Yasir Qadhi – The Pitfalls of Muslims Allying with the Progressive Left

			Yesterday, somewhere in North America, a children's school was holding a Pride Month celebration. As
you're aware, this is June. And many of the Muslim children did not show up. And they came after the
parade finished. The teacher brought the Muslims into the classroom and severely reprimanded the
children. Maybe you've heard the audio has gone viral. And this isn't the only time this has
happened a few months ago in England, a video went viral where a young child or teenager or
something said that you cannot be queer and Muslim at the same time. And the teacher literally went
ballistic on the child yelling and screaming that tolerance is a British value. If you're British,
		

			you must be tolerant, you know, so yelling and screaming that you have to be tolerant. This, you
know, 15 year old Muslim kid. So we this is not the only time today as well. I just tweeted some
things happening in Maryland a few months ago in Detroit. I mean, this is now becoming a national
crisis. And some key points are raised, too, that we need to have a national conversation on. Some
of the points that are being raised is that tolerance is a two way street. The teacher said in this
audio clip, that if you want to be tolerated as a minority, you have to return the favor and
tolerate other people that are minorities, okay, quid pro quo, you scratch my back, I scratch yours.
		

			The teacher said in this audio, that last month, they had Ramadan awareness, and everybody came last
month or two months ago, there are Ramadan awareness, and the whole school was aware of raising
awareness of Ramadan. Today, the teacher said we have LGBT How come you did not come. So you're not
being fair in this in this understanding. The teacher also said that if you don't agree with these
values, then you need to go back where you came from. If you don't agree with these values, you
don't belong here. And the British teacher also said similar things that these are British values,
right? Tolerance is a British value. If you don't have this value, then you don't deserve to be in
		

			Britain. And all of this, by the way, it is actually frightening that the power dynamics are so
unequal and nobody seems to be commenting on this. You have a grown adult in a position of
authority, you have a teacher that is in a position of authority, yelling, and getting angry at a
young Middle School teenager who's trying to make sense of the world. And instead of even if you
firmly believe in your worldview, even if you do, is this the way you should get your point across
as a teacher to a student yelling and making the student feel intimidated. So today's brief Katara
today's brief topic is to tackle this philosophy head on, like, well, I in my heart felt for this 15
		

			year old child, my heart went out to these youngsters they're lost. What do you say to an adult
screaming at you? What do you say that? If you want to be tolerated, you're brown skinned basically
your brown skin, your Arab Muslim background, you're weird from the perspective of our culture.
We're tolerating you. If you want to be in our society, they say you had better tolerate these
people as well. What do you expect a 15 year old to respond? Well, I felt so it's our job to give
them some talking points. That's the purpose of today's hotter I hope Insha Allah, we begin that
conversation I'm not going to say I have definitive answers, because this is a complex topic. How do
		

			you explain to this you know, Teacher, how do you explain that that analogy is incorrect. And we
have to give these simplistic water proof talking points to the next generation and we also have to
explain to our own kids at home because that's what they're telling us right that hey, you know, if
you want to be tolerated, then you have to return to tolerance. It's a two way street over here. So
as usual, I divide my talks into specific points so that we remember so five points today inshallah
five points. The first point purely from a philosophical standpoint, taking a step back and
commenting on the reality of what's going on in the left versus right to divide because you have the
		

			liberal progressive left, you have the conservative right here, right. We begin by pointing out the
logical inconsistency within the progressive left because the progressive left does not actually
have a consistent methodology from within. Really the progressive left is basically a bunch of
different ethnicities, ideological groups who don't have anything in common amongst themselves,
except that they don't like the right that's really all they have in common, right. In reality
within themselves, there is no will school, no standard paradigm, no consistency. You have within
them basically P
		

			But who aren't mutually contradicting each other? And that is why, ironically, pre 911 As you're
aware, most Muslims ideologically sided with the right, because they felt familiarity, they felt
comfort, family values consistency, right? Because of 911. The right hated us for our religion, not
our values. So they wanted to kick us out. The left for the first time in American history took us
in, but they took us in not because they loved us for who they we are, they took us in because they
wanted to demonstrate diversity. They wanted to demonstrate inclusiveness. But here's the point.
What is inclusiveness and diversity? How can you reconcile cultural relativism versus universal
		

			human rights? How can you praise other cultures, while you want to enforce your own, there's a
contradiction. This is the contradiction of the left, I want you to understand this point, the left
says we want to tolerate and we want to embrace diversity. Okay, what are you going to do when that
diversity goes against something you think is sacred? How can you respect something that goes
against your own value system. And so the left is beginning to understand, and this union of all of
these left progressive groups is now dismantling it is now coming apart. Because in the end of the
day, the left accuses the right, of being hip or being bigoted, of being intolerant. Guess what, now
		

			we're seeing the left is just as bigoted, and just as intolerant. But over different issues, the
right is consistent. We want people that look like us talk like us act like us, we want people of
our ethnicity, our culture, obviously, that is threatening to us, because we're not from their
culture, but they're being consistent from where they're coming from. We don't like it because we
are the minority here, right. But the left doesn't have a consistent paradigm to respond back to
them. So what they really have is a group of disconnected ethnicities, ideologies, religions that
have nothing in common, other than they don't like the status quo, they don't like one ethnicity.
		

			And the default, once the left is now on the rise, once they are dominant, and they are dominant for
the last this, you know, this presidential cycle, whatnot. Now you're gonna see the fault lines from
within. And that's what's happening with us. We were tolerated, as long as we could be a feather in
their cap of diversity. We were tolerated, as long as they could showcase all look, we're even
tolerating the Muslims. But when we want to enforce our personal values in our life, we are no
longer tolerated. So it was a facade, it was a hypocrisy, you didn't really want inclusion and
diversity, you didn't really want because legitimate diversity would mean you accept us for who we
		

			are. That's legitimate diversity. But obviously, it can't be that case. So this leads me to my
second point, for any Westerner for any person whose ancestry goes back, you know, more generations
and ours in this line, to claim that tolerance is a Western virtue.
		

			Wallahi what can you even say? Tolerance is a Western virtue. How short is their amnesia? How
quickly they forget. And it was said to me, I'm not sure that the teacher yesterday in that school
was a history teacher, which makes it even more ironic. A history teacher is saying the West is a
tolerant society. This is our value. Since when, since when is tolerance a Western virtue? You want
to be in and open up the box of history? Never in human history has slavery existed in a worst
fashion against a specific ethnicity. Then in America, you want to open up tolerance, Jim Crow,
Laos, your laws, you want to open up tolerance, the internment of 100,000 Japanese Americans simply
		

			because they were a different ethnicity. And this is in our lifetimes. 19 You know, 42 you want to
open up in tolerance tolerance in Canada, in Australia, and other places, how they treated the local
indigenous, taking away their children, forcibly telling them they cannot speak their language. This
is not well known in the 60s and 70s. The people of that generation are now adults. This isn't this
isn't centuries ago, children were taken away from their parents in the 40s 50s and 60s, forcibly
taken away. Why? Because they were from the Indian indigenous people. This happened in Canada. This
happened in Australia. As for America, this happened before this point in time recently, not as
		

			recent. But in Canada and Australia. We're talking about our generation, the people that are now
adults, this happened to them, tolerance, whose tolerance so again, this quick amnesia of tolerance
is our virtue our you know,
		

			Our a progressive, right? The fact of the matter is that hardly any culture and civilization has
demonstrated more war and more intolerance than overall the trajectory of Western history. In fact,
the irony of ironies, when this child this Muslim child is wanting to enforce family values, they
are returning to the values of Western culture for more than 1000 years, even LGBT laws tolerance
for 1000 years, LGBT was not tolerated for 1000 years, this is in our lifetime, it is switching. So
this child if we tell him what to say, what this child who say, actually forget my ethnicity, I'm
going back to your ethnicity. I'm going back to your forefathers, I'm going back to your culture for
		

			1500 years, 2000 years, how your own society understood this phenomenon. That's what I'm going back
to what are you going to say tolerance, LGBT laws, we're only in our lifetime reversed. The Supreme
Court ruling took place around 10 years ago. So don't come and preach me. We are a tolerant society,
you are changing day by day. And you expect just because you change every bit else is going to
change at your pace. Even if you believe you're right. The way you're going about this, of course,
they're not right. But even if you believe you're right, the sheer arrogance of forgetting your own
history, you're not tolerant in the slightest. And now you're screaming at a 15 year old child, the
		

			irony of screaming you have to be tolerant to somebody who doesn't agree with you is lost on these
people. You cannot force somebody to be tolerant, you want to be tolerant, you begin by being
tolerant of somebody you don't agree with and in this case is becoming us as the Muslim community.
The third point here again has to be said there is a clear blatant racism, how so? xenophobia and
this is coming from the left, which used to criticize the right for racism. This is the irony. The
left would say we like people of different colors, different backgrounds, the left would say we are
against the bigotry of the right. Okay. Allah says in the Quran, or the better. tilba Holloman afar
		

			Hey, Mama tofi sudo Akbar hatred has come from their tongues and their hearts have even more hatred.
Allah says in the Quran Wahlen todo unclear who do not Surah Hatta Tibet amulet to home, they're
never going to be pleased with you. So whoever thought that the left would permanently protecting
Muslims. I'm sorry, open your eyes and see this reality, the same group that would criticize the
right when the right said to us and to the Hispanics and to the African Americans go back home. The
left would say How dare you now from the tongues of the left the exact same thing. If you don't
accept our values, this teacher literally says on the audio go back to where you came from the exact
		

			same phrasing. But here's the question and especially this teachers from Canada, right. The irony,
Canada's an immigrant country, even America, we have to what is America? You know, if if a person
who has a white background if his father or her father came landed on Ellis Island in 1948, from
Dublin Ireland, right? Okay. I will say my father landed in Houston, Texas in 19 6215 years
difference. I was born and raised here. I've never had any nationality, any citizenship other than
this country? Why would you say if I disagree with you, I should go back home, your father came to
Ellis Island, you can go back home if you don't like me. But here's the point. Suddenly, there is
		

			white privilege. And this is a term they hate. This is a term they say they don't have. But the fact
of the matter is, they're demonstrating this, how can you say to somebody, you go back home, if you
don't agree with me, when you yourselves and your ancestors came from somewhere else. There's only
one difference skin color, because in this case, they're not even Christian. It's not even Christian
Muslim. There's one difference is the privilege of ethnicity and background. And so the left that
claims to be open minded and tolerant of all even ethnicities, when push comes to shove, they think
this country is theirs. And the response. Why do you get to define values? I'm an I'm an American,
		

			I'll speak for myself. I'm born and raised here. I have only one nation. I've never had any
nationality. This is my country wide. Can't I have a stake in these values that you say tolerance is
a British or an American or Canadian value? Guess what? I'm an American to so many others of us are
American to why can't we to collectively also get involved and talk about what does it mean to be
tolerant? How come you get the privilege of defining values? I'll tell you why. Because my skin
color is a few shades darker. And so what has happened are the above details but a lot of men have
for him that hatred that was hidden in their hearts. It has now come out Allah tells us in the
		

			Quran, don't be fooled brothers and sisters, I've said right from here I've said multiple times. We
are neither left nor right. We're neither Republican nor Democrats. We have to be above this. We are
Muslims. And sometimes in some issues one group would be better in other issues other but never
should
		

			Your heartbeat attached to identity politics, we are above this. So this is my third point here.
subtle racism, subtle privilege of their ethnicity, we own our values. This is our country, and it's
not their country. It's equally ours. That's the vision of this country. Technically, it's equally
ours. But realistically, you think it is yours and not mine. And therefore, when I disagree with
you, it comes out go back to where you came from. And I don't have the right to say to them, Why
should I go back to where my grandfather came to? You should go back to where your grandfather came
from because your grandfather colonized and pillage and * the native Indians. My grandfather
		

			didn't come and do that. In reality, I have more right to this land because we came legally we pay
taxes from day one, we worked our way out from bottom all of us. We know this. We came with nothing
in our pockets. My father came with 20 bucks in his pocket, he worked his way to where we are hard
work. As for you guys, pillaging, plundering, *, bombing, Hiroshima, that's what you guys did.
So in reality, we have more right than you do. But if we say this, they're gonna say, Oh, and you
know, the reality they feel that type of privilege. So this is the third point. The fourth point,
let's get now to the technicalities. They say respect is a two way street. They say quid pro quo,
		

			you scratch my back, I scratch your back. They say we had Ramadan month. Now we have LGBT month. How
do you respond to this? Herein lies the fundamental issue that we have to educate our youth to stand
up and respond to. They are comparing apples and oranges. And they don't seem to understand that
they are comparing completely different things, and putting them in the same box. They think
ethnicity, and religion and sexuality are all types of the same manifestation. They compare skin
color and ethnicity, with religion with sexuality. And for us, each one of these is a completely
distinct reality. It's comparing apples and oranges and bananas literally completely separate
		

			ethnicity. Skin color is not a choice. I don't choose my skin color. I don't choose where my parents
ethnically are from. And so we would make the logical, the rational and the Islamic argument.
Ethnicity should be neutral, we have logical because it's not my fault. ethnicity is not a crime.
ethnicity is not a choice. ethnicity is something that is my skin color, and ethnicity should be
neutral. So to celebrate ethnicities to celebrate ethnic diversities, this should be completely
normal and accepted. As for faith, here, we get to a different reality. Faith is a choice. I choose
to be Muslim. Faith is a choice. Faith involves multiple aspects of ritual of theology of life and
		

			death of ethics or values. They are not all the same, you from an agnostic background might think
they're the same, but within the faith traditions, they are mutually exclusive. You either believe
Jesus is the Son of God, are you don't you I do believe Buddha, is this or Krishna? Is this or that
or you don't? It's mutually exclusive. And therefore, here's the irony. We as Muslims will say, if
we have a Ramadan festival, or Islam Festival, where non Muslim children are forced to pray,
according to our salah, and a Christian says, I don't want my son to participate in that ritual.
What should our stance be brothers and sisters?
		

			What should our stance be? If the father says, I'm a Christian, and I don't want my son to
participate in a religious festival, we must support the freedom of the Father, we must support
because we're being consistent now. We must say you know what we agree with you. We agree with you.
If you know a bunch of children are being forced to participate in a religious ritual and a festival
in a ceremony that is uniquely religious than yes, it's not the same as ethnicity. And we will then
say, Well, I agree with this. But then here's the awkwardness. Being participating in a ritual is
not the same as being taught. So if you're taught about Ramadan, it's not the same as being forced
		

			to fast on the day, obviously, right? If you're taught Muslims believe there's one God and our
children are taught Christians believe Jesus is the Son of God. Okay, here we get to this gray area
and each parent is going to be on his own me personally, if it is taught from a completely
descriptive fashion descriptive. I am fine with this as long as the child is old enough like
teenagers on the not a five year old but world history class when they're in high school, okay,
learn history without proselytizing without preaching. And the Quran teaches us what the Christians
say the Jews say the Quran teaches us world history, no problem. In my opinion, maybe some of you
		

			will disagree, but in my opinion, we separate teaching neutrally versus asking the child to
participate. So if you were to have a Ramadan day, and you teach everybody Muslims found
		

			Just in the month of Ramadan, and for one day, a Muslim comes, says his Ramadan experience. That's
one way, I don't see a problem. And if you were to have on Passover, a Jewish person come says,
Passover is the day God bless the children of Israel. I personally don't have a problem with this
because this is teaching. But if you were to have everybody has to participate in the Passover
festival. No, that's not right. So you have to be a little bit more nuanced over here. Now, the last
point sexuality and this point, point number four, sexuality is completely different. It's neither
ethnicity nor faith. Sexuality has so many multiple things, one's own personal values, one's own
		

			concept of decency, one's own religion, one's own ethics, for the board of the school to take charge
of how sexuality will be taught, I'm sorry, no, we have to put our foot down here. The board the
school should not be in the business of teaching sexuality, teach us chemistry, physics, maths,
teach us biology teach us the world don't teach us values about intimacy, that's something that
parents should be in charge of. And so here we would say, and especially by the way, once this
version of sexuality comes in, now, we're talking about normalizing that which is abnormal, LGBT,
we're talking about suggestive partial * and dancing, all of these festivals, they bring in
		

			somebody who crossed dresses, you know, they bring in somebody man dressed like a woman woman
dressed like a man acting like them. Now, this isn't education anymore. This is indoctrination and
normalization. So we draw the line over here. Now the point comes from the perspective of these
people, ethnicity, and religion, and sexuality are in the same box. For us, we can make a logical
and a historic and irrational argument that each of these three is different, we can. But easier
than this, we just bring in the religion court. And we say our Faith says these three are different,
because that is watertight. If you open up biology and history, they will go back and forth. And we
		

			can logically you can say, How is ethnicity the same as religion? How is religion the same as
sexuality, but the simple thing to use is to say, we have our ethical values from our Lord. Allah
tells us right from wrong, my brain could be right and wrong, my understanding, we hope it's right.
But it could be wrong. Collectively, we could be right or wrong. For multiple generations, this
country thought slavery was good. If at that stage, somebody said, we should endorse this, and we're
teaching it in school. If in that state, somebody said, you have to live up to our values of
slavery, or else you can leave, what are you going to say to them, we have a higher source that
		

			tells us what ethics what law what morality is, and you don't agree with the source. But we believe
we have a divine source that is error free. As for you, you keep on changing every few months and
years, you have a new value, a new idea. And we need to push back You Don't Know Allah knows, you
think you know, you don't know. And your history shows you don't know you're experimenting, like
cocktails every few years, a new idea, a new thing. And even within your own movement, there are so
many multiple contradictions. Now the trans movement by the way, many people who are non religious,
they find this absurd. How can a person just say he's a woman, and then a man and then walk into the
		

			woman's locker room? Parents are getting angry at this? How can a man at the age of 3040 pretend
he's a woman and then participate in the Olympics or in the women's sports? How can this is
happening now, and even non religious people are saying this is doesn't make any sense. So
internally, they're inconsistent, they don't have a higher value. This is the fourth point here that
we have a higher set of values that tells us ethnicity and religion and sexuality are separate
things. The fifth and final point
		

			we need to push back at what does it mean to respect what does it mean to respect the teacher all
over in America and Canada in England they say you must respect this other ideology. Recently a
group of alumni came together I was on the board of this and they we we formulate a document called
navigating differences Google this document is all over the news right now. hamdulillah was involved
wasn't the main person check him the doctor had them and which was the main person whose idea and
whose but I was on the team to craft and to write this. This document hamdulillah over 300 Rula MA
from across North America from all backgrounds, all backgrounds, Salafi su fishy Deobandi
		

			believability, I mentioned it because I want you to know this is something that there is no empathy
enough, doesn't matter which felucca which might help you belong to. We have some prime signatories,
well known ruler MA from every strand of Islam. They have endorsed this document, so please read
this document. In this document we say I'm quoting from this piece
		

			Full coexistence does not necessitate agreement, acceptance, affirmation, promotion or celebration,
I want to read that again. Peaceful coexistence. Nobody's saying a stop for Allah we go kill
somebody. Nobody's saying we go punch somebody in the face right? A lot of you know the more
hardcore critics they got angry peaceful coexistence How can you say this? And the response is what
do you want us to say? You are you? Are you calling for violence? We say to the critics from inside
who? What do you want us to say? We are citizens of this country we are and we're not calling for
violence. So we have to put our foot down here. We're not calling for shoving and pushing and
		

			punching and uh, no. Peaceful coexistence does not necessitate agreement. I don't agree your
drinking. I don't agree with it. It doesn't mean acceptance. If you want to cut your body parts, I
don't accept it. I think you're doing something very wrong. affirmation. I don't affirm you. This is
a figment of your imagination. Promotion. I'm not going to wave a flag, or celebration. I'm not
going to participate in a parade that is celebrating this thing. Peaceful coexistence does not mean
this then the document says we refuse the false choice between succumbing to societal pressures to
adopt views contrary to our beliefs, ie we must acquiesce and agree that you have correct beliefs
		

			and the other side facing unfounded charges of bigotry. The two options we're being given. Either
you celebrate or you are a bigot. We say no, there is a third choice, that third choice. We do not
agree we actually strongly disagree. We think this is wrong. We think this is dangerous for society.
We're not going to celebrate, we're not going to endorse, but if your law has passed and if your
Supreme Court has passed it. What do you want us to do? I don't have to agree to the Supreme Court
to be an American Muslims of America. We need to be firm on this point. Look at before the abortion
debate 1/3 of Americans before they overturn Roe vs. Wade 1/3 of Americans said we don't support the
		

			Supreme Court's decision of abortion. Okay, those 1/3 Because they were white evangelicals, nobody
dared say to them, if you don't like our country, go back to where you came from. Do you understand
this point 1/3 of this country said we don't support the Supreme Court's decision about abortion.
		

			Famous intellectuals would say those who perform abortion, They're murderers. Some people killed
abortion doctors, vigilante justice, some people became terrorists, and they would literally shoot
abortion doctors, right? Nobody said the whole movement is terrorist. Nobody said this. I'll tell
you why. Because their ethnicity is different than ours. Let's be brutally honest. I'm sorry to be
blunt here. But they have white privilege, white Christian privilege. I'm saying this bluntly,
because they're white Christians. They got away with what they got away with. As for us, we have to
be super careful in our language and our couching what not May Allah protect us if one crazy person
		

			does something, we all get into trouble, you know this, right? But when one crazy person does it
amongst them, nobody amongst them gets into trouble except that one person, you know this reality.
Anyway, my point is the fifth point. We don't have to respect your values to be American, we have to
be blunt here. My Americanness has nothing to do with endorsing the current status quo. I have every
right to disagree Islamically and constitutionally, and we need to own we need to be blunt, we need
to be firm, we need to teach our teenagers to own their own identity. Be a proud Muslim, and be an
American and say as a Muslim, and yes, as an American, I don't have to agree with the Supreme Court.
		

			I don't have to agree even with the majority opinion of this country, and doing so makes me no less
of an American. That's the reality actually, technically that is the reality. So bottom line
brothers and sisters, this is the beginning of a conversation. It's not an end all. I hope inshallah
with this, you will also come back to me with other points, and I hope the goal is inshallah if not
myself, other people should. I'll try to but I only have so much time should actually make a PDF for
our high school kids. These are the talking points, we should literally distribute it to our next
generation. This is how you respond next time a teacher yells at you that you're being bigoted,
		

			you're being homophobic you're not tolerating and being respectful, we need to teach them there are
five simple points you need to say back and these are some of them and if we have more inshallah we
can add to the list this list, bottom line to to conclude
		

			these trials and these fitten
		

			in sha Allah there's also good in them we have to know this
		

			Nothing happens except there's good in it. And perhaps one of the good is that we are all going to
be forced to be religious activists in our households, perhaps one of the positives, we cannot
afford to be silent or else your children will no longer be practicing Muslims, their version of
Islam is going to be something that we may Allah protect us. So perhaps one of the positives, every
one of us now, we have to make a stand. We have to educate ourselves, we have to educate our
children. And in that process, maybe just maybe Insha Allah, we will preserve their identity in a
way we would otherwise never have preserved so Allah is using this as a catalyst for us. Allah is
		

			using this to motivate us to be better Muslims in our lives so that we can pass our religion down to
our children and inshallah more conversations will follow Xochimilco said I'm gonna have to label to
catch up
		

			either call
		

			me, Ms de Heaton doll Seanie with
		

			me what to feed
		

			it
		

			feels
		

			to me,
		

			Jenny Tansa down to
		

			me