Related Posts

Wajahat Ali and the Doha Debates

While we were in Doha for the MLT Conference, we were able to attend a special session of the Doha Debates. The topic was “Motion: This House believes that political Islam is a threat to the West.” Wajahat Ali, of AltMuslim and Goat Milk, has done a nice write-up of the issues discussed. He was also gracious enough to make me sound intelligent. I have his permission to include his original questions, and my responses, below. 1) How would you personally define “political Islam” and “the West?” Do you think the debates adequately defined these two terms? The problem with…

Good Apples, Bad Barrel?

Disclaimer – I am not offering this article as any type of justification for the prison abuses going on. Let me be 100% clear – I think what has happened in the Abu Ghraib prisons, and perhaps elsewhere as well, is atrocious and I am angry about it. It is our fault as a country and we need to fix the problem immediately. Those responsible for overseeing these horrible travesties should be severely punished and things must change immediately. Actual post – In the interests of learning from the situation and trying to understand factors at play, I came across…

Muslim Advocates: Stop Biased Law-Enforcement Training

57 Organizations Call on White House to Investigate Offensive FBI Trainings Today, Muslim Advocates, working in coalition with 56 Muslim, Arab, and South Asian organizations, requested that the White House create an interagency taskforce to investigate bigoted and offensive trainers and materials used in trainings for counterterrorism agents and law enforcement. Wired magazine first reported in July that the FBI was using materials that stated that Prophet Muhammad was a "cult leader," and that Islam is a religion that "transforms [a] country's culture into 7th-century Arabian ways." Recently disclosed materials show that these grossly inaccurate and inflammatory training materials extend…