Karim Metwaly is a very popular YouTube Muslim apologist. He’s young, charismatic, handsome, and well spoken. He decided to take on the belligerent YouTube atheist Dusty Smith by responding to a video called, “If you are a Muslim you are retarded.”

Karim deserves a lot of credit for taking on Dusty. This action proves that he’s not afraid to defend his religion against anyone. He tries to provide a positive representation and message of Islam which, I believe, brings hope that the religion can modernize and reform itself, and remove the oppressive radical elements that have been a plague for so long, especially for Muslim women.

The problem with Karim is he can’t win the arguments against his religion. He’s unable to rid the Quran of all the hateful and insane passages which are in abundance. He can make excuses, but that doesn’t make the passages go away.

After responding to Dusty, Dusty fires back. It’s not pretty. When it comes to the argument, Karim is completely owned by Dusty. I haven’t seen a bigger beating since Bambi got stepped on by Godzilla. But of all the punishment Karim received from Dusty, the absolute worst was the punishment Karim gave to himself when he defended pedophilia.

Seeing Karim actually say things like “but the 6-year-old was really smart” reminded me of the biggest problem I have with religion. It causes otherwise intelligent and good people to idolize things that are intellectually and morally repulsive.

As someone who gets into these debates, I’ve seen it firsthand. Jews and Christians will defend Moses’s slaughtering of women and children (Numbers 31:17,18.) They’ll apathetically state that the victims weren’t innocent, and that Moses had to keep the bloodline pure. If you can justify the deliberate targeting and butchering of unarmed women and children, what wouldn’t you be able to justify?

For Islam, it’s defending the notion of women only having half a man’s testimony in court, the constant call for violence against non-believers and others, and the so-called prophet being a pedophile.

As Dusty Smith put it, there are two options in defending Prophet Muhammed (in his 50s) marrying a 6-year-old.

1. Deny it.

2. Defend pedophilia.

Karim Metwaly takes option 2. “Aisha (at 6-years-old) was really smart.” “Back then it was acceptable.” “It wasn’t forced or anything like that.”

Dusty addresses the “back then it was acceptable” by pointing out that a God who never changes wouldn’t change moral positions on pedophilia. I’ll add a second point to that statement as “back when it was acceptable” is the same common argument made by Christians to excuse Old Testament brutality. Why are you following a book that’s based on a primitive understanding of morals? And at the same time, how can you argue that these books are sources of “objective morality?”

But the thing is, I don’t believe it’s a “primitive understanding of morals.” Ancient philosophers such as Confucius and Socrates lived over 2,400 years ago. They were among the most moral people who ever lived. Their morals elevated the ethics of their society. So how is it possible that an all-powerful creator failed to do what they did?

It’s not a “primitive understanding of morals,” it’s the worst people of ancient society, absolute criminals, creating a religion. In today’s world there is unspeakable cruelty in many cultures, unethical societies run by unethical people. The year on the calendar doesn’t make mankind more ethical than people who lived centuries ago.

It’s not modern morality that has made life more enjoyable in what we consider to be civilized societies today. It’s certainly social progress to an extent, but most importantly, we should be thanking organized law enforcement. Good arms are required for good laws.

There is still child marriage in many Muslim areas of the world, there is still accepted pedophilia. And guess what they use as a source to justify it? Sharia Law! So for all the Muslims following the “back then it was acceptable” passages of the Qur’an, when is Karim going to inform these people that it’s not acceptable anymore?

In regards to “Aisha (at 6-years-old) was really smart” and “It wasn’t forced or anything like that,” does anyone really need to explain why these are horrendous arguments? How can Karim or anyone say these things without feeling embarrassed?

Wouldn’t it be better if God taught proper moral guidance from the beginning? And when you have a book containing “back then it was acceptable” immoral teachings, how do you determine what to follow and what not to follow? Knowing that the morality is flawed, why would anyone promote Sharia Law? If your religious book is so bad that you need to pick and choose, expand your mind beyond that one book.

Call me picky, but when I search for books that provide moral guidance, if I find passages that justify the murdering and marrying of children, that book becomes disqualified immediately.

-James Kirk Wall

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