# The Southern Poverty Law Center has jumped the shark **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 4, 2016, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588 "2016-11-04T05:28:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/41 "2016-11-04T13:49:07Z")
I’m confused, is the shark part of a hate group and who is he jumping? ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/42 "2016-11-04T14:00:01Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Thank you. I was going to post about this, but you beat me to it. It is the lesson, do not repeat blindly what you hear on a radio or similar - people make bullshit claims and sometimes their prejudices distort into outright falseness. As clearly in this case. > [@](#): > > If one wants to read what the SPLC actually has to say about [Ali](https://www.splcenter.org/20161025/field-guide-anti-muslim-extremists#ali) and [Nawaz](https://www.splcenter.org/20161025/field-guide-anti-muslim-extremists#nawaz), there’s the links. About Hirsi Ali they are right. I do not know Nawaz, the criticisms in there seem maybe not fair… perhaps he is hypocritical, but he seems to be of a different quality than the others. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/43 "2016-11-04T14:23:03Z")
Here is the response to SPLC from Maajid Nawaz: > **[I’m A Muslim Reformer. Why Am I Being Smeared as an ‘Anti-Muslim Extremist’?](https://www.thedailybeast.com/im-a-muslim-reformer-why-am-i-being-smeared-as-an-anti-muslim-extremist)** > > Call it “Islamsplaining”: First-world keyboard virtue-signallers have put themselves in the business of issuing fatwas. > [@](#): > > Through the counter-extremism organisation Quilliam that I founded, I have spent eight years defending my Muslim communities in Europe, Pakistan and beyond from the diktats of Islamist theocrats. I have also argued for the liberal reform of Islam today, from within. But, in a naively dangerous form of neo-Orientalism, the SPLC just arrogated to itself the decision over which debates we Muslims may have about reforming our own religion, and which are to be deemed beyond the pale. > > Let us call it “Islamsplaining.” > > In a monumental failure of comprehension, the SPLC have conflated my challenge to Islamist theocracy among my fellow Muslims with somehow being “anti-Muslim.” The regressive left is now in the business of issuing fatwas against Muslim reformers… ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/44 "2016-11-04T14:35:21Z")
Nawaz is legitimately a controversial pick–and the last bullet of “in his own words” is especially bullshit. But I’m a little surprised that people would criticize the inclusion of Hirsi Ali, but not object to pretty much everyone included on the list. She’s not really any better than Pamela Gellar. If anything, she’s worse, because she has a veil of credibility. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/45 "2016-11-04T14:39:32Z")
There is a [change.org](http://change.org) petition to urge the SPLC to remove these two from their blacklist: [Petition · Remove Maajid Nawaz and Ayaan Hirsi Ali from the SPLC's list of anti-Muslim extremists - United States · Change.org](https://www.change.org/p/southern-poverty-law-center-remove-maajid-nawaz-and-ayaan-hirsi-ali-from-the-splc-s-list-of-anti-muslim-extremists) It has around 10,000 signatures, but SPLC has sent a statement that they will not back down, see here: > **[The SPLC refuses to remove Maajid Nawaz from its list](https://www.change.org/p/southern-poverty-law-center-remove-maajid-nawaz-and-ayaan-hirsi-ali-from-the-splc-s-list-of-anti-muslim-extremists/u/18319559)** > > First, I would just like to thank you all for your support, as I had no idea that my petition would reach over 8,000 signatures in under three days. > > Today, I was informed that the Southern Poverty Law Center has no intention of removing Maajid... [QUOTE=SPLC] That kind of talk is not what we want people to discuss when discussing Muslims. These are conspiracy theories and it’s dangerous to portray every Muslim essentially as an infiltrator… [/QUOTE] In response to this accusation of being a conspiracy theorist, Nawaz has said in the article I linked to above [QUOTE=Maajid Nawaz] It’s not as if there’s any shortage of Muslim extremists who want me dead. They exist in numbers so plenty that former jihadists have even taken to calling in to my live LBC radio show to confess to once having made plans to assassinate me. Europe has witnessed around 6,000 of our fellow Muslims leave to join ISIS. Here in Europe, amid jihadist assassinations and mass terror attacks planned with military precision, we truly are in the thick of it. Meanwhile, from the comforts of sweet Alabama comes this edict that liberal Muslims working to throw open a conversation around reforming Islam today are somehow to be deemed “anti-Muslim extremists.” [/QUOTE] Indeed, here is a video of Nawaz actually talking on a UK radio show to a reformed extremist IS sympathizer: **someone who had actually plotted to kill him** : Listen to what this ex-IS sympathizer says about the notion that potentially violent extremists are some tiny minority in UK Muslim communities. The SPLC have essentially issued a fatwa on AHA and Nawaz; as if they didn’t _already_ have a target on their backs. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/46 "2016-11-04T15:08:13Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Nawaz is legitimately a controversial pick–and the last bullet of “in his own words” is especially bullshit. yes i agree > [@Riemann](#): > > The SPLC have essentially issued a fatwa on AHA and Nawaz; as if they didn’t _already_ have a target on their backs. They issued a religious scholarly opinion? how very strange, there is no religious scholarly opinion. It seems to me just a banal secular list of people they consider to be problematic speakers. The idea that either of them is in ‘danger’ over the listing from some american human rights organization is just a very strange one. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/47 "2016-11-04T15:25:58Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Thank you. I was going to post about this, but you beat me to it. > > If one wants to read what the SPLC actually has to say about [Ali](https://www.splcenter.org/20161025/field-guide-anti-muslim-extremists#ali) and [Nawaz](https://www.splcenter.org/20161025/field-guide-anti-muslim-extremists#nawaz), there’s the links. Nawaz did an editorial for the Daily Mail? (Yes, that Daily Fail) It is really him the one that jumped the shark. And as others have pointed out the OP was misled by the ones spinning this in right wing media sources, as usual I can see that the posters from the right always get upset with the ones pointing at the lies and exaggerations made by those right wing sources and instead of demanding better or dumping those sources the right wingers insist on disparaging the ones who are telling them who and how they are being misled. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/48 "2016-11-04T15:35:36Z")
Today I learned the word “Neo-Orientalism”. Neat. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/49 "2016-11-04T17:13:51Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Is Nawaz even a secularist? I think he believes in God and considers himself a moderate Muslim. He wrote the book “**[Radical](https://www.amazon.com/Radical-Journey-out-Islamist-Extremism/dp/1493000616/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1478279458&sr=8-1&keywords=nawaz)**”, which is about his journey both into and out of radical Islamism. He is very vocal against the radical elements now, and has been threatened. It’s an excellent read, by the way. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/50 "2016-11-04T18:54:36Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > And as others have pointed out the OP was misled by the ones spinning this in right wing media sources What the fuck, where do you get this? My knowledge of Hirsi Ali comes primarily from interviews by Bill Maher and Sam Harris. Despite attempts on the far left to claim otherwise, it’s not reasonable to call either of them “right wing”. Not only are both of them campaigning strenuously against Trump, Maher was for Bernie earlier in the campaign season, and he gave $1 million in 2012 to help get President Obama reelected. > [@Ramira](#): > > About Hirsi Ali they are right. No they are not. And a woman who left a fundamentalist Baptist church or Catholicism or Mormonism and complained about the patriarchal way she was raised would not get this kind of heat. It’s a blatant double standard that exists simply because Muslims are more likely to have brown skin. So even the fact that Hirsi Ali herself is brown-skinned is not enough to save her from being thrown under the bus. And your list of Muslim countries where women are allowed to be single and live alone would be comical if it weren’t so sad. What percentage of the world’s Muslim population do those cover? Did not look like a large one. And just because they are allowed to live alone does not mean they could openly be sexually active and atheistic and not have to live in danger. Whereas across the West this is an unremarkable way to live in the 21st-century for a modern woman. ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/51 "2016-11-04T18:57:58Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > No they are not. And a woman who left a fundamentalist Baptist church or Catholicism or Mormonism and complained about the patriarchal way she was raised would not get this kind of heat. Baloney. People would be tripping over themselves to explain how it was a subset of Christianity and how mainstream Christianity doesn’t believe that etc. They would support her but warn people about not painting all of Christianity with such a broad brush. Happens with Hasidic Judaism as well- people seem to have no problem distinguishing between fundamentalism and not fundamentalism. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/52 "2016-11-04T19:09:48Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > What the fuck, where do you get this? My knowledge of Hirsi Ali comes primarily from interviews by Bill Maher and Sam Harris. Despite attempts on the far left to claim otherwise, it’s not reasonable to call either of them “right wing”. Not only are both of them campaigning strenuously against Trump, Maher was for Bernie earlier in the campaign season, and he gave $1 million in 2012 to help get President Obama reelected. Read it again, I’m not calling them as being right wing, only that the right wing is doing what I would call [nutpicking](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Nutpicking) and they are attempting here to claim that all the liberals **should** do as they claim, there are a few logical problems with that that you are ignoring. Being wrong on an issue does not mean that they are 100% right wingers, they are however useful to the right to use as wedges. It has to be noted here that you are willfully ignoring that what I pointed too was that the here you are misrepresenting the reasons why the SPLC is complaining against them and that they are not on the list you claim. > [@Ramira](#): > > Maybe you should not listen uncritically to people, it took just one bit of Googlling to see that this organization did not in fact put these two people “on their list of hate groups”, but profile them in a list of people they consider [extremist anti-Muslim speakers](https://www.splcenter.org/20161025/field-guide-anti-muslim-extremists). Some of the persons on the list are also listed - as the article makes it clear - as being hate groups, but only when they are so cited. > > The hate group list from reading this article is a separate thing. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/53 "2016-11-04T19:11:20Z")
Hirsi Ali is inarguably an anti-Muslim extremist. She believes that Islam is inherently evil and is something to be defeated before it can be reborn or reformed. I don’t know how you get more extremist in your anti-Muslim sentiment than that. I suspect that the defense of Hirsi Ali is less an attempt to argue that she’s not an anti-Muslim extremist, and more to argue that being such a person is fine and justified. In other words, you believe she’s not an extremist because you agree with her. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/54 "2016-11-04T19:15:28Z")
Mrs Ferguson is a liar and has been proven as one many times. From what I can gather about him, Majid Nawaz is basically mental vascillating from one extreme to another. ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/55 "2016-11-04T19:21:27Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > I just learned from Sam Harris’s podcast that the SPLC has [placed Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Maajid Nawaz on their list of hate groups.](http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/10/maajid-nawaz-splc-anti-muslim-extremist/505685/) This is absolutely absurd, and really despicable as it endangers their lives. I am particularly livid about this because I have had great respect for this organization over many years. Just the other day I was watching a stellar _West Wing_ episode in which they got a shout-out for having successfully sued the Ku Klux Klan–the award forced the KKK to turn over their HQ to the mother of a victim of racial violence. How far they have fallen. Can organization can make a decision you disagree and not lose all your respect? They have their reasons for doing this. My inclination is that they are wrong to do it. I still think they’re a great organization with honest motivations and ethics. ETA: Reading\*\* Richard Parker’s \*\*post above, makes me question whether my anti-religious views color my perception. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/56 "2016-11-04T19:23:47Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Meanwhile, the SPLC continues to do good works. For instance, they take state and county governments to court for throwing people in jail for inability to pay fines, which the Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional a long time ago, but has been happening again in recent years, especially as localities turn over collection of fines to private operators. This really illustrates the mission creep. What you’re describing there is clearly what they were founded to do, and it is the kind of thing that always made me admire them so much. But just think about their name: what does denouncing Hirsi Ali have to do with Southern poverty law? > [@GIGObuster](#): > > Read it again, I’m not calling them as being right wing, only that the right wing is doing what I would call [nutpicking](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Nutpicking) and they are attempting here to claim that all the liberals **should** do as they claim, there are a few logical problems with that that you are ignoring. No, _you_ read what _you_ wrote again: “thie OP was misled by the ones spinning this in right wing media sources”. I am the OP. Right? With me so far? But I did not get any of my information from right wing sources. Therefore it is impossible that I was misled by them. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/57 "2016-11-04T19:32:51Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > This really illustrates the mission creep. What you’re describing there is clearly what they were founded to do, and it is the kind of thing that always made me admire them so much. But just think about their name: what does denouncing Hirsi Ali have to do with Southern poverty law? They combat hate, intolerance and discrimination. That is their charter. They may have started with the idea of protecting poor southerners from hate and discrimination, but you see it’s a big world, with lots of people hating, intolerating, and discriminating. It’s not so much mission creep as continuing on the mission that they were originally chartered for. > [@](#): > > No, _you_ read what _you_ wrote again: “thie OP was misled by the ones spinning this in right wing media sources”. I am the OP. Right? With me so far? But I did not get any of my information from right wing sources. Therefore it is impossible that I was misled by them. So, where did you get the incorrect information that they were added to the list of hate groups? It was assumed that you picked that up from some media, but it appears you came to that erroneous conclusion on your own. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/58 "2016-11-04T19:42:54Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#): > > had this happened before I sent in my absentee ballot, I might have voted for Trump, just as a fuck you gesture to the extremists taking over the left. Good for you for prioritizing your fact-free and bigoted ideology over the good of the country. Why try to do what’s best for America when you can say “fuck you” to liberals? You’re not a patriot, coward, and you never were. You’re just a whiny, sniveling, cowardly bigot. No one who actually loved America could have such a sentiment. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/59 "2016-11-04T19:43:56Z")
I have a lot of sympathy for Ayaan Hirsi Ali based on her life experience, but she’s definitely espoused extreme views. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2016, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588/60 "2016-11-04T20:01:57Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I have a lot of sympathy for Ayaan Hirsi Ali based on her life experience, but she’s definitely espoused extreme views. By some definitions of “extreme”. She is an atheist, and that is undeniably “extreme” (though correct) in most parts of the world. But what does it mean to call her specific views about Islam extreme? Does it require there to be only a small minority of Americans who share them? Or just that they go against the majority view within the left-wing intelligentsia? > [@k9bfriender](#): > > So, where did you get the incorrect information that they were added to the list of hate groups? Can you not fucking read? The very first sentence of my OP makes it crystal clear that my information came from Sam Harris’s podcast, and the _Atlantic_. Neither of which is a right wing source. And you are splitting hairs to call the information incorrect. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-jumped-the-shark/770588.md?page=4)