The Empire Files: The Most Dangerous Year for Muslims in America

[swtantra]

Such a smart and well spoken lady. Amazing.

[rationalroman]

Congrats Abby, to the Empire Files crew. Quality journalism as always. If you ever did a piece on how my nation Australia without question helps America build and consolidate the Empire, it would bring enormous shame to the land down under.

[isaacw]

Although there were several good points made during the interview, I feel that this episode fell short because it didn't address the effects Muslim violence and oppression has on the western world. I agree that painting all Muslims with the same brush is prejudice, but I also think that labeling people that criticize Islam as a religion, it's adherents, and the violence and oppression done explicitly in it's name with the term "Islamophobic" is another broad brush that stifles open and honest debate.

The west's influence on the world is an important subject that is getting some much needed attention with The Empire Files - but I'd argue that the world's influence on the west is important as well. I really enjoy your work Abby, and hope to see your perspective on the world continue to broaden .

[naomifishman]

The truth is all I want, I'm so glad to find you on the internet.

[livevegan]

So great that you are back so soon :) such a wonderful show! xx

[tindog]

What about Christianophobia" the muslims give out enough of that....

[marinatonkonogy]

Amazing interview! She is such a deep thinker. Thank you.

[vk]

While I appreciate the reasonableness in Prof Deepa's arguments about muslims being angry with western imperialism, what does this professor have to say about Muslim leadership and their actions in India? After all, India was a victim of the Islamic ideology for some 800 years, islamic invaders genocided some 80-100 million Hindus (of course, the world doesn't give a damn). given this history and their continued aggression in Kashmir in the name of freedom (whereas the real reason is their Muslim ideology), they've driven out some 500K Kashmiri Pandits (Hindus) from their homeland who r still unable to return to their homes. Wherever the demography becomes favorable to them, they start showing their real face. take the example of Assam, West Bengal and Kerala in India where non-muslims r starting to experience real islamophobia. Would this professor still say that islamophobia is fake and baseless??!!!

[normster]

@25:33 Abby asks "what can we do as non-Muslims who are just appalled by this Islamaphobia rhetoric do to build solidarity and internationalism with the Muslim community"?

How about for starters move to the Muslim majority country of your choice?

[Arslan]

I usually say, if we can't help our fellow human beings fleeing from death, can we really call ourselves civilized or even humans??? I'm not from a rich country but if someone was fleeing their home because of war, persecution, disease or climate change, I would welcome them to my country.

[jamesdempster]

What do you expect people to think? We don't know the difference between Muslim and Muslim extremist and no one's trying to help in that situation

[ramy]

Its a religion history and their tendency to stick to medival beliefs...islam done deserve to exist in this era...its my opinion

[sumbulyousuf]

Never fails to amaze me! love your work Dr. Deepa Kumar!

[---Free-Comics---IG---Playtard]

Professor Kumar's interview was more solid that the wall behind her! I especially agree with her in regards to creating a long-term plan.
Any such transition away from Empire, may lead to the reaffirmation of Empire, in the event that such a transition fails.
Essentially, keeping said transition from becoming mere fad or trend that may fade is key.

An idea is "profitable karma" from a consortium of participants within Empire, that wish to make a "transition" out of it.
Where parties wanting to transition into sustainable/social companies would reinforce each other through advertising, sponsorship and endorsement.
("One hand washes the other")

+1 EF!!!

[cleberoliveira]

Who pays this woman to deceive people?

[mikevic]

All religious pagans are also dangerous .

[roger]

Muslim must have 2 choices in America be good American obay American law or leave America or we will deal with you.

[KerronLewis]

I love the Empire Files. I’ve learned a lot from almost every episode and it covers many topics that I’m concerned about that isn’t covered elsewhere. Love the intrepid Abby Martin. Always talking about her and telling other people to look at her stuff. Having said that, this was the first episode that I didn’t love. It was hard to watch. Deepa’s arguments are porous, sometimes evasive and sometimes apparently intellectually dishonest.
I’ll give some examples. She didn’t respond to Sam Harris’ statistic, she spoke around it and said muslims have different opinions… Harris didn’t dispute that. He said that 17% or 70% (I didn’t hear clearly) of the muslim community in France support isis (I also don’t know why Abby considers it a sweeping statement). I think it would’ve been honest and brave to take on the stat, debunk it, or admit that it is troubling and maybe worth finding a solution for. She just distracts from it.
Cultural racism? Come on, semantics are very important. Do I believe that cultural discrimination against muslims exist? Yes. Do I believe that racism against people who look middle eastern exist? Yes. Do I believe that they happen concurrently and by the same people? Yes. But conflating them is kind of goofy and maybe weakens credibility. Maybe it’s because the word racism is more jarring than discrimination and she wants to use it with the word islam to pack a punch but it backfires.
Arguing that a muslim woman faces no more oppression than a woman in the west? Well that’s obviously not true. I assume that they face all the oppression of other women, but then, as she mentioned, it’s compounded by cultural norms backed by religion, albeit to differing degrees.
At some point she gives a list of reasons for islamophobia and I didn’t disagree with any. However, she didn’t mention any contribution by the religion itself or its extremists. I agree that the majority of extremism is borne out of Western hegemony, but not all. For example, Isis made it clear that geopolitics aside, they still hate the west, for religious reasons. I believe it’s written in their manifesto or something. Including this would add a lot more credibility to her argument.
I didn’t disagree with everything she said… just these, and maybe a few other things… but credibility was lost early.

[JOB-eeqn]

I did not agree with her on the Hitchens and Dawkins they attack Christianity as much as Islam

[mshakespearek]

Very clear and correct, how can we change this ?