{"id":2713,"date":"2015-06-24T08:12:01","date_gmt":"2015-06-24T07:12:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gspellchecker.com\/?p=2713"},"modified":"2015-09-04T11:01:51","modified_gmt":"2015-09-04T10:01:51","slug":"cj-werlemans-racist-anti-muslim-bigotry-exposed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gspellchecker.com\/2015\/06\/cj-werlemans-racist-anti-muslim-bigotry-exposed\/","title":{"rendered":"CJ Werleman’s Racist, Anti-Muslim Bigotry Exposed."},"content":{"rendered":"
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Image Credit: https:\/\/atheistsunited.org\/<\/p><\/div>\n

You may wonder what’s left to write about CJ Werleman – already exposed for misrepresentation<\/a>, serial plagiarism<\/a>, probable sockpuppetry, <\/a>outright lies<\/a>\u00a0and a\u00a0suspicious\u00a0Twitter follower<\/a> count\u00a0\u2013 not to mention public humiliation<\/a> at the hands of Sam Harris. Both Salon<\/em> and Alternet<\/em>\u00a0have since dropped Werleman from their pages, the latter completely removing his articles from their archives altogether. The only platform still willing to publish him is the propagandist outfit ‘Middle East Eye’<\/em>.<\/p>\n

It would seem that he holds ‘new atheists’ responsible for this career nosedive, so spends his days demonizing them via his twitter feed<\/a> – desperately trying to link them to any atrocity or topical ill-deed he can, such as Anders Breivik<\/a>‘s terrorism, White Supremacy<\/a>, and The\u00a0Chapel Hill<\/a>\u00a0Shootings.<\/p>\n

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The latest in this\u00a0catalogue\u00a0of bitter vindictiveness comes by way of\u00a0 associating\u00a0prominent atheist authors with\u00a0the horrific crimes of the Charleston Shooter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This kind of malicious dishonesty gets the better of me and I can’t resist digging a little\u00a0deeper on Werleman to see what other inexcusable behaviour he is capable of. And the results of my curiosity\u00a0are not good news.<\/p>\n

Werleman bemoans the period<\/a>\u00a0he identified as a\u00a0‘new atheist’, and now\u00a0claims to have seen the light – seeing\u00a0it,\u00a0coincidentally, around the same time he was offered a gig with atheist smear-merchants Salon<\/em> and started cosying up with popular\u00a0Islamopologists such as Glenn Greenwald. That’s where all the clicks are you see.<\/p>\n

So, what of Werleman’s previous views on Islam and Muslims then? Well, they fall into categories ranging from hypocrisy, anti-Muslim bigotry to\u00a0outright racism. Below is a sample. This is clearly not mere anti-theistic sentiment:<\/p>\n

\"wpid-screenshot_2015-06-24-12-39-43-1.png\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"21\"<\/a> \"20\"<\/a> \"19\"<\/a> \"18\"<\/a> \"17\"<\/a> \"16\"<\/a> \"15\"<\/a> \"14\"<\/a> \"13\"<\/a> \"12\"<\/a> \"11\"<\/a> \"10\"<\/a> \"9\"<\/a> \"8\"<\/a> \"7\"<\/a> \"6\"<\/a> \"5\"<\/a> \"4\"<\/a> \"3\"<\/a> \"2\"<\/a> \"1\"<\/a>These tweets are a few years old of course, but keep in mind that Werleman is a 42-year-old man – this isn’t some college journal we have unearthed, but the thoughts of an adult male approaching middle age. This kind of rhetoric and prejudice had no place in the atheist movement back then, and it certainly has no place in the atheist movement now.<\/p>\n

Indeed, nothing as abhorrent as his worst comments can be found\u00a0in the works\u00a0of any of the ‘new atheist’ authors he persistently smears. Werleman is clearly projecting the prejudices he espoused\u00a0onto anyone who dares to criticise him, or Islamic ideology.<\/p>\n

It’s clear Werleman has simply swapped out extreme anti-Muslim bigotry for extreme anti-atheist bigotry. This isn’t some tame progression from critic of Islam to liberal apologist, but a childish bigot hitching his wagon to a new extreme after deeming it a more lucrative option.<\/p>\n

UPDATE 25 June 2015<\/strong> – In response to this article, CJ Werleman has released what he understands to be an ‘apology’ via his Facebook page<\/a>. Of course, it takes mere moments to realise it is anything but. He completely misses the point when he says ‘You see, New Atheists aren’t upset I was an anti-Muslim bigot, probable racist, in 2009. They’re upset that I’m not that now<\/em>‘.<\/p>\n

Firstly, there is an inability to accept responsibility for blatant racism, describing it as ‘probable’ – reminding me of the\u00a0time he failed to take\u00a0full responsibility for blatant plagiarism in this ‘apology<\/a>‘. And most importantly –\u00a0 people aren’t ‘upset’ because he is no longer a racist bigot, they are annoyed because he applies those abhorrent traits to ‘new atheists’ as a whole.<\/p>\n

CJ Werleman once again reiterates that he no longer stands by his published ‘new atheist’ books, and urges people not to buy them – yet they conspicuously remain available to purchase via his official website.<\/p>\n

The targets held up as the worst of this imagined\u00a0‘new atheist’ evil are Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins. I’d like Werleman to note which of those individuals promoted such bigoted views as ‘Arab =Terrorist’ and ‘Muslims should be banned from flying’. Who knows? Perhaps as I awake in April 2021 at the tender, impressionable age of 37 – I too may suddenly forget that racism is wrong – although I had always assumed memory loss came to one a little later in life.<\/p>\n

If one thing is clear from this entire episode it’s this; The profile CJ Werleman has concocted in order to denigrate all ‘new atheists’ is based not on a reality, but solely on his own past transgressions. Werleman can’t seem to grasp that just because he was an appalling racist bigot when critical of Islam, it doesn’t mean everyone is.<\/p>\n

Although Werleman’s target has changed, his bigotry remains – tarring ‘New Atheists’ with the same broad strokes he once reserved for Muslims and Arabs.<\/p>\n

Stephen Knight is host of The #GSPodcast. You can listen to The Godless Spellchecker Podcast here<\/a>, and support it by becoming a patron\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/i><\/p>\n

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