Secular Jihadists For A Muslim Enlightenment

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://youtu.be/tj_CjUzrEzY  Up to 2 million Uyghurs are currently being held in WW2-style concentration camps in China as we speak. They are being subjected to torture, forced indoctrination, human trafficking, organ harvesting, forced sterilization, and other egregious human rights abuses as part of a massive ethnic and cultural genocide effort. Nury Turkel is Commissioner at the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (most recently appointed by Nancy Pelosi), and a member of the Uyghur community who grew up in the Xinjiang region, or East Turkistan, and has served with the Bush, Obama, and Trump administrations. He was born in a "re-education" camp at the height of the Cultural Revolution and spent the first several months of his life in captivity with his mother. He joins us to talk about the targeting of his people in one of the worst human rights disasters in current times — and what we can all do about it. 

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/how-do-atheists-38559712  One of the most common questions asked of atheists is, “What happens after we die?” Religion has provided a tremendous amount of comfort to those who are facing death or have lost loved ones. Have we done the same? Simi is a California pediatrician who has seen it up close, professionally and personally. She is also an ex-Muslim atheist who had to process the death of her father recently. Likewise, Ali is a pathologist who used to do autopsies and developed a perspective on death that many may find unique. For those struggling with the prospect of death—the one affliction that will ultimately get us all—don’t miss this episode.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://youtu.be/Vlh3CKIIAKE  In 2020, mainstream liberals like Noam Chomsky, Margaret Atwood, Salman Rushdie, Gloria Steinem, and JK Rowling are fighting back against the tactics of the "woke" far left. Although aligned on many principles, the woke crowd often uses and endorses tactics that perpetuate censorship and ostracism, what has come to be known as "cancel culture." Atheists and secularists from the Muslim world have been subject to this for years, and to us, it isn't much of a surprise. What's surprising is that this realization has now reached prominent mainstream liberals. Will they win? Or will the left's extremists overrun them like it happened on the right? In this episode, we look at both sides of the cleft on the left using a bit of role play: Armin presents the woke arguments, and Ali plays the mainstream liberal. Listen and tell us what you think.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/finding-comedy-37654952  Jaffer Khan is a rising star—write down the name. A talented (and hilarious) stand-up comedian in the New York area, Jaffer grew up in Houston's Muslim community and left Islam many years ago. His bit, "The One True Religion," has gone viral on YouTube (link below). He talked to us about his life, upbringing, career, having a "Muslim" identity despite being a non-believer, and how he brilliantly turns controversial topics into comedic gold onstage. Check it out.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/hindu-rebuttal-37136801  Jarin Jove is a self-described “Hindu atheist” who is disillusioned by what he feels is a dismissive approach to Hindus by ex-Muslim atheists. He has written a five-part blog post criticizing Ex-Muslims of North America as well as the hosts of this podcast. While not representative of all Hindus, Jarin is sympathetic to India's ruling BJP party and its Prime Minister Narendra Modi's policy. We talked about a range of issues, including his support for the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC) — he proposed that opposing the CAA was anti-Hindu bigotry. Ali vehemently disagreed. This got heated and interesting. Check it out.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/from-christian-33786211 Erin Jones was a devout Christian for 35 years. She was a Youth Minister in the Assembly of God church for six years. Last year, she converted to Islam, upsetting her conservative, religious, pro-Trump parents. In her faith, she aligns with Reformist Muslims like Maajid Nawaz and Irshad Manji. Erin is also an autism blogger and mental health advocate with high-functioning autism. We talk to her about her journey and why she chose Reform Islam as her new spiritual path. This is one of the most moving episodes we've done. Check it out.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/is-quran-with-38636798  It is an open secret in Islamic academia that different versions of the Qur'an exist today. Some of the differences are minor variations in punctuation or word choice. Others are more consequential, implying different meanings to the same verse. Aside from these variants (the ahruf and the qira'at), some of the oldest available manuscripts of the Quran, such as the Sana'a manuscript, show significant differences between the older text and the standard text we have today. In Islam, perfect preservation of the Qur'an as the infallible, divine word of Allah is promised by Allah himself. What do these variations tell us about the process by which this was achieved — if it was achieved in the first place? Abdullah Gondal takes us through dozens of differences in different Qurans and what they mean. There are many visuals in this episode, so viewing the video version of this episode is strongly recommended.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/ex-muslims-armin-38680048 The murder of George Floyd has kicked off widespread protests, and more importantly, a conversation about police brutality and systemic racism not only in the black community but also in other marginalized communities. Ex-Muslims have diverse views on this, including within this podcast: Ali is a staunch supporter of BLM, while Armin has some reservations. In this episode, they find points of agreement but also duke out their differences. Check it out.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/when-truth-is-34457647 Razib Khan is Director of Science at Insitome and a genomics consultant. He has worked with Family Tree DNA, National Geographic, and various private clients. An influential scientist and writer in the fields of evolutionary biology and genetics, Razib is a Bangladeshi-American atheist from a Muslim background. He has written for The New York Times, National Review, and India Today, among others, and runs the Gene Expression blog and the Brown Pundits podcast. We talk about a range of fascinating topics—which (TWIST!) leads to an astonishing revelation about Ali's ancestry! Check it out.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/one-true-islam-36234950  Every devout, practicing Muslim believes that the Islam they practice is the true faith. Yet, there are countless versions of the religion practiced among its 1.7 billion adherents. Does the one true Islam exist? If it does, who is really practicing it? And is everyone else wrong? What does “Muslim” mean? Is it strictly someone who believes in Islam, or simply someone born to Muslim parents? Abdullah Sameer preached Islam for fifteen years and founded popular Islamic websites like Light Upon Light before giving it all up in 2016 and becoming an atheist. We’re going to tackle all these questions and more. Warning: there will be heat.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/coronavirus-and-38253500  What do Islamic scriptures say about pandemics, plagues, and microbial scourges? Abdullah Gondal returns to the show to educate us about the absurdities of healthcare in Islamic theology. Check it out.

Thomas Sheedy is an entrepreneur and the founder of Atheists for Liberty. He has held high-level positions in a variety of organizations, and is a former FFRF (Freedom from Religion Foundation) Student of the Year. We talked with him about the prospects of conservative-leaning atheist organizations like his, the state of atheist activism today in general, and his recent political party switch Democratic to Republican. That got pretty interesting, to say the least! Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/atheists-for-37976822

Understandably, this Q&A was dominated by questions about the recent murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer and three of his colleagues. We discussed the role of racial bias in policing, and Armin and Ali had stark differences in their views. Needless to say, it got heated. Watch the argument and read the links below (mentioned in the episode) to come to your own conclusions.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/world-after-19-36770228 Melissa Chen is a writer and activist. She is the co-founder and managing director of Ideas Beyond Borders (IBB, with Faisal Saeed Al-Mutar) and a columnist for The Spectator USA. We talk about her work with IBB, which has translated countless pro-secular works of literature from English to Arabic, from books to Wikipedia pages. We also talk about her strong criticism of China and what kind of global geopolitical realignment we can expect to see after its role and missteps in the COVID-19 pandemic. Check it out.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://www.patreon.com/posts/de-radicalized-35249435 We speak to Susanna M, a former Catholic, radical far-leftist, and Antifa affiliate who credits ex-Muslims in large part for helping her out of dogmatic thinking and embracing true liberalism and skepticism.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://youtu.be/PssNIY10KD4  There’s no such thing as a harmless falsehood. With all the misinformation, pseudoscience, and conspiracy theories out there, it’s time to talk again about how to process information critically and accurately, and why this can save lives. We’ll talk about this and answer your questions. Don’t miss it.

Watch the video version of this conversation (for patrons): https://www.patreon.com/posts/dealing-with-33606864  Janice Selbie is a registered professional counselor with a special interest in religious trauma syndrome. She divorced her religion after forty years as an evangelical fundamentalist. At around the same time, she divorced her husband (a pastor) after nearly two decades together. Devastated by these losses, she went back to school to become a professional counselor. She runs the online Divorcing Religion Workshop (www.DivorcingReligion.com), and is putting together the Conference on Religious Trauma (www.CORT2020.com) being held this April in Vancouver, BC.

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://youtu.be/kzhzxuBbtVQ  With the US election season in full swing, the atheist and ex-Muslim communities are often as polarized as everyone else. In this episode, we take a look at all the Democratic primary candidates as well as the record of the Donald Trump administration to see which candidate(s) would be best for the interests of the largest minority group in the US: the religiously unaffiliated. Don’t miss this!

Watch the video version of this conversation (for patrons): https://www.patreon.com/posts/raising-kids-33515055  Courtney Heard is the newly announced co-Executive Director of Atheist Alliance International (AAI). She is familiar to many of you as @godless_mom on Instagram and Twitter. Accomplished, inspiring, and whip smart, she is also a mom of two who gained a lot of her fans (including Ali) from her articles about secular parenting. Check out the conversation!

Watch the video version of this conversation: https://youtu.be/3lHEbDQhpoA  In this three-part series, Armin and Ali go back to basics to discuss the two major sects of Islam: Sunni and Shia. What do these terms mean, how did these sects arise, what are their differences, and why have they been so ready to kill one another over them for thirteen centuries? In Part 1, we looked at the early history of each sect and how they came into existence. In Part 2, we discussed the differences in their beliefs and theology. In Part 3, we talk about where the conflict stands today and how it might look in the future. Check it out.