 We're going to jump right into the debate. We are thankful to have you here as well as thankful to the speakers of whom I'm going to introduce. First, T-Jump, who is the leader of the channel, T-Jump on YouTube as well as the Discord channel, T-Jump. And also introducing Kenny Boomer, who is from Houston, Texas and has been a Muslim for over 30 years. He is the author of the book, Consider Islam, Disproving the Patriots of Propaganda. The second edition was just released on Amazon. And the number one release in both genres of comparative religions and religious studies. All right. Thank you. Thank you. I'd like to start by saying, As-salamu alaykum, Ramallah, I'm here to be a cultured peace people on everyone. I do bear witness to no god other than Allah. And I bear witness that Muhammad is his final servant and the seal of all prophets. I'd like to thank the organizers of this debate con 2022, the first one ever. And they've been very accommodating, been very gracious hosts. And they've made it pleasant every step of the way. We had a few technical issues with the audio, but that's just how it goes. That's audio. We can't do anything about that. But I also want to say thank you to T-J for the world-renowned T-J, the world-renowned T-Jump. I did want to gift him a copy of the translation of the clear Quran and a copy of my book, Consider Islam, Disproving the Patriots of Propaganda. With that being said, I will start my time here. Now let's say that Islam is much more than a religion. It's a complete and comprehensive way of life with a universal message. And it followed properly. It's a system of belief that is guaranteed to bring success to the individual and society alike. It's a guide's people to be decent and just contributing members of society. One who follows this way of life is a Muslim, meaning one who submits willingly. And it's a Muslim's duty to act in defense of all that is right and to oppose all that is wrong. Allah says in the Quran that the good deed and the evil deed cannot be equal. So repel evil with that which is better so that he between whom and you, there's enmity will become as the closest of friends. So based on the guidance from Allah in the Quran, the prophet Muhammad SAW, he said that if someone among you sees wrong being committed, that he must write it with his hand through deed and action through conduct by somehow intervening, right? And if he cannot do that, then he must do it with his tongue by speaking up or calling for help or speaking out against the injustice. And if he cannot do that, then he should do it by his gaze through a look of disapproval. And if he cannot do that, then he should do it with his heart, meaning that we turn to Allah in prayer about the situation. Some things in life only Allah can change. Islam guides and shapes people in collective morality for all in society who have a willingness to follow it. No one can be forced. Collective morality is expressed in the Quran in such terms as equality, justice, fairness, brotherhood, mercy, compassion, solidarity, and freedom of choice. It encourages the individual to be active participants in society in the process of establishing moral objectives through all of society and not just within a chosen group. It starts with the individual who then influences his group, who then influences society as a whole. Islam teaches and encourages every person to play an active role in the process because doing so will bring about success in this life and even greater reward in the hereafter. Each member of society in Islam is therefore encouraged to take care of all members of society by sacrificing of one's time and one's resources and to take initiative according to his or her ability so that others are able to overcome their own burdens. Allah says in the Quran, by no means shall you attain righteousness unless you have freely chosen that which you love and given what you love with what you love. And whatever you give of truth, Allah knows it well. So above all, Islam seeks to inculcate within every Muslim the need to seek justice and to apply it to himself as well as to others. And that's why the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him by following the guidance of Allah is recognized by the US Supreme Court. Many people don't know this as one of the history's greatest, 18 greatest lawgivers. But the Islamophobes, the word of Islamophobia, they don't know that because the media seldom mentions anything good about Islam. And if they do know about it, then they quickly move past it because all they've been told is that Islam radicalizes people, makes them commit acts of terrorism. It's not true. Allah says in the Quran, indeed Allah commands you to render trust to whom they are due and when you judge between people to judge with justice, excellent is that which Allah instructs you indeed and allows forever hearing and knowing and seeing. So as in Western codes of morality, Islam is a moral system of laws referred to as Sharia. And in the world of Islamophobia, once again, people have been convinced that Muslims are working behind the scenes to force this infamous Sharia law on people. That's not true. And however, Sharia laws is to be followed by Muslims themselves. It has nothing to do with non-Muslims. They have, non-Muslims have nothing to fear regarding Sharia. Sharia is for the Muslims. And again, Sharia are God-given laws that include the requirement for Muslims to follow the laws of the land. As long as those laws don't call someone to commit some type of evil. Islam gives people guidance for life but also the freedom to choose whether or not to follow that guidance. Allah makes it clear in the Quran by saying, let there be no compulsion in religion. Truth has been made clear from falsehood and whoever embraces that truth has grab hold of a trustworthy handhold that will never break. That verse is saying that people have the freedom of choice to follow or not follow the guidance of Islam. It's their choice. Just like someone has the choice whether or not to follow the laws of the land. However, failure to follow the guidance will eventually bring about failure for both the individual and mankind alike. And that is the test of which Islam provides the solution. It's part of the world's greatest questions that every human being eventually asks themselves, why are we here? What's this life all about? And unlike any other system of belief, Islam gives a great comprehensive answer for it. Allah says in the Quran, it was for a true purpose and specific term that we created heaven and the earth and everything in between. Yet those who deny the truth ignore the warning that they have been given. Allah says in another verse that recall when your Lord brought forth from the loins of the children of Adam their descendants and had them testify regarding themselves when he asked them, am I not your Lord? And they replied, yes you are indeed, we testify to that. Then Allah can caution them by saying, now you have no right to say on the death judgment that you were not aware. So this test is to distinguish between those who are humble and grateful from those who are arrogant because they see themselves as self-sufficient. And if we did not have a purpose, then we would be no more significant than animals that just racked on instinct without any conscience, only living and dying. Allah says in the Quran, be sure, we will test you through fear and hunger and the loss of lives and property and the fruits of your labor. But we give glad tidings and hope to those who persevere and who say when affected by the calamity, inna li lahi wa inna ilahi rajim from Allah we come and to Allah we will return. This gives people hope in something that makes this life worth all the struggle that we go through in this life. So the purpose of the test is to give glory to our creator instead of arrogantly giving it to ourselves as though we're self-sufficient. Especially since we all know our own weaknesses and insecurities and the flaws that we have. Therefore Islam gives people purpose and hope to people in the midst of their own trials helping them to keep pushing forward and to do right instead of engaging in things that are detrimental to self and thereby detrimental to society. Most people on the planet either fail to follow or totally reject guidance. Instead they engulf themselves in seeking pleasures of the world while clinging to mostly self-gratifying individualized subjective views about morality. But that way of life eventually breaks down because the people who have no universal moral compass with which to guide the masses towards good, how it creates a problem eventually. However, the prayer in Islam is a constant and universal plea that we pray five times a day asking our creator to guide us to the straight path, the path that is best for both the individual and society alike. Islam encourages people to make constant effort as individuals and as a community who encourage and influence one another to do good. Allah says in the Quran, compete with one another as if in a race doing good righteous deeds. So Islam dissolves away all the dangerous views of moral relativism and to each his own mentality and incorporates all the commonly accepted moral values in laws of society that are actually God given instincts about what's wrong and right and teaches humanity to be constant and proactive in following these moral codes. Islam widens the scope even further by helping society to be constantly mindful of our domestic associations, civic conduct, our activities in political, economic, legal, educational, private and social realms. It covers life in the home and in society abroad from the dining room table to the battlefield, from the cradle to the grave. Islam demands that morality be at the forefront of every action and ensures that the affairs of life are regulated by moral norms instead of being dominated by selfish desires and petty interests that are nothing more than a system of self-aggrandized self-gratification. Islam answers the most basic and fundamental questions to the most complex and provides a solution for how to deal with every problem that we face in society. By example, this pandemic. It's recorded in the saying of the Prophet Muhammad SAW that he said, if you hear of a plague in a land, do not enter it. And if it breaks out in the land where you live, do not leave. And he said another hadith that he said, do not quarantine the healthy with the infected. Now these comments were made over 1,400 years ago before modern technology could tell us how exactly how disease is spread. And, but however, it'd be futile to make blanket statements by claiming everyone knows about this, everyone knows that. Because here we are two years after the pandemic and people are trying to travel on airplanes but are complaining about wearing their masks and other people are refusing to get vaccinated. And so also signs, you know, reminding people to wash their hands are everywhere. Meanwhile, as Muslims, we cleanse ourselves no less than five times a day before each and every prayer. And many of us are strong, liberated Muslim women readily choose to cover themselves in modesty by wearing the hijab and sometimes wearing the veil. They're not forced to do this, contrary to popular belief. The Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him, he said that cleanliness is half of the faith. And that's based on a law telling us in the Quran that truly a law loves those who turn to him in repentance and loves those who purify themselves in all aspects. He also said in the Quran, Alhamdulillah, Allah swt said that, and we sent down in the Quran such things that have a healing and mercy for the believers. Another one of the world's great problems is poverty and homelessness. One of the five pillars of faith in Islam is zakat, spending of one's own wealth and charity. The word zakat is mentioned 32 times in the Quran and one simply cannot be a Muslim if they don't give in charity. Allah says in the Quran, this is the book of which there is no doubt. Containing guidance for those who are mindful of Allah and for those who believe in the unseen and for those who spend out of what we have provided for them. Everything that we have in this life comes from our Creator. The Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him thereby says that charity wipes away sins. In another hadith, he says that every act of goodness is considered an act of charity and that even sharing your smile with someone, being polite is a form of charity. So according to an article titled, US Muslims gave more to charity than other Americans rather in 2020 published November 5th, 2021. They stated in that article that Muslims gave more to charity in 2020 than non-Muslims and Muslims are more likely to volunteer. And in their study, they said that only 1.1% of all Americans are Muslims and their average income is lower than that of non-Muslims but they explained in their 2021 Muslim American giving report that despite making up only 1.1% of the nation's population that Muslim donations were as a highly diverse and quickly growing minority contributed to an estimated 4.3 billion in total donations to mostly non-religious causes over the course of that year exceeding all other groups religious and non-religious alike. They said in that article that, and I quote, they said, we believe our findings are significant, not only because this is the first time that we can see the size and scope of giving by the small and highly diverse community but also because US Muslims face a great deal of discrimination. Another poll in the UK, they said that Muslims gave more to charity ahead of Christians, Jews and atheists. And a poll by Defined Financial 2021 said that Jews and Muslims give more to public society benefit organizations involved in civil rights and social inequalities than Christian and non-Christian neighbors. And of course that encompasses every group. Another problem in the world is that the world is faced is war. Nearly 32 years ago, Jay Chanton in his book, Militant Islam said, and I quote, the image of Muslim armies converting people as they advanced has sank so deeply into the Western mind that no amount of repetition of the truth is likely to dislodge it. So contrary to Islamophobic belief, Islam was never spread through war, but instead it spread because of the wars waged against Islam. And we're still seeing that happen today. Islam is still the fastest growing religion in every country in the world with most reverts being women. Islam demands that Muslims only fight in defense of self and others in society. Everyone standing up against all injustice. And if war is necessary, which sometimes it is, that it must be conducted justly and only until aggression from the enemy stops or from the other side stops. After the Reformation, secular versions of the just war theory were prominent and just war is contrasted with holy war. And because of the Christian crusades, they were considered by many Christians to be holy wars. It's often assumed that jihad is the Islamic equivalent, however that's anything but the truth. Based on Allah's guidance in the Quran, the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him developed eight rules of engagement in Islam, which state that killing non-combatants is not allowed. I'm gonna repeat, killing non-combatants is not allowed. The eight rules of engagement in Islam prohibit the killing and destruction of women, children, the elderly, non-combatants, religious leaders, animals, religious buildings, trees and crops. All the rules of war based on verses of the Quran in which Allah says, by example, fight in the cause of Allah against those who first fight you and run them out of places that they have first run you out of. But if at any time they stop their aggression towards you, you stop your aggression so that you don't become those who oppress. Allah says in another verse of the Quran that Allah does not prohibit you from showing kindness and being just to those who do not fight you, nor who have driven you out of your homes. Indeed, Allah loves those who are just. Another one of the world's problems, please allow me to get a drink of water in one second. Excuse me, alhamdulillah. Another one of the great problems of the world is this issue of oppression and injustice and inequality. In this final sermon, I'm not gonna go through the entire sermon, I'm gonna touch on some key points of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, the last sermon before he died. Salah alayhi alayhi wasalam. He says, oh people, it is true that you have certain rights in regards to your women, but they also have certain rights over you. Do treat your women well and be kind to them for they are your just partners and committed helpers. All of mankind is from Adam and Eve and an Arab has no superiority over an Arab and an Arab has no superiority over a non-Arab. A white has no superiority over a black, nor does a black have any superiority over a white. None have superiority over the other except through good action and piety. And he ends by saying, do not therefore do injustice to yourselves. It's based on what Allah tells us in the Quran. He says, to each of you, we have prescribed a law and a way of life and had Allah so willed, he would have made you all of one community. But his will was to test you in what he's given each community. And so he says, so compete with one another in doing good and to allow, will you all return? And then he will inform you over the things of which you used to differ. Many of those who attempt to villainize Islam are unaware of the fact that the Harvard Law School, one of the most prestigious institutions of its kind in the world has posted a verse of the Holy Quran at the entrance of its faculty library describing the verse as one of the greatest expressions of justice in history. The verse comes from Surah An-Nisa, the chapter about women, verse 135. And it's been posted at a wall of the faculty's main entrance dedicated to the best phrases in articulating justice. And they say, that verse says rather, it says, oh you who believe be patiently standing firm in justice as witnesses for Allah. Even if it be against yourselves or your parents or your relatives, whether one is rich or poor, Allah is more worthy of both. So follow not your personal inclinations lest you be unjust. And if you distort your testimony by lying or refuse to give it, then be aware that indeed, Allah is all aware of what you do and he's well acquainted. One of the, I'm gonna close with addressing one of the greatest problems in this world and that's the use of drugs and alcohol. The Pew Research Center said in the United States and many other countries religiously active people are less likely to drink alcohol than those who are not as religious. And they say, and I quote, that may not be a surprise because holy texts from the Christian New Testament to the Koran to the Hindu texts warn against the dangers of excessive drinking and other potentially harmful vices. But they say, despite those teachings, the relationship between religion and alcohol consumption remains a nuanced one and not all US religious groups eschew alcohol to the same degree. They state that alcohol remains a prominent part of Christian religion from the gospel accounts of Jesus turning water into wine, peace be upon him, to the present day European monks who support themselves by brewing beer to the use of wine and some contemporary communion services. Their report also said that there's a higher likelihood of drinking among the religiously unaffiliated and that less than 1% of atheists said alcohol is not morally wrong. They didn't agree that it was morally wrong. So they also stated in that article that they did not survey Muslims because our faith teaches us that intoxicants of all kind are forbidden, deemed harmful. So people who have looked into Islam unbiasedly see the benefit of it. And that's why, again, as I mentioned that Islam is the fastest growing religion in every country in the world. Modern technology has made it possible for people to be exposed to the truth of Islam, even despite the propaganda, the negative portray of Muslims in the media. The Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, said, Alhamdulillah. The message of Islam will enter every home as a sign before the day of judgment. Allah says in the Quran, man plans and Allah plans and Allah is the best of planners. In their most recent study, the Pew Research Center said that Islam will nearly equal Christianity in the number of followers by 2050 before eclipsing it around 2070 if current trends continue. And that's because people do see Islam as a solution. And despite the propaganda, it's very prominent in this world. I try to encourage people, and I talk to people about Islam to be readers and not repeaters, by repeating the same rhetoric over and over and over again. It's hate speech. It causes division. You find a Muslim that is attacking someone, because of their religion, call me because I wanna talk to that Muslim if he's a Muslim at all. Because that goes against the grain of Islam. It's not allowed. Islam demands, it demands our great obligation to stand up against injustice, to speak out, no matter who the oppressor is. Be they Muslim, it doesn't matter who they are. It's the Muslim's responsibility to speak out against injustice. So I invite everyone again to be readers instead of repeaters. Please don't listen to the propaganda because they don't stop. And ask you, and I invite you to consider Islam for what it is instead of rejecting it for what it is not. And I'll leave you by saying, As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatu. Thank you. Thank you so very much, Kenny, for your opening statement. And we are now going to hand it up to T-Jump for his up to 20 minute opening statement. T-Jump, the floor is all yours. Thank you, James, Amy, and Kenny Boomer for joining us today. I appreciate the opportunity to hold this debate. And thank you everyone in the audience for being here. I really appreciate you guys. The question today is, what is the solution to humanity, Islam or atheism? In answering this question, I think the best way to do that is to look at how these ideologies influence and inspire the communities to which adopt them. And we can look at these through a number of statistical means. There's a ton of data on these different topics and the correlations between religious belief, really religiosity and poverty and education level, IQ level, technological advancement. There's pretty much any statistic you can name. We have data on it. If you'd like to know the religious level and education level or any of these stats for any given state or country, you can just look at the Pew forums, religious landscape survey. It's all there. And you can go ahead and check which of the various states and countries have a different level of religiosity and how often people go to church, self-acclaimed religion, and you can check the corresponding levels of poverty and education and obesity, violent crime rates, diabetes rates, child abuse rates, educational attainment levels, income levels, unemployment rates, sexually transmitted disease, teen pregnancy, you name it, it's on there. We got data on all this. So we can literally just go down the list and test, is this ideology one that inspires a better way to live? And resoundingly the answer is, if the country is more secular, it does better in every one of these statistics. The more religious the country is, the worse off it is in every single one of these criteria. You name it, every single sociological measure of wellbeing, you are more likely to find secular states with the lowest levels of faith in God and the lowest rates of church attendance faring far better in each one of these criteria. And if you look at the states with the highest levels of faith in God and rates of church attendance, they have the worst in each one of these statistics, both locally in the United States and globally across the world. This statistic even holds if you include the worst of all of these secular nations, China, Russia, North Korea, even though North Korea is comparable to many of the worst countries in the world, which are also Islamic in many cases, the average of all the secular nations far outweighs the average of the Muslim nations. So if Islam really was the solution to humanity, you would expect the Muslim countries would be doing better than the secular countries, which is the exact opposite of what we're seeing. One of the biggest problems in the Islamic nations is Islam. Islam is one of the biggest problems because it's focused on religious beliefs in education, Trump's education of scientific beliefs. And since they focus so heavily on religious texts and teaching their kids the religious doctrines, rather than the scientific doctrines, they get far less of an education that gears them towards political change, scientific advancement, and benefiting humanity overall. And we can see this in many respects, specifically in women who are treated as second-class citizens, as they are not even given the same level of education as the men are, they are given the opportunity to teach their kids as much science or inspire them to be as many scientists, which is why we see Islam being so far behind technologically and scientifically. Why Islam is only 0.8% of all Nobel Prizes, whereas atheism is 10% of Nobel Prizes. Christianity is 65%, Judaism is 25%. We can test that each of these ideologies do far better as a solution to mankind than Islam does. So I'm not sure why we should consider Islam to be the solution when it can't even come on par to these other main ideologies in the world. We look at scientific belief. The amount of scientists who believe in a God is from this poll, about 72% personal disbelief in a God, and about 7% belief in a God, the highest scientists in the world. It's a pretty staggering number. Just given general populace compared to average scientists, about 80% of the general populace believe in God, about 33% of scientists believe in a God. From this, we can say that if you don't believe in a God, you're more likely to have a more scientifically-minded set of beliefs that makes you more likely to make a difference in the world, which is why we see such a disparity in Nobel Prizes between religious and non-religious. From The Saves Journal, are Muslim countries more prone to violence? Muslim countries are overrepresented among countries with the high levels of overall forms of internal violence, including non-state conflict, one-sided violence, highly repressive human rights policies in countries that practice capital punishment. Kidnappings are 56% higher than the average, murders are three times higher than the average. If we look at human rights and rule of law in all countries, 2021, 80% of the worst countries are Muslim countries. Half of the world's population for prisoners of blasphemy are in Pakistan. Like if we're just looking at these statistics, we can just go down for days and days, all of these different statistics show that the Muslim countries do worse for humanity than the secular countries, or the Jewish countries, or the Christian countries. They all do better in all of these regards. And so if we're looking for the solution to humanity, we would probably go for one that does better off for the people in the country. Now, one of the main arguments here is the no-truth gossip. Well, maybe those aren't real Muslims. Maybe the real Muslims wouldn't do those kinds of things. And maybe so, I can't say who are the real Muslims and who aren't, but I can say that this ideology of Islam has an effect on people at some proportional rate of the true Muslims and some proportional rate of the not-true Muslims, and overall, that effect is far less than the proportional rate of the true atheists or the true Christians or the true Jews. Those ideologies as a whole tend to inspire more people to do better in that society than Islam does. And if we're looking for a solution to humanity, it's better to go with the one that disproportionately has a positive impact on the society. Even if Kenny is right, and Islam is the true perfect thing, that if the very small percent of people who really followed it are the perfect lives, because it's such a small percent of the society, it doesn't have a significant enough of an impact on a whole society to be considered a really the best solution. The best solution is one that affects the most people and provides the best quality of life for the most people, not just the few minority who might actually choose to follow it. Other problems in Islam. Gender-based violence. There's more gender-based violence in Islam than pretty much any other religion. Domestic violence, honor killings, female gender mutilation, which is also a problem here for male general mutilation. Marital rape is higher in Muslim countries than non-Muslim countries, the lowest being in secular nations. In conclusion, if Islam is a solution for humanity, then it should be able to solve the problems in Islamic countries. And if it can't do that, then it isn't really a contender to say that it's just a solution for all humanity in non-Muslim countries. Until Islam can live up to the standards of all the other countries that we see in secular nations and Christian nations and Jewish nations, then it's not really a serious contender for the solution of humanity. And I will conclude there. Thank you so much, Tom, for your opening statement. And with that, we're going to hand it right back over to Kenny for his up to eight-minute rebuttal. The floor is all yours. Please let me get my stopwatch back up here for a second. And thank you for that, TJ. All right. So according to the Huffington Post, 12 of the last Nobel Peace Prize winners are Muslim. That is 42%. 12 out of the last, what is it? Bear with me one second. Yeah, just 12 of the last, according to Huffington Post, 12 of the last Nobel Peace Prize winners were Muslims. And in regards to, we're not talking about we're looking for solutions to these problems. So we're not here to discuss the failures of humanity. We're not here to discuss failures of people. We're talking about the doctrine itself. What does Islam say? Not what people do. Okay, so if he did make a, in regards to saying who the true Muslims are, the true Muslims are referred to as the Muqman, the true believers. Allah says in the Quran, in al-Musli, mean al-Muslimati, wal-muqminina al-muqminati, meaning the Muslim men, the Muslim women, the believing men and the believing women, making a clear distinction between the true believers, remember the Muqman are the true believers, and making a clear distinction between those who call themselves Muslim. Maybe they're born into Muslim families and so forth, or they're Muslim by name, and they, you know, they may associate with the community, but they don't live according to what Islam teaches. So we're not here to discuss the failures of mankind. We're here to discuss what does the religion, what does the doctrine teach? And during the course of TJ's opening, I appreciate all of it, but I didn't hear anything that atheism provided as a solution. So again, we're here to discuss what does the creed itself bring as guidance, a moral guidance to all people that starts with the individual and then goes on to other people. Yes, there's Muslim countries in the world that have problems, but guess what, we have a lot of problems here in the United States. As a matter of fact, they have statistics here, I can bring them up in regards to the, let me go ahead and grab it real quick, because the drug and alcohol use, by example, here in the United States is so prominent. I mean, it's something that people are just consuming or consuming things that are so detrimental to them that they, it's a huge problem. And it opens the doors to other problems, other issues. So bear with me one second as I go to this figure here, because it's quite disturbing. And so again, in regards to women, now the verse that I just mentioned, and there's many verses similar to this, al-muslimina, al-muslimati, al-mukminina, al-mukminati, allows mentioning the men and the women collectively to establish a, when you study the tafsir, when you study the interpretation of what these verses are talking about, it allows mentioning these verses to establish the equality between men and women. The Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, he taught his companions that the best among you are those who are best to their women. In the Islamophobic world now, they're gonna convince you that the Prophet, peace be upon him, was a warmonger and he was a pedophile and he was all these things that stuck for a lot. No, he was not. But that's the ongoing narrative that's repeated over and over and over again. But think about it. The truth is the truth, even if no one believes it. And a lie is a lie even if everyone believes it. A lie often repeated eventually becomes that what's accepted, it becomes accepted as the truth. Even the liar himself begins to tell the lie so often that he has convinced himself that the lie that he's telling is the truth. And so depending where T-Jump got these figures from, I'm not surprised by the figures and I'll tell you why because I'm not trying to deny any reality of them but also we have to consider the source where you got it from. We live in a world where Islamophobia is running rampant and that's the truth of the matter. It's something that we can't hide from. And so again, we're looking for solutions. What does atheism have to provide? What does it have to provide? According to Sean Breen with the Atheist Republic, he says and I quote, this is his words. He says, atheism contains no demands nor consensus on purpose nor does it enforce any universal meaning. There's no atheistic existential reason for all of human existence. So if atheism can't provide a solution for the basic question about why we're here in life and why this life exists, then how can it provide universal guidance to people? But contrast to what Allah says in the Quran, that it's not righteousness that you turn your faces towards the east and the west but what's righteous is that you believe in Allah in the last day and the angels and the book and the messengers and give of your wealth to relatives and orphans and travelers and beggars for those who ask and for those who ransom slaves and to establish regular prayers and practice regular charity and to fulfill the contracts that you have made and to be firm and patient in times of suffering and adversity through all periods of panic. These are the people of truth, the men, the true believers, the God fearing. So yes, people fail. People in the United States are failing. People in Mexico, they're failing. In Canada, they're failing. All over the world, people are failing. But what doctrine is guiding people to the truth? Why is it, ask yourselves, if Islam is that bad, why is it, how could it be that Islam is the fastest growing religion in every country in the world? That's a fact. It will surpass Christianity, it will. And some people use the excuse, wow, that's just the Muslim birth rates are out of control, on the contrary. Think about this, if you're a God fearing person, if you believe in a creator, and I realize some people here may not, but nevertheless, if you believe in a creator, then if you believe everything happens by the will of that creator, then that creator, if it was in fact, the birth rates that did it, which is not, it's a cop-out, but if it was in fact, the birth rates that did it, then it would have been the creator himself that caused those births to happen. Alhamdulillah, I mean, so it's still the will of Allah that causes that to happen. Still, it causes what the Prophet, peace be upon him, said, saying Islam will enter every household before the day of judgment, as a sign before the day of judgment. Now, people may not accept Islam, but what's happened is, and thank you to the organizers of this debate, by example, because in all the people out doing dowel and all the discussions about Islam, that it is going into people's home, whether people reject it or not, but what the Prophet, peace be upon him, said is being fulfilled in the age of modern technology. People are running to Islam. They're not running from it. They're running to it. Fastest growing religion in the world is providing solutions. Once again, that's the topic of the debate. What's the solution for society? I haven't heard anything, unfortunately. I haven't heard anything that atheism gives to provide answers to these problems. Islam has a solution. Intoxicants aren't allowed. I'll repeat, intoxicants aren't allowed. You can't do it. You can't be a Muslim and consume alcohol and intoxicants. You just can't do it. You can't call yourself a mu'min. You might call yourself a Muslim, but you're not of the true believers because the true believer doesn't do that. You understand? Think about the people who, in my closing, the people who are suffering from alcoholism and drug abuse and people crack heads and all these things that we see in society that creates one problem after another, destroying families and tearing down the individual physically, mentally, emotionally. Islam says, don't do this. You know what it says? It says there's some benefit in alcohol for the people, but the detriment is far worse. So stay away from it because it's from Satan. It's gonna cause you problems eventually. It might make you feel good for a time. It might open you up and, you know, I'm happy, go lucky. It might take away your burdens and your pains and your experience in life for a short period of time, but those problems still remain. You're only trying to blanket them and hide them and you can't run from them. And again, I invite you to accept Islam and to realize that we're looking for solutions in this debate, inshallah. So very much Kenny. And with that, we're gonna head right back to T-Jump for his eight-minute rebuttal. All right, so to jump right in. So Kenny mentioned that there are problems in the US too. Oh no, it's a two-quo-quay fallacy, the fact that there are some problems in the US and that we don't have like perfect solutions to everything doesn't mean that that is, it's equally as bad. I would not count alcoholism at the same level as female genital mutilation or honor killings. I feel the problems in the Islamic community are far worse than the problems in the secular communities. For example, Kenny mentioned homelessness. There are, just Google it, 83,000 homeless children in Saudi Arabia. There are zero homeless people in Japan, one of the most secular nations in the world. Only country with no homelessness is a secular country, Japan. So if we're going based on homelessness, secular countries win. He mentioned that Islam is the fastest growing religion. Look, even if that's true, that doesn't make it good. I don't care about the number of people who adhere to it. I care about the quality of the lives that the ideology promotes. So I don't really think that bringing the number of people who happen to go to a religion as a qualification for which is the solution to humanity is really a great criteria on here. He mentioned that Islam solves moral relativism. Well, this isn't actually a problem. Most people believe in moral objectivism even without religion. We just look at the Pew survey's paper, the largest poll of professional philosophers. About 70% believe in moral realism even though only about 15 to 20 are religious. So even though most of them are secular, they also believe in objective morality. You don't need a religion to believe in objective morality. So it's not really a problem that needs solving. Can you mention that no one's actually forced to wear a hijab? Well, he should definitely tell this to all the women in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan who will be honor killed if they don't do it. I don't know if they know this. He mentioned poverty. Poverty levels in Islamic countries is some of the worst with some of the most people who live on under a dollar a day. So I don't know how, even if maybe somewhere in the Quran there are solutions to these problems, no one in the Islamic communities are actually using those solutions to solve the problems. I feel like that's kind of an issue here when you're trying to say, what is the better ideology? Kenny mentioned that it's not about what the people do, it's about what the doctrines say. Well, I totally disagree here. I don't care if your doctrine has the ultimate solution to everything. If nobody actually listens to it, then it's not a solution. For it to be a solution, you need to inspire the people to actually act on those solutions to make people's lives better. Just saying it has the solution but no one listens to it isn't really a solution at all. He mentioned the Nobel Peace Prizes. Yes, most Nobel Peace Prizes are taken by Muslims because most of the wars and conflicts are in Muslim countries, that makes perfect sense. That isn't evidence for his case, that's evidence against it. He said atheism does not provide a solution to these problems. I mean, I didn't offer a solution because you don't need to offer a solution, what you need is to offer statistics. Even if the ideology says just potatoes, everyone worships potatoes and literally nothing else. If it inspires more people to act in such a way that they have better lives, then whether or not the potato's doctrine actually offers answers doesn't matter because it's making people's lives better. So whether or not the book claims to have answers or says it has answers isn't really important here. What matters is which inspires people to live better lives. Secondly, atheism does offer answers to all these questions. That's why we have universal healthcare and the NHS and all the different secular nations that work together in order to solve homelessness and poverty and why there's no homelessness in Japan. Secular nations do have solutions that actually work and inspire people to solve these problems in those countries, which is why we don't need to say here is the ultimate solution and paragraph six of the atheist holy book. We can just say, look at our actions. We have less of these problems in our countries. We do have solutions and they work. We don't need some kind of supermind to tell us what to do. We're actually making the difference ourselves. Secondly, Kenny mentioned alcohol and drugs. Less alcohol and drugs in Muslim countries. Totally agree, this isn't a good thing. Just to read Reuters, in moderation alcohol and drug consumption has been linked to improved quality of life and lower risk of health problems like heart disease and certain cancers in some previous research leading doctors to advise some patients to imbibe occasional as of a part of healthy diet. Researchers know from the CMAG, alcohol isn't bad. Drugs aren't bad. There's nothing wrong with them. They're totally good. They're better for people. They improve people's lives, lots of people's lives all over the world. Banning it out right because some people are alcoholics is a bad idea. You're going to decrease the freedom of everyone because some people overuse and overindulge. This is not a good thing. This is a bad thing. We're taking away people's freedoms and taking away people's happiness and joy just because some people do bad stuff. This is not a good doctrine. This is a bad doctrine that shows why we should not adopt Islam. We should prefer the ones that allow you to take alcohol and drugs in moderation because that improves people's quality of lives and taking that away will decrease people's quality of lives. Kitty mentioned that there's no war, no spreading by the sword in Islam. Google and all of the different historical sites and Yale disagree. Early Muslim conquests also referred to as Arab conquests or the early Islamic conquests began with the Islamic prophet Muhammad of the seventh century. He established a new unified polity that the Arab Peninsula under which the subsequent Rashidin and Umad-e-Muhad caliphates saw a century of rapid expansion through conquest. Yes, there were lots of conquests by the sword in Islam. This is a thing just calling them no-truth conquests. They're not real conquests or they're not done just to spread Islam. Yeah, Islam used the sword. Cherry picking reasons here doesn't make it any less violent or murderous. So yes, yes, there were many of those. Charity, he mentioned charity that there's more charity in Islamic nations, Islamic communities. I believe the charity in Christian is actually the highest but that doesn't make a difference here because the effect is the lowest. The quality of life, the life expectancy in these countries is the lowest. Even if it has the most charity, it has the least actually effect on the quality of life of the people. What has the most effect is the NHS, the single-payer healthcare systems. The healthcare systems of the secular nations do far better to improve people's lives than any amount of charity in any country. So if we're talking about what's actually a solution to the problem of health here, secular nations win hands down because we have healthcare. Inequality, so he mentioned inequality. Inequality is some of the biggest in Islamic countries. Just look at Saudi Arabia where you have billionaires and billionaires and then homeless people, 83,000 homeless children on the streets. Inequality is some of the worst in the Muslim nations. Of course, America is the worst. Granted, you got me on that one. America's bad. Other than that, he mentioned atheism has no source of answers to these questions. Yes, it does. I believe in objective morality. I am an atheist. In my model, I think we do have answers to these questions. I think there is a best of all possible worlds, the best way the world could be. One where it's impossible to force anyone to do anything they don't consent to doing. There is your answer. That is the ultimate answer to perfect morality. You have an answer, atheism does provide an answer. I believe that's all I have for now and I will conclude there. Act with that end of the rebuttal. That takes us to 15 minutes of open dialogue and conversation. It's all you guys. Okay, so I appreciate that, TJ. And, but in the course of this, I did hear you say, towards the end that you tried to imply that atheism has an answer for these issues, but you also said that drugs aren't bad and that people should be allowed to use. Once again, in my opening statement, I stated that Islam demands that people have a right to choose. That's very important. But by saying that drugs aren't bad and people should be allowed to use, if we look at the statistics on this, and I couldn't get to it earlier because I couldn't find it in my notes, but I'm just gonna read this. This is based on drugabusestatistics.org and they state that among Americans aged 12 and older, 31.9 million are current illegal drug users and they have used within the last 30 days. 11.7% of Americans 12 and over use illegal drugs. 53 million or 19.4% of the people 12 and over have used illegal drugs or misused prescription drugs within the last year. They state that if alcohol and tobacco are included, 165 million or 60.2% of Americans aged 12 and older are currently drug users, abusers rather, and that they've also again used in the last 30 days. 139.8 million Americans 12 and over drink alcohol. 14.8 million or 10.6 of them have an alcohol use disorder. 58.8 million use tobacco. 31.9 just a couple more lines here. 31.9 use illegal drugs, 8.1 million, which is 25.4% of illegal drug users have a drug disorder and lastly the two million people or 24.7% of those with drug disorders have an opioid disorder. This includes prescription painkillers and painkillers as well as heroin. So my question to you is that it's easy to say if you haven't had anyone in your family or anyone that you know or if you just haven't been exposed to someone who is, their life is dissolved because of drug use or someone who's died in a car accident and things of that nature. It's easy to say, oh it's not a problem but what do you have to say to those people who have suffered that? Would you still tell those people that people should be allowed to use? Would you tell someone who's lost their family member in that? Yeah, I mean the fact that some people abuse those things doesn't mean that everyone should lose their right. Raise your hand if you've illegally used drugs in America or drinkin' alcohol. Yeah, that's okay. How many of your lives are negatively affected by this? Keep your hands up. Okay. How many of them were more negatively affected than the positive effects you've gotten? A few hands, so everyone's hand was up, everyone illegally used pretty much and only a few of them had negative impacts. Should we take the rights away from every single person in this room who had positive experiences with the illegal drug use just because of the few people who had a negative experience? Who's taking the right away? That's what I'm asking you. So again, in my opening statement I tried to stress the fact that in Islam it's about freedom of choice. Allah says let there be no compulsion or religion. Truth has been made clear from falsehood and whoever embraces the truth is grab hold of a trust where the hand will never break. So what we're talking about here is for one, Islam is not taking away people's freedom to choose to do what they're gonna do. That's part of the test of life. That's why we're tested, okay? And so let's dissolve that idea. That's not true, but it's okay. Let me get up there for a second. So the point here is that in your doctrine, it says all alcohol used to be banned. Now from what I just showed that would eliminate the happiness of all the people in here who got a positive impact from that. Whereas my ideology says this provides a positive benefit. As I read from the medical journal previously moderate use can improve the quality of life for both drugs and alcohol. My ideology says this is a good thing for people. We should allow people to have this. Yes, some use it negatively, some have bad experiences, but many people have good experiences. So it seems like my ideology is more qualified to assess what's better for people here because it can allow for those who can gain many benefits from these. These do give benefits. They do improve quality of life. Whereas your ideology doesn't allow for that. It doesn't see the positive benefits. So I appreciate that. I'm not sure if you remember, I can go to the verse of the Quran which it states that Allah says in the Quran in summary that alcohol and so forth has some benefit to man. You know, sometimes if you're sick and make you feel better and things of that nature, it sometimes takes away people's worries and their stresses of life. But Allah says in the Quran but the detriment of it is far worse. So avoid it because it's from Satan. So again, again, we're here looking for solutions to the society's problems. So if you don't see drug and alcohol abuse and alcoholism and drug abuse as a problem, then there's the problem. Islam says to stay away from it. For one, people have had a bad week and so they go and they get drunk on Friday, Saturday night thinking their problems are going away. No, they're not. So you're just masking that. So again, where's the solution to the overriding problem? Is it okay to go to the people at the drug centers that are trying to get off drugs and alcohol whose lives have been turned upside down because of their misuse and say, oh no, it's not a problem, go ahead and do it again. Of course not. Of course not. If we're gonna look at things objectively and be true to ourselves, we should be telling those people, look, yeah, it's been bad for you. You probably need to stay away from it. Well, the thing is you open the door a little bit and it has the potential for opening full bore and there's the problem. So which is the better solution? To say, oh, it's okay, everyone use the alcohol or to say, you're tested by whether or not you choose to not consume it or not. The Muslims, you can be assured there's Muslims somewhere that are consuming, right? There's gotta be somewhere, but they're not following the doctrine. And so again, it's not like Islam is placing a stamp and saying, it's gonna be our way or the highway. No, that's not true. It's let there be no compulsion in religion. That's why we're tested. That's the beauty of it. So again, in summary, I'm talking too much, but in summary, what would you tell the people at these, you know, trying to get off of the drugs or alcohol or whatever that has destroyed their lives or their families, what would you tell them? Would you tell them, go ahead and keep doing it? Or you tell them, you know, to stay away from it? No, I would tell them to stay away from it because they're misusing it, but I tell the people who positively gain impacts from it in life that they can keep doing it. Give me an example of the positive impacts that it has. I mean, what do you mean? Weed reduces stress and allows people to become better, healthier people. It reduces pain. Alcohol does the same thing. It can be relaxing. Many people have a glass of wine, which helps them take the edge off and improves their quality of life, helping them to work and function more. It can reduce the damage of heart disease. There are tons of these things. Like as I just read from the medical journal, it has proven for a fact that moderate consumption of alcohol and drugs can benefit people's quality of life. This is a fact. And the fact that my ideology can recognize the scientific fact about the world and Islam is objectively wrong about the scientific fact shows that my ideology is more qualified to assess the solution to humanity. So I acknowledge, yes, there are people who with alcohol and drug problems, and we should give them the ability to go to treatment centers so they can be cured of those problems, but we should not take away the rights of everyone else who does not have those problems, which is the majority of people who do not have those problems, take away their freedoms to be able to use these things responsibly and take away their rights to improve their own quality of life responsibly. It's like the fact that many people drive badly and get into crashes. Does that mean we should take away everyone's right to drive? Obviously not. The fact that some people have a problem does not mean we should restrict the rights or just have a blanket statement that all alcohol is bad. It's not. We know for a fact it's not all bad. The positives for many people do outweigh the negatives because they don't misuse it. It's only the people who misuse it who shouldn't have it, not everyone. Well, so I think you was chasing strawman a bit when you mentioned about the scientific facts. I haven't mentioned the scientific facts regarding Islam and what it states about alcoholism or drug intoxicants and so forth. I haven't said anything about that. Oh, I apologize. You said it says in Islam that the negatives outweigh the positives or something like that. Well, no, I was saying the verse of the Quran say, yes, that the problems that it calls are worse, so stay away from it. That's the thing I was saying is scientifically provably false. Okay, well, so that's not necessarily true. I don't know where you're getting those statistics from, but let's look at this collectively and not from the point of view of someone who, again, has not had any type of family disruption or loss of life due to these problems. You know, people getting divorced because they cheated while they were drunk or they shot someone while they're drunk. I mean, these are serious problems because it opens the door to other issues within life. So, again, we're gonna talk about what the solution is. What's the solution? What would be a better solution to eliminate it completely? To say, you know what, for all of humanity, for all of humanity, it would be better if we just stay away from that stuff. Because what happens when someone starts drinking, you know, using drugs and using alcohol, that their mind is altered. And this is one of the reasons why Allah says, don't come to the prayer in a state of intoxication because you don't know, your mind is not in the right place. That's the reason it was actually in three steps. Islam was eventually eliminated. And, but again, it's a person's choice. That verse within itself is telling someone that you have the choice whether or not you're gonna follow the guidance and do what's better for yourself and for society, for the community, or if you're gonna choose to do something that your mind is in the wrong place because, you know, you wouldn't have a little wine, you'd go and get behind the wheel. The next thing you know, you think you're doing fine, you feel fantastic, but your mind has been altered. Seems you're making the same argument that I've already addressed. Like the fact that a minority of people have problems does not mean we should ban the majority who don't. The majority of people who drink do not have alcohol problems. The majority of people who smoke weed are not addicted to weed. In fact, it's pretty hard to get addicted to weed. Very, very hard. So the majority of people do not have problems and you're listing a few people who do have problems is like saying, oh look, a guy ate so much chocolate, he died from chocolate poisoning and got diabetes, therefore let's ban chocolate for everyone. This is a terrible idea. This is the kind of thing a bad ideology would do. Acknowledging the minority of issues and then trying to make a universal principle that applies to everyone as if that principle would be good for everyone is a factual mistake. Many people's lives are, the majority of people's lives are benefited by alcohol and drugs, not detrimented by them. Do some people have problems? Yes, but if your ideology can't acknowledge the benefit it happens to have to billions of people's lives every day, then your ideology is a objectively worse ideology. I guess the question that comes to my mind is that if your mind is altered, then think about this, if your mind is altered, then you're saying inevitably that what makes you you is not sufficient. And so you need something to make you feel better. And so your own comprehension is being overrun by your choice to find some type of solution to make you feel better. Oh, I have no idea. That's subjective, but you said a few people. I'm not following what you're saying. Well, okay, okay. So your mind is altered by all kinds of things, dopamine, oxytocin, all kinds of drugs in your brain that affect you without your control. And like strokes is a big one, cortisol. I'm glad you brought that up. So my point here is that these drugs can mitigate the things that are already affecting your brain that you have no control over, like stress. On pain, like medical marijuana is a thing and it's very common and very good to have medical marijuana because it helps people cope with cancer when they're dying and suffering in pain 24-7. Yeah, this affects your brain and decreases the pain like all drugs do. That's kind of the point of drugs is that they affect your body to mitigate other things. Okay, I'm glad you're saying that. Thank you because this statement by According to Scientific American says that, and this is what they're saying, and I quote, research suggests that religious brain, the religious brain exhibits higher levels of dopamine, a hormone associated with increased attention and motivation, end of quote. So it goes back to what I just said. If you're saying that you need to compromise your intellect, yourself, you need to compromise yourself to feel better and to cope with the things in life. Whereas the religious, religiously motivated people, religious people, by their, I'm not saying, this is what they're saying, Scientific American, look it up, research also suggests that a religious brain exhibits higher levels of dopamine or hormone associated with increased attention and motivation. That's beautiful in my mind. Another one says that the theorists are more inclined than atheists to endorse moral values to promote group cohesion. They say these findings suggest that a widespread, the widespread idea that atheists are immoral may arise in part from their weak endorsement of moral values that promote group cohesion and their conscience-based, case-by-case, moral judgment of actions. And that's what we're getting here because you said that the rights of the majority shouldn't be overrun because of the problems of the few, but 31.4 million drug abusers in the world, that's not a significant number. And what's better to say, hey, society, let's stay away from that. Let's help one another, encourage one another, let's find solutions outside of having to alter our minds. And so again, we're looking for solutions to the problem. Is drug, it wouldn't be labeled as drug abuse and alcoholism if it wasn't a problem. I mean, so it's to imply that these problems aren't really problems because it doesn't affect me. Well, that's subjective reasoning. That relates to your life experiences. So what I said was is that all drug use is not drug addiction. Not all people who have drugs are addicted to drugs. You said there's 34.1 million and there's several billion people who use drugs. That's a very, very small percentage of a problem. So again, you keep conflating this problem with the minority and confusing that as evidence that your ideology is correct when it's objectively wrong. The majority of people who do drugs and alcohol do not have a negative consequence of life. They have the opposite. They have a positive consequence, which is what all of the research data shows. The reason it's illegal is because some people have a big problem with it, which can cause things like crashes. The vast majority of people do not have a problem. They have a benefit from these things, which has been proven scientifically in numerous studies. Your position, your religion's position on this is objectively just wrong. Let me ask you a question, TJ. Be honest. I expect you to be honest. I'm not saying I expect you to be dishonest anyway. But so I don't know if you have children or not. But let's say someone who's addicted to crack. Hold on, hold on, hold on, one second. So a person who's addicted to crack, they think that their objective is to go and get the crack and it makes them feel better, okay? So my question to you would be, so we're not just talking about weed and we're not talking about just alcohol. We're talking about drug use, period, because we have stepping, it's a step process. You do a little bit more. Addiction to drug use, those are not the same thing. Okay, well, the problem of alcoholism and drug abuse, that's what I'm talking about. Which is not the same as the use of it. Okay, well, I realize that, but does it open? I agree with you that, yes, addiction is bad. We should give people treatment for addiction. Do you agree? Not everyone is addicted. The vast majority of people are not addicted. So treating the entire thing, the entire usage of drugs and alcohol as if they were addicted is a false equivalent. Okay, well, hold on, but do you agree that the people who are addicted, they start it with that mentality of saying, okay, it just makes me feel better and it's not a problem. Don't you, you don't agree that- No, the gateway drug myth has been proven false. So it's not, the gateway drug is false. So how do you get from A to Z then? I mean, eventually you have to start with A to get to Z. You take lots of drugs at the same time. Yeah, you take a lot of drugs, right? And the drugs begin to have less effect on you, so you take a little more drugs. I take more cocaine so I can work harder, so I can get more drugs and, you know, that in the course from back in the day. Most people use it responsibly and if you use it responsibly in small doses, that really doesn't happen. So if you had children, I don't know if you do, no offense to your children, please don't take what I'm saying. Yes, they can take drugs responsibly. Would you tell them, hey, Dad, I want to use some crack? Would you say, oh, yeah, go ahead. If you take it responsibly. Just get you a hit on that crack rock. I don't think you would. I think it's responsibly. You would tell them to smoke crack responsibly? Yeah, there's actually a number of... Well, okay. There's a number of... And on that note, I want to thank both of our debaters for their open conversation and we are going to give it to both of them for their closing minute remarks, starting with you, Kenny. All right, all right. All right. All right, once again, I'd like to thank the organizers of this, the BACON 2022. It's been wonderful, it's been fantastic. We had a few hiccups with the audio earlier, but that's just how things go in production and trying to put on an event like this. The organizers have been fantastic and they've been very, very, very gracious hosts, to say the least. And I look forward to having more of these events in the future, inshallah, God willing. I also want to thank TJ. I've watched a number of his debates online. He is a very well-experienced debater and so I enjoyed very much having this discussion. During the course of the discussion, the topic of the debate was, which is the solution for society? Atheism or Islam? And I tried to establish, regardless of the failures of mankind, people fail. People aren't perfect. They're gonna do what they're gonna do. But what does the doctrine teach? What would be better? And I tried to demonstrate, and just starting with the why does life exist? Why are we here? I tried to establish Islam has the solution and the answer for why we're actually tested. Why are we going through these things? Why do we have to deal with loss of life and property and why do these hurricanes happen, these pandemic, what is this all about? It's all to draw our attention to the one who created us. A lot of asking, a question in the Quran, making, causing people to think and to pond and reflect, asking, does man not consider from that what he was created and what he was gonna eventually return? But we pat ourselves on the back and we see ourselves as self-sufficient. Like, we're gonna make it through this life with no problems. But in the process of it, people are turning to drugs and alcohol and they're turning to sex and they're turning to whatever else the world provides. Allah says in the Quran, that this life is nothing more than play and amusement. So fear Allah, fear your Creator. Be mindful of your Creator and think, did you create yourself? Of course not. But I discussed the pandemic and the fact that people aren't saying, oh, it's not a big deal. You're washing your hands and your face and you clean yourself before prayer five times a day. But look, we have signs everywhere saying, wash your hands. Adults need to be reminded to wash their hands. And it's a problem. Islam automatically, we have to cleanse ourselves before each and every prayer. We do this five times daily. There's the solution. Our Muslim women, in some Muslim countries, it's part of their culture that they dress in modesty. But let's make it clear. The Muslim woman is not forced by the doctrine itself. That's culturalism. The doctrine doesn't say that they have to cover their face and they have to, it says to tell your women to cover their adornments, their body parts, to cover themselves in modesty. But it's their choice. Not all Muslim women do that. And so again, it's their choice. It's a freedom of choice. Islam is not trying to impose anything on you. You're tested by that which you have been guided by. You can accept it or you can reject it just like the laws of the landers. I try to mention the opening statement. You can choose to follow the laws of the land or not. It's up to you, man. But what's going to happen if you don't, there's going to be consequences for it. And so, you know, from equality, trying to establish the gender equality, that's a big topic to discuss. It's a lot to go into so we didn't be able to get, like I would like to discuss that. But matter of fact, the 14th chapter of my book is titled The Rights of Women in Islam. I take that particular subject very seriously because of this, it's one of the most attacked areas against Islam. And so I devoted a whole chapter to that subject in particular. And I discussed the drug and alcohol use, the rights of equality for all people. Mentioning that at the masjid, when we go to the mosque and we go to pray, we say, allahu akbar. We might have someone from whatever country on this side from the, the place is full. Every masjid that you go to, every house of prayer, is filled with people from all nations. And when we see one another, we're brothers in faith. I forgot to start my time, but I'll just, I'll just close by saying that Islam is the solution. And I encourage you to, you know, to seek knowledge about Islam from Islamic sources. You know, go to the Muslims themselves. Go to the Muslims in your community, the local mosque of the masjid. And talk to the Muslims. Contact me, whatever question you have. I don't mind asking, you know, answering it. And try to stay away from receiving information about Islam from non-Islamic sources. So I encourage you to be readers instead of repeaters and to accept once again Islam for what it is, instead of rejecting it for what it is not. So I'll leave you by saying assalamu alaikum. Peace be upon you all. Thank you very, very much. Thank you so very much, Kenny. And now we're gonna hand it over to T-Jump for his up to four minute closing statement. All right, so the topic tonight was what is the solution to humanity? I made the argument that the solution to humanity is the one that produced the best outcome for living, the best life standards, the best education standards, the best well standards, the most food, the most of everything that we measure in quality of life. And Kenny made the argument that alcohol is bad. I don't really see this as a serious argument. I don't really care about alcohol usage. If you do it responsibly, that's a good thing. It's an improved quality of life. It doesn't diminish it. And so I don't think the fact that people, a small minority of people have problems with alcohol and drugs outweighs the fact that there are honor killings. And serial law has people having been stoned to death and having their arms cut off and being imprisoned for not believing in the faith. I don't think the small amount of people with alcohol and drug problems even comes close to the negative impacts on society as all the different policies in serial law have is in the Islamic countries. So if we're asking what is the solution to humanity, we should go with the one that improves education, has the highest IQ, by the way. Atheists have a six point higher IQ than religious people on average. Has the highest education level. Highest education level actually goes to Jews and then Christians, atheists are third, then Buddhists and then Islam and Hindus are like the half as much as any of the other ones. So I'm going with the ones that have the best impact on society. I think that is the best solution to humanity, which is not Islam and I will yield my case. I would like to thank both Kenny and T-Jump for joining us tonight at the Bacon and we are now going to be moving into the Q&A section. So if you have a question you'd like to ask either or both of our interlocutors, I'd like you to please gather in the center here. My question for you, you said that Islam, you don't take drugs in Islam and the drugs in itself is, yeah, what about now, can you hear me better? Even louder. Louder. Hadouken. All right, cool. So, there are more positive, again, I'll agree with T-Jump on that, there's more positive effects in regards to drugs and there are negative effects in regards to, let's say, military, we literally get our mental stability beat up on daily and for years and years and years and when some of us get out, we have this thing called PTSD and they force us to or they tell us that we need to take a Lexapro and things of this nature. Whereas scientifically, yes, it may work, but if you actually try to do a more holistic way of taking maybe mushrooms or a D&T, that has been proven to be more beneficial than taking Lexapro because if you get off Lexapro, you get zaps. So my question is with the actual evidence that shrooms and things like that, that are actually more better for humans versus maybe the Word of God, do you think that in Islam, right, would that be accepted as a part of Islam because that actually helps, again, way more than somebody telling me the Word of God to the mental stability of humanity? So I appreciate your question and so if I understand it correctly, that might not work. Oh, it's just off, it's off, okay, so. You're getting a signal now, okay. Okay, so I appreciate your question and your comments there and so I think what we need to consider is that, for one, our God, our Creator is the one who gave us the resources to make these medications and so forth for ourselves and if they're used responsibly, then that's a blessing from our Creator but in that is the test. And so if something is set in place by society, by a collective agreement in society that these particular drugs are beneficial to help someone and of course we know that's the case. So Islam not telling you not to use any medication but again, if it's prescribed by a doctor and it's regulated and so forth but what happens is that people start opening the door a little bit and it gets progressively worse because we know that sometimes you have to increase your dosage even with the doctor but you have the doctor regulating it instead of the person that's consuming the drugs and the alcohol to the point that they just, what they took last week or last year or whatever, didn't, it's not the same amount that, they need more now, they need more now, okay, they need more now and so they begin to abuse it and there opens the door to the problem and so we have to be mindful of that and think about that. So this is for T-Jump. In the 20th century for the first time in history we had widespread atheistic regimes that were responsible for 109 million deaths globally. If atheism is the solution, then why does it seem that it was the greatest historical problem that we ever had in the 20th century? It wasn't atheism, like if we, if that was, Isn't that special pleading? Like you said, that's not Islam? No, because the vast majority of, the vast majority of atheists don't do that, they don't avow that, they don't adhere to that whereas in Islam, no, the vast majority of, the majority of Muslims actually do support Sifria law in countries, whereas the vast majority of atheists totally condemn Hitler. That was where political ideologies, atheism did not in any way adhere for any of those things. There's no tenants of atheism that actually support those things, whereas in Islam there are specific tenants that interpreted by the vast majority of Muslims, whether Kenny calls them true Muslims or not, they interpret these statements that are literally said by the holy book to do these things, whereas there's nothing in atheism that supports that and pretty much every atheist country in the world disavows Hitler and Mao and Pol Pot other than like China and Russia. Those are the only exceptions. So pretty much every atheist country today disavows those things and does everything in the exact opposite way. So that would be ridiculous to equate that to atheism specifically because there's no holy book in atheism that says advocates for any of that in any possible interpretation as opposed to Islam which literally has the words that can be interpreted to say those things. Okay, I will ask a quick question before I... Just because we have so many questions that I want to be heard, I want to... I want to... Okay, go to the next question. Three seconds. I hate to do this, but just because we got a response from Kenny. Okay, absolutely. Yeah, so I have a question for Kenny. You had said that the abuses of people's rights such as things like women not being allowed to drive or having the forcing, the full, you know, Nicarb base covering those have nothing to do with Islam. They're closer than they might. So... Those chairs people like to walk, not her. Okay, so my question to you is it seems to me that in countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia, it's religious scholars and religious clerics who know these Islamic sources very well that support and enforce these laws. So my question to you would be if it seems like there are all of these scholars that support these oppressive things, how can you say that that isn't real Islam or true Islam? Yeah, so thank you for that question. And that's the typical questions that come up on this subject. And we have to realize that culturalism has tainted the religion in some aspects and that again, you know, if you look at the statistics, you know, 30,000 since 9-11, by example, 30,000 new reverts to Islam each and every year is actually increasing. It may be even higher than that by now, but most of those being women. And so the women who are reverting to Islam, they're studying in Islam and that you can be assured that they're concerned about am I gonna have to cover myself? What am I gonna have to do? Do I even wanna do that? And they come to realize that when you study this properly that you don't have to. Now you're highly encouraged, but in that is the test for the woman, right? And so in those countries, those societies, you know, that's part of their culture, that's the expected norm. And, you know, we shouldn't judge our standards based on what they do in their country. That's their country making those laws and those rules. And again, that's not Islam itself saying to do that. Now they base what they're saying, you know, they kind of go overboard with it in a sense in that. But Allah says in the Quran just that, do not go to extremes in your religion. Do not do things that outside of the rules here or what the guidance. And so sometimes the culturalism does, you know, kind of domineer in some societies, some situations, but what they're trying to do is they're trying to eliminate the, in those instances, they're trying to eliminate, you know, divorce rates and adultery and sex, you know, sex outside of marriage and children being born, you know, with only one parent and so forth. And so, you know, again, it's not religion, the religion itself that's telling them to making them do this, it is their choice and that is the test. You'll see Muslim women in summary, you'll see Muslim women often that they're Muslim women but they don't, they don't cover themselves, they carry themselves modestly, but they don't necessarily have a job on. Hello, this question's for T-Jump. As an atheist myself, I'm curious to know how you derived objective morality from atheism. Thank you. So I derive objective morality by looking at the evidence. So in philosophy, the evidence of morality comes to us from moral intuitions and moral progress. If we look at the pattern of the way morality has changed over time, it seems to be a very clear, consistent pattern from women's rights to LGBT rights to voters' rights to workers' rights, animals' rights. It seems that as the scope of our intellect and our resources improves, that the scope of morality also seems to increase with that. And if we plot this out on a graph, it seems like morality is following a very specific pattern. So in the same way that Newton discovered gravity, it was called, his model, he used this term, hypothesis non-fingo. So he didn't actually say what gravity was. He had no idea. All he did is he said, here is this very clear pattern that we see. Here is a principle that we can use to describe it, which is his mathematical principles. And I'm just doing the same thing with morality, like most moral philosophers. We see a pattern in morality, and we make principles to describe it, and then try to infer what it could be from that, which I think it's more something like an undiscovered law of nature or something like that. But there are many hypotheses like it's a higher order emergent property, platonic object, a priori abstract. There's lots of different various models of what morality could be. It's just, we don't know, hypothesis non-fingo. All we know is there's this very clear pattern that we see. I guess, why should we objectively value that progress? Or maybe I shouldn't. Yeah, I gotta stop. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for your kind words. I really like your kindness and the way you express yourself. Thank you, thank you. I really like it. So I have a question that's a little bit personal for you, for me in the way it also. You said in your opening statements that Islam tells you to be good. In the closing statement, you said that you have to follow Islam. But you have to follow Islam, sorry, but you have to follow Muhammad's example. From what I've heard, he killed and tortured people, owned and trade slave, pillaged, had sex slaves, slept with underage girls. He did everything that we would say in this time that a bad person would do. And from that one, he was a normal warlord of his time. And I see no change in him, in goodness on him, that he would make him a model of my life. So my question for you is, why do you choose him as a model of your life? Because you do not seem to be like him. You are a much more kinder person than he seems to be. Alhamdulillah. Thank you for the question. And by no means do I think that I'm anywhere close to the character of the Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, peace be upon him. Because Allah, swana, taught himself, our God, our Creator himself, said that he sent him as a mercy to all of mankind. He is the best example of what a human should be. I encourage you to watch my debate later this evening with David Wood on the topic of the marriage that you mentioned to Aisha, radiolahu ana. So Malcolm X is a quote by Malcolm X that I mentioned in my book that he says that the media is the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent and that's power because they control the minds of the masses. Another quote by Malcolm X says that if you're not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people that are being oppressed and loving the people that are doing the oppressing. And so the common narrative in the world of Islamophobia is that it's all negative images about Muslims and by attacking the credibility of the Prophet himself, they're inevitably attacking all Muslims. And so I would encourage you, I'm sure that when I said earlier and I've said it a couple of times today to be readers instead of repeaters because when I hear you say this, no offense to you, but these things that you're mentioning, these are the same common things that we hear all the time because the propaganda used against Islam that's why I wrote that book back there and it's so prominent in closing, it's so prominent that people begin to believe it while they, because they've heard it so often and you just begin to believe it. So I encourage you to seek knowledge from true Muslims and to get your knowledge from Muslims and you'll see if you study the life of the Prophet in closing and the unbiased historians and scholars that have studied his life, you'll see that their narrative is totally different than the one from the Islamophobeside, okay? Thank you. Questions for Kenny? Sure. Hey Kenny, I heard you mentioned during... I heard you mentioned during your opening statement that Islam guarantees success to the individual in life and in the hereafter. Would you please define for me success and how can you substantiate such claim? Okay, great, that's a great question. So the call to prayer itself when the Adonis called, what's being said is that God is great, God is great, and the law is great, and the law is the greatest. To come to prayer, come to prayer, come to your success, come to your success, because what you find is that the continuous return to prayer five times a day, I don't know if you're believing a crater or not, but the continuous return to prayer gives us the opportunity to seek forgiveness for the things that we've done wrong in this world. It gives us the opportunity to thank our God, our Creator for blessings that He's bestowed upon us. It gives us the opportunity to say, God help me. I don't know what to do about this. In my personal prayer, I always say, every prayer, oh, allow you my comfort, my peace, my protector, I can't make it without you. Because I've tried, I've tried to live my life and I've had success in this. I used to be in the music business, signed a couple of record deals and so forth, but I realized that inevitably all that's for not. When I've devoted my time and my life to my Creator and that continuous return, it makes me more conscious about everything I say and I do. Makes me a better person. I'm not just speaking for myself, this is the Muslim standpoint that Islam reconditions the individual. Makes you, if you were a drug addict or you was running around with different people and having sex with people all over the place, it makes you run away from those things. It reconditions you and remodes you and reshapes you. And it's all established by the prayer. Allah says in the Quran in summary, to seek help through patience and prayer, the continuous return, the continuous return, come to success, come to success. You can't, once you get up out of the prayer, you feel that your burdens in life have been removed every single time, every single time. So I'll leave it at that. Thank you. Yeah, so this question is for Kenny. Sure. So you consistently throughout your statements, quoted Sura Al-Bakr, Aya 256, where it says, let there be no compulsion in religion for the truth stands out clearly from falsehood. The thing is, is that you say to be a reader and not a repeater. Well, the Quran also says, I'm not sure the Sura or Aya, it says that if you are in doubt, seek those who have knowledge. Well, I think that when it comes to Islam, those who have knowledge would be the Sahaba and those who compile their words, would it not? Well, sure, there'd be the ones closest to the Prophet, peace be upon him. So, in Asbab Al-Nazul by Al-Wahiri, who was considered one of the greatest Quran commentators of his time, he said that it was reported by, he said it was reported by Al-Suri, that, here it is, that the verse, let it be no compulsion in religion, was called down because there was a traitor from Medina who had two sons who accepted Christianity. They were brought to the Prophet Muhammad and Muhammad and Allah allegedly then revealed this verse, let there be no compulsion in religion. It says, yes, no problem. It says that this was before the Messenger of Allah was commanded to fight the people of the book. It says, but then Allah is saying there is no compulsion of religion, was abrogated, replaced, and the Prophet was commanded to fight the people of the book in Surah At-Tawbah, in verse 29, ayah 29 where it says, fight those who do not believe in God in the last day, nor comply with God and his Messenger have forbidden, nor embrace the religion of truth from among those who were given the scriptures until they pay the jizya, the tax, willingly and fullingly submitted. And so I was just wondering, why are you consistently quoting an abrogated verse in your... It's not abrogated. So I don't know who that person was that gave that opinion, but so you're talking about two different situations here. For one, if you notice what the verse says, it says to fight those who reject the law in summary, those who are fighting against you, those who are rejecting and force them to pay the jizya. So that situation is one in which the Muslims were actually living amongst, living with the Christians and they were in a situation where they were, in a war situation. Just like we in this country, we have to pay taxes and part of our taxes go to our military defense. And if we don't pay the tax for everything, but part of it goes to our military defense. So if we don't pay the tax, then we have brought a... It's detrimental to ourselves. You've brought a shame against yourself because you had the ability to either go and join the fight to defend the nation or you have chosen not to fight and you just don't wanna be a part of it, but that same nation is taking care of you. So in that situation that you mentioned, that other verse, the Muslims were actually in control at that time and when they took over Mecca, when they returned there after the hijra, they had to leave to Medina. When they come back, they come back 10,000 strong. They didn't kill anyone. All the people who were previously torching them and doing all kind of wrong to them, they didn't harm a soul. And now they're in control and the Christians are living among them. Some of the Christians had to pay the jizya, the meaning of the tax. It's nothing more than the tax that we would pay here in the United States is similar to that. And so if you don't wanna pay it, then it's putting a putting pressure on them to say, hey, are you at least going to help us? If you're a man and you're part of this community, are you willing to come and fight? If you're not willing to fight, are you willing to at least spend your resources so that we can arm our defenses? Because inevitably we're defending you as well. So I'm sorry if I, so that's, there's two different things going on there. So. Any questions for Kenny? Sure. T. Jump brought up an article or a website saying that the statistics show that it's better in secular locations like crime and the poverty. I just wanna know, asking you personally, what do you think the agenda of these, of the guys who wrote these articles, because you talk about Islamophobia, do you believe the men who made these articles, speaking of Christiano, had an agenda and if they had an agenda, what do you believe it was? Well, so we know that Islamophobia is real and it's something that we have to consider whenever we hear something about any source, from any source, we need to be wise enough to say, well, let me check into that. You shouldn't just believe anything you say, you hear someone say. You should go and check the source, see who, if you can, to the best of your ability, find out what these people are all about. So I don't know what sources he was using, I don't think he mentioned, but the fact of the matter is, Islamophobia is prominent, it is real and we've discussed Hitler today and let me just mention a quote by Hitler, I mentioned it in the book as well, and it says, the purpose of propaganda is not to provide interesting distraction for blasé young gentlemen, but to convince the masses, but the masses are slow moving and they always require a certain time before they are ready to even notice a thing and only after the simplest ideas are repeated thousands of times will the masses finally remember them, right? And another quote by one of his henchmen, the Paul Joseph Goba is a chancellor of Nazi Germany, he says, the propaganda works best when the people being manipulated are confident that they're acting on their own free will, and so in summary, these tactics that are used, they're well studied, we hear these little sound bites, we hear 10 second sound bites over and over again, radical Islam, Sharia, Sharia law, women are oppressed, over and over and over again, people begin to believe those things. It's far from the truth, I encourage you to, I gift you a book, a matter of fact, for free if you like, and that's what I'm addressing in the entire book, just proving the patriot's a propaganda, and yeah, so we can't believe everything that we hear.