American Islamic scholar Dr. Yasir Qadhi said in a June 11, 2023 lecture at EPIC Masjid in East Plano, Texas that the political Left is just as bigoted and intolerant as the Right is, just over different issues. He explained that Muslims were tolerated by the Left only for as long as they could be a “feather in their cap of diversity [...] but when we want to enforce our personal values in our life, we are no longer tolerated.” He said that the Left is now adopting the phrasing of the Right, telling Muslims that if they don’t accept progressive values, they should “go back to where you came from.” In addition, Dr. Qadhi said that the Left is subtly displaying “white privilege”, adding: “When push comes to shove, the Left thinks this country is theirs.” The lecture was posted to EPIC Masjid’s YouTube channel.
Dr. Yasir Qadhi: “At the end of the day, the left accuses the right of being bigoted, of being intolerant. Guess what? Now we’re seeing the left is just as bigoted and just as intolerant, but over different issues. The right is consistent. ‘We want people that look like us, talk like us, act like us. We want people of our ethnicity, of our culture.’ Obviously, this is threatening to us, because we are not from their culture. But they are being consistent in where they are coming from. We don’t like it because we are the minority here, right?
“But the left doesn’t have a consistent paradigm to respond back to them. What they really have is a group of disconnected ethnicities, ideologies, religions that have nothing in common other than [that] they don’t like the status quo, they don’t like one ethnicity as the default.
“Once the left is now on the rise, once they are dominant – and they are dominant for this presidential cycle – now you’re going to see the fault lines from within. And that’s what is happening with us. We were tolerated as long as we could be a feather in their cap of diversity. We were tolerated as long as they could showcase ‘we’re even tolerating the Muslims.’ But when we want to enforce our personal values in our life, we are no longer tolerated.
“It was a façade. It was an hypocrisy. You didn’t really want inclusion and diversity. Because legitimate diversity would mean you accept us for who we are. That’s legitimate diversity. It obviously, that cannot be the case.
“This leads me to my second point. For any Westerner, for any person whose ancestors go back more generations than ours in this land, to claim that tolerance is a Western virtue – what can you even say? Tolerance is a Western virtue? How short is their amnesia?
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“So whoever thought that the left would permanently protect the Muslims: I’m sorry, open your eyes and see this reality. The same group that would criticize the right when the right said to us, to the Hispanics, to the African Americans [to] ‘go back home’ – the left would say ‘how dare you!’ – Now, from the tongues of the left the exact same thing: ‘If you don’t accept our values’ – this teacher literally said this, it’s in the audio – ‘go back to where you came from’. The exact same phrasing.
“But here is the question – and especially since this teacher is from Canada – the irony. Canada is an immigrant country. Even America. What is America? If a person who has a white background, if his or her father came, landed on Ellis Island, in 1948 from Dublin, Ireland... Ok, I will say, my father landed in Houston, Texas in 1962. 15 years’ difference. I was born and raised here. I have never had any nationality, any citizenship other than this country. Why would you say, if I disagreed with you, that I should go back home? Your father came to Ellis Island. You can go back home if you don’t like me.
“Here’s the point. Suddenly, there is white privilege. This is a term they hate. This is a term they say they don’t have. But the fact of the matter is, they are demonstrating this. How can you say to somebody ‘you go back home if you don’t agree with me’, when you yourselves, and your ancestors came from somewhere else. There is only one difference. Skin color. Because in this case, they are not even Christians. It is not even a Christian-Muslim [conflict]. There is one difference, and it is the privilege of ethnicity and background.
“And so the left that claims to be open minded and tolerant of all ethnicities, when push comes to shove, they think his country is theirs.”
