NameJamie Al-Nasir
Statement

My name is Jamie, 28 years old, and raised in London by an English Christian mother and Pakistani Muslim father, both of whom have always been very liberal but do believe in God. I am a software engineer and I\'m currently studying for a Masters degree in Pharmaceutical Science. I had previously always had a fondness of Islam mainly due to intrigue, that is until I started to practice the religion more when I started to feel distressed at the ideas regarding life that Islam forces on its\' followers. I was the previous developer of Freeware educational Islamic software, which I developed under the name of Jamal Al-Nasir for DivineIslam.com. My projects including Quran Viewer which I developed in the best of intention to promote Goodness that so-called religion claims as its\' own. Unfortunately whilst developing the software and studying Islam I came to the inevitable conclusion that the religion of Islam is cruel, brutal and barbaric. I started to literally become sickened by the language of the Quran; that very Quran I once viewed as sacred and beautiful showed it\'s true colours and not very pleasant ones at that! I went through a period of trying to re-affirm my faith and intellectualizing, I now believe Religion however is nothing more than a power structure and \"mind-virus\" to use Daniel Dennett\'s term, and whilst it does indeed have some positive attributes I personally believe it\'s negative effects far outweigh its\' benefits. I am now an Atheist with an interest in secular humanism! Thank you for your time and I wish you the best with your endeavour!