Patrick is out again

I was eagerly looking forward to Patrick’s reply to my latest reply to him as I thoroughly enjoyed our discussion and truly respect him. However, I was quite disappointed on reading his brief and strange reaction. Patrick does not engage with anyone of my arguments, but only expresses his disappointment at me. He says that he believes that I will not quite “get it.” Immediately thereafter, he asks his readers regarding what to do when the person you are debating “lacks the mental sophistication to appreciate your arguments?” Here Patrick assumes that he had offered highly “technical” and “sophisticated” arguments which poor me just wasn’t able to comprehend at all. Of course, this is what he likes to believe and he does not bother to present a single example to substantiate his baseless assertions. I don’t quite understand why Patrick reacted in such a strange way. I believe I understood his argument and then replied to them the best I could. If Patrick truly believes that I misunderstood anyone of his arguments, then he should have pointed that out clearly by sharing those alleged examples with his readers. If indeed I misunderstood anything, then I will acknowledge my mistake. But the problem is that Patrick does not offer any such alleged examples and I do not think that he will likely do so in the future.

Patrick alleges that instead of engaging with his arguments, I rolled out “reams and reams of mostly irrelevant text…” Again, no examples are proffered to support this assertion. On the contrary – and you can see my reply – I limited my comments to the issues raised by Patrick, without raising any irrelevant issues. It was Patrick who rolled out a list of irrelevant issues and I clearly pointed that out in my reply. Patrick then proclaims that everything “goes right over” my head. Well, I can say that everything I say goes right over Patrick’s head. I think we can make such statements about anyone, but such proclamations are ineffective if we do not submit any proof and evidence to substantiate our claims.

Patrick insists that he is not misrepresenting the situation and acting unfairly towards me, but, with all due respect, I believe he is doing both. I would request all readers, Muslims, Christians and all others, to read both our replies to each other and then honestly ask themselves if anything Patrick has said is even remotely accurate or justified.

Patrick appears to be quite desperate to “strike” me “out,” but it simply isn’t working. He appears to seriously believe that by throwing a bunch of baseless claims and assertions, while ignoring completely what I had to say, he would somehow manage to “strike” me out. But this is not how it works.

I think the problem is as follows: Patrick is frustrated over the fact that I disagree with his arguments and do not just blindly agree with everything he has to say. He insinuated previously that I was “rebellious” as I did not agree with all of his claims and “truths.” I can say the same thing about Patrick: that he is being “rebellious” by not accepting the “truth” which I am presenting. How do we determine what the other person is really thinking and what his/her inner thoughts really are? Why is it so difficult for Patrick to just accept the simple fact that I disagree with his arguments and claims not because there is a “rebellious spirit” within me but, quite simply, because I sincerely believe that his claims and arguments are weak? Afterall, I have shown in my replies why I disagree with Patrick through a clear demonstration of my arguments. Similarly, I do not believe that Patrick is being “rebellious” when he disagrees with me as, even though I disagree with him, I believe that Patrick appears to sincerely believe that I am wrong for certain reasons. Why can’t we accept this about each other, instead of throwing around silly accusations of being “rebellious”?

It appears to me that Patrick wants me to blindly endorse his views. But I have my own mind and I cannot just put that aside. I read books on a regular basis and try to learn what different scholars are saying and then make up my own mind. In all of my discussions with Patrick, I did not raise any irrelevant issues like he did. On the contrary, I remained well within the boundaries of the irrelevant issues he raised and tried to address them as best I could. Now just because I have a different perspective, view and do not agree with everything that Patrick has to say, is no justification for him to launch such attacks against me, that too without a shred of proof.

What Patrick is attempting to do is play the psychological game, where you merely insist repeatedly that your opponent just does not “get it”, that everything goes “over his head”, that he is “immature,” and “young,” and cannot “get” your supposedly highly nuanced, subtle and sophisticated arguments, while not once submitting a shred of evidence, hoping that others, primarily your friends, would just buy your claims blindly and not even bother to listen to the other side.

Patrick simply declares Mr. Steve Hays the “winner” at the beginning of his tirade although I very much doubt that he even bothered to read what I had to say and how Mr. Hays “responded” to me. This is, unfortunately, the problem with many Christians. They ignore virtually everything you have to say and then convince themselves that their opponent “does not get it.” I very much doubt that I will be having any further discussion with Patrick since he has made it quite clear that he is not at all willing to discuss the issues. Nonetheless, I will see what he has to say should he, perhaps, offer a reply in the future.

I invite the readers again to read both arguments and then decide for themselves.