Normally we do not reply in length to articles about us, but the author of this item must have put a lot of time into his piece, so the least we can do is to write a response.
Let us, if we may, point out a few factual errors and omissions in this article.
1. “The site’s blogger profile says that “Muslims Against Sharia” is from Afghanistan.”
One of 5 MASH members profiles actually does read Afghanistan. Initially, the default setting of Afghanistan was not changed to the USA, but then we left it as it were to allow “honest critics” to make fools of themselves. It is not surprising that the author did not mention the other four profiles.
2. “Curiously, the site contains absolutely NO membership or governance information at all.”
If the author had any brains, he/she could have realized that there are security issues involved. But an ideologue having brains, is a little too much to hope for, isn’t it?
3. “The first “donor” on the list, if you google it, turns out to be the Executive Director of the organization.”
That’s a great piece of information, except for MASH does not have an Executive Director.
4. “The second “donor”, turns out to be a member of the organization who seems to spend most of his time posting anti-Muslim taunts on various blogs.”
Anti-Muslim taunts, that’s interesting. We actually do post taunts, mostly to provoke responses, but judging by the responses we provoke http://www.reformislam.org/quotes.php, red (bottom) section, our taunts are hardly anti-Muslim. And if we do get into an argument with Islamofascist on a rare occasion, we promptly get blocked.
5 “And here again, one is struck by the uncanny similarity between the agenda of this allegedly “Muslim” group, and that of American and European neo-nazi sites that claim to support “moderate” Muslims while actually trashing anything Islamic.”
Our motto, which is posted on the top of every page of our website is that Islam is Peace, Love, and Light. Our logo contains a crescent and a peace sign. For the author to omit those items is at the very least disingenuous, but expecting integrity from a degenerate demagogue is quite unreasonable, so we won’t focus on that.
6 “Among the elements of this “Muslim” “Manifesto” are such popular right wing talking points as “the Crusades were not unprovoked acts of aggression, but rather attempts to recapture formerly Christian lands controlled by Muslims”, and “We must remove evil passages from Islamic religious texts, so that future generations of Muslims will not be confused by conflicting messages.””
Just because the author does not like the history of the Crusades, it does not change historical facts. As for removing evil passages from Islamic religious texts, it is our original idea. Granted, someone could possibly come up with the same idea before, but we are not aware of it. But the demagoguery of the author attributes any ideas that that he/she opposes to the other side of the political spectrum.
7 “For those who don’t know John Loftus, he’s an extreme former Fox News commentator”
The author seems to know a hell of a lot about that damn extremist Loftus. Then why does he/she fail to mention that Loftus is a life-long Democrat? Or is it just Lotus’ nefarious plan to deceive Democrats? Just as non-Muslims Against Sharia have a nefarious plan to deceive Muslims?
8 “The next item in the “blog” is a press release from Joe Kaufman, of “Americans Against Hate”. You remember them? Founded by a Republican media specialist, they sponsored the nauseating “Gore-Sharpton” ads that Bill O’Reilly condemned.”
That sounded interesting and we contacted Joe Kaufman about the supposed ads. He was not aware of them. So this is another item the author just made up. Must be running out of one-sided facts.
9 “If you dig deeper into the “blog”, you’ll find ... extensive condemnation of Islam in ALL its forms, of Democrats, and of every Muslim country on the planet. In an hour of searching, I didn’t find a single entry…not one…that said anything positive about Muslims.”
Let’s dig deeper, shall we? The author must be referring to the following articles that defame Muslims and Democrats: “Islam is O.K. The Imam's are NOT!”, “Muslim hero breaks up train beating,” or “Armenian Genocide Bill” that states “Muslims Against Sharia commend House Democrats and Speaker Pelosi,” just to name a few. And if the author missed all those articles, there is a list of prominent moderate Muslims in the upper right corner of every page on our blog. But we must have placed them there just to denigrate them, right? But if that were true, why would we publish their articles on our blog?
10 “I did find this entry, which actually argues that “moderate Muslims” pose a greater threat to mankind that Jihadists.”
If the author found that entry (which was clearly posted for discussion purposes and not to imply that moderate Muslims are a threat), why not mention that it was accompanied by a MASH comment “For the record, the author does not understand what "moderate Muslim" means.”?
11 “In fact, the articles posted on the blog are once again completely indistinguishable from the sort of URQ Muslim-hatred one expects from the likes of Shaidle, McMillan, Sentinel, and the emerging neo-Nazis.”
Would “Islamonazi's Prayer for Stormfront” be one of those articles?
12 The author goes on to list some of the non-Muslim blog contributors, claiming, “So these are the “Muslims Against Sharia”” The author’s ideology prevents him/her from making a distinction between a blog contributor and a member of Muslims Against Sharia. Just as it prevents him from making a distinction between moderate Muslims and Islamofascists. But it comes as no surprise because this tactic is widely employed by degenerate demagogues, whether they are Islamofascists, left-wing Dhimmis, or right-wing nutjobs.
In case the author realizes that our reply made him look like an idiot, which demagogues usually are, and changes the contents of the article, we took screenshots.
Update (1/15): In the interest of fairness, here is a link to the next article posted by the same author: "If You Can't Beat'em..." It seems that even a demagogue might reconsider his/her position when confronted with the facts. The key word is "might", though.
Update (1/16): While we gave the benefit of the doubt to ‘Balbulican the demagogue’, and answered all of his/her questions, he/she is still bent on proving to the world what kind of frauds we are. Lucky for us, the demagogues are usually not that bright. We figured that the best way to find out how many people consider MASH a fraud, is to run a poll. And what do you know, our demagogue got caught lying. Below is an excerpt from our message to the fraudulent fraud-buster:
"when this comment appeared there was only one negative vote. Do you really expect anyone to believe that someone who runs a “StageLeft” blog would vote for Fred Thompson? Your pathetic attempt to skew the results of this poll are so transparent, it’s not even funny. We suggest next time you try to accuse someone of fraud don’t get caught perpetrating one." Our demagogue’s new life goal is to prove that MASH is a fraud. He trolls the Internet collecting quotes (which we’ll be happy to provide for years to come) that in his feeble little mind make us non-Muslims. (Apparently calling someone an idiot or a Nazi is a very un-Muslim thing to do.) The demagogue claims he/she noticed, “that even the conservative sites who initially applauded this fraud are quietly backing off”. The fact that he/she does not mention the sites in question is interesting, but what even more interesting is that how our demagogue could have noticed the "quiet backing off" of the aforementioned sites. Don't you just love to catch a smear merchant in a lie?
Update (1/21): first 100 votes are in. Under 20% of responders believe that MASH is a fraud. Considering that a comparable percentage of Americans believe that 9/11 was some type of Neocon conspiracy, the results must be pretty accurate. The fact that nearly half of Ron Paul supporters think that MASH is a fraud is not surprising. What would be is that a lot of Fred Thompson supporters seem to agree with those of Ron Paul. But this anomaly has been addressed earlier.
Monday, January 21, 2008
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19 comments:
I don't have the time nor the inclination to parse the dense stupidity and BS in this post. Suffice it to say that we're onto you wingnuts. Thanks for the laughs, idiots.
Dear trog69,
We apologize for not conforming to your Muslim stereotypes. From now we will try to defame everyone who criticizes Islam, yell “Death to America” every chance we get, and once in a while kill an occasional infidel. We hope to get back into your good graces and become the kind of Muslims that you think Muslims should be. We appreciate your comment and looking forward for more constructive criticism.
Cordially,
Muslims Against, scratch that, For Sharia
Hi, guys.
How does one join your organization?
If you are a Muslim who supports our goals, please send your request to mash5@reformislam.org for further instructions. If you are not a Muslim, but would like to help us, you can become our blog contributor. Please send an email to info@reformislam.org and put "BLOG ACCESS" in the subject.
I'm not sure you've noticed, but quite a few websites are starting to suspect that you're actually just a group of folks inciting anti-Muslim feeling. Now, you know and I know that's not true, and I understand that your organization is deeply rooted in the Islamic faith, and that your only concern is doctrinal accuracy and purity.
Perhaps you can help me allay some of the concerns out there.
In terms of your project to edit the Koran, folks...are you working with Muslim scholars and clerics on this, or is it just sort of a "wing-it" thing?
In terms of your contributors - there seem to be an awful lot of folks with a history of anti-Muslim blogging or commentary. Could you point us at a couple of actual Muslim scholars who have contributed to your site?
Thanks so much. Looking forward to your response.
"I'm not sure you've noticed, but quite a few websites are starting to suspect that you're actually just a group of folks inciting anti-Muslim feeling."
We have. First, when someone cannot defeat your argument on the merits, they try to discredit you. This tactic is pretty transparent. Second, consider the source. We have Islamist and loony leftists accusing us of impersonating Muslims while being rightwing nutjobs. We also have rightwing nutjobs accusing us of Taqiyya and not being moderate.
“I understand that your organization is deeply rooted in the Islamic faith, and that your only concern is doctrinal accuracy and purity.”
Actually, our primary compass is common sense. We believe that God is infallible and good. Anything that contradicts that must have not come from God.
“are you working with Muslim scholars”
At this time we have some help from an Imam, who is doing it on condition of anonymity. We are actively looking for a religious scholar who would put his name on our project, but so far we have been unsuccessful. Apparently not to many Imams want to have a price on their heads.
“there seem to be an awful lot of folks with a history of anti-Muslim blogging or commentary.”
Their anti-Islamist rhetoric does appear anti-Muslim sometime. We wish they would make clear distinction between Muslims and Islamists every time they talk about Islamists. Unfortunately, they don’t. Does it hurt the dialogue? Yes. Does it merit getting rid of them? Absolutely no. They bring so much to the table in terms of constructive criticism of Islam that some of their little diatribes that we could do without are not that important. Ideally, we’d love to have all of our supporters to agree with us 100% of the time, but that is highly unlikely.
“Could you point us at a couple of actual Muslim scholars who have contributed to your site?”
We had some postings by Ghazal Omid (http://ghazalomid.com/, her articles are posted under Regime Change in Iran), but she disassociated herself from us after we published the Koran http://www.reformislam.org/koran.php. Apparently, even for some moderate Muslims removing evil passages from the Koran is a little too much.
(shriek)
Ya'll commended Pelosi?
Oh ok, because of the Armenian Genocide...
whew! For a minute there I thought you'd lost your collective minds
;)
That's quite a challenge...rewriting the revelation of God without the assistance of any scholars. I'm glad you have "some" assistance from "an" anonymous Iman...that must help.
I'm just trying to imagine what would happen if an anonymous group of self-proclaimed but completely anonymous Christians released a new version of the Bible which they had edited themselves, with "some" help from an anonymous priest, and without the aid of Biblical scholars. I could see that occasioning reactions ranging from amusement to outrage - but I couldn't really see it having any positive impact or credibility at all. Do you see your anonymity, absence of credentials and scholarship, and lack of mandate, as an obstacle at all?
KennewickMusing,
It does not matter where the good idea comes from, left or right. We will always support it.
MAS, I know.
I support the legislation.
It's a personal thing, I can't stand that air headed fool.
Balbulican,
“completely anonymous Christians”
Christians don’t really need to be completely anonymous. No matter how much their coreligionists disagree with them, they are unlikely to suffer physical harm.
“Do you see your anonymity, absence of credentials and scholarship, and lack of mandate, as an obstacle at all?”
Of course we do. How dumb do you think we are? However, due to our risk-utility analysis we concluded that is more practical to remain anonymous at this time. We can change our anonymous status any time we want; the problem is that it cannot be reversed. Too many famous critics of radical Islam had to go into hiding. This is not something that we choose to do at this time.
Gosh. Well, good luck with that. Exaclty what impact do you expect releasing a bowdlerized Koran to have? I'd be worried that it would simply anger people...as would the release of a bowdlerized Bible by anonymous editors. Could you describe the positive impact you expect to achieve here?
Tnanks!
"I'd be worried that it would simply anger people"
I think we're well beyond the worrying about angering people stage.
"Could you describe the positive impact you expect to achieve here?"
Every Islamic religious institution in the West, i.e., mosque, madrassas, military/prison chapel, etc. uses current version of the Koran that contains quite a large amount of vile material that could not have come from God. Since most of the Western Muslim establishment is comprised of radical Muslims, these parts of the Koran are emphasized. If we could provide an alternative and decrease radicalization of Western Muslims even just a little bit, it is better than sitting on our asses doing nothing. BTW, how is that “immediate” request for blog access going?
"BTW, how is that “immediate” request for blog access going?"
Oh, I don't think I need it at this point. I'm getting pretty much what I want without it. Thanks for asking, though.
In terms of rewriting the Koran, then...you don't really have a mandate, you don't really have scholars or clerics helping you out, and you acknowledge you don't really care how angry you're going to make peeople.
So I'll ask again (since you missed the question) - what positive impact do you expect to achieve?
Thanks.
"you don't really have a mandate"
Being a fraud who just got caught red-handed (see update to the article) are you really in a position to even talk about the mandate?
BTW, how's that "quiet backing off of conservative websites" going? We really would like to know what sites they are. Catching you in yet another lie would be fun, wouldn’t it?
"BTW, how's that "quiet backing off of conservative websites" going??"
Going pretty good, thanks. Marsilio from the Politic commended you (without having been to your site, I guess), then dropped out of the thread after several folks pointed him to the Stageleft thread. Your obsecenities have alienated Mike Brock: and Rootleweb now links to our article. I'm quite pleased.
Balbulican,
How dumb are you? Besides the fact that we have no idea who "Marsilio from the Politic" is, I guess someone from MASH must have commented on that blog, 'backing off', at least for normal people, would mean withdrawing previously manifested support. There are some conservative website that claim that we a Gihadi conspiracy based on the notion that no Muslim can be trusted, but we never had any support from them to begin with. This makes your last comment as transparently disingenuous as the rest of your demagoguery.
"rootleweb now links to our article"
Does it? You posted a comment with a link there. God, you're a moron.
Muslims Against Sharia: You left a comment at Right Truth yesterday:
"Debbie, I can't believe you fell for that commie crap! Think about it. Left-wing ideologue blames something he/she doesn't like on Neocons. Read Another "Exposer" of Muslims Against Sharia: http://muslimsagainstsharia.blogspot.com/2008/01/another-exposer-of-muslims-against.html"
First, you know that I support your organization and your efforts. The post where you left the above comment, was simply an excerpt to an article that someone had send me, with a link back to the original site so folks could go read it. I don't understand why you were upset at me.
Second, my husband had a heart attack Thursday and I simply threw up a couple of articles and links for people to go read, no comments or opinion from me on them.
I have no idea why you were upset. I'm at the hospital and regular posting at Right Truth should begin Monday afternoon/evening.
Debbie Hamilton
Right Truth
Debbie,
First, we wish your husband speedy and complete recovery.
Second, distant second, the poster must have been thrown off by Rosemary's reaction who DID buy that crap. We apologize for misunderstanding.
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