Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations

Thursday, July 18, 2013

Oxford Debate: Is Islam A Religion of Peace?

Added by admin on July 14, 2013.

In France, the UK and across Europe ”immigration” — a code word for massive inflows from mainly Third World and Muslim countries — has become a dangerously divisive and politically explosive issue exacerbated by the current six-year long recession.

Flag of the Nation of Islam. The stand for Justice, Freedom, Equality, Islam. (Credit: Wikipedia)

“Immigration” along with a range of other euphemisms are used in the “politically correct” world of the 21st century to smooth, for those on the Left, or smother, for those on the Right, discussion about the impact on the West of the political-religious ideology of Islamism (see here, here and here).

Flag of the Nation of Islam. The letters stand for Justice, Freedom, Equality, Islam. (Credit: Wikipedia)

Mehdi Hasan, a Muslim journalist speaking for the motion

Daniel Johnson Oxford debate Islam Is Not A Peaceful Religion

Daniel Johnson, a Catholic journalist speaking against the motion

Recently at Britain’s Oxford University, the Oxford Union — founded in 1823 and said to be “the world’s most prestigious debating society” — held a debate on the motion: THIS HOUSE BELIEVES ISLAM IS A RELIGION OF PEACE. The motion was carried with a Yes vote of 286 against a No vote of 168.

The debate took place a few days after the barbarous butchering, in the name of Islam, of a British soldier outside his barracks in south London on May 23rd. The debate proceedings were published to YouTube by the Oxford Debating Union on July 3rd 2013.

Watch and listen to each of the six debaters here. The Oxford Union Website is here. Below are the video contributions of one debater from each side:

Daniel Johnston gives his argument against Islam being a peaceful religion.

Daniel Johnston, journalist and editor of what he calls the “not very right-wing” magazine Standpoint, called Islam “the most direct threat to Western civilization in the world today”

Published on Jul 3, 2013
FOLLOW Daniel Johnson on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/DanBJohnson

Mehdi Hasan gives his argument for Islam being a peaceful religion.

Muslim journalist Mehdi Hasan is political editor of the UK edition of the Huffington Post. He asked whether 1.6 billion believers in Islam around the world really are all “followers, promoters and believers in a religion of violence”. Hasan urged his audience not to “fuel the arguments of the phobes and bigots and legitimise hate”, but to “trust the Muslims that you know and that you hear.”