The Typical False Rhetoric

[mattsidedish]

One aspect of political philosophy, IMO would be the application of propaganda and rhetoric to not only aid in the assertion of certain aspects of a political candidate, but to distract from the real issues, causing a multiplicity of red herrings and rabbit trails that must be executed thoroughly in order to establish what is true and what is not. I hope you enjoy a Facebook post of mine (as well as a post on SecularCafe.org for peer reviewing purposes) that explains some false rhetoric that I encountered months ago with a friend of mine. While this issue hasn't been a particularly rational school of thought, it is one that I have met in extreme numbers. so many people actually believe this nonsense that I am wary of whom I relate my thoughts on it to. Anyways, without further a due: IS OBAMA A MUSLIM? - The intelligent approach.

Is Barack Obama a Muslim???

The only way of coming to an intelligent conclusion on this matter (as if his testimony wasn't good enough) is to examine the five pillars of Islam, and examine how he has (or how we know he has) followed accordingly. I decided to take a little time to spell this out for you guys, even though I don't necessarily have an audience, I'm just some lonely nerd introvert (spoing) looking for something long to type to take up time I could be doing physics. So here we go!

Like I said, I'll go over the five pillars and spell out what they mean, then give examples of how Barack Obama has/has not followed them, and what speculation can arise because of it.

1. The first Pillar of Islam is the Shahada: belief in the unity of God and the prophethood of Muhammad. One must truly believe this and profess it with their mouth before they can even be put in the category for the assumption of this belief. Now Obama claims he's a Christian, but based on my (more vast) knowledge of Christianity, I can just tell you up front that he hasn't exactly exhibited even a single or subtle hint of his involvement with this religion. But I don't need to tell you that, right? I mean, who takes Obama's word for ANYTHING these days? You'd be a fool to. So this one's off the table; we can't decide on his religion based on this first (and most important) pillar.

2. The second pillar of Islam is Salat, or Prayer. We know that true, practicing Muslims pray five times a day: dawn, noon, mid afternoon, sunset, and nighttime. During this prayer, a typical observant Muslim will use a "prayer mat"-a mat to be sat on for comfort, no religious significance here- while they pray, and they will turn it toward the direction of Casbah, and pray, usually in Arabic. But because he is the president, and all, we tend to have a pretty fair understanding of his daily schedule, like on April 8, 2010 (during evening prayer) Obama was having dinner with Prime Minister of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev. (taken from Google, "presidential events during -suchandsuch- hour of Muslim prayer) Amazingly, Dmitry didn't emerge from that dinner astonished that Obama pulled out his prayer mat, turn it toward Casbah, and begin praying in Arabic, because he didn't. We also know that on April 5, 2010, during noon prayers, Barack Obama was hosting the White House annual Easter egg hunt.(also taken from Google, "presidential events during -suchandsuch- hour of Muslim prayer") As with this case, he never plopped down on a rug and begin to pray in Arabic, as both events were televised. (Dates used were taken from early in the campaign around the time these "Muslim" claims were made, intentionally, on my part.) So, we can obviously see here, as well as every other day since he came into office, there have been no reports of him praying at all, actually......so um.....Moving on.

3. The third pillar of Islam is Zakat, or alms-giving. This is where muslims who are able, give 2.5% of their wealth, annually, to the poor. Being he is the president, the public has a certain amount of access to his tax returns. Taken from 2000 to 2004 (intentionally before he became president, he, annually, gave an average of .4% of his wealth to anyone. Not just to the poor, but in generic donations. Wow, I can beat that! So, again, very obviously, we get nothing from this pillar.

4. The fourth pillar of Islam is Sawm, or fasting. During each day of Ramadan, the ninth month on the Islamic calendar. Practicing muslims do not eat during the daytime hours of any day during this month. For the past 11 years, which is the extent of my willingness to search, Obama was not only seen, but photographed every single day of this month eating. My descriptions are getting shorter for some reason. Moving onward.

5. The fifth and final pillar of Islam is the Hajj, or pilgrimage. At least once in their life, practicing, financially able, and able-bodied muslims are required to make a pilgrimage to Mecca. Barack Obama, up until this point has not made this trip. Although there is still time, it is extremely unlikely, because the Saudi government will not let you into Mecca if you aren't a muslim. And Barack Obama, based on my objective, factual information, is not a muslim.

So, there are only two reasonable suspicions here. Either Obama is not a muslim, or he's a really, really, really bad muslim. I won't even go into the fact that he drinks beer and eats more pork basically every week.

For those of you who continue to accuse Obama of being a muslim, you are misguided, and frankly, ignorant, even though there is nothing wrong with ignorance. But after reading this long post, you should be informed enough to not be, therefore, ignorance in this case...is not bliss.

Also understand that even if he was a practicing muslim, there is nothing wrong with that. If you disagree with the practice, that's fine. But using this tactic of accusatory nonsense in politics is a gesture of insufficient brainpower to create a logical argument, and the very type of social ineptitude that I mention time and time again on this website. (Facebook)

Lastly, those of you who don't genuinely believe he's a muslim, but make the point anyways because you also think he's a terrorist, and believe that muslim=terrorist, you just need to stop spreading such nonsense, because it makes many of us truly informed conservatives look bad.

If I managed to give any false information, or I manufactured some sort of insult based on any misinformation, please let me know so I can be sure that my posts are the most factually based they can be. If anyone actually managed to read all of this, I will ask you to respond on your thoughts about the topic, and my presentation of the topic. Thanks, and goodnight.

[artisticsolution]

Hi Matt...I read all of it...and it was pretty entertaining...and I commend you on your fair mindedness.

As for any critique, the only thing I would say is I would have liked to see links or references to all the statements you made.

I am not interested on whether or not Obama is a Muslim per se...but I do like interesting writers so kudos to you in that respect.

[mattsidedish]

Hi Matt...I read all of it...and it was pretty entertaining...and I commend you on your fair mindedness.

As for any critique, the only thing I would say is I would have liked to see links or references to all the statements you made.

I am not interested on whether or not Obama is a Muslim per se...but I do like interesting writers so kudos to you in that respect.

Hello artisticsolution. Thanks for your input. I agree, some citing would have made this post much better, as it would for most posts. I actually spent about an hour and a half developing the post (to the best of my memory; it was a long time ago). This is actually not nearly as long as I put into my Wikipedia articles that I sometimes author, or my blog posts to LessWrong.com. Also, usually when I create threads for educational purposes, I tend to stick to the nitty-gritty, citing everything and treating it as a college paper (which I write many of). Unfortunately, most of what I write doesn't include the time frame that this one did. I would love to go back and find those sources, but I'm sure they're lost in the billions of records now, though there's a good possibility you could find different sources by googling the information for confirmation.

Thanks for your post!

[Kayla]

same-sex marriage and socialized medicine are the most important islamic doctrines

Obama is in favor of both which is clear evidence that he is a heavy duty salafist

[WanderingLands]

same-sex marriage and socialized medicine are the most important islamic doctrines

Obama is in favor of both which is clear evidence that he is a heavy duty salafist

Same-Sex marriages? Never heard of that in Islamic countries, as Sharia Law (based on the religious principles of Islam) certinaly does prohibits homosexuality (ie. Quran, with the references to the Biblical Sodom & Gomorrah, and the Hadith).

Heavy duty Salafist? Show me evidence of him being one.

[Arising_uk]

Sense of humour failure?

[WanderingLands]

Sense of humour failure?

Highly doubt it; I believe I know where this person, Kayla, is getting at.