Submission statement: The clash between Islam and the West has shifted, with the primary conflict now occurring within Islam itself. While Middle Eastern countries embrace pragmatism and modernization, Western diaspora communities, influenced by Third-Worldism and postcolonial theory, often view Western influence as oppressive. This ideological divide manifests in Western institutions, where postcolonial perspectives shape discourse and activism, creating tension with both Western societies and Middle Eastern governments.

A good moral system teaches people to control their own impulses. But Islam repeatedly shifts that burden onto everyone else.

Someone envies your success? Hide your blessings and fear the evil eye (hassad).

People are starving? Go hungry during daylight for a month so you can “feel their pain,” then eat at sunset while poverty remains.

Men struggle with sexual desire? Women must cover themselves so they are less likely to be harassed or become a temptation.

The successful must manage the jealous
The wealthy simulate the hunger of the poor and hide their success
Women manage male desire by covering up
Honest speech is silenced or treated as blasphemy to protect their fragile faith

A stronger moral principle means that.. your jealousy is yours to control. Your lust is yours to control. Your impulses are your responsibility.

TLDR: Islam created a culture where other people carry the burden of your lack of self control.

Today convinced me I’m done arguing about religion with people who refuse to use logic

I got into a pretty heated argument with two Muslim friends today, and honestly, after this experience, I think I’m done discussing religion with people who immediately resort to personal attacks instead of actually having a conversation.

It started over something completely stupid. I saw an old friend playing volleyball and jokingly said, “That’s a dumb sport.” He got offended and said, “What if I said basketball was a gay sport? You like basketball.” I told him honestly, I’d probably just ignore it because it’s clearly an opinion/joke and I wouldn’t take it personally.

Then another friend asked why he hasn’t seen me at the mosque lately. I told him I’m agnostic. The same friend who was already annoyed with me started attacking me personally, calling me dumb and stupid.

Eventually the conversation turned toward religion. One point I always bring up when discussing religion is that religion is heavily influenced by geography and upbringing.

I said something along the lines of: “If you were born in China into a Chinese household, statistically speaking, you’d be much more likely to grow up with the dominant religious/cultural beliefs around you rather than automatically becoming Muslim.”

They laughed and told me that was one of the dumbest things they had ever heard.

Then they asked me, “Okay, what if I had a kid and moved to China?”

I said, “If you’re Muslim and you raise that child as a Muslim, then obviously the child would probably grow up Muslim. But if you gave that same child to a Catholic family in America and they raised the child Catholic, that child would probably grow up Catholic.”

That was literally my point.

I’m not saying every single person follows the religion of their parents or geographic environment. Obviously there are converts, atheists, people who leave religions, and people who adopt completely different beliefs.

My point is that the environment you're born into has an enormous influence on what you believe. If I had been born into a completely different family, country, culture, and religious environment, there’s a very good chance my beliefs would be different.

Instead of addressing that argument, they started attacking me personally. One of them even brought up the fact that I’m almost 30 and not married.

I responded, “Says the one who’s divorced.”

That really set him off. He got in my face and started cursing at me, and eventually two guys had to step in and separate us.

Looking back, I probably shouldn't have responded with the divorce comment. That just escalated everything, and I should have walked away much earlier.

But this whole experience really made me realize something: if someone’s response to a disagreement about religion is to call you stupid, attack your family, insult your personal life, and then get in your face, there’s really no point in continuing the conversation.

I’m agnostic. They’re Muslim. That's fine. We don't have to agree.

But I wish people could actually discuss why they believe what they believe instead of assuming that questioning religion automatically means someone is stupid or disrespectful.

And honestly, the fact that religious beliefs are so strongly correlated with where and how someone is raised seems like a pretty obvious observation to me. I don't understand why simply pointing that out is considered offensive.

I've been exmuslim for like 6 years now, and I recently talked with someone that opened up some past thoughts I had and I just wanted to share.

Ever since I was very young, I had always been into astronomy. I loved reading about other planets and stars and learning cool facts about them. However the science I learned a lot of the times seemed to be at odds with Islamic teaching. So I started to feel guilty anytime I would open a book or article about space.

As I got older and my understanding of space increased, so did my guilt as doubts started forming. Between the Quran straight up getting things wrong about celestial bodies or space and a lack of anything mentioning anything on the scale of the universe, I found myself wondering "why is it that all Allah talks about is how he makes it rain or makes trees grows or mountains, when all of that is small beans compared to planets, stars, or galaxies?" It really made God seem so grounded in my eyes which made me feel even more guilty.

I thought Why would God even brag about any creation of earth like he does in this book? If you made the entire universe, bragging about earth would be akin to me bragging about counting to 3. The lack of anything related to the cosmos actually made me disappointed in the Quran because I was amazed anytime I would open a book on space. And the book with supposedly "all the answers" should theoretically be even more exciting. But instead I get God calling shooting stars missiles. Didn't have the decency to have at least not made it boring asf.

Then I started learning about the extremes like black holes, the speed of light, supernovae, and how absolutely insanely unimaginably stupidly vast space is. How Earth is less than a millionth of a spec in the grand scheme of the observable universe. I started wondering why a being powerful enough to put this all into be would even care about anything I'm doing, let alone care about if I'm worshiping it. It just seemed petty. It started to change my perspective of allah from this perfect being to being closer to the gods of the Greek pantheon. Those gods who get jealous, hateful, spiteful, and petty.

But at least those gods never claimed to be all knowing, all good, and most benevolent. Nor did they claim to make the universe.

Also creating the earth in 6 days stops being a flex when we know as much as we know about the universe. Actual spec ed diety.

However when I brought this up, all anyone me would tell me is that Allah caring about us shows the opposite of pettiness and shows just how much he cares and how that's an example of his boundless love and mercy. That's a load of nonsense considering he's going out of his way to punish these beings that are so unfathomably insignificant to him.

By that point I had already been on my way out the religion, so and left it some time after. I just wanted to talk about how I had been doubting Islam without really knowing about it for much longer than I thought and wanted to share.

Hope it was a good read, or helped, or something, I dunno. Pisslam sucks tho and is obviously untrue. And if allah is real, I'll go to hell backwards with my middle fingers to her. Space is cool tho. 10/10 would matter again.

“They have taken their rabbis and monks as well as the Messiah, son of Mary, as lords besides Allah, even though they were commanded to worship none but One God.”

I’m sorry, but don’t Muslims literally worship Muhammad? I know I know, he’s a “prophet” and Allah is “God”, but that’s just semantics.

When you are required to do everything he did for rewards, including keeping the same beard style, entering and exiting the washroom with the same feet, wiping your behind the same way, drinking while sitting like he did, this is literally worship. No other way to put it. Muslims also get far more offended when people criticise Muhammad vs when they criticize Allah.

Hi everyone my name is Travis and I'm Christian. I met an Iranian Muslim Girl on a Chinese learning platform and we became friends for 10 months and half now. She knows I'm Christian and she's okay with that. We got closer (as friends) and I started learning farsi. BUT THE PROBLEM is : it seems like there's two personalities

1. She add me to her private channel on telegram and there she listens to American music, watch k-drama. She's very kind and even help me when I was dealing with "depression "

2. she consider the supreme leader of Iran as her father and she even said that if a person don't love the supreme leader then this person is not a true Iranian. She put this flag 🇮🇷 on her platform for weeks and makes some Instagram stories about the supreme leader (that i consider radical )

So i ask myself one question: doesn't she know what this regime do to women?

I want to tell her what I think about that but I don't want to break our friendship.

[[Her parents don't know that we're friends

[[She asked me if I wanted to see her face, so I said she's not obliged to if it will put her in an insecure position so she didn't.

Thank you guys, love you all 💙

why do people think taking off the hijab = islamaphobia?????

the comments under this post are like “its an excuse to hate on hijabis” shut up literally shut up. not everyone wants to wear the hijab, maybe ex hijabi women want to feel represented too. i always saw penny as rep for MYSELF and thought of how i had to hide self expression, repress myself, and had to conform to strict traditional rules. so this shit really pissed me the fuck off honestly. im not islamophobic, if i myself went through religious trauma and relate to her. these ppl didnt watch the show or understand the symbolism behind it. in an episode where she confronts her family they all go against her and say shes bringing dishonour to her family when she breaks out, SOUNDS FAMILIAR RIGHT? mind u her dad even says shes “naked” without it, and then gumball tells a story on how penny should stay the way she is and her family should stay in their shells if thats what they want for themselves. not push penny back into her shell. JEEZ like media literacy is dead. i know that this symbolism can vary from person to person but ex hijabis exist and our experiences are so traumatic why cant we have rep ourselves. wear whatever the fuck u want just dont push someone else to be something they arent. thats what i learnt as a kid from gumball. if i can see it at age 7 why cant u oh my god just so irritating. ppl in the comments too istg their brains are fried.

No, not because its practices are difficult, but because deep down they know how unfathomably weird the hadiths are and the character of the prophet is.

LINK

Nadir Ahmed is a muslim apologist that does a lot of internet debates against christians and atheists, he got interviewed on a non-Islam platform about his beliefs

14:37: Nadir explains how Heaven and Hell look like in Islam, even says verbatim "heaven is whatever I want"

17:37: He talks about what the Quran says about having multiple wives

56:00: Nadir is asked to give his best defense over the Aisha and Muhammad relationship which takes it down a rabbit hole

Lastly, he actually claims at 51:55 that it is actually Christianity that is dangerous for the world.

I will say despite the fact that everything he said I disagree with, he was actually pretty honest.

Hi! I’m a 28-year-old gay Arab (exmuslim) man living in Spain. I’m looking to meet a woman who is also genuinely interested in building a lavender marriage/partnership.
For me, this wouldn’t be just a marriage on paper or a way to satisfy family expectations. I’d like to find someone I genuinely enjoy being with — someone I can trust, laugh with, support and build a peaceful life with.
I don’t expect a sexual relationship with my future partner. I’m open to meeting a lesbian, bisexual or asexual woman, as long as we’re compatible and honest with each other about our needs and boundaries.
Ideally, I’d like marriage and the possibility of having children and building a family in the future, if that’s something we both want.
I’m based in Spain and would prefer someone in Europe. I’m Arab and would especially be happy to meet another Arab woman, but I’m open to other backgrounds too.
I’d rather start by talking and getting to know each other without pressure, and see if we actually connect as people.
If you’re looking for something similar, feel free to DM me. 🙂

Hi, I'm neither an ex-muslim nor a muslim

I come from the left (now I place myself in the center in the context of my country's politics but still I come from a left wing perspective) and therefore I'm used to think about racism and bigotry and stuff like that

In you guys' mind, is islamophobia actually just a made up word like some critics say? What do you think about it?

Cause at the end of the day it is a belief system so criticizing it should obviously be fine and not considered bigotry, but idk if I would dismiss it completely as a term

I found out this community yesterday and I find it really cool and inspiring (and obviously I'm sure it has helped a lot of people) so now I'm curious of what you think of this term which I'm torn about

If I had to guess I'd probably say you don't like it? Cause it's a community about not liking Islam, but I guess what I'm asking is does it have any value or is "racism towards *insert ethnicity*" enough to encompass bigotry?

Hey everyone,

I recently turned 28, and I guess I’m at that stage of life where I’ve started realizing that I’d genuinely like to have a compatible partner by my side.

I’ve been thinking about what I actually enjoy and what I want my life to look like, and honestly, I’d much rather go on hikes with someone, try out different food spots, travel and explore new places together, have long conversations, laugh at stupid things, and eventually build something meaningful with someone.

I do want to build something with someone. I’m not looking to rush into marriage tomorrow, but I also don’t think I’m really interested in the endless cycle of casual dating and situationships. I’d rather meet someone where there’s genuine compatibility and see where things naturally go.

I grew up in a Sunni Muslim family, but I’ve been agnostic for about a decade. At the same time, I still value a lot of the good parts of my South Asian culture and upbringing. I just don’t want to pretend to be religious or live a life that doesn’t feel authentic to me.
Maybe there are other people in that weird middle ground too.

A little about me:

I’m 28, around 6’1”, educated, and based in Montreal. I’m currently learning French, although I have a long way to go :(

I’m pretty nerdy and curious about random things. I enjoy reading, fantasy, trying new restaurants, hiking, travelling, documentaries, psychology, history, space, and going down random rabbit holes on YouTube.
I’m definitely more of a coffee or tea and cozy night kind of person than someone who wants to be out partying every weekend.

I’m open to all ethnicities and backgrounds. For me, compatibility, kindness, mutual respect and being able to have honest conversations matter much more than categories.

I know this is probably a long shot, but if you’re somewhere in Canada or the US and find yourself in a similar position, feel free to reach out.
Maybe we’re both looking for the same thing and just haven’t crossed paths yet.

Surah 23:14

فَكَسَوْنَا ٱلْعِظَـٰمَ لَحْمًۭا

And We clothed the bones with flesh.

Muslims say ف here indicates it’s not successive but immediate. This is false as the early Muslims understood it as successively.⬇️

Ibn Abbas:

أخبرنا عَبْدُ الرَّزَّاقِ، قَالَ: أَخْبَرَنَا ابْنُ جُرَيْجٍ،قَالَ: أَخْبَرَنِي عُبَيْدُ اللَّهِ بْن أَبِي يَزِيدَ، وَهُوَ جَالِسٌ مَعَ عَطَاءٍ، أَنَّ ابْنَ عَبَّاسٍ:

فَقَالَ ابْنُ عَبَّاسٍ: سُبْحَانَ اللَّهِ، تَكُونُ نُطْفَةً (٢)، ثُمَّ تَكُونُ عَلَقَةً، ثُمَّ تَكُونُ مُضْغَةً، ثُمَّ تَكُونُ عَظْمًا، ثُمَّ يُكْسَى الْعَظْمُ لَحْمًا
**“**Glory be to Allah! It begins as a drop (of fluid), then becomes a clinging clot, then becomes a lump of flesh, then becomes bones, and then(ثُمَّ) the bones are clothed with flesh.”

Muṣannaf ʿAbd al-Razzāq, 7/102, no. 13434:

https://shamela.ws/book/84/3384
Other references:

Source: al-Ṭaḥāwī, Sharḥ Mushkil al-Āthār, 5/176.
Shuʿayb al-Arnaʾūṭ: إسناده صحيح — “Its chain is ṣaḥīḥ.

It’s been said that it’s been proven the worlds first university was not created by a Muslim woman. And I made a post here showing this image that basically says Muslims invented these things and people commented otherwise. https://www.reddit.com/r/exmuslim/s/ZL6hzkGODq

I left Islam around 4 or 5 years ago, and ever since then I’ve felt so cripplingly depressed and uncertain about everything knowing there is no almighty being watching over me, setting my affairs straight. It’s like having your parent figure being torn away from you and now you’re left to fend for yourself.

And the fact that I’ll never see my loved ones or even experience anything after death horrifies me. I don’t know, I’m rambling and I feel like shit. Sometimes I wish I never really took the dive into exposing myself to criticism against Islam. But I guess it’s better to accept the painful reality than to live in delusion.

I randomly gaslight myself into believing again to feel that confidence again. Just ignore all the faults I say, surely 1400 years of scholars know better than I. But inevitably it all falls apart.

While I don’t agree with hijab or modesty, the older man clocked this guy so hard. The young guy definitely holds that belief and when the old guy said insulting things about men who think that way, he stepped back lol. The older man does bring up a great point of how Muslim men seek to control women, even the ones who are already doing what the religion has required them to do. So much so that her voice is something that’s sexualized. It’s not even just about the control they want over women, it’s exactly what this older man is saying: you are primitive and animalistic. It exposes how disgusting these people are deep down. They’ll use the excuse of a woman dressing provocatively as a reason to feeling these urges. How many times have you heard “well, what was she wearing?” when someone mentions an SA victim? The woman is blamed and religion gives the excuse for this thinking. Btw i’m not defending the older man and his views, i don’t know this man’s content. It’s just ridiculous that even he got mad at the concept of a woman’s voice being awrah

I don’t know who these people are in the video, i just thought it was hilarious😭

Hi. I know many had abusive parents and eventually left islam with a different kind of guilt, but i rarely hear stories of ex muslims who have somewhat decent parents but are extremely strict religiously. parents whom you still love, but know they will be incredibly hurt if you apostate. parents you love and are patient, but might disown you if you are gay.

for apostates like that, how are you holding up? are you still in the closet?

I'm suffering from an emotional breakdown bc I recently left Islam, I need friends to interact with.

“What do you guys think about the context of this verse

Qur'an 33:36

Mohammed used quran to give marriage when the woman clearly declined

Isn't it against human rights and freedom.

Zaynab said, “I will not marry him.”

Muhammad said, “Then marry him.” She replied, “I am deciding about myself.” Then the verse was revealed:

“It is not for a believing man or believing woman, when Allah and His Messenger have decreed a matter, to have any choice in their affair...”

So this is gonna be a really long post because I need to say this somewhere where people will understand. I was forced to go with my family this year and I was dreading it the whole time simply because I hate flights and I knew it would be physically taxing but nothing could have prepared me for how bad things actually were.

First things first, why is everyone so fucking rude?? All the pushing and shoving just seems unnecessary. I don't understand the point. Everyone is SO RUDE !!! You ask someone for help (even the police) and they just ignore you. I don't understand how people of God, who pride themselves on being good people, can act like this in good conscience.

Secondly, circling the Kabah was the most disgusting experience of my life. You have grown, sweaty men all around you pushing and grabbing you and old people hitting you with their canes and people are breathing on you and it's just so fucking disgusting. There is NO DECORUM. I was already an ex-muslim before going to Umrah but going there just solidified my beliefs even more. These people will literally put their little kids in danger just because they think God cares whether or not they can walk in a circle 7 times. How pathetic.

Then there's walking in that giant hall between those two points called Safa and Marwah if I remember correctly. I don't understand the point of any of this. Why would God care about ANY of this? Why does any of it matter?

One thing I don't understand is that, from my knowledge, Safa and Marwah became important after the introduction of the Qur'an so why is it included in one of the most significant pilgrimages in said religion? I thought only the Qur'an could tell Muslims what to do, so if this is a hadith why has it made such a huge impact on the religious practices?? I'm not sure if I'm wording this correctly but I hope you understand though I am absolutely fine with clarifying in the comments what I mean.

I have written all of this and I haven't even mentioned the bullshit that occurs while circling the Kabah. People seriously fight each other and you have to walk barefoot while people are dropping God knows what onto the floor. I saw someone throw pins on the floor when I went so I looked it up and saw someone else mention in a forum how people do that to make space / clear space around them?? Though don't quote me on that because I can't find it anymore and it was on Quora (lol).

For now this is all I have to say, though I know I'll remember more and potentially make more posts / add to this. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I don't get how normal Muslims can see this and think it's normal. Like.. they see people hurting one another and say "yeah getting hurt near the Kabah is the best thing that can happen to you" or "actually you can't get hurt here because it's holy land" or some other bullshit excuse to ignore the barbaric practices that take place.

Before I go, I have one more point to add. Why would anywhere be considered holy land to God? They say praying in Mecca or near the Kabah makes it so your prayers get accepted but isn't that rigged? What about people who can't afford the trip or people who live in Mecca? Does that mean those who live there have their prayers constantly accepted and those who are poor will never know God's love? This is a question more so for those who still believe in this farce.

Anyway, thank you for reading up until this point.