-Muslim hate crimes after 9/11, (b) the hysteria that breaks out around the building of mosques in America, and (c) the use of anti-Muslim rhetoric in political campaigns and conclude that Islamophobia is manufactured. Islamophobia is real; it is destructive, and it should be confronted by all people of conscience.

Why All of This Matters

Ultimately, this isn't about scoring points against Maher or his panel; this is about making this world a better place. The Muslim world is incredibly diverse, and can by no means be reduced to a single cohesive unit. From Eastern Europe to the horn of Africa, and from Lebanon to Indonesia, we are talking about fundamentally different societies and cultures. Some of these societies are more socially progressive than others; but in all of these societies, there are Muslims who are fighting for women's rights and against extremism and violence, and they deserve our support against their reactionary opponents. To lump them all together under an ugly stereotype that's defined by the Muslim world's worst elements only alienates our progressive allies in Muslim societies and makes their causes all the more difficult to advance.

Bill Maher attempted to cite an Egypt poll, saying it showed that 80-90% of people in the country approved of death as a punishment for leaving Islam. The actual number is 64%, which is still horrifyingly high, and I am alarmed by it. An Israeli or a Palestinian may also be alarmed by the poll that found the majority of Israelis favor discrimination against their non-Jewish neighbors. But how we express these concerns also matters. If some random city in America had a high crime rate in the African American community, and one public official said "I'm concerned about this problem" and another public official said "the blacks are a problem," which of these two would we all (probably including Bill Maher) condemn as a racist? When concern for certain problems within societies turns into hostility towards inexcusably large groups of people who have little in common beyond some random demographic factor (in this case, religion), then that is a paradigmatic example of bigotry. And this type of bigotry puts entire communities under attack from the outside, thus distracting from their fight to advance and tackle problems within. If Bill Maher wants to take his progressivism seriously, he should really let go of reckless rhetoric and join the real fight to advance progressive causes within and without Muslim societies.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/omar-baddar/5-things-bill-maher-got-w_b_5315893.html

[MellowDem]

32. I think Maher's big point is right...

Regardless of the details he got wrong. Islam is explicitly opposed in many ways to liberalism, right in its own texts.

I think followers of Abrahamic religions that take their texts literally are more conservative, regressive etc., no surprise given the terrible stuff in those texts.

I think the massive privilege of religion is what allows someone to identify with a text that is explicitly misogynistic, for example, and identity as a feminist. Religion gets a pass. Intellectual dishonesty is encouraged and respected. It's socially normative to not believe the inconvenient parts of the religion you say you believe in.

If someone identified as a KKK members but said they are not a racist, it would elicit eye rolls at the least. But if most Americans were members of some racial organization or other that touted various race supremacy theories and this was socially normative, then probably not.

I don't think the fact that religious privilege in liberal countries allows liberals to identify with bigoted beliefs in order to gain the benefits of community and tradition while not having to accept the responsibility of identifying with bigoted texts is a good argument for those beliefs not being bigoted. It's just further proof of religious privilege.

The fact that so many on the left want to steer the conversation from the substance of religious texts to the completely subjective morals of people who identify with a given religion as "proof" of what that religion is belies the fact that they don't see the privilege they are upholding.

[snooper2]

26. FYI

On Wed Oct 8, 2014, 11:34 AM an alert was sent on the following post:

Islam is a conservative, bigoted, regressive religion...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5635971

REASON FOR ALERT

This post is disruptive, hurtful, rude, insensitive, over-the-top, or otherwise inappropriate.

ALERTER'S COMMENTS

This is sheer racism.

You served on a randomly-selected Jury of DU members which reviewed this post. The review was completed at Wed Oct 8, 2014, 11:37 AM, and the Jury voted 2-5 to LEAVE IT.

Juror #1 voted to HIDE IT
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #2 voted to HIDE IT
Explanation: easiest jury ever.
Juror #3 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: nah
Juror #4 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #5 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #6 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: It can't be racism because race isn't even an issue. Its a criticism of a doctrine.
Juror #7 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: It isn't racism. ALL religions are conservative, bigoted and regressive.

Thank you very much for participating in our Jury system, and we hope you will be able to participate again in the future.

[Dr. Strange]

30. See THIS is just one of the problems I have with Uygur's response here.

He downplays Affleck's racism charge by saying, "You know he meant bigoted." Well, no, he meant racist. As this alert shows, there is this attitude among some "liberals" that says attacking a religion* is racism. And when Uygur just tries to sweep it away, it says (to me) that either he's not paying attention or he's just being disingenuous.

*Ironically, the only religion that I've seen this conflation occur with is Islam.

[Rhinodawg]

33. I noticed that too.

disingenuous.

[reddread]

3. because he is just that far removed from liberal values

As many of his sympaticos are.
Because racism and nationalism are a bitches brew for lockstep imperialists.
The place where libertarian hypocrites and neoliberals frolic.

[MisterP]

8. if Gohmert were saying what Maher said, word-for-word, Dems'd howl with laughter for a good week

but if someone who says gays *don't* have tails and breathe fire starts talking like Alfred Rosenberg, Dem head start bobbing because it seems consensual

it doesn't always work: Kanye West once insulted Bush, but a good third of DU didn't angrily say that his behavior toward that guy in the wheelchair was justified

[Major Hogwash]

17. No shit! If an uglier, more obnoxious version of Maher was to show up on tv one day . . .

. . . a lot of these people would just ignore him.
But, this is Bill Maher, *the* Bill Maher.

As if douchebags like him can't be racist pieces of white trash in real life!!
What does it take to make that grade?
But, noooooooo!
This just can't be!
Oh noes, not our lovable, little teddy bear of a man, Bill Maher.

Maher makes me want to puke!!!
He's not funny.
He's not intellectual.
He's not even interesting, in any way, form, or fashion.
He's a sexist pig who bragged all of the time about going to Hugh Hefner's Playboy mansion back in the 90's.

Plus, on top of all that pile of dog pile, he loudly supported Ralph "The Crypt Keeper" Nader for President in 2000, while constantly mocking the 2000 Presidential election by saying it was a contest between Gush and Bore.
Fuck Maher!

[MellowDem]

11. He doesn't...

Now that that strawman is out of the way, I can't for the life of me figure out why a liberal would defend Islam, a terribly regressive, homophobic, misogynistic, and bigoted religion with all sorts of nasty shit laid out explicitly in its texts.

Wait, I think I know. Religious privilege.

[Rhinodawg]

34. It may be true..

"Islam is a terribly regressive, homophobic, misogynistic, and bigoted religion with all sorts of nasty shit laid out explicitly in its texts. " I agree and that their shit.and we shouldn't get involved.

And in that bigoted comes with violence to other people... Gays, Jews, nonbelievers.

So your it should read...

"Islam is a terribly regressive, homophobic, misogynistic, and violent bigoted religion "

[leftynyc]

19. You wouldn't be asking this question

if it had anything to do with Christianity. DU needs to face up to the fact that Maher was right - THIS liberal board bends over backwards, sideways and into a pretzel in order not to discuss the more unsavory parts of Islam especially in regards to treatment of women and people here DO use the Islamophobe label to deter any such discussion. Anyone who denies that is quite simply ignoring reality. Maher never said anything about hating Muslims so that's just hyperbole.

[randome]

5. Burkas and stoning for everyone! Yah!

You don't need to hate Muslims or religion to hate the widespread practices of keeping women submissive, gays dead and giving children to marriage.

But, hey, it's just another religion, right? Who are we to protest?
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Don't ever underestimate the long-term effects of a good night's sleep.[/center][/font][hr]

[Johonny]

7. I think it is an interesting liberal discussion in which each person has a relative

degree of being correct. Ambiguity is perfectly acceptable and the most likely outcome of such discussions but is often completely ignored in America where issue need to have clear cut right-wrong/ black-white answers.

[EX500rider]

9. Are there any other major religions where it is against the law to leave the religion?

Because it is illegal in 23 Muslim countries..

Under current laws in Islamic countries, the actual punishment for the apostate (or murtadd مرتد ranges from execution to prison term to no punishment. Islamic nations with sharia courts use civil code to void the Muslim apostate’s marriage, deny child custody rights, as well as his or her inheritance rights for apostasy. Twenty-three Muslim-majority countries, as of 2013, additionally covered apostasy in Islam through their criminal laws.

A survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2010 found relatively widespread popular support for death penalty as a punishment for apostasy in Egypt (84% of respondents in favor of death penalty), Jordan (86% in favor), Indonesia (30%), Pakistan (76%), Nigeria (51%), and relatively minor support in Lebanon (6% in favor) and Turkey (5%). Another survey conducted by Pew Research Center in 2012, among Muslim populations in select Islamic countries it was allowed to conduct a survey, found continuing support for death penalty for anyone who leaves Islam to become an atheist or to convert to another religion. Death penalty for apostasy in Islam was favored by large majorities of pro-sharia Muslims in Egypt (86%), Jordan (82%), Afghanistan (79%), Pakistan (76%), Malaysia (62%), Palestinian Territories (66%); and a significant percentage of Muslims in Lebanon (46%), Bangladesh (44%), Iraq (42%), Tunisia (29%), Tajikistan (22%), Indonesia (18%) and Turkey (17%). Governments of six Gulf countries - Saudi Arabia, UAE, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait - did not permit Pew Research to survey nationwide public opinion on apostasy in 2010 or 2012.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostasy_in_Islam

[Dwayne Hicks]

10. Well

I have to side with Maher on this one. Just note the polls he pointed to during his debate with Affleck.

[lovemydog]

15. The Young Turks explains this very well.

Thanks for sharing it WillyT.

[K lib]

31. Reza Aslan is Wrong About Islam and This is Why

not exactly what the this topic is about but it does address many of the points being made in the debate.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/10/05/reza-aslan-is-wrong-about-islam-and-this-is-why/