#leavingislam

[whyileftislam]

[aimforbone]

[the-secret-apostate-blog]

The Sacrifice

Year 1997 – 1998

Before coming to the UK, my family lived in the UAE. Before that, we lived in Pakistan where I was born. Eid in Pakistan was always a big deal. I actually used to look forward to it. It was food, new clothes, money for the kids and most importantly a time where the family would come around. We had moved from Rawalpindi back to my birth town of Sargodha in the province of Punjab. This is where some of my father’s family lived. We would sometimes go and visit my mum’s parents for Eid however this year we were staying home. A few weeks before the “Big Eid” (Eid ul Adha) my dad brought home the best present I could ever want. A couple of goats! It’s shocking how much joy an animal can bring to a child. We had no other pets but my mum had a Partridge in a cage at home. There was a ridiculous claim that they brought “good luck” to a household due to their bird song translating into “Glory to your Nature God” or something like that. But aside from this poor little bird in a small cage in the house, we didn’t have anything else.

My dad brought the goats and he told me that one of them was mine. I was over the moon. I spent the next few weeks taking the goat for walks, constantly stroking it, making sure it had water and also gave it some of my toys to play with as it was tied up in the back of the house. We would go every day to buy fresh hay. It should be noted at this point that the only thing both my parents told me about this goat was that it was mine and it was for Eid.

I woke up on Eid day and wore my new clothes to go to the Mosque with my dad and brother for the morning prayer. Each year, we would sit down in a local park where the massive Eid Prayer was held. It was only men of course and before the prayer there was the customary sermon. Eid ul Adha is the 2nd Eid that Muslims celebrate. It takes place after the Hajj (Pilgrimage in Mecca). It honours the willingness of Ibrahim (Abraham) to sacrifice his son as an act of obedience to God’s command. Before Abraham sacrificed his son, God provided a male goat to sacrifice instead. In commemoration of this, an animal is sacrificed and divided into three parts: one third of the share is given to the poor and needy; another third is given to relatives, friends and neighbours; and the remaining third is retained by the family. I was very much aware of this however being around 8 years old, I didn’t think I was prepared for what happened after we returned from the morning prayers.

We were greeted by my mum who gave us some desert (it is custom to eat something sweet after you return from Eid Prayers), and we all proceeded to have breakfast. After a while the doorbell rang and my dad went to open it, I walked outside into the front of the house and saw a butcher sharpening his knives. There was a large cutting board made from what could only be described as a tree trunk and soon, my dad came over and said that this is for the Qurbani (Sacrifice). We never really had a Qurbani in the house before, all I knew about it was that we got some meat sent over from a butchers but this time it was happening in the house as opposed to a somewhere else. Being that young, I didn’t realise what was happening until my dad went and brought my goat from the back of the house towards the butcher. There was an immense feeling of dread and the realization that my goat was going to be slaughtered. Without a thought, tears started coming out of my eyes, I didn’t know what to do, I was frozen, and my dad told me that we have to slaughter to the goat for God. “That’s fine! But not my goat!” I shouted. In Pakistan, there really aren’t any animal rights laws, even if there were, they don’t apply to animals that are to be sacrificed. It wasn’t until they lied the goat on the ground and began to tie its legs when I lost my temper. I remember screaming at the butcher, and called him a dog. I ran towards my Goat and my mum grabbed me and sent me upstairs.

I ran upstairs and proceeded to the balcony where I could see what was happening. The goat was bleating. It sounded like a person screaming for help. I remember that so vividly. I was livid and the tears wouldn’t stop rolling down. They had tied its legs, and the butcher proceeded with taking the knife towards the goat’s neck. In order to make an animal slaughter halal, a short prayer is said just before it is killed. I heard the butcher say it as he used the knife to cut the neck. I don’t think it was something I should have been allowed to see, but the entire family was gathered on the balcony. My mum, my dad’s sisters, their daughter and my brothers. It was a spectacle at the cost of what could only be described as suffering. Dad’s sister tried to console me but I screamed my lungs out as I watched my pet being killed. It was struggling as its life was drained away in a huge pool of blood. Muslims will lead you to believe that halal is the best way to kill an animal as it is quick and painless. There wasn’t anything even remotely quick or painless about what I was looking at. It was inhumane. It was at this time the rope on the goats leg became lose and it tried to get up as its partially decapitated head swivelled. The butcher pushed it and it fell back. They held its legs, until the last bit of life escaped from it.

I cried all day and refused to talk or see anyone. I didn’t eat anything all day and in the evening my dad brought over some rice. He told me that I need to eat and the whole point of a Qurbani is that we sacrifice something we love for God. He told me that all the animals which were slaughtered today go to heaven and it’s our Muslim duty and an obligation from God. All I knew was that the story of Abraham sacrificing his son in obligation to God was to test his willingness to do so. Just as he was about to do it, a goat was brought in its place on the command of God. So in the end, he didn’t sacrifice what he loved. But today, I lost a beloved pet… and I knew that nothing was sent by God to replace her.

[exmuslimladies]

Why do I need to call myself an ex-muslim?

There are two parallel roads Muslims usually take when the horrendous topic of ex-muslims comes up

“You don’t like islam? Fine whatever, that’s your life, but why do you have to make such a big deal out of it?”

and

“How can you even call yourself an ex-muslim. There’s no such thing as an ex-muslim, you were never muslim to begin with”

Well let me break it down for you

I choose to call myself an ex-Muslim because leaving a system of living that is culturally, morally, and socially drenched with Islam is fucking difficult.

I choose to call myself an ex-muslim because -for many people- I don’t seem to exist. My reasoning for leaving and experiences are apparently invalid, and that my very personhood is negotiated as soon as it becomes apparent that I don’t share the beliefs of mainstream muslims.

I need to call myself an ex-muslim to make it clear that someone who is born into islam can leave islam, that someone born into a muslim family doesn’t have to conform to so called family values.

And most importantly, I call myself an ex muslim because i want to represent the opportuity for a meaningful life after leaving a system of thought that convinced me for so many years that everything unrelated to a specific definition of allah is meaningless.

[the-nu-vibe-blog]

Just created this video which talks about #Jesus and the #ProphetMuhammad. It’s in the section called “talking and that” which is under the heading “love Series”. 🤗💙 . . . . #religion #leavingislam #mehdi #messenger #lastmessenger #lastprophet #truth #freedom #thetruthshallsetyoufree #yourtime #itsnow #welcome #NuVibe

[nogodinvolvedsblog]

"As the world celebrates multiple successes with vaccines from several companies, I see some of our friends suggesting Islam takes credit for having two Turkish born scientists who are promoted as Muslims.But if you go and check the big Dawah pages on Facebook and Instagram, they have been mostly quiet, why? Not because they are not usually hypocrites to take credit for many things, no. Because there is a Muslim WOMAN here!! How can they bridge this with their faith that says women are half brain, half logic, and half witness.Narrated Abu Said Al-Khudri: The Prophet said, "Isn't the witness of a woman equal to half of that of a man?" The women said, "Yes." He said, "This is because of the deficiency of a woman's mind."(Sahih Bukhari 3:48:826)Worse more, neither of those scientists showing any Islamic inclinations.She is not vailed and he has no bearded. Neither starts with "Salam Alykum" or wear Islamic symbols. They represent the integration that these Dawah and their hypocrite followers do not want to see. They are worse than if the vaccine was found by infidels.I celebrate their success and the successes of the other vaccines. I see them as evidence of the potential we all have in using science and knowledge.But for my moderate friends who are celebrating them as an example of Islam…stop the BULLSHIT! You are being more hypocrites that the fundamentalist here. Look at them? They only managed to achieve this by fully integration and being part of the Western drive in science and culture. You want more examples of them?? You know what you need to do.We have great potential when we leave the fairytales, like which foot to enter the toilet and how to excuse sky daddy when we fart!! Follow facts and science. More real academic institutions independent of religion and less Madrassas."@arabic_translatedmemesExMuslim #exmuslimMemes #atheist #Atheists #atheisim #leavingIslam

“As the world celebrates multiple successes with vaccines from several companies, I see some of our friends suggesting Islam takes credit for having two Turkish born scientists who are promoted as Muslims.But if you go and check the big Dawah pages on Facebook and Instagram, they have been mostly quiet, why? Not because they are not usually hypocrites to take credit for many things, no. Because there is a Muslim WOMAN here!! How can they bridge this with their faith that says women are half brain, half logic, and half witness.Narrated Abu Said Al-Khudri: The Prophet said, “Isn’t the witness of a woman equal to half of that of a man?” The women said, “Yes.” He said, “This is because of the deficiency of a woman’s mind.”(Sahih Bukhari 3:48:826)Worse more, neither of those scientists showing any Islamic inclinations.She is not vailed and he has no bearded. Neither starts with “Salam Alykum” or wear Islamic symbols. They represent the integration that these Dawah and their hypocrite followers do not want to see. They are worse than if the vaccine was found by infidels.I celebrate their success and the successes of the other vaccines. I see them as evidence of the potential we all have in using science and knowledge.But for my moderate friends who are celebrating them as an example of Islam…stop the BULLSHIT! You are being more hypocrites that the fundamentalist here. Look at them? They only managed to achieve this by fully integration and being part of the Western drive in science and culture. You want more examples of them?? You know what you need to do.We have great potential when we leave the fairytales, like which foot to enter the toilet and how to excuse sky daddy when we fart!! Follow facts and science. More real academic institutions independent of religion and less Madrassas.”@arabic_translatedmemesExMuslim #exmuslimMemes #atheist #Atheists #atheisim #leavingIslam

[exmuslimladies]

There is no God but Chocolate cake

This is why "there is no God but Allah" really means "there are lots of gods but Allah is the special one"

I am trying to convince my friend that I ONLY like chocolate cake with my afternoon tea. Not a Victoria sponge. Not ginger bread. Not cheesecake. I don't like shortbread. I don't like Welsh cakes. I dislike battenberg and I don't dare acknowledge spotted dick.

There is no cake fit for afternoon tea other than chocolate cake. Afternoon tea is so important, in fact, that to consider anything else is to commit an atrocity against chocolate cake.

There is no cake but chocolate cake.

"But" my friend raised an eyebrow "other cakes are enjoyed very much. Some people enjoy cheesecake. Some people enjoy croissants instead. There's definitely at least one person out there confidently ordering spotted dick for afternoon tea"

"NO" I screech "HOW DARE YOU THERE IS NO CAKE BUT CHOCOLATE CAKE. I'M GOING TO GO AROUND AND SMASH UP ALL THE OTHER TYPES OF CAKE AND GONNA BURN THE RECIPES AND CAMPAIGN TO MAKE IT ILLEGAL TO SELL OTHER CAKES AND WHOEVER ASSOCIATES CAKE WITH AFTERNOON TEA OTHER THAN CHOCOLATE CAKE...."

My friend looked concerned with my obsessive and jealous craze, they could see the fire in my eyes.

Cake I thought There is only one cake. Whoever associates cake with afternoon tea other than chocolate cake...

".... they won't get any fucking supper because I'll put a bullet through their head"

[the-secret-apostate-blog]

The Repulsive worksheet.

Year 2000

We didn’t start school until 7 – 8 months after arriving in the UK. At this time we had moved out of my aunt’s house and into a council flat. My experience of school in UAE and Pakistan had been mostly positive, although the UAE’s education system isn’t the best by any means. I distinctly remember my first day at school in the Emirates or more specifically the Arabic class. The teacher expected me as a new student to be able to read and write something he demanded from the text book. Bearing in mind that I had zero knowledge of how to read Arabic didn’t get in the way of him relentlessly hitting my palms with a plastic stick each time I failed to respond. Growing up I had read the Quran but the Arabic was vastly different as the text didn’t have any of the markings above the alphabets which makes it easier to pronounce words. With that in mind, I was looking forward to attending school in England.

The school was a call “Frizinghall” in Bradford. The students were mostly of a Pakistani background but there were still a few white kids from around the area. The first thing that was abundantly clear was that a lot of the boys in my class or indeed the school, immediately started to mock my accent. I didn’t think there was anything majorly wrong with how I spoke but I suppose this was confirmation that I had a bit of an accent. I should say however at this point that I suffered from horrendous bullying from year 7 all the way up to year 10. It has in many ways shaped a lot about my personality now. I will try however to keep this blog mostly about things which led to me leaving Islam.

It was my 2nd or 3rd week at school. It was THEN where I witnessed something that made my stomach churn. The teacher had asked a girl in my class to hand out some worksheets to the rest of the group while he wrote on the board. She made her way around the class putting down the sheets in front of the kids. I noticed that a few Asian boys she gave the sheet to didn’t take the sheet from her hands but let her put it on the table, after which they would blow on the sheet. I didn’t get it at first but soon realised that they were blowing it as though it was dirty or repulsive, simply because the girl who gave it to them was white.

I felt sick, I had never seen anything like it. The boy sat next to me did the same thing and I asked him why, to which he replied “It’s because “gore” are dirty”. “How do you know she’s dirty?” I asked to which he simply replied “Because they don’t clean themselves properly like us”. I didn’t really attach any religious reasons to it at the time. I just felt that it was plain rude and awful. Retrospectively thinking about it, the logic behind this was probably based on the fallacy of how Muslims take pride in washing themselves with water when they go to the toilet. The religion may command it but it’s arrogant and insulting to even pretend that all Muslims are cleaner than someone who isn’t. All this wasn’t in my mind at that time though, I was more concerned about how the girl must have felt while this was going on.

After the lesson we had a break and I couldn’t help but approach her and ask if she was ok. I don’t know why I did that. I was quite reclusive thanks to the name calling and accent remarks which were thrown at me randomly. “What are you on about?” she said. I told her that I think its shit that the boys did that to you when you gave them the worksheet. “They do it all the time… I don’t give a fuck really” and walked off.

I was too young to really question what happened, or even try to approach the teacher at the time. But for me the time had come to stand alone in the corner once more while everyone else played with their Pokémon cards. I had failed to make a single friend at this time, something that would continue for a while.

[the-secret-apostate-blog]

A new life..

Year 2000

Sitting next to my brother I am now bored of this flight. It’s only an hour or so long, but it’s our second one since we left the UAE. The initial flight into London was via PIA, who for whatever reason always serve the same appalling rice and curry as their in-flight “meal”. This flight is with British Midlands and the flight attendant asks us if we would like a sandwich. I pick out the one which looks the most exotic to me. At 11 years old, and only having ever lived in Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates, I didn’t quite know what “Ham and cheese” really meant. All I knew was that it was enough to prompt my dad to get up and take the sandwich out of my hands and give it back to the attendant. I settled for egg and cress which was still considerably better than the stale rice and wallpaper paste from the Pakistan International Airways flight.

I remember asking my dad why he took it away, and his response was simply that it was “Haram” (forbidden). I looked over at the other passengers eating their exotic sandwiches and thinking to myself about how bad it was. How can they eat haram food? I had this irrational repulsion all of a sudden. It was my first exposure to food that can be classified as forbidden. People only ate food… food which was by default halal (permissible) everywhere I had lived before. Confused I returned back to thinking why does it take so long to get from Dubai to London and then from London to Manchester.

We landed in shortly, and as we collected our bags, my parents accompanied by me and my two brothers proceeded towards the exit where my Uncle (Mums sister’s husband) was waiting for us. We drove on the dreary motorway to the city of Bradford. Needless to say it was a step down, however I was excited to meet my cousins and family who we hadn’t seen in several years. I remember arriving at their home and realising how small the houses were but it didn’t matter. We played video games and found out that we would be staying at my auntie’s house for longer than I expected. It occurred to me quite soon that this dreary town, away from the glitz of the UAE and the craziness of Pakistan was my new home. But I was with my family who I hadn’t seen for years and I was looking forward to it.

[the-secret-apostate-blog]

The Haram Crisps

Year 2000

We’ve been in the UK for several weeks now. Needless to say the novelty of it had worn off. During the day my cousins would go to school and me and my brothers would sneak in a few games on the PlayStation knowing full well that our hosts didn’t like it. They had a reasonably big family, my aunt, uncle and 6 kids. Now that we had moved in, a total of 11 people in a terraced house, made things claustrophobic. Most of the time, there wasn’t much to do. My father insisted that we took this time (while we were unable to go to school due to our asylum application) and read school books left by our cousins and from the library. However the PlayStation was a much more appealing prospect.

One day, bored of the endless hours on Crash Bandicoot, I asked my mum for some money so I could go to the shop. So with £1 in my pocket I walked to the corner shop. I picked up some penny sweets, and a packet of crisps. As I did so, a white gentleman made a quick quip saying “oh those are my favourite”. I smiled, and proceeded to the till which was manned by an Asian shopkeeper. I distinctly remember him asking me if I was sure I wanted those crisps. I didn’t understand the question really, I nodded and paid him. It should be noted at this time that he didn’t tell me why I wouldn’t want those crisps. He assumed that I was making a “well informed decision” I suppose. I walked outside and opened my crisp packet and ate a few. At this point I saw two of my cousins walking back from school. They saw me and ran to catch up so we could walk up together. They were accompanied by their friend “Hubba” whose real name I still don’t know. He was the street “bad boy” or at least his older brother had some reputation for being a prick, which he seemed to have leeched off. In either case Hubba looked at me and said “Why the fuck are you eating those?”. My cousin said “That’s bacon man!” It wasn’t…. it was bacon flavour however I didn’t know what it was but was soon told it came from pigs. I remember feeling stupidly embarrassed and ashamed. “Please don’t tell anyone I pleaded”. Eating something haram is a big thing in Islam, and the word is not only used to define un permissible food, but also drinking, gambling and sex before marriage amongst other things. My father had not really elaborated on why I couldn’t eat the sandwich on the plane, he simply told me it was haram. Now I found myself around other people eating forbidden crisps. I didn’t know what to say except the truth… “I didn’t know what smoky bacon meant”. They laughed and gave un approving looks. “How could I be so stupid”? I asked myself loudly. Hubba replied in a stereotypically racist Indian accent “Because you cannot speak English”. My cousin laughed, and so did I…trying to hide my embarrassment.