Death to infidels!

How many more Avijit Roys, Washiqur Rahmans and Ananta Bijoys need to be killed before the world wakes up to Islamic extremism, asks Aki Muthali

Islamophobia: The irrational fear of being raped, beheaded or hacked to death for being critical of Islamic scriptures.

There’s a much neglected discussion on the contrast between the Western secular nations and the conservative Islamic nations. The titled arguments are usually US foreign policy and Islamophobia – which makes dialogue difficult as the titles itself are deeply seeded in contempt.

The plethora of opinions surrounding the societal conflictions aroused by Islamism is often paired with the conflation to European colonialism – but what’s glaringly obvious and conveniently forgotten is the fact that European colonialism and the atrocities committed by European settlers have been widely condemned in the 21st century and the civil rights movement has been vastly embraced to enforce equal rights for people of all colour and religion, whereas the Muslim world is predominantly run by Sharia which makes a liberal democracy impossible; therefore human rights are scarce and any protest for civil rights will get activists hung or lynched in the name of blasphemy. Orthodox Islam dictates the world must be governed by Islam, and such is the sentiment in all Islamic nations – thus the 21st century Muslim world is occupied by 7th century values which are at constant war with the social modernization that defines the West.

What’s maddeningly perplexing is the Western liberals’ solidarity for the conservative voices of the Muslim world that restrict human rights. Western liberalism has been hijacked by these modern [pseudo] liberals who drown all discussions of Islamism with their sense of indignation for their colonial past. Where is the logic in resurrecting white colonialism while debating modern, present-day abuses by Muslim extremists like the Islamic State and Boko Haram? All lands with a Muslim majority were secured through Islamic colonialism as well – so why is it that only the Western world is condemned for colonialism/imperialism while great swathes of lands in the Eastern world continues to face a perilous reality triggered by Islamism? For every Islamic nation – there’s a sordid tale of Islamic colonialism and imperialism that had erased the identity of the people by raping them into slavery and conversion.

For those who do not understand my repetitive usage of “Pseudo Liberals” in many of my articles – it’s where every Jon Snow, Sansa Stark and Arya Stark will claim King Joffrey is justified in his acts!


Raif Badawi has been in a prison in Saudi Arabia, receiving torture with a looming sentence of death for starting a discussion on secularism on his blog since 2012. His wife, Ensaf Haider, and their children fled to Canada for refuge and tirelessly protest for Badawi’s release. His “crime” was encouraging secular values – and it was enough to get him convicted of blasphemy – which makes every other dissidents of theocracy regress and remain silenced about the human rights abuses inflicted by Sharia, regardless of which nation they reside from.

On February 26, 2015, Avijit Roy, an American blogger of Bangladeshi origin was murdered by machete-wielding Islamists. He was a passionate man, as Badawi, who believed in the necessity of secularism. He was critical of religion, including Islam – which hurt the prides of Muslim extremists who used Roy’s visit to Bangladesh during a book fair as an opportunity to show their condemnation by hacking him to death and critically injuring his wife.

If people like Raif Badawi and Avijit Roy cannot even respectfully encourage secularism in the Islamic world – where is the room to reform? These are just two people among an increasing number of people persecuted by Islamic sentiments that are ultimately backed by a great majority of Muslims in both Islamic and Western worlds. In the 2013 PEW research study – it was confirmed majority of Muslims want Sharia as the governing body of law in Muslim-majority nations.

Between Raif Badawi and Avijit Roy – two men appearing from two vastly different cultures and land – the common denominator is Islam, and many Muslims have shouted “Allahu Akbar” [god is great] during Badawi’s flogging and after Roy was reported to be murdered. When everyday Muslims celebrate the torture and/or murder of secular humanists, it’s sadly very safe to make a claim that the cognitive dissonance suffered by Muslims is maintained consistently over the centuries through severe indoctrination provided by Islamism.

Just as I had written all of the above – I learned about a third blogger who was hacked to death by 4 Islamists in Bangladesh since Avijit Roy’s murder. Washiqur Rahman was murdered practically a month after Roy’s murder and just last week, Ananta Bijoy Das was sentenced to death by another group of primitive imbeciles who couldn’t evolve for the love of life.


We’ve all heard of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a survivor of Sharia’s brutality and an unapologetic critic of ideological bigotry who makes bold statements without sugarcoating the tragedies inflicted on the modern society by Islam. She is labeled an “anti-Muslim bigot” by the very horde of fanatics clamouring about Allah’s greatness during the tortures and murders of freethinkers, and this very group of fascists and Western liberals are in harmony as they chant “Islamophobia” to muzzle all legitimate criticism of Islam. Regardless of all the death threats, Hirsi Ali goes above and beyond to highlight the very viable threats Islamism poses on society.

The scriptures deem that Islam does not need improvement or alterations as it has finalized the entirety of religion as the infallible word of god that is supreme in every way – but I suppose we’re supposed to just ignore the calling of rape, slavery, genocide, hate and animosity towards women, girls, non-Muslims, atheists, apostates, LGBTQ, Jews, Christians, Pagans, etc.?

If people want their religion to be viewed as a morally righteous ideology – then their scriptures must follow that standard – there should be no verses that endorse violence, hatred and discrimination of any kind – and as long as religious text continues to embrace such vulgarity, it will be condemned as morally corrupt and held responsible for influencing violence and hatred among its adherents.

Recently, Reza Aslan, my favourite unicorn, claimed God is not responsible for hate – that the hostility witnessed in worshippers in the Middle East is not produced by religious scriptures – essentially, Aslan maligned Muslims as being more prone to violent personal thoughts and behaviour and end up infusing their narcissism to the scriptures to a get a false understanding of the true meaning to suit their convenience. How unsophisticated is that narrative? A violent misogynist has a perfect line from the scriptures to batter, rape and further humiliate and violate his wife’s rights – because the scripture itself specifically states a husband has ownership of his wife and therefore has every right to abuse her for not submitting to his tyranny – you don’t have to be a “misogynist” to understand the vulgarity.

Saudi Arabia is the perfect example of how religion influences human rights abuses. To claim scriptures have zero influence in theists is like claiming the consumption of food has zero influence in growth – utterly nonsensical and immeasurably dishonest. 


By using denialism against evidence – you are becoming a concierge to the apology granted for fascism. We cannot overcompensate for the West’s atrocities by creating apologies for Islamist violence – it is possible to condemn both atrocities equally.

As long as Islam evades its reformation we can expect more extremists in the future. Even if the Islamic State (IS) and Taliban, et al are dismantled, the religion itself will continue to radicalize new groups of terrorist organizations as there are religious scriptures that support their entitlement to violence as a practicing Muslim. Any religious person can succumb to fanaticism – however, we can factually confirm that there isn’t a worldwide trend among Hindus, Christians, Jews and Pagans constructing a global takedown to implement the totalitarianism of their ideology as the Islamists.

Ancient words on a piece of paper that prompts existential grief is being granted more protection than the human beings it assaults – and if that doesn’t persuade people to admit the consequences of ideological indoctrination – I’m saddened to admit the intellectual approach is struggling to prevail. 


It takes great effort for me to formulate words lacking profanity every time secular humanists are murdered. It makes the rest of the non-conformed and freethinking people wonder when they’ll face the same fate? When will our lives trump the phantom victimhood of these fanatics – when will the impending violence vowed upon us by ideological tyrants be acknowledged by the society that blindly respect and tolerate the most intolerable behaviours persisting from the most foul and primitive of ages?

If Islamists exist not because of their religion but because of feeling disenfranchised in every single society they exist in – it begs the question as to why other racial and religious groups who are also disenfranchised have yet to break out in a systematic fashion of violence? If secularism is so offensive to Muslims that they feel “excluded” in society – maybe it is time people stop blaming the victims who uphold secularism and start looking at the religion that indoctrinates them with isolation by calling on its followers to not befriend or take ally from non-believers?

Ideological fanaticism is a result of psychological confliction which is delivered by the multiplicity of contradicting scriptures – and overcoming it isn’t simple, because educating fanatics about reality means that what they’ve believed their whole life to be true is now being proven as false – and it wounds their prides with a devastating blow.

A simple speech or statement of fact is like playing with fire – the tragedy it ignites is being fueled by none other than the apologists who base their condemnation of criticism of Islam on their inexperience of life under Sharia. People can easily dismiss Dawkins and Harris by pointing at their pigment and geography – yet what justification for the dismissal of people like Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Raif Badawi? If colour and region was all that mattered to reject facts on Islam – then I implore the theist and anti-atheist community to explain why Muslims who had lived and breathed their religion also get condemned for being critical of Islamism?

To refuse the existence of people of colour who criticize Islam with better precision to its scriptures and law of land (Sharia) is beyond despicable as their voices are being shrugged off as irrelevant – which confirms it’s a deliberate oversight by apologists who just want to invalidate the criticism of Islam as a “white man thing” which ultimately compromises the safety and liberty of people of colour who have been criticizing Islam for a longer period of time while risking their lives in solidarity for secularism. Atheism is not a foundation of white people so admitting to your racial bias is the first step in acknowledging people of colour also had a history of atheism throughout all ages. 
 
Society still believes religion has the right to dominate the world as displayed by Islamists in the Middle East and Christians in the U.S. How long before people finally admit that theocracy still plays a major role in the delaying and destruction of human advancement?

If poverty and political strife is what contributes to terrorism – the biggest terrorists on Earth would be women and girls for the gender apartheid and torture they’ve faced for over three thousand years and yet not a single female terrorist battalion has ever emerged. So cut the bull**it and start showing true conviction for the fight against oppression and inequality – starting with describing religion for what it is – because if you’re a feminist/humanist, you would have recognized religion was created by patriarchy.  

The fascism of Islamist values clouds the motive of everyday Muslims who cannot be differentiated from the mob lynching Furkhunda or the protesters at Dhaka in the memory of Avijit Roy. There are many closet-Jihadis, like Abase Hussen, [father of the British Muslim girl who fled to join IS] that blame the West for everything Islamists do while almost every week an Islamist slaughters the innocent for the Allah of his sect – and every time devout Muslims claim that that is not real Islam and yet, both Islamists and self-proclaimed true Muslims worship the same scriptures. Within just a week in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Islamists created a bloodbath – and it had everything to do with God. 

The overt hostility of Islamic scriptures towards non-Muslims and minorities is valid enough for the condemnation of Islamism. If being wary of the 21st century version of Islam that is no different from the barbarism it perpetuated since the 7th century Islam is “phobic” – then I welcome the supporters of the claim to “Islamophobia” to live in a purely Sharia-run nation as freely as they choose to live in the West. Sharia desperately fights to stifle free speech for non-Muslims by touting victimhood when it's denied accommodation to infringe on other people's rights – so if the Western world is intolerant towards the values of Sharia, it’s doing justice.

How many more Avijit Roys, Washiqur Rahmans and Ananta Bijoy Das are required before the world accepts the issues with Islam? How much more should the body of proof weigh before society admits Islam is in need of reform in the most desperate way? Pseudo Liberals are becoming pioneers in the art of victimhood for fascists. And yet, Nazism and Islamism are denounced – both, for the same reason.

Secularism is the benchmark to West’s reduction in ideological fanaticism – whereas Islamic nations will have you flogged [or executed] for daring to even entertain the idea of secularism. Sharia runs amok in the judicial system to the bedroom and even the dinner table – the obsessiveness of implementing Islam in literally every aspect of Muslims’ and non-Muslims’ lives is similar to the qualities of OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) – and shame on me if I let you infringe on my rights and the rights of the future generation in the name of “political correctness”. In the history of Islamism, it is the death to infidels – whether by execution or conformity – so naturally, there will be throng upon throngs of resistance that will unapologetically denounce such insidious bigotry – not everyone is so far removed from common sense as the brigade of pseudo liberals.

The day free speech stops becoming injurious to the non-conformed of Islam – the day Islamism will cease, and the religion will recognize peace.

Aki Muthali is a freelance writer, who's a feminist. Born and raised in Sri Lanka, she currently lives in Canada. She’s also an illustrator and a painter. Follow her on Twitter 

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