We need to learn something from the Jews:
don't take converts too seriously.

They should prove themselves for years before we invest anything in them.

Most converts have problems and our resource-strapped community is not equipped to deal with them. Normal Westerners do not convert to Islam.

Most of them have problems, whether they be: a mental illness, an identity crisis, rebellion against parents, attraction to extreme ideologies, a desire to annoy society and engage in anti-social behaviors, etc.

🧵Western Mosques that are both beautiful and vernacular:

Dar al-Islam in Abiquiú New Mexico


Fatih Mosque, Amsterdam

Middle Easterners are under the impression that their government is a foreign entity, as opposed to a reflection of the society.

"They are thieves"
"They are liars"
"They are curropt"
"They are nepotistic"
"They only care about themselves"

No, WE are all of those things... ...these traits are rampant in our societies.

Dads lord over their family like mini dictators.

Thievery and scamming are everyday occurances.

We constantly lie, to the extent that a truthful person is called a simpleton (sāda).

Our governments are just doing what we do!

The Navigating Differences document cements my theory that Islam in America will go the way of Judaism. 🧵 There will be reform-minded people, who compromise so many values that eventually their Islam becomes about biryani, TV shows, and Brown immigrant culture, in the same way that liberal Judiasm is about bagels, Jewish humor, Brooklyn accents, Chinese food on Christmas, etc.

What does Rumi’s poetry have to do with Iran and Afghanistan Fighting? A thread 🧵

Since the Tālibān takeover, Iran’s government has been cautious but not hostile to the new government, to the chagrin of Iranians and many Afghans, especially the Persian-speaking Tājiks.

https://twitter.com/AhmadMassoud/status/1662556880219062272

Early in the takeover days, Persian-speaking Afghans in the Panjshīr region began to resist the new Tālibān government.

They were led by Ahmad Masʿūd, the son of famous commander Ahmad Shah Masʿūd.

Many Iranians and Afghans believed that Iran should have supported resistance.

Muslims cry about Western colonization, our ancestors were engaged in the very same practises at the same level.

Muslims took slaves, looted, and erased cultures.

In an alternate timeline where Ottomans conquered the Americas, we would take pride in that as well. Imagine a timeline where the majority of North Americans are Brown Muslims.

Then, poor European immigrants arrive and tear down statues of early Muslim leaders, complain that everything is too Muslim, etc.

Would a Muslim society accept that? I don't think we would.

Wanton destruction of old sites is par for the course in our countries.

The impulse to study and preserve relics is Western. Europeans founded Egyptology, not Egyptians.

The tomb of Cyrus the Great was identified by Europeans. Before they arrived, it was a grazing ground.

https://twitter.com/thebluecairo/status/1658720150009282560

This page has documented just some of the insane destruction unleashed on Ahl al-Bayt shrines in Iran and Iraq. The carnage is just unimaginable.

https://twitter.com/ArchivesPersian/status/1307081699117985800

Arabic dialects would have broken into distinct languages à la Latin ages ago were it not for the Muslim emphasis on learning and preserving classical Arabic

Maltese is proof of this.

https://twitter.com/LinguisticsShi1/status/1653478598123110423

A shared ethnic identity is not enough to keep a language unified, Turkic languages broke up from one or two formal registers into a dozens of distinct languages.

You need a stronger motivator like religion to animate a strict adherence to a standardized language.

Persian nationalists peddle the Pahlavi myth that the Cyrus Cylinder was the 'first charter of human rights.'

Please read the many translations, it's mostly just a self-aggrandizing document.

The modern usage of 'human rights' is a distinctly Western and liberal notion.

https://twitter.com/irgc_ender/status/1653724930511450114

For anyone who doesn't believe me, you can read the entire translation. Please point out where 'human rights' are expressed, directly or otherwise:
britishmuseum.org/collection/obj…

"9 Signs of a Childish society": 1. Bad driving:

Iran is a cash society. There are no credit cards. Until recently, even homes were purchased in cash.

Given that, Iranians are often utterly shocked when I explain how debt-driven the American economy is.

How can everything, even down to cell phones and clothes be on credit? A local spice vendor once asked a visiting European friend how much money he has. He responded frankly: just a few thousand Euros.

The spice vendor was shocked, not only did he have more money (in Tomans), he also owns his home, making his net worth was magnitudes higher!

Please don't treat creatives like this. Our work is work too... I get these every day, Muslims are always expecting free labor, or worse yet they agree to pay and then don't! Even MSAs have cheated me out of money.
But non-Muslims tend to pay upfront and even tip afterward...

ATTENTION PERSIAN LOVERS:

For the past few months, I have been tracking down and scanning rare, out-of-print, and must-have books for students of Persian poetry. So far we've scanned about ten books, but I'm hoping we can finish many more! (1/2) If you want access to the books we've scanned so far, just send a donation of any amount to the project (DM me for details). The donations will allow us to find these rare/out-of-print books and make them available to everyone everywhere! (2/2)

Persians call the robe many Muslim cultures wear an 'aba (عباء), which is an Arabic word, and Arabs call it a bisht (بشت) which is an Arabization of the Persian word 'back' (پشت). In Levantine Arabic, a calendar is called a rūznāmeh (روزنامة), a Persian loanword via Ottoman Turkish, but Persians call it a taqvīm (تقويم), which is an Arabic loanword.