Ayaan Hirsi Ali on France's Proposed Law Against Muslim Extremism

What is stopping particularly people from the left, including intellectuals, from recognizing the differences, that there are differences in people that follow the peaceful version of the religion and then people that follow the more radical version of the religion that wants to convert people? What is stopping them from recognizing that this is an issue? Because it's almost like an agreed upon reluctance to discuss it, to acknowledge it, and to automatically classify any discussion of it as Islamophobic. And I've seen this label put on you, that you are Islamophobic. Yeah. So the term Islamophobia is obviously very much a Western term. It's an opportunity, opportunistic term. The West has gone woke, and they feel an intense regret for some of the things that were done by their ancestors. And so you have names like homophobia, sexism, and so on. And Islamophobia is, I would say, a term that is put right in there to exploit that situation. The way I see it, it's an artificial term. But let's set that aside. And let's see why it is that Western leaders go along with the assertion that Islam is a religion of peace. There's nothing to see here. It's just a small group of people who have lost their way. And they would have been violent anyway. But in general, Islam is a religion of peace. So on. A lot of leaders, contemporary Western leaders, they don't know much about religion, even their own. And they don't want to. I mean, you could find out. You could be ignorant of something, pick up a few books, and just find out. I think, number two, there is a sense that because the West is really powerful, where it matters, economically powerful, more powerful than any Islamic country, militarily more powerful, diplomatically more powerful, there is almost that parent-child relationship where it is, we'll just let them come along. They'll grow up. They'll come to our way of seeing things. If they want to believe that Islam is a religion of peace, let's say it's along. Let's come. Let's do it along with them. With some people, I think that is the case. And then along came ISIS. And they saw that you couldn't do that. And you are now dealing with people who truly believe. And I think it was a matter of time before people in Washington and Berlin and London and so on thought, wait a second. It's not only that they believe it. It is in the Koran. It's in the Hadith. It's in the history of Islam. We better do something about that. That's when you start to see a shift in how the confrontation or the clash of values is approached. The latest example, if you will let me, is the president of France. In France, for the last 20, 30, 40 years, they were saying there's nothing to see here. Islam has evolved. It's just like Christianity. It's either a religion of peace or it's irrelevant altogether. All religions are going to go away. We are now living in the post-religion age. In 2021, there is a law right now that has gone through the Law House of France, and it is being debated in the Senate where they're talking about if that law gets passed, then Muslims who are accused of trying to separate their communities from the rest of France along religious lines are going to be stopped by that law. There will be no more homeschooling. They will be told the values of the republic prevail. Anywhere that there's a clash between Islamic values and values of the republic, the values of the republic prevail. And he is saying if that law passes, that's all going to be enforced. Think about that. How would they possibly enforce that? Look, I'm just as curious as you are. They've also banned hijabs on the beach too, right? Haven't they done that? I get a mixed story about is it the hijab or the burqa? So there are attires where you can take a scarf and cover your head. I guess that's not banned anywhere. There's no debate about that. But there's something about the thing that covers your face. And there's been a lot of debate in Europe about that. And some participants of that debate are saying, we're not talking about religion here. It's all about security. We need to see everybody's face. Well, now everyone wears a mask. It's all out the window because of COVID. Because of COVID. And there are other things that are out of the window because of COVID. Because you just asked me, how are they going to enforce those rules of stopping Muslims from separating themselves from the rest of society through their associations, through their schools, through everything that they do that make them say, we don't want to have anything to do with France, even though physically they're in France. I think they're going to use some of the measures that they applied or some of the laws that they applied during COVID. They're going to assume powers that all of us thought a liberal society would be very careful with. And now they're not. So I guess that's what they're going to apply. They'll be breaking into people's homes, mosques, associations, whatever, looking for Islamist materials of Dawa. Dawa means the proselytizing and they will try and put a stop to that. They'll try and police literally what goes into people's minds and comes out of their mouths. Wow. That seems very dangerous to me. And COVID made it possible. Catch new episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience for free only on Spotify. Watch back catalog JRE videos on Spotify, including clips, easily, seamlessly switch between video and audio experience. On Spotify, you can listen to the JRE in the background while using other apps and can download episodes to save on data costs all for free. Spotify is absolutely free. You don't have to have a premium account to watch new JRE episodes. You just need to search for the JRE on your Spotify app. Go to Spotify now to get this full episode of The Joe Rogan Experience.