Maybe if Bilal Philips stopped calling for people to be murdered in accord with Islamic law, he would find “Islamophobia” on the wane. “Imam decries Islamophobia while Pride battles homophobia,” from the Globe and Mail, July 3:
For some Pride veterans, it might have been a bit of a déja vu moment: As thousands of scantily clad, flamboyantly colourful Pride marchers sashayed down Yonge Street, the ire of several was drawn by speakers at a nearby convention who noted that, according to their scripture, homosexuality is an abomination.
The conference was an annual convention at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre — a weekend-long series of discussions on what it means to be a devout Muslim in the 21st-Century.
But one of speakers at the weekend-long conference has got in trouble with the city”s politicians before for anti-gay stands.
Bilal Philips, a Jamaican-Canadian imam, was one of the weekend’s speakers. He was expelled from Germany earlier this year for saying, documented on YouTube and elsewhere, that Islamic law teaches that gays and lesbians should be killed.
That wasn’t his focus on Sunday. Like his speech in Germany, his talk centred on Islamophobia and how Muslims can combat it, and misconceptions surrounding their faith, in a plugged-in world.
But he suggested his audience take his treatment in Europe as a lesson in “vigilant” PR.
“I got expelled from Germany for life, why? Because I said I believe that according to Islamic law, homosexuals should be executed if they are caught in the act. It’s Islamic law. I”m not allowed to believe that? “¦ Just to believe that, you”re a threat to the society?
Uh, yeah.
“So this is how vigilant they are,” he said. “We should be also vigilant with the media. When things are said, we should be responsive, we should be on Google, on Facebook, whatever. We should be responding to these things.”…
And they are, with fogs of misinformation and disinformation.