Dawah Man

Go drink your dad's sperm now; what are you waiting for!?!

Imran Ibn Mansur, better known online as Dawah Man, is a lunatic Muslim apologist in the UK and prominent figurehead for the Saudi/Wahhabi affiliated  London Dawah Movement and Islamic Education and Research Academy (iERA). He is ostensibly focused on proselytizing Islam, a practice known as da'wah, but mainly preaches to the choir. Dawah Man is best known for a video he made presenting an...unorthodox version of the argument from morality focusing on whether atheists can drink their father's sperm. He tends to get excited easily, using excessive hand gestures, yelling at the camera, and occasionally jumping up and down in his videos. He is considered by many to be a complete and utter mental case.

Hilariously, many Muslim apologists and scholars have criticized Dawah Man and his affiliate organizations, on the basis that their arguments and debating styles are so poor they make Islam look bad and dissuade potential converts. His bizarre views on Islam have led to his popularity declining amongst Muslims; he initially used to receive hundreds of thousands of views per video, but barely seems to break ten thousand anymore (see his YouTube Channel, "Naseeha Sessions", on Social Blade for statistical information).

Perhaps the funniest aspect of DawahMan is that he is adament about Muslims not "imitating" the unbelievers but doesn't specify how, in doing so he actually imitates them more himself multiple times throughout his videos (for example he frequently uses African-American and British grime ghetto-slang; such as using the word "mandem", ending sentences with the words "bruv", mispronouncing words like "youth" with "yoot" and using phrases such as "mad ting in the masjid!" for his brainwashing sermons lectures; clearly words which etymologically have no origin in Islam).

He also bizarrely believes democracy and voting is "haram" based on reasoning even Islamic scholars reject (claiming "Allah can only be the supreme legislator" - ignoring the fact that after the death of Muhammad, the early Muslims used voting to systematically elect the four Rightly Guided Caliphs as their leaders). His irritating behaviour has alienated so many British Muslims that he has become parody amongst them. British Muslims also tend to ignore him during election campaigns and actively participate in the democratic process, having at least 40 representatives in both houses of the British Parliament ). Today a minority of lunatics still continue to follow him, rejecting everything from evolution, "freemixing" (no not the DJing kind of freemixing), and even portions of the Qu'ran and hadith to suit their own desires. They also regularly berate, insult and ridicule actual Islamic scholars.

Dawah Man also openly supports sectarianism and division amongst Muslims, and has frequently targeted Shia's for discrimination.

Career
Imagine that we are a people who are [walking on a path at night.] And what adds to our situation is the fact that this path, not only is it dark and we can't see which way we are going and what the right path is, there's...pitholes and holes and cracks in the floor, there's lions and all sorts of animals and creatures... But then suddenly, we see a man, holding up a light. And with this light he's able to...navigate a path towards his survival. And we look as this man from afar and we think, he can aid us in our survival, so we we follow him. We walk right behind him because he has the light, and he's guiding us to the right path. He can see where the harm is and where the path to safety is. Brothers and sisters, that light is knowledge. And that man, is a man of knowledge.

Dawah Man originally tried to be a rapper, but turned to Islamic apologetics when that didn't work out. He started his da'wah career by uploading street debates and apologetics videos onto his Youtube channel, which has managed to rack up tens of thousands of subscribers. His da'wah method is apparently to approach random people on the street &mdash; most of whom know little about Islam or any other religion &mdash; and "debate" them. On top of that, he only uploads the debates he wins, leading to him proudly displaying "victories" against opponents who are clearly intoxicated or just plain idiots. Dawah Man has occasionally made the mistake of approaching someone well versed in religion and apologetics, with predictable results.

Dawah Man has since launched an online "Muslim Survival Guide," which allows the gullible devout to pay a monthly subscription fee to listen to ramblings on day-to-day Islamic morality that they could find anywhere else for free.

As a "scholar"
Now we are witnessing the asaghir (little one's) taking on the Akabir as if they know better. Such are the times which are surely an indication of the closeness to akhira when people will look upto the unscholarly rabble as being some sort of authority on such delicate matters.

Dawah Man's latest career move has been to act as an alim (a scholar of Islam), much to the chagrin of his more educated coreligionists. He and his friends have made several assertions about Islamic theology which have been thoroughly debunked by those actually knowledgeable in the matter.

Most notably, Dawah Man started 2016 by challenging Imam Muhammed Asim Hussain, a Muslim scholar, on the obscure issue of whether Muslims are allowed to celebrate Mawlid, the Prophet Muhammad's birthday. Dawah Man (predictably) took the hardcore Salafi viewpoint that it's ABSOLUTELY HARAM (unacceptable), that everyone should live as a 7th century Bedouin, and made a video claiming that Mawlid was unacceptable. Imam Hussain uploaded a video defending the Mawlid, and also invited Dawah Man to meet him at one of Hussain's lectures. Dawah Man instead fired back with another video defending his position; Hussain responded in kind, but also stated that Dawah Man was "still invited to attend the lecture, he will be given VIP treatment and again his safety [will be] guaranteed." Dawah Man reacted by rejecting the invitation and saying Imam Hussain was "either a lair or […] ignorant." Finally, Imam Hussain responded with a two hour and forty minute long(!?!) video completely refuting Dawah Man, whose only response was to upload an insulting cartoon of Hussain to Instagram.

None of this embarrassment seems to deter him.

Arguments
We're smart now, we're not gonna behave stupid [sic] anymore!

Dawah Man and his teacher Hamza Tzortzis are strident fans of Christian William Lane Craig's arguments, which they shamelessly plagiarized until they were called out on it. They have nonetheless managed to piece together their own arguments for Islam, which are debunked as follows.

YA DADDY'S SPERM
Dawah Man's most famous video revolves around a simple argument from morality &mdash; without Allah, there's nothing wrong with drinking your father's semen, therefore, Allah must exist. Dawah Man backs this up by debunking brief strawman forms of the evolutionary explanation for morality, the role of social pressure, and Sam Harris' formulation of consequentialism. He uses all this to posit a false dichotomy &mdash; these systems don't work, therefore, Allah. Hilariously, he also tries to condemn non-religious moral systems by claiming they allow pedophilia, apparently oblivious to certain things.

In addition to the other problems with the argument from morality, the most obvious problem with Dawah Man's variant is that it assumes a moral system, and uses this to determine what is and isn't moral. Dawah Man dismisses moral possibilities which don't agree with Islamic morality as inherently immoral &mdash; a circular argument. He also relies heavily on appeals to emotion to get his point &mdash; atheists can have no morals &mdash; across.

Rhetorical devices in the Qur'an
There could have been much better, insightful questions, than to evaluate such powerful texts on basis of linguistic features. It's like talking about the fine quality and texture of the threads of a cap of a water bottle to someone who is thirsty.

Dawah Man and the London Dawah Movement have often made the claim that the 108th and shortest surah (chapter) in the Qur'an, Al-Kawthar (The Abundance: ), is a "literary miracle" and "inimitable" because it contains numerous 'rhetorical devices' in the first three words and/or in the entire chapter. However, their criteria for counting 'rhetorical devices', as well as the significance they attach to them, is somewhat lacking.

The chapter itself is as follows:

إِنَّا أَعْطَيْنَاكَ الْكَوْثَرَ

فَصَلِّ لِرَبِّكَ وَانْحَرْ

إِنَّ شَانِئَكَ هُوَ الْأَبْتَرُ

Which roughly translates to

''Surely We have given you Kausar (Abundance),

''Therefore pray to your Lord and make a sacrifice.

''Surely your enemy is the one who shall be without posterity.

Dawah Man and Hamza Tzortis reach their inflated numbers by counting things like syntax, tense, and even using the correct word as 'rhetorical devices.' Although they and their affiliates have presented this argument many times, a particularly detailed variant which incorporates all of their claims is presented on Tzortis' webshite; this is examined here.

'''1. Emphasis & Choice of Pronoun

'''2. Word Choice

'''3. Word Choice

'''4. Word Arrangement

'''5. Multiple Meaning

'''6. Grammatical Shift: Iltifaat

'''7. Conceptual Relatedness (intertextuality)

'''8. Word Choice

'''9. Emphasis and Choice of Particle

'''10. Semantically Orientated Repetition & Rhythm

'''11. Rebuke and Contempt

'''12. Word Arrangement

'''13. Choice of Particle: Confinement/Exclusivity

'''14. Rhythm and Sound

'''15. Prophesy/Factual

None of these loosely defined 'rhetorical devices' would require a divine author, as they are basic elements of language. Nor does using descriptive language or correct grammar make al-Kawthar in any way "inimitable"; by this metric, most pieces of writing in any language could meet or surpass the number of arbitrary 'rhetorical devices'.

In addition, the assumption behind this argument is that the linguistic merits of the Qur'an would prove its claims of divine authorship. Even if we assumed the Qur'an was somehow agreed upon to be the most well written book in history, such would not "prove" anything &mdash; the world's fastest swimmer is faster than all others, but this does not mean they are miraculously fast.

Flattered
It's safe to say we are flattered for our cameo in this video here. It is age restricted, so watch out.