CJ Werleman was born June 18, 1973. Werleman is a journalist, feature columnist for Middle East Eye, and host of Foreign Object. CJ Werleman is the author of 'Crucifying America', 'God Hates You, Hate Him Back' and 'Koran Curious', and is the host of Foreign Object. Werleman is a journalist who writes on Islamophobia and other issues regarding the Muslim communities.
Antisemite CJ Werleman Urges His Followers To “Make Life Unbearable” For Every Zionist
Serial liar, plagiarist and vile antisemite CJ Werleman has posted this chilling tweet to his 377K followers on Twitter/X:(Israelly Cool 6/3/24) READ MORE>>>>>>
Serial liar, plagiarist and vile antisemite CJ Werleman has posted this chilling tweet to his 377K followers on Twitter/X:(Israelly Cool 6/3/24) READ MORE>>>>>>
January 1, 2023:
I have exposed antisemitic “journalist” CJ Werleman’s constant lies on many occasions, including the one about how he supposedly became a reformed Islamophobe. As I pointed out in that post, he keeps changing his story, and the dates he provides do not seem to match the reality of his supposed epiphany.
Werleman has just come out with a video again describing his supposed process of redemption. And not surprisingly, things still do not add up. Werleman describes his “first come to Muhammad” moment as being in 2009, when he read Mahmood Mamdani’s book “Good Muslim Bad Muslim”, that supposedly “unpacked many of the lies the mainstream media was telling about Islam during the early years of the war on terror.” He claims the book “ignited a fire in him”, leading to him studying the Quran and Islam.
The fact is, Werleman has never once mentioned this book – so pivotal to his “enlightenment” – on any of his social media accounts. And he has previously credited research on his own book “Koran Curious” for starting his study of Islam, not this book. --Israelly Cool: CJ Werleman Again Lying About His “Redemption From Islamophobia” Story
I have exposed antisemitic “journalist” CJ Werleman’s constant lies on many occasions, including the one about how he supposedly became a reformed Islamophobe. As I pointed out in that post, he keeps changing his story, and the dates he provides do not seem to match the reality of his supposed epiphany.
Werleman has just come out with a video again describing his supposed process of redemption. And not surprisingly, things still do not add up. Werleman describes his “first come to Muhammad” moment as being in 2009, when he read Mahmood Mamdani’s book “Good Muslim Bad Muslim”, that supposedly “unpacked many of the lies the mainstream media was telling about Islam during the early years of the war on terror.” He claims the book “ignited a fire in him”, leading to him studying the Quran and Islam.
The fact is, Werleman has never once mentioned this book – so pivotal to his “enlightenment” – on any of his social media accounts. And he has previously credited research on his own book “Koran Curious” for starting his study of Islam, not this book. --Israelly Cool: CJ Werleman Again Lying About His “Redemption From Islamophobia” Story
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June 22, 2022: OpIndia: Twitter account of fake news peddler and Islamic terror apologist CJ Werleman banned in India
On June 22, the Twitter handle of fake news peddler and Islamic terror apologist CJ Werleman was withheld in India. If someone from India tries to open his account, a message that reads “@cjwerleman’s account has been withheld in India in response to a legal demand” appears on the screen. As per this message, his account has been banned in India following a request from either a court or a competent authority in the government. May 12, 2022; OpIndia: Serial fake news peddler CJ Werleman shares another fake news claiming that ‘Hindutva extremists’ thrashed a Muslim man
The carefully edited video was shared by Islamist sympathiser Werleman to put out a false narrative that Muslims are being attacked in India by Hindus. Mar 7, 2022: ByLine Times: Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine Reveals Moral and Intellectual Rot of the ‘Anti-War’ Left
CJ Werleman argues that, though their arguments had relevance decades ago, analysts of US imperialism such as John Pilger and Noam Chomsky are no guides to the present Jan 14, 2021: Israellycool: Jew-Hater CJ Werleman: I Was ‘Duped’ Into Sharing Fake News An apology. That’s because he is not sorry he tweeted something false to demonize the Jewish state. He’s just embarrassed he got caught. Mar 31, 2015: Danthropology: CJ Werleman Calls New Atheists “White Supremacists”
In a recent series of Tweets, CJ Werleman has attempted to call New Atheists to task. His usual kinds of arguments against anti-theism have, to me, occasionally merited a brief mention behind the likes of Reza Aslan or Glenn Greenwald. But now I feel Harris might have taken the most appropriate actions with Werleman by vowing never to write about him again. Mar 19, 2015: Godless Spellchecker: CJ Werleman Can’t Be A Journalist – If Facts and Evidence Matter
It’s been a devastatingly embarrassing six months for author and columnist CJ Werleman. Exposed for misrepresentation, serial plagiarism and probable sockpuppetry – and this was all before Sam Harris effortlessly spanked his ill-judged libellous accusations. Both Salon and Alternet dropped Werleman as a result, the latter completely removing his articles from their archives altogether. The only platform still willing to publish him is Middle East Eye. It’s a self-immolation that is painful to look at – yet I can’t seem to help myself. Jan 21, 2015: CJ Werleman: Middle East Eye: American Sniper mirrors the war on terror propaganda |
April 27, 2015: "God Hates You, Hate Him Back: Making Sense of The Bible," a book by CJ Werleman was released. September 8, 2022: An op/ed by Wasiq Wasiq stated: "British Muslims should stay well clear of journalists like Werleman who disguises sympathy for Islamism as a legitimate defense of the Muslim community writ large. By ignoring the role Islamists play in inflaming communal tensions, he does nothing for social cohesion between Muslims and Hindus in England.
British Muslims should not listen to CJ Werleman. Nor should anyone else." 
On June 22, 2022 the Twitter handle of CJ Werleman was banned in India. I
January 1,2023
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ON THE RECORD: Nov 18, 2014: Matthew Flannagan: I have been focusing a lot in my thinking, writing and research on questions of the relationship between religion and morality. One particular frustration I encounter in this topic is the, unfortunately common, tendency for writers and researchers to conflate separate questions and subsequently give answers to the wrong questions thinking they have answered the right ones. A good example is article which was sent to me via e-mail recently entitled “The destructive myth about religion that Americans disproportionately believe.” (written by CJ Werleman) The article comments on a recent survey which found that the majority of people in certain parts of the world, including the United States of America, believe that belief in God is essential for morality. The author considers this a “destructive myth”. His rebuttal involves two premises: (a) he interprets the survey’s results to mean that the majority of people believe you cannot live a morally good life unless you believe in God; (b) he aims to refute this by appealing to some unsourced crime statistics that suggest atheists do not commit disproportionately more crimes than theists.
I think his reasoning on both points is mistaken, before getting into why, I note that this article proposes to be about whether belief in God is essential to morality; it is not about the related, though separate, question of whether the existence of morality depends on the existence of God.
Turning to the first premise (a), the article opens with:
“Pew Research Center published the results of a survey conducted among 40,080 people in 40 countries between 2011 and 2013. The survey asked a simple question: Is belief in God essential to morality? While clear majorities say it is necessary, the U.S. continues to be an outlier. In 22 of the 40 countries surveyed, the majority says it is necessary to believe in God in order to be a moral person. “This position is highly prevalent, if not universal, in Africa and the Middle East,” says the report.”
This is confused. The author states the question asked was: “Is belief in God essential to morality?” The author then interprets those answering in the affirmative as saying “it is necessary to believe in God in order to be a moral person.” This does not follow from the affirmative answer. The question asked was whether belief in God is essential to the institution of morality itself; such a question is asking whether the institution needs this belief. The question did not ask what attributes were necessary to be a moral person.
Not only are these separate issues, they are logically distinct.
To see this let us briefly ask the question why do people think that belief in God is necessary for morality? I think the reason is typically based on a conjunction of two ideas.
The first is that a person cannot be rationally committed to always doing the right thing unless they believe, explicitly or implicitly, that the world is ordered so that commitment is not inconsistent with their own long term happiness. If this belief is false, then there will be cases where doing the right thing involves a significant sacrifice of one’s happiness and self-interest, and when such cases occur, it is difficult to see why moral reasons must trump or always be overriding.
The second is that atheism tends to undermine this belief. If a person believes the world is created and providentially ordered by a loving and just God, he or she will have reasons to think the world is ordered so that being committed to doing the right thing does not disadvantage people in the long run. Atheists, however, lack reasons for thinking this is the case and arguably have, given their atheism, good reasons for denying such beliefs.
The upshot of both these ideas is that a person cannot rationally be committed to always doing the right thing, to the overriding authority of morality, if he or she does not believe in God. To have rational authority over people’s actions, morality requires belief in God or something like divine providence.
I do not have space to document it here but I believe something like this line of reasoning is behind the popularity of the claim that morality requires belief in God. What is important to note, however, is that this line of reasoning does not mean atheists cannot be committed to living a moral life and or that they can do so successfully. The argument is that the atheist who is committed to moralitys overriding authority lacks rational justification for his or her commitment. The fact a person lacks justification for commitment does not mean he or she cannot have commitment. People can be, and often are, committed to things they cannot rationally justify. When atheists contend that religious commitment is irrational they grant this very point.
The first premise, (a), is therefore mistaken; claiming belief in God is necessary for morality does not entail atheists cannot live morally upright lives.
Suppose, however, we assume for the sake of argument that this premise is true. This brings us to the second premise, (b); the author argues:
“So what of the U.S.? A comparatively eye-popping 53 percent of Americans essentially believe atheists and agnostics are living in sin. Despite the fact that a research analyst at the Federal Bureau of Prisons determined that atheists are thoroughly underrepresented in the places where rapists, thieves and murderers invariably end up: prisons. While atheists make upward of 15 percent of the U.S. population, they only make up 0.2 percent of the prison population.”
The appeal to atheist incarceration rates is one I have seen on several freethinker cites recently (they often appear to be based on self-reported statistics of prisoners who are seeking parole and data tends to not be provided as to their belief at the time of arrest, among other issues). One line of response to this sort of rebuttal is to call into question the figures cited and some of the problems with the figures are recorded here. In this post I want to put this response to one side and instead focus on two problems with any appeal to crime statistics in this context. --ManadM: Is belief in God essential for Morality? Why Crime Statistics don’t answer this question 11.18.14
I think his reasoning on both points is mistaken, before getting into why, I note that this article proposes to be about whether belief in God is essential to morality; it is not about the related, though separate, question of whether the existence of morality depends on the existence of God.
Turning to the first premise (a), the article opens with:
“Pew Research Center published the results of a survey conducted among 40,080 people in 40 countries between 2011 and 2013. The survey asked a simple question: Is belief in God essential to morality? While clear majorities say it is necessary, the U.S. continues to be an outlier. In 22 of the 40 countries surveyed, the majority says it is necessary to believe in God in order to be a moral person. “This position is highly prevalent, if not universal, in Africa and the Middle East,” says the report.”
This is confused. The author states the question asked was: “Is belief in God essential to morality?” The author then interprets those answering in the affirmative as saying “it is necessary to believe in God in order to be a moral person.” This does not follow from the affirmative answer. The question asked was whether belief in God is essential to the institution of morality itself; such a question is asking whether the institution needs this belief. The question did not ask what attributes were necessary to be a moral person.
Not only are these separate issues, they are logically distinct.
To see this let us briefly ask the question why do people think that belief in God is necessary for morality? I think the reason is typically based on a conjunction of two ideas.
The first is that a person cannot be rationally committed to always doing the right thing unless they believe, explicitly or implicitly, that the world is ordered so that commitment is not inconsistent with their own long term happiness. If this belief is false, then there will be cases where doing the right thing involves a significant sacrifice of one’s happiness and self-interest, and when such cases occur, it is difficult to see why moral reasons must trump or always be overriding.
The second is that atheism tends to undermine this belief. If a person believes the world is created and providentially ordered by a loving and just God, he or she will have reasons to think the world is ordered so that being committed to doing the right thing does not disadvantage people in the long run. Atheists, however, lack reasons for thinking this is the case and arguably have, given their atheism, good reasons for denying such beliefs.
The upshot of both these ideas is that a person cannot rationally be committed to always doing the right thing, to the overriding authority of morality, if he or she does not believe in God. To have rational authority over people’s actions, morality requires belief in God or something like divine providence.
I do not have space to document it here but I believe something like this line of reasoning is behind the popularity of the claim that morality requires belief in God. What is important to note, however, is that this line of reasoning does not mean atheists cannot be committed to living a moral life and or that they can do so successfully. The argument is that the atheist who is committed to moralitys overriding authority lacks rational justification for his or her commitment. The fact a person lacks justification for commitment does not mean he or she cannot have commitment. People can be, and often are, committed to things they cannot rationally justify. When atheists contend that religious commitment is irrational they grant this very point.
The first premise, (a), is therefore mistaken; claiming belief in God is necessary for morality does not entail atheists cannot live morally upright lives.
Suppose, however, we assume for the sake of argument that this premise is true. This brings us to the second premise, (b); the author argues:
“So what of the U.S.? A comparatively eye-popping 53 percent of Americans essentially believe atheists and agnostics are living in sin. Despite the fact that a research analyst at the Federal Bureau of Prisons determined that atheists are thoroughly underrepresented in the places where rapists, thieves and murderers invariably end up: prisons. While atheists make upward of 15 percent of the U.S. population, they only make up 0.2 percent of the prison population.”
The appeal to atheist incarceration rates is one I have seen on several freethinker cites recently (they often appear to be based on self-reported statistics of prisoners who are seeking parole and data tends to not be provided as to their belief at the time of arrest, among other issues). One line of response to this sort of rebuttal is to call into question the figures cited and some of the problems with the figures are recorded here. In this post I want to put this response to one side and instead focus on two problems with any appeal to crime statistics in this context. --ManadM: Is belief in God essential for Morality? Why Crime Statistics don’t answer this question 11.18.14