Yasmine Mohammed ياسمين محمد  🦋

Interesting convo. I have a lot of respect for @Deeyah_Khan’s empathetic perspective re Jihadis and Nazis, and humans in general. But there were a lot of times when I felt she was being hypocritical or at least being intellectually dishonest. /1https://twitter.com/SamHarrisOrg/status/1071153241465876480 …

The most egregious was her misrepresentation of @Ayaan. To say that Ayaan is the opposite of Sarsour in that she dishonestly makes Islam the problem in the same way Sarsour refuses to acknowledge any problem in Islam shows that Deeyah needs to familiarize herself w Ayaan’s work 2

You seem to be very empathetic to Nazis but can’t extend that to ExMuslims who have suffered atrocities because of Islam. Maybe if you too had been forced to wear the burka, then you too would be “so obsessed”. 3

The fact that you’re not obsessed when your sisters are being arrested for not wearing a cloth on their head is pretty disheartening, to be honest. Perhaps it wasn’t an issue for you in your Liberal European home, but not all of us had an upbringing like yours. 4

Finally, youve won 2 Emmys and seem to be doing pretty well getting your voice out. So it’s strange for you to lament that @MaajidNawaz & Ayaan get the microphone was really strange. Ayaan and Maajid are being demonized and being put on hate lists while you’re being celebrated 5

Deeyah, you really need to acknowledge that you have had a privileged upbringing in a Muslim liberal European home and you are by far in the minority. And when you try to sell it as the majority it is both dishonest and attempts to erase all our experiences. Sam was 100% right. 6

Having said all that, I’m pretty sure that if we had a conversation, we’d probably agree on more than we disagree on. And if not, at least it would be civil and pleasant. I have a lot of respect and gratitude for the work she does in general.