John Aman - Are “Honor Killings” Spreading in America?

Liberty Counsel Vice President John Aman joins Lars to discuss cases the organization says show Sharia-inspired “honor killings” are happening in the United States. Is America doing enough to confront violence committed in the name of family or religious honor? 

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SPEAKER_00 0:04

Hey, welcome back to the Lars Larson Show. It's a pleasure to be with you. You know, when you hear about honor killings, they sound like something that happens in a third world country somewhere other than the United States. But Liberty Council says they're actually happening right here in America and warns that problem could be growing. I thought we'd talk to John Ammon, who's vice president of marketing at Liberty Council and author of Patriot's Handbook on Sharia's threat to American culture. John, welcome to the program.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Thanks so much, Lars. Good to talk with you.

SPEAKER_00 0:34

Just I good to talk to you as well. Would you mind telling my audience? I think many of them could imagine they know what the generic definition of an honor killing is, but would you mind just refreshing their memory on what an honor killing is and how we came to start having them in the United States of America?

SPEAKER_01 0:52

Well, an honor killing is an attempt to retrieve the lost honor of a family when primarily teen girls take actions that are offensive or dishonoring, they think, to the Islamic faith or to the family. For example, if a teen girl converts to Christianity, that dishonors the family. And so they'll take action either to hustle her out of the country or to take her life. More recently, uh just last year, as you probably know, up in Lacey, Washington, there was an instance where a father tried to publicly strangle his 17-year-old daughter outside the hospital the high school she attended. And uh she he had to be pulled off, otherwise he almost certainly would have killed her. He was 44, big husky guy, trying to take the life of his own child in a public way. So enraged was he at the loss, he thought, of their honor as a family. So and this kind of thing has been happening for years here in the United States, and it's um I hate to say it this way, but it's it's really a feature, not a bug of Islam. And uh it's been imported to the United States by the Islamic faith.

SPEAKER_00 2:08

I mean, is it something that Islam does not seem anxious to try to get rid of? I mean, if there were a practice by, say, Christian churches in America or or people who go to Christian churches, and it was something like this, where you were hurting members of your own family because you thought perhaps they'd done something that dishonored the family, uh I would expect that most Christian churches would tell their parishioners, you're not allowed to behave this way, and we're going to officially condemn it. But is the Islamic community doing that?

SPEAKER_01 2:38

I haven't heard it. Um, you know, you would expect that uh authoritative imams who uh preside at large uh uh mosques might uh speak out, or Islamic organizations here in the United States would uh issue public statements in uh direct opposition to this kind of thing, but I am not aware of it at all. And I think that that's unfortunately fairly telling about uh what the stance is of the nation. I mean, and of course, honor killings are not limited to the United States. They happen frequently across the Muslim world. So uh it it is uh just one aspect of Sharia law that that uh threatens uh that makes life so so horrible for so many people, I'm sad to say.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

I'm talking to John Amon, who is vice president of marketing at Liberty Council. So is this the reason that Liberty Council has made the argument that Sharia law, which is a part of Islam or a way that Islam is practiced in a number of countries, is incompatible with the U.S. Constitution?

SPEAKER_01 3:42

Yeah, I mean it it it it it certainly is, because uh Sharia is the uh quote Islamic way of doing things. It's a complex and detailed and totalitarian system that requires to be that it has that has to be superior. It is um uh the um it's incompatible for that reason with the U.S. Constitution because by nature Sharia law governs every aspect, public and private, of an individual and a culture's life. So it can't have competitors. And in the initial stages when a um when Islam is few in number or has a small population, it's in no position to assert that kind of a thing. But but it is being infiltrated in various ways here in the United States. Um even in Texas, there was a um uh Islamic tribunal that uh advertised its services online, and and that uh that has been taught and is being shut down by the state of Texas. But but they actually went public online offering their services from their judges who were defined as judges. Uh they said that disputes would be resolved according to Islamic jurisprudence and its sharia or law. Uh its purpose was to settle any dispute among Muslims really residing in the U.S. So that's just one example of how Sharia is.

SPEAKER_00 5:14

Well, is that constitutional to offer that kind of public service to say we're gonna resolve this instead of having the American courts resolve it, we'll resolve it by Sharia law?

SPEAKER_01 5:24

No, it's not. And um, for that reason, when in this when Texas caught wind of it, the governor and the attorney general uh Ken Paxton took quick action to enforce the primacy of Texas law first, and then of course uh federal law when it came to all sorts of matters, including uh divorce and other marital disputes. But uh yeah, no, it's it's outside of the the the Supreme Court, the sorry, the uh the U.S. Constitution is the Supreme Law of the United States, and so any competitor has it has no standing here in the U.S.

SPEAKER_00 6:01

Well, John, you know what this reminds me of is I'm a Protestant Christian, I'm not LDS, but there are LDS people out there, and there was a point where the LDS Church had a dispute with the United States government because they practiced polygamy at the time. And in the end the resolution of that eventually was that the LDS Church had to officially disclaim, you know, polygamous uh arrangement. Now, there are there other spin-offs from the the main Mormon church who still practice polygamy? Yes, there are. But the main church has said, no, we're not gonna do that. Islam could do the same thing in the United States if it chose to do so, couldn't it?

SPEAKER_01 6:37

Oh, yeah, it could, but it but it in a sense it can't, because that would be to abrogate the very character of Islam. And you know, uh honor killings are not the only element of Sharia law that are completely foreign to the United States um that uh that we need to uh address. I mean slavery is a part of Sharia law. Um child bride marriages, which do occur here in the United States, are uh endorsed in Sharia. Um the uh capital punishment for leaving Islam or for being an apostate. Yeah, being an apostate, all that uh criticizing uh Muhammad, all these things are actual capital crimes. Now that's not taking place in the United States so far as I know, but that's that's that's Sharia law. So it's not just um honor killings, horrific as they are.

SPEAKER_00 7:41

I don't doubt that. John, thank you very much. That's John Eamon, who is Vice President of Marketing at Liberty Council and author of Patriots Handbook on Sharia's threat to American culture. Back in a moment. I'll get to your phone calls and emails at 866 A Lars. That's 866 439 5277. Send your emails to talk at LarsLarson.com.