this is a bad title Islamaphobia and criticisms of Islam

Islam would be better but then its not categorized correctly and wouldnt there already be something in the religion area?

I'm not really caught up on all of this yet, but just FWIW, re: "support for Sharia", I think you ought to take into account that "support for Sharia" is fairly ill-defined as a proxy for other more specific beliefs. See for example this comment from the director of international survey research at Pew, about the interpretation of this particular survey question:

Or, basically, I think Zogby's comment is about right:

Basically this note is just to repeat what luckbox said:

Of course, that said, honor killings are bad, and there's plenty of room for criticism of various bits of law and culture in various Islamic countries without being Islamaphobic. But criticism can veer into something more bigoted when people over-generalize.

And yes, to answer one of your other points, sometimes people also fail to treat Christians with enough nuance too.

On that, I think to some extent people dial in their sensitivity to bigotry based on perceptions of the dangers related to prejudice, which are contextual. I think many western liberals doubt that their prejudices against Christians are likely to lead to much in the way of negative consequences for Christians, and they're probably right on that score. They also feel like they're criticizing "from the inside", as it were, because Christianity is a major part of their culture, and many of them are former Christians (this understanding could of course also be applied to criticisms of Islam from former Muslims...).

But, as we've seen (for example in the wake of 9/11) anti-Muslim prejudice can have pretty severe consequences for people (some of whom aren't even Muslims!) in western countries in a way that just isn't true right now for Christians.

Note that I don't think these factors excuse all anti-Christian attitudes among liberals regardless of how stridently they are expressed. I think people should be more careful in general about painting with too broad a brush, whether they are talking about Jews, Muslims, Christians, or even Republicans. But it does explain why someone might legitimately be less concerned about anti-Christian sentiment than they are about anti-Muslim sentiment, I think.

New York just passed a law saying Orthodox Jews can no longer appeal to the Old Testament to avoid getting their children vaccinated. It seems in this instance that it is ok being critical, and even passing legislation overriding, a religious based belief for the common good.

You seem to be making some sort of utilitarian based argument, that we shouldn't be critical of Islam (independent of how bad some ideas are) because too many people would get upset and it would upset the apple cart too much. Which is fine I guess, as long as you are admitting that is what is going on.

I was contemplating a thread on the RFRA a while back and didn't get around to it. Re: "appeals to the Bible to avoid having children vaccinated"

It could still probably be its own thread. Cliffs: I think RFRA is sort of fundamentally incoherent, but maybe it's not exactly the worst in practice? I dunno.

By far the most viral moment in Maher's history of real time is the clip with Harris and Affleck. The numbers don't lie

There is extensive polling data on a list of beliefs coming from muslim majority countries. It's broken down by country. These differences in culture aren't slight and its not just a mere uptick. There is a very wide gap. Many of the cultural differences can be directly linked to text in holy book. Like throwing people off a roof is a very specific action. Same with stoning etc. When Maher and Harris showed the stones it takes to actually have a real conversation in this climate, Affleck perfectly represented the current state of leftism. His idiotic squealing, contorted face, and ignorance wrapped in a hostile righteous disdain for those standing up for liberal principles with accusations of "racism" (pssst its a religion ben) and blind defense of the "marginalized". The illiberal left. The stupidity affleck displayed has softened slightly in a place like 2p2 but still both here and the real world the fact remains that standing up for liberal values gets a mouth frothing mob of leftists hurling epithets at you if you are not on the side of the "oppressed" identity

I think another way to describe what kelhuss is suggesting is that the current state of mainstream leftism on this forum and on display through the dem's and their friends in MSM is a very basic and core human traits that can become pathological. You can sum up the lefts position on this forum and elsewhere 95% + of the time by lumping everyone in to a group identity and then rank ordering their perceived level of oppression (group level). Those "marginalized" group identities are then used as a weapon and a shield. It's become so obvious and effective that the right is slowly reacting with similar tactics. For example the right elevates candace owen to argue their exact same pov because she is doing so with dark skin

You would literally need zero details on Israel conflict and history to sort out basic left vs right divide. You could skim half a wiki page and realize Israel is more modern and affluent and know where the left will side. The same principle can be applied to their overt racial discrimination at places like harvard. The left really cares about racism, well not really, just the right kind of racism. Oppressor vs oppressed racism. When Sarah Jeong gets hired as an editor at the NYT (as mainstream as it gets) nobody on the left cares that she had a couple hundred racist and sexist tweets. She was racist towards the right people, the vast majority of the left either yawned or defended her. Even the clowns over at vox tried to wokesplain how acceptable her behavior was. IIRC this lead to the intellectual flyweight just deleting his twitter account. Fortunately he's back to explain to everyone that math is a social construct

Just a comment from skimming through the past couple pages. Some of you seriously need to get away from the computer and especially from politics for at least a week. Take a time out. Maybe all of this rabid posting seems clever while you're in the moment but if you were to take a step back and a deep breathe you might get some perspective. There's a few posters itt that come off like they have a genuinely unhealthy relationship with the news cycle

The problem with Harris is that he knows full well that there are reams of apologetics for the equally insidious verses of the Bible. I'm yet to hear him go into any Islamic apologetics regarding any of the scripture he dislikes. Maybe he has though, I don't know or care that much what he has to say. Either way, given that you've got America sitting there, with its texts about slavery and stoning adulterers, and without slavery or public stonings, one might be led to suspect that there are other factors than his literal interpretation of the offensive verses.

And if one spends the bulk one's time talking about the inherent dangers of Islam and dismissing whatever other factors one might be able to identify, others might think one is a bit of a wazzock.

Four word sentences better? I'll make it simple. Those numbers are conservative. Not everyone admits intolerance.

Well named put it nicely in the post above - it's not a case of people getting upset, it's a case of people being actively harmed due to prejudice that results from the overly broad characterisation of Islam.

There is an element of utilitarianism about it though, that essentially boils down to whether beliefs result in harmful actions (actual harm, not just people being upset). As such I have no issue with the law prohibiting an appeal to the Old Testament being used to prevent children being vaccinated and am also in favour of laws against appealing to religion in defence of FGM (although this is actually more of a cultural than religious thing, it's just the first thing that came to mind because it was discussed earlier).

There are a lot of reasons but in the context of Islam he makes lots of broad-brush attacks that resonate with bigots.

This doesn't sound like you are arguing he is an Islamophobe. Maybe you don't think he is?

This is the first time I've ever seen the term "Christianity" associated with a phobia or -ism.

The post that I quoted in that very post that contained the term wasn't the first?

The polls don’t indicate anyone doing anything to anyone. So it does not make sense to calculate how much danger in terms of numbers those supposed Muslims propose since just answering a poll isn’t an indication of danger. It does suit stereotypes and preconceived notions of association with inhumanity to draw dangers from such information and then argue with association. Breaking news- humans can be faulty.

It doesn't seem like this is really a rationale to label someone as Islamophobic (bigoted) or not. It seems it is an argument that certain speech (even if possibly correct) should not be permitted because the perceived real world consequences are too high.

I mean, looking back we all think Martin Luther was a pretty important, positive historical figure in liberalizing Christianity, and allowing the conditions for progress in the Western World. But at the time I am sure he could have been criticized using the logical framework you and WN laid out.

I mean, taking it to the extreme you could make the same case against Jesus Christ.

It seems only in hindsight can we determine who was a heretic who should be silenced because his ideas are too harmful, and who is a revolutionary visionary who changed the world for the better.

The point is, there is a lot criticism about Christians. However, not much discussion on if there is Chistianphobia. I do not think there should be much, if any discussion about Chirstianphobia, as it would be a cop out against criticisms of Christianity. This hold does not hold true for islamabhobia, for many on the left.

Like if I said Islam is not compatible with western liberal (not political) ideals, I'd have to defend against claims of islamaphobia. With that said, western liberal ideals include secularism, and Christianity is fairly secular, while Islam is anything but.

Conversations the woke left don't want to have. How many years ago did Harris and Maher get shouted down for explaining the liberals are eventually going to have to stand up for liberalism?

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-birmingham-47910695
https://edition.cnn.com/2016/04/11/e...vey/index.html

Meanwhile in Portland (below) Canada, and the UK they have drag queen story time. The left can't deal with it's own values because it's basically oppression narratives that've taken over at this point

It’s a shame the actual classical liberals didn’t have podcasts because a lot of them had some interesting things to say about Islam and religious pluralism.

Ironically it came about in my life not too long ago that I had a person tell me unsolicited that he liked Bill Maher--my liberal deplorable uncle. He hates Trump, thinks Reagan and Clinton were good presidents, watches MSNBC.
So that might be the Maher demographic and it just isn't represented on 2p2.

Again, criticising ideas is completely fine. What isn't fine is broad brush criticism of a religion of a whole when that criticism is not valid for large swathes of people.

Regarding MLK and JC, I don't have the same qualms for advocacy for change from within - criticism of a religion by a leader from within the religion is far less likely to result in prejudice against the religion as a whole, since it's clear to anyone hearing it that the issue being discussed isn't a universal belief among adherents. When people see the broad brush criticisms from people like Maher and others in the public space it's much more likely that people assume it applies to all adherents of the religion and is therefore more likely to result in prejudice.

Have you tried explaining to Ilhan Omar that she should resign from Congress, as her beliefs are incompatible with Western democracy?

Comparing Bill Maher to Jesus Christ is probably taking things a little too far. But I think the point is the Western left working in concert with the greater Muslim community to quickly condemn anyone who challenges the orthodoxy of Islam today as bigots, even when their motives clearly are not bigotry, seems like a bad idea.

And utilitarian based arguments that such harsh condemnation should be practiced for the common good seem like it could be weaponized very easily to stifle any attempt at meaningful progress, especially from within.

Sam Harris himself often brings up the case of two of his friends, Maajid Nawaz (a former extremist turned Muslim reformer) and Ayaan Hirshi Ali (an feminist activist apostate) as 2 examples of critics of Islamic orthodoxy who have been widely vilified by the Muslim world and Western left as Islamophobes for their efforts.

In fact, I doubt you could name a single recent Islamic apostate who isn't widely vilified by the left. I imagine even Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses (and the man himself) would be widely condemned as Islamophobic by the left if they had come out in contemporary times.

For all I know, he is vilified by the left of today. Trolly, Fly and Tom, thoughts on Salman Rushdie? (I am naming these three out, because I am giving them credit enough for probably being educated enough to even know who he is)

See, here is the real issue. When someone says Islam, folks like Mr. Wookie, Fly, et al hear "Muslims", and they come running hard and fast with their righteous indignation.

What if I told you that the Muslims in the US are just as secular as Christians? Or that Muslims in the US are more likely to be concerned about extremism in the name of Islam than the general public? Because both of those are shown to be true based on polling data.

People are more likely to call out people for criticising Islam than they would similar criticisms about Christianity because people aren't discriminated against for being (or looking) Christian in the US. That means that public criticism of the religion isn't likely to cause undue harm to Christians. Conversely Muslims are heavily discriminated against already and further criticism is likely to proliferate that problem.

When someone says Islam, folks like Mr. Wookie, Fly, Willd et al hear "Muslims".

He was talking about Martin Luther, not Martin Luther King