> Freedom of Thought, Speech and Action? Not really.

[Qatada]

Let's gather the arguments as to why there's no real freedom, even in western societies. Something which they claim to aspire to.

[Qatada]

asalam alaikum



It should consist of;

Freedom of Thought

Freedom of Speech

Freedom of Action



But does it?


Freedom of Thought

Do we even have freedom of thought? To simply dislike homosexuality makes you a homophobe. If someone detests this, they are not granted visa to a country, like the UK. In Germany, people are shown videos of homosexual couples, and they have to keep watching them in order to be fit enough for a Visa there.

Now, this means you can't get into a country (or stay there permanently) - unless your mindset fits with their designed paradigm for you. If you don't accept that mindset, they won't let you in their 'free' country.


Is this really freedom of thought which the west is aspring to? Or is this dictating and forcing your beliefs on others?



Freedom of Speech?

Just yesterday on the headlines a Roman Catholic British Bishop is subject to punishment in Germany for denying the Holocaust on Swedish television.

source; http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukp...6tHfWfiBVG07JQ


Whether it happened or not is a totally different issue, but if freedom of speech is the trend these days, then why is the poor guy liable to punishment for just expressing his opinion? Is this really freedom? If you took his view, you would also be liable to punishment.



Freedom of Action?

There's so many laws which make certain things forbidden, and certain things permissible. And within the span of a few years, the thing which was forbidden is now allowed and the other which wasn't allowed is now forbidden.

Someone may argue that people voted for this to be the case, but that isn't necessarily so. Take the example of cannabis, to take it will only affect the user. So why shouldn't the user have the choice to take it without fearing the police? Especially since its something that he is doing to his ownself, his own self-professed freedom. So why should he suffer legal consequences?

If he does - then that is limitations to freedom of action.



If all these freedoms are restricted, you don't really live in a free society.

[Qatada]

asalam alaikum


Summary

You will realise that all these laws created by the state actually prevent a great deal of freedom. So there are restrictions in your freedom of speech while you might live in the state which boasts about freedom of speech.

The state makes you believe you have this freedom by showing you videos of poor countries where they don't have these rights. But these have always been Islamic values since it was first revealed (and this is what we are arguing in favour of).

You have freedom to do what you want, but laws are placed as restrictions so people don't go past the limit to cause harm to others and to give others their rights. This is the exact same case in Islam.

[Qatada]

Freedom of Religion & The Death Penalty?

Many people criticize Islamic law for punishing the apostate from the religion with the death penalty. They argue that this is not freedom to practise a religion you desire.

According to the USA, a person is allowed to follow whatever religion you choose, and switch to another religion at any time - without any consequences from the government.


Does this mean that USA has given more rights to the individual than Islam has?

Not really. Why? Because The US, or UK don't punish for rejecting God because their system of secularism isn't based on the foundation belief in One God. Rather, its about believing their secularism or democracy is superior over other forms of beliefs. They will punish people (in many cases with the Death Penalty for this treason), and they will even punish other nations for rejecting democracy as the superior ideology.

So why then can't Muslims - whose basis and foundation is the Tawheed [Oneness] of Allah, have punishments for someone who willingly rejected Islam (hence disloyalty to the Muslims as a whole), based on their own methodologies? If Muslims believe that disloyalty to Allah, and the believers is treason - then why can't they punish for it in their own way?



Now someone may go ahead and say that a Muslim leaving his religion is not disloyalty to his people.

But by apostating, this person has left his people and disunited them, and most likely even caused corruption amongst the people. The significance of this is that it could make others doubt Islam, as was done by the hypocrites - purposelly - during the life of Allah's Messenger.


So Allah revealed the verse;

A section of the People of the Book say: "Believe in the morning what is revealed to the believers, but reject it at the end of the day; perchance they may (themselves) Turn back;

[Quran 3:72]

Ibn Kathir comments on this verse and mentions;

This is a wicked plan from the People of the Book (Christians and Jews) to deceive Muslims who are weak in the religion. They decided that they would pretend to be believers in the beginning of the day, by attending the dawn prayer with the Muslims. However, when the day ended, they would revert to their old religion so that the ignorant people would say, "They reverted to their old religion because they uncovered some shortcomings in the Islamic religion.'' This is why they said next.


[لَعَلَّهُمْ يَرْجِعُونَ]


(so that they may turn back.) Ibn Abi Najih said that Mujahid commented about this Ayah, which refers to the Jews, "They attended the dawn prayer with the Prophet and disbelieved in the end of the day in order to misguide the people. This way, people would think that they have uncovered shortcomings in the religion that they briefly followed.''


Tafsir.com Tafsir Ibn Kathir



Now imagine in the USA, someone came and tried to cause disorder amongst the people. Saying to them that we should leave our loyalty to the state, and make our own form of loyalty superior.

What would happen? The media would be after that community, arguing that they are not loyal to the state, and anyone caught promoting their ideology over the ideology of secularism and democracy, they would be - imprisoned right? [This is what alot of Muslims are being accused of.] If they persisted in this - they would most likely get literal life imprisonment (which is synonymous to death because you can't meet anyone you love, and don't have freedom in life), or the actual death penalty.


If you are not arguing against this, then you are infact in favour of it. Do you find it okay for someone to be punished with life imprisonment, or death - if they are trying to overthrow your values?

Then don't be surprised if Islam does the same for the protection of its people.





A Judge Applies the Law, not the Local Guy in the street


an Islamic judge, in an Islamic state will apply the Islamic law for that apostasy.


The person by leaving Islam has 3 days, within which any of his doubts can be cleared. The whole reason he left Islam is because something didn't convince him or he was in doubt. Its about anything he has doubts about which can be clarified. And the scholars and people who excel in different secular fields (i.e. scientists etc.) should help him as much as they possibly can in this.



Hiding disbelief [=disallegiance] in the heart is not punishable in this life unless accompanied with action

If someone was to argue that having loyalty to another state or regime [opposing democracy] in your heart/mind is not punishable, then this is also the case in islam.

Someone who apostates and hides their disbelief in their heart or even in private, will not be killed according to Islamic law. He'll simply be a hypocrite.

Whereas according to other regimes; The only way someone can avoid being punished after being convicted is to PROVE that he has left his allegiance to the other regime, and he will most likely be blackmailed to do something in order to deny any form of allegiance to his previous belief. Compare this to Islam, where once someone has his doubts cleared - if he says the shahadah [declaration of faith], we accept his belief as being Muslim on the spot, and we can't doubt his Islam, even if he is a hypocrite [someone who claims to believe but is infact a disbeliever] in his heart after this. Unless he does something which proves disloyalty, such as fighting against the Muslim state etc.

[al-boriqee]

Im glad you started this thread akhee Qataadah as this realm of discussion needs to be exposed for what it is and inshallah I will contribute to some information on this absolute scandal and utter hypocrisy of west polemics.

Here is one of the best talks on the subject given by Yasir Qadhi which is profoundly beneficial to the western audience and gives a perspective that according to my opinion is uncharted among muslims, at least not in the articulate manner he delivered the academic response to the topic, along with continually making the average islamaphobe fume in anger.

YouTube- Defending the Prophet Against Orientalist Critique - Pt. 1 of 2 - Yasir Qadhi

YouTube- Defending the Prophet Against Orientalist Critique - Pt. 1 of 2 - Yasir Qadhi

inshallah, yall would like it

[salman]

boxer and silver, let us keep in mind that the purpose of this thread is not to start a on-going discussion with kuffaar on this topic rather the prupose of this thread is to gather some arguments and responses to help Muslims in their discussions with non-Muslims to prove the fact that the big words you speak of have no absolute definition and implication even by your own standards. thank you

on topic

akhee Qatada, jazak Allah khayr for starting this thread - the kuffaar's whole ideology and methodology is based upon this whole concept. it would be also better if you link to few other threads we had on this subject.

[salamfromrom]

a bit of humor :P

Salam

[salman]

please do not make these posts here; this is only dedicated to Muslim responses and comments. I already moved the discussion posts to other thread and made it clear the last time.

The discussion thread can be found at: Discussion on Freedom of Thought, Speech and Action