atheist from Pakistan

Hello all,
I have been searching for atheist forums for a long time now. Finally I found one! I cant wait to participate in discussions with other like minded people. Living in pakistan, most of the people around me are muslims and its just offensive to them if i even bring up the fact that I am an Atheist and an ex-muslim.
I would love to see if there other ex-muslims here and how they feel about this and why they left Islam and what difficulties they had to face from their families.

[Smellyoldgit]

Greetings.
You're doomed now that you're associated with this fine site!
I wonder if the prospect of honour killing is a bit of a problem with some families?

[ghoulslime]

Tamana wrote

Hello all,
I have been searching for atheist forums for a long time now. Finally I found one! I cant wait to participate in discussions with other like minded people. Living in pakistan, most of the people around me are muslims and its just offensive to them if i even bring up the fact that I am an Atheist and an ex-muslim.
I would love to see if there other ex-muslims here and how they feel about this and why they left Islam and what difficulties they had to face from their families.

Welcome, Tamana! We are honored to have you join us!

Smellyoldgit wrote

Greetings.
You're doomed now that you're associated with this fine site!
I wonder if the prospect of honour killing is a bit of a problem with some families?

Yeah it is with many families, thankfully mine isn't that bad. But it happens mainly in rural areas, not so commonly in cities. So sad.

[ILOVEJESUS]

Hi Tamana. What made you make the jump into atheism? I am always interested to hear from Muslim converts as this faith seems to have the most draconian and fearful strategies to keep their "faithfull".

[Whisper]

Welcome to the forum Tamana!

ILOVEJESUS wrote

Hi Tamana. What made you make the jump into atheism? I am always interested to hear from Muslim converts as this faith seems to have the most draconian and fearful strategies to keep their "faithfull".

Well, even as a kid when I was supposedly a muslim, i was never fully satisfied with the concept of God. It never made sense to me but I still believed it because I didn't want to go to hell forever. I would pray everyday just like everyone else, ask for forgiveness and praise God even though i really didn't like Him. But later on I realized what load of bullshit that was! My parents are very very religious so I grew up reading ALOT of Islamic books and was constantly being reminded of Hell and Heaven. The first thing that struck me as most unfair was how islam treats women. The inequality is very evident in Quran and Hadeeth (sayings of the prophet)
And yes Islam has very scary strategies to keep muslims faithful. Most muslim scholars say that an apostate should be killed. SO yes very scary, who would dare question Islam if they can get killed for it?

[Eva]

welcome to our humble forum, tamana.

[Captain Relativity]

Welcome, Tamana, and congratulations on your apostasy. This is an extremely brave and dangerous thing you are doing. Tell me, are you able to openly express your disbelief to your family and friends? Have you come out of the closet, as it were? Is such a thing even possible? I was under the impression that in your country atheist's lives depended on keeping their mouths shut and their opinions to themselves.

And please correct me if I'm wrong, I am an American after all, but Tamana is a woman's name, right? Do you have to cover yourself from head to toe and all the rest of it? Have you had any problems with the morality police? Sorry for all the questions, but I'm fascinated by what your life must be like and how you manage to survive with your sanity intact. Again, congratulations and welcome.

[ILOVEJESUS]

Tamana wrote

Well, even as a kid when I was supposedly a muslim, i was never fully satisfied with the concept of God. It never made sense to me but I still believed it because I didn't want to go to hell forever. I would pray everyday just like everyone else, ask for forgiveness and praise God even though i really didn't like Him. But later on I realized what load of bullshit that was! My parents are very very religious so I grew up reading ALOT of Islamic books and was constantly being reminded of Hell and Heaven. The first thing that struck me as most unfair was how islam treats women. The inequality is very evident in Quran and Hadeeth (sayings of the prophet)
And yes Islam has very scary strategies to keep muslims faithful. Most muslim scholars say that an apostate should be killed. SO yes very scary, who would dare question Islam if they can get killed for it?

I think Islam is a great example of followers going through the motions through fear and habit. When I have brought this up with Muslim friends I always got the same sort of response. Basically if they didn't do this or that they would be at best disregarded by their families and at worst beaten or.......! When asked what they thought of this I would then get rhetoric along the lines of how much better a Muslim their parent setc would be for doing this, and how they would be the weak etc. I have the up most respect for anyone with the guts to be able to distance themselves from such an organisation.

[Sternwallow]

Tamana wrote

Hello all,
I have been searching for atheist forums for a long time now. Finally I found one! I cant wait to participate in discussions with other like minded people. Living in pakistan, most of the people around me are muslims and its just offensive to them if i even bring up the fact that I am an Atheist and an ex-muslim.
I would love to see if there other ex-muslims here and how they feel about this and why they left Islam and what difficulties they had to face from their families.

Hearty welcome to you!
You say it is offensive to them that you are an atheist former Muslim, but doesn't that make you a dreaded apostate automatically under sentence of death by any Muslim who knows your state? Indeed, are they not themselves due to be stoned to death with stones if they (even your own relatives) don't kill you on the spot?

Aside: we usually do not capitalize atheist because it is not a world view or movement and we do capitalize Muslim because it is a recognized religion. Just a tip, not a hard and fast rule.


P.S. Sorry that this is a bit redundant. I wanted to respond as soon as I read that intro post, which I just did.

[clambake]

Welcome, brave Tamana.

[ubs]

Welcome Tamana. What a rare treat to have you here.

[dogpet]

Tamana wrote

I would love to see if there other ex-muslims here and how they feel about this and why they left Islam and what difficulties they had to face from their families.

Hi Tamana, there is a nice lad called The Awoken One who has kicked muhamid into touch and who pops in sometimes. We've also had 2 or 3 potential jihadists unfortunately, but they were easily seen off with a few cartoons.
I hope you have friends local to you in the same situation? Stay safe

Captain Relativity wrote

Welcome, Tamana, and congratulations on your apostasy. This is an extremely brave and dangerous thing you are doing. Tell me, are you able to openly express your disbelief to your family and friends? Have you come out of the closet, as it were? Is such a thing even possible? I was under the impression that in your country atheist's lives depended on keeping their mouths shut and their opinions to themselves.

And please correct me if I'm wrong, I am an American after all, but Tamana is a woman's name, right? Do you have to cover yourself from head to toe and all the rest of it? Have you had any problems with the morality police? Sorry for all the questions, but I'm fascinated by what your life must be like and how you manage to survive with your sanity intact. Again, congratulations and welcome.

Well I havn't told my parents yet because they are VERY religious. If I tell them i have left Islam, they would just be very upset thinking their daughter is going to hell forever. I don't want to hurt them, so I pretend to be Muslim infront of them. I still pretend to pray when they are around and fast during Ramadan because I can't tell them I don't believe in Islam. It's not like I don't have the guts, I'm not afraid that they will beat me or anything. I just don't want to hurt them.
Yes Tamana is a womans name, it's my middle name. No, I don't have to cover myself from head to toe in burqa, my parents never made me do that. My mother wears a burqa from head to toe, she told me a few times but she never forced me to. In pakistan, it's not a cultural thing to reveal your body anyway.
And I do have some atheist friends here and some slightly liberal Muslim ones who don't hate me for not being a muslim. Sometimes we get into arguments but its not like they would ever hurt me. So yeah majority of my friends are not that religious. But those are just my close friends, I don't go around telling acquantainces and other random people I meet on daily basis that I am an atheist. So most of the time I do keep my opinion to myself.