Havw I come on too strongly?
Help
I'm arguing with some Muslim women about the ethics of FGM and in response to one of them saying this
"How can something be horrible and wrong but Sunnah, our god is the most just the most merciful and had given us the best most merciful religion, how can it be sunnah if it’s horrible and wrong?"
I wanted her to continue to notice the logical fallacies in the whole thing so I responded with this long spiel which I'm now realising was most likely counterproductive to my vision:
"Or maybe your god is just made up and the men who wrote the holy book at that time were wrong on this. Just as god didn't outlaw slavery but banned alcohol and pork. Just as he claims women are worth half of a man. you can try to justify it all you want and play mental gymnastics. Once the blinders come off, you'll remember this period in time when you were trying to reconcile the harm Islam and other Abrahamic religions perpetuate with your morality and laugh at how hard you tried to ignore the elephant in the room.
How is your god merciful and how is the religion most merciful if the punishment for apostasy, death is still legal in 2026?
If men can marry 4 prepubescent wives, if women have to cover up and follow so many rules men don't?
How is your religion merciful when you give unbelievers the "choice" to either convert forcefully or pay a tax? And once again, how is your god merciful if he tells you that people who leave the religion or criticise it have to be put to DEATH? And no I don't accept the cope that it's because it was written when apostasy was viewed as treason bla bla bla. People are still afraid to leave/criticise Islam now in all Muslim majority countries because of this very real fear of death and extreme violence being visited on them by the state/ family/local communities et.al. For all it's faults, people have never been scared to leave Christianity because of death (no I don't believe in fucked up Christianity either) and yet, the internet is full of scared ex Muslims talking about keeping up appearances because outwardly declaring they're leaving the religion could lead directly to their deaths.
How can you view a religion that inspires such fear and suffering in LGBTQIA/feminists/non conformists in its populations as perfect?
And let's not even talk about the Arab slave trade and the normalisation of slavery and racism in Islam which god didn't have time to ban. Also the forced arabisation and destruction of indigenous cultures that existed pre Arab conquest in Africa all the way to Asia (but god had time to ban pork and alcohol and women showing their hair presumably).
This is surely a perfect religion with a just god. "
Was I indeed counterproductive? Does it come across as Islamophobic? What could I have done better to get across to her? And did I mischaracterise any bits? I'm happy to go back and edit the initial response to her with any suggestions given here, as I was aiming for her to see the fallacies in Islam but I'm afraid my anger got the better of me and I responded in an antagonistic manner. What do you comrades think?
Posted Aug 3, 2026, 2:02 PM UTC