Guest post: “Burning my Koran”

June 12, 2025 • 9:30 am

Based on the Jesus and Mo post yesterday, which commented on a British man fined for burning a Qur’an, a reader sent me a commentary that he/she wrote fifteen years ago about burning a Koran, and revised yesterday.  Given the ideological climate, the reader of course wishes to remain anonymous, so I’ve changed the name. It’s published below with permission.

Burning My Koran

by Jean Smith (name changed to protect the writer)

September 24, 2010, revised June 11, 2025

The short version:

The sooner everybody in the world burns a Koran, the sooner we can get back to things that really matter.

The longer version:

I’m here in the back yard of my house. I am holding a copy of the Koran which I purchased with money I earned — I have the receipt. This is not a rare edition — it is a cheap paperback copy, one among millions in the world today. I’m about to douse it with charcoal lighting fluid and set it on fire.

If you’re the kind of person who takes violent exception to this sort of activity, please note that I am alone. There is no one here who is either encouraging or trying to stop me, so if you are thinking about taking bloody vengeance, be sure that it is directed only at me.

If this were a copy of Grimm’s Fairy Tales, or a biography of Einstein, or a telephone directory, burning it might seem like an odd thing to do, but it would have no great importance to anyone. Since I am an atheist, and therefore I don’t believe in the god described in this book, or in any other god, then as far as I am concerned this book is like any other – nothing but a mass-produced assembly of paper with ink on it. So one less Koran in the world is inconsequential to me.

I am not burning this book for the purpose of offending any person or group of persons, so if you do take offense, you are missing my point. I am doing this because I can, in response to a recent news item: the police in a town in England arrested six people for burning a Koran and posting a video about it on YouTube. Their so-called “crime” was not that they violated a fire code, nor that they destroyed a book which they didn’t own — but “inciting racial hatred”.

From the news reports, it appears that these Koran burners are crude racists. In other words, ignorant, fearful people. These are not people I admire or feel much sympathy for. But if anyone feels “racial hatred” towards me, as a white atheist Westerner burning my own paper with ink on it, then that person is every bit as much a crude racist.

I have my own reason for burning this book — not to express racism (which I do not feel), nor contempt for the ideas set forth in the book (which I do feel), but to demonstrate that no one’s personal choice of religious rules and beliefs is in any way binding on me or anyone else. If you have a book that you hold to be sacred, then you probably won’t burn it. That’s easy. But that’s all you get.

This book is not a sacred account of the words of God. After all, there is no god. And what would a god need with a book anyway? Books are made by people, for people. Books are paper with ink on it, this particular one belongs to me, and I am going to burn it.

I take the matches from my pocket. Are you starting to feel a bit uneasy? But what if you knew that a whole shipping container of Korans was about to be washed overboard in the middle of the ocean — would the harm be thousands of times greater? Would that diminish Islam in any way? Would the world even notice? Of course not. It would merely be a monetary loss to the publisher, and a trivial amount of pollution. And if the loss of a shipping container full of Korans wouldn’t diminish the faith, how can the loss of a single copy?

Do you call me intolerant of others’ beliefs, a racist, a bigot? Now it is you who are offending me (Because I am tolerant. Just not respectful) – should you therefore be forbidden to say that I am intolerant? Of course not. In this society, you have a right to express yourself, just as I do. But if you have a right to say things that I find offensive, it necessarily follows that you can’t invent a right not to be offended yourself.

Time to strike the match.

One other thing. Those guys in England who burned a Koran were idiots. From the news reports, they even managed to set their gas can on fire in the process, so they’re lucky they didn’t hurt themselves. But despite their ineptitude, they managed to pull it off. If there really were a god, an omnipotent creator and destroyer of worlds, a timeless master of every atom of the universe, and if this god had the slightest concern about the book, couldn’t he have sent a thunderbolt, or a rain shower, or at least caused these guys to forget to bring matches? What does a supreme being have to worry about anyway? And if all you want is what He wants, what do you have to worry about?

Whoosh!

 

35 thoughts on “Guest post: “Burning my Koran””

  1. I don’t suppose He Who Must Not Be Named will be be reminding the world that he too desecrated a Koran.

    Is it not sad that the author of this piece has to be anonymous? So much for freedom of religion.

    1. Western civilisation made a bad mistake in response to Ayatollah Khomenei’s fatwa on Rushdie, and then again over the Danish Mohammed cartoons (and indeed have repeated the mistake many times). The response should have been widespread, deliberate and ongoing flouting of all such taboos. Instead, the response has been appeasement and self-censorship, followed by reinforcing that censorship with legal prohibitions. 😢😡

      1. Yes Coel. Mistaking politeness for a line in the sand is a huge problem when the opposition gets large enough. It is about scale. See in the two following:

        Trannies using the “wrong bathroom” in 2010 wasn’t much of a big issue – making allowances for them wasn’t a bad idea… UNTIL…2020 when 25% of freshmen call themselves “trans” and free riders like autogynephiles cornered the market. And wrecked the annual Pride Parade on 8th Ave. 🙂

        Like….
        2. Objecting to a tiny minority’s butt-hurt complaints about burning their favorite book wasn’t an imperative in the 1980s with a tiny percent of Muslims in society.

        Turn large swathes of your biggest (UK) cities into Talibanistan, into Pakistani ghettos, the calculation is very different.

        Scale matters always.
        Best to you Coel,

        D.A.
        NYC

        1. DA – I agree with your point but I was surprised that 25% of freshmen identify as trans. Where is that figure coming from, please? My quick google search suggested more like 2.5%.

          1. It depends on what you mean by “trans”. By more restrictive definitions, it is more like 1% or 2% or so that are trans. The 25% of freshman at some colleges who call themselves “trans” are just jumping on a bandwagon. They are mostly “nonbinary” or “gender queer” or “agender” or some other often meaningless label.

            If you dislike the fact that you are cis and straight, you can arbitrarily call yourself one of those labels. Then you become one the cool gender nonconforming crowd and you no longer need to think of yourself as a heteronormativite oppressor.
            Announcing to the world that you are “gender queer” doesn’t actually create any expectations that you change your lifestyle and start cross dressing or breast binding or something. You can just dress peculiarly and, perhaps, put a stupid purple streak in your hair. Then you can join in the pride parades and chant “We’re here and we’re queer!” Also your life no longer seems as humdrum and boring as it actually is. You have something to babble about both to yourself and to your therapist when you visit him/her/they to get your Prozac prescription renewed.

          2. The YRBS (youth risk behavior survey) carried out nationally on US high schoolers by cdc every two years was the most reliable report on gender stuff. However the fucking trump admin removed all data from more than twenty years of surveys from the cdc site. Then by court order had to return all nongender risky behavior data like violence, smoking, alcohol use, unprotected sex and the like. I have a hard copy of the most recent (2021?) full results and I think it was around 2.5% of grades 9-12 self identified as trans.

          3. Yes Gareth – I took that number from my collected observations from Ivy numbers.

            There’s a HUGE variation, probably depending on the social cachet of “trans” on campus – which in itself is a vague, un-nailable category from the start. (This is not a precise science. hehehe)

            There is this: (sorry the length – AI references,, google search campus/yale/etc)

            “Several Ivy League universities boast a high percentage of LGBTQ+ students. CollegeVine reports that approximately 23% of surveyed Yale students in the class of 2022 identify as LGBTQ+, earning it the nickname “The Gay Ivy”. Harvard University also sees a significant increase, with LGBTQ+ students now representing 29% of incoming freshmen in 2021, according to the New York Post up from 10% in 2013″

            https://www.google.com/search?sca_esv=45c8bf4228d081b3&cs=0&q=Ivy+League+Universities&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiKht6v2eyNAxW4M1kFHVbDJ9wQxccNegQIDhAD&mstk=AUtExfB6TJEXvwsetEMd_wjPeW3MHgIJla6nbpZ9SNNyb9sCYhspXNFupFvlJFarF7ov-rtsF0001yPNwD-RqIGFuEp-4g9KeJ7jG6fDE6BbaCxZVpOOiGVBcfJD4xsC85suB6yrSqLLfgv3OS_naJO8MtfL3Lhb7wyjBaylE1G_KzZVYaQNmZvueWh–qXRlMbfPToJ&csui=3

            Again, huge variance, and Abigail Shriver suggests the rates are/were even higher at high schools. Which makes sense if it is a social contagion – which always trend way younger and more female.
            best to you Gareth,

            D.A.
            NYC

        2. I may have seen a hint of that – where I know a person who to all appearances is boring straight-cis-heteronormative. They are in a conventional marriage, and they have kids. But they work at one of the small super-duper-woke colleges that is in the news for that reason at times, and their straight-cis pronouns includes some odd pronoun that I’d never heard of before. Looking it up, I found that it was totally vague.

  2. Nicely put! It’s just words on paper to me. Like the bible. I respect other’s opinions on those books, including those for whom the books are holy, but if the books belong to me, I feel I should be able to do whatever I want with them. I have copies of each, and don’t intend to destroy them. I like to have them for reference. In a pique, I might toss one on the campfire. But I wouldn’t do it to provoke. I am a better person than that.

    I see this was originally penned 14 years ago. Things haven’t changed, have they? Pity.

  7. Rather than burn Qurans, would be to read it and comment on its stupidities. Which are many. Solomon speaks the language of ants. Allah creates falling stars to chase eves dropping djinns away from Allah’s throne. And many more grotesque goofy claims. All supposedly messages to Mohammad from Allah. Bizarre claims such as Allah leads who he shall lead and leads astray who he will lead astray. Say what!? So Allah leads some astray who will then spend eternity in a torturous hell? Doers that make sense? The Quran is one of the goofiest, most bizarre books ever penned.
    Reading it critically its quite an experience. Rather than just burning Qurans, the Quran should be read and commented on until everybody knows these goofy claims and laughs at them.

    2. The problem with your suggestion is that the Quran is seriously boring. In a spirit of trying to understand an alien concept, I managed only about a third before I gave up. Not before I had identified many contradictions and inconsistencies.

    3. Yes William. I read it first doing graduate study in Middle East politics (required reading of course)…which is why I came to America in the first place 30ish years ago – and later I read it again some years ago. It is a quick read unlike the Bible.

      I wish everybody would read it.
      I’m sure they’d be wowed.. and convert immediately.. when they see the bright truth, scientific wisdom and moral solid ground it represents. It is, after all, the final unalterable inerrant word of the creator of the universe – peak wise in all matters.

      We know this b/c this is what over a billion people (and their western allies) tell us.
      And I’ll leave these assertions right here.

      But by all means.. people SHOULD read it.

      D.A.
      NYC

      1. The hectoring, gabbling tone is what strikes me most forcibly about the text.
        If this is Allah’s final word to the human race, he must hold us in the greatest contempt.

        2. Yes Raskos: “Hectoring” is very apt. “Bossy” is another good descriptor.

          D.A.
          NYC

    4. “Rather than burn Qurans, would be to read it and comment on its stupidities.”

      My life is too short for this.

  8. I wish the author wasn’t anonymous because I would like to buy him/her/it a beer!

    Some years ago I burned a copy of the “Koran for Dummies” at a festive bookburning event. The offending tomes were held up, indicted, and put on trial as the surrounding crowd either cheered or jeered. Interestingly, the book which received the most widespread acclamation for incineration was “Dianetics”. Self help books were popular fodder for the flames as well. A few booed when the Bible burned, but they were shouted down in the best Jacobean fashion. So it was that the burden of my groaning shelves was reduced.

    If you don’t like it, my name is Bruce Morgan and I live in Archer Florida. I double dog dare you to do something about it! You can expect a warm welcome.

    1. Notwithstanding what I said about taboo, yours is the best comment I’ve read today. Just what I needed!

    1. Me neither.
      It is healthy that there should be a strong taboo against it. Even if no one ever found out.

      1. I am the same. I have two copies of the Bible that are wasting space, but I cannot bring myself to dispose of them.
        Edit: meant as a response to Jim.

          1. I gave my childhood bible to goodwill decades ago. I have a religious cousin who sends me one every few years. Always tells me to “read the red words!” He’s an odd duck. I used to give them to good will, but the last one I threw in the trash, and it made me laugh (out loud). If he sends me another, maybe I’ll burn it. Sounds fun. Just kidding, I’ll throw it away again.

            Edit: I was thinking, if he actually sent me a KJ bible, I might keep it since it has some artistic merit. But he always sends me the modernized versions…

  11. Readers might find this video of interest. A UK politician speaks on Islam and blasphemy in the House of Commons. Notice how empty the house was…..

    1. The House typically is nearly empty when the Opposition gives speeches. They aren’t intended to change any Government minds. Still courageous and principled as Hansard is writing it all down into the record, and those who wish to take furious offence, will. The MPs have to show up for “division” (votes), at the discretion of the parties’ House Leaders to make sure a Government bill passes, or to stay away to make sure a minority Government doesn’t accidentally fall from too many Opposition MPs in the House that day.

    1. That’s a good read. It brings to mind a comment made on another blog in a different context, which I saved in my digital scrapbook of scrappy quotes:

      You shouldn’t accommodate the easily offended. I would even go as far as saying that one should at times offend them on purpose, to make it clear we don’t agree with the privilege they demand from us.

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