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The views of a Secular Humanist and Muslim
14 years ago
General
I will preface this by saying I am no great fan of apologetics as a way to try and convert people into any specific belief. I don’t even think apologetics are valuable to faith, if faith is exactly that. You can either put belief in something unknown or you can not and no amount of convincing to or from said faith would be effective if it is actual faith. My point in this is not to argue that I’m right, I’m human and imperfect, as all humans are. Nor is it to try and convert people to my way of thought. Everyone should be free to believe and to an extent act as they think is a benefit to society.
I was an atheist for 6 years, and over all I had a great time. I love thinking about things both critically and philosophically, be they religions or science or art. I value my ability to use my brain to form opinions, even if as a human, my opinions, like most others, can be biased. Why did I stop being an atheist? For one, I found a large amount of hypocrisy among some atheists, that is not saying that hypocrisy is not found in any system of belief or disbelief. However this bit of hypocrisy shocked me as someone who had assumed all atheists were like me at the time and would be able to look critically not only at the beliefs of others but at their own beliefs. Instead what I found were threads and videos by some expounding support for socially inept and bigoted individuals on the basis that they were also atheists. In my mind it is extremely hard to truly be a critical thinker if you are unable to be critical of your own views.
My main stay beliefs as an atheist revolved around secular humanism and shockingly still do despite my conversion to Islam. I know it is easy for some to assume that a Muslim must support things like theocracies based solely on the fact that many middle east countries are just that. I do not support theocracy from any religion. I believe that limiting the free will of people to choose or not to choose to have religion in their lives is not only wrong but is not a display of what faith is, If one if forced by a governing body into faith then that person’s faith is not based on their actual beliefs and is thus not faith at all.
I write this in hopes of dissuading some who would assume that based on a specific book I read that I am some how unable to form my own opinions on matters and am simply blindly following what is set down in front of me instead of using the brain I feel I am blessed to have to try and come to conclusions that are both socially responsible and ethical for everyone. And I believe that choosing equality for all is rational and just.
I’ve come under fire for my beliefs from secularists and Muslims alike. Some Muslims believe that equality should be based on gender roles and I cannot as person who thinks women should be free to do what they want with themselves as long as it does not harm others, fully accept this rational that all men are A. and all women are B. To me in it’s essence this kind of argument is bigoted to both genders. At the same time I have come under some fire for my recent choice to wear hijab (a form of modest dress based in Islam) buy secularists. This too is at it’s root wrong to me. My clothes do not harm anyone around me, they make me feel closer to god and that to me is all my hijab is about. I’ve had people tell me that I am obviously an oppressed woman for wanting to be modest in a world where growing up I always felt pressured to look this way, that you never saw fat people on tv unless it was a comedy, that those who did not fit into a size 6 were fundamentally irresponsible and greedy. The fact that some would want to limit my dress to not include a scarf is to me as sexist and bigoted as the Saudi government’s limiting women to wearing a scarf. There is a healthy middle ground that I feel some people choose to over look on the basis of their own belief in what is right.
Moderation is key in my mind to health in all parts of the human psyche, and in my case this involves moderate use of religion for my own emotional fulfilment. Now one could say that using religion this way is using it as a crutch, my answer to that is that sometimes people need crutches, we are emotional and ego driven by nature and if such belief can aid in a semblance of rationality and thus aid an individual to be happier it in the end can aid all of society. This however only works in moderation.
One should also note that secular society to be fair and just to all, should never limit a person for belief in a deity(s) that is benign in their practices.
I was an atheist for 6 years, and over all I had a great time. I love thinking about things both critically and philosophically, be they religions or science or art. I value my ability to use my brain to form opinions, even if as a human, my opinions, like most others, can be biased. Why did I stop being an atheist? For one, I found a large amount of hypocrisy among some atheists, that is not saying that hypocrisy is not found in any system of belief or disbelief. However this bit of hypocrisy shocked me as someone who had assumed all atheists were like me at the time and would be able to look critically not only at the beliefs of others but at their own beliefs. Instead what I found were threads and videos by some expounding support for socially inept and bigoted individuals on the basis that they were also atheists. In my mind it is extremely hard to truly be a critical thinker if you are unable to be critical of your own views.
My main stay beliefs as an atheist revolved around secular humanism and shockingly still do despite my conversion to Islam. I know it is easy for some to assume that a Muslim must support things like theocracies based solely on the fact that many middle east countries are just that. I do not support theocracy from any religion. I believe that limiting the free will of people to choose or not to choose to have religion in their lives is not only wrong but is not a display of what faith is, If one if forced by a governing body into faith then that person’s faith is not based on their actual beliefs and is thus not faith at all.
I write this in hopes of dissuading some who would assume that based on a specific book I read that I am some how unable to form my own opinions on matters and am simply blindly following what is set down in front of me instead of using the brain I feel I am blessed to have to try and come to conclusions that are both socially responsible and ethical for everyone. And I believe that choosing equality for all is rational and just.
I’ve come under fire for my beliefs from secularists and Muslims alike. Some Muslims believe that equality should be based on gender roles and I cannot as person who thinks women should be free to do what they want with themselves as long as it does not harm others, fully accept this rational that all men are A. and all women are B. To me in it’s essence this kind of argument is bigoted to both genders. At the same time I have come under some fire for my recent choice to wear hijab (a form of modest dress based in Islam) buy secularists. This too is at it’s root wrong to me. My clothes do not harm anyone around me, they make me feel closer to god and that to me is all my hijab is about. I’ve had people tell me that I am obviously an oppressed woman for wanting to be modest in a world where growing up I always felt pressured to look this way, that you never saw fat people on tv unless it was a comedy, that those who did not fit into a size 6 were fundamentally irresponsible and greedy. The fact that some would want to limit my dress to not include a scarf is to me as sexist and bigoted as the Saudi government’s limiting women to wearing a scarf. There is a healthy middle ground that I feel some people choose to over look on the basis of their own belief in what is right.
Moderation is key in my mind to health in all parts of the human psyche, and in my case this involves moderate use of religion for my own emotional fulfilment. Now one could say that using religion this way is using it as a crutch, my answer to that is that sometimes people need crutches, we are emotional and ego driven by nature and if such belief can aid in a semblance of rationality and thus aid an individual to be happier it in the end can aid all of society. This however only works in moderation.
One should also note that secular society to be fair and just to all, should never limit a person for belief in a deity(s) that is benign in their practices.
(I avoid using the term "humanist" here because it has various definitions, some of which are applicable to myself and some of which are not. So there's that. But at least in a broad sense I am indeed a humanist. And a link, just for giggles: )
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humani.....Medieval_Islam