“Islam influences every aspect of believers’ lives. Women are denied their social and economic rights in the name of Islam, and ignorant women bring up ignorant children. Sons brought up watching their mother being beaten will use violence. Why was it racist to ask this question? Why was it antiracist to indulge people’s attachment to their old ideas and perpetuate this misery? I read the works of the great thinkers of the Enlightenment—Spinoza, Locke, Kant, Mill, Voltaire—and the modern ones, Russell and Popper,with my full attention, not just as a class assignment. All life is problem solving, Popper says. There are no absolutes; progress comes through critical thought. Popper admired Kant and Spinoza but criticized them when he felt their arguments were weak. I wanted to be like Popper: free of constraint, recognizing greatness but unafraid to detect its flaws.Spinoza was clear-minded and fearless. He was the first modern European to state clearly that the world is not ordained by a separate God. Nature created itself, Spinoza said. Reason, not obedience, should guide our lives. Though it took centuries to crumble, the entire ossified cage of European social hierarchy—from kings to serfs, and between men and women, all of it shored up by the Catholic Church—was destroyed by this thought. Now, surely, it was Islam’s turn to be tested.”

“Islam influences every aspect of believers’ lives. Women are denied their social and economic rights in the name of Islam, and ignorant women bring up ignorant children. Sons brought up watching their mother being beaten will use violence. Why was it racist to ask this question? Why was it antiracist to indulge people’s attachment to their old ideas and perpetuate this misery? I read the works of the great thinkers of the Enlightenment—Spinoza, Locke, Kant, Mill, Voltaire—and the modern ones, Russell and Popper,with my full attention, not just as a class assignment. All life is problem solving, Popper says. There are no absolutes; progress comes through critical thought. Popper admired Kant and Spinoza but criticized them when he felt their arguments were weak. I wanted to be like Popper: free of constraint, recognizing greatness but unafraid to detect its flaws.Spinoza was clear-minded and fearless. He was the first modern European to state clearly that the world is not ordained by a separate God. Nature created itself, Spinoza said. Reason, not obedience, should guide our lives. Though it took centuries to crumble, the entire ossified cage of European social hierarchy—from kings to serfs, and between men and women, all of it shored up by the Catholic Church—was destroyed by this thought. Now, surely, it was Islam’s turn to be tested.”

“With the first commandment, Mohammed tried to imprison common sense. And with the second commandment, the beautiful, romantic side of mankind was enslaved.”

“Even with protection, even with death threats, I can publish, I can travel and I can live the life that I want and not the one my parents want or some imam somewhere thinks I should live.”

“My first experience in the Netherlands was very pleasant, extremely pleasant. I mean, I got my residence permit, refugee status, within four weeks of arrival. People treated me extremely well.”

“They decided to let immigrants in and I am an immigrant. They gave us a chance to participate in this country's life and I took it.”

“Let us recognize that we can no longer tolerate violent oppression of women in the name of religion and culture any more than we would tolerate violent oppression espoused by any other bully in the name of a twisted rationale.”

“I'd like Muslims to look at their religion as a set of beliefs that they can appraise critically and pick and choose from.”

“The people who believe themselves to be on the left, and who defend the agents of Islam in the name of tolerance and culture, are being rightwing. Not just rightwing. Extreme rightwing. I don't understand how you can be so upset about the Christian right and just ignore the Islamic right. I'm talking about equality.”

“When I look at people talking about intersectionality, what I see is the human being magnifying a biological attribute, and then putting them aside, putting them in a corner as victims of oppression....I most certainly don't see myself as a victim.”

“But without doubts, without a standpoint reached through questionings, human beings can't acquire knowledge.”

“American liberals today are hesitant to speak out against the denial of rights that is perpetrated in the name of Islam.”