By Paul Salahuddin Armstrong

Why is it okay for a British newspaper to put out a headline like this implying conversion to Islam is a negative thing? Would they say this if he converted to ANY other religion? This is a blatant example of anti-muslim prejudice in plain sight!

Islam teaches respect and compassion, for us to strive to be good people as far as is humanly possible. I’m not a fan of Tate, but that’s besides the point. Tate’s conversion to Islam is potentially the best thing he’s ever done, and could play a huge role in helping him to reform himself and his life.

Whatever bad things Tate did previously have nothing to do with his conversion to Islam. The religion is not responsible for the way Tate was leading his life or whatever ideas he was previously promoting through his social media channels.

There are many examples of people who converted not only to Islam, people who converted to other religions too, people with bad track records before their conversions, whose conversion to a religion completely transformed their lives for the better, into really constructive human beings who then contributed to society for the better.

It’s too early to tell yet, but it’s possible that this could be true for Tate as well. Even though I’m not a fan, I don’t doubt his conversion. I hope it is genuine and I pray that his newfound faith leads Tate to re-examine his life, decisions he’s made in the past, and his perspectives on many things.

Either way, whether Tate’s embrace of Islam leads to a genuine spiritual transformation or not, it shouldn’t be used as another opportunistic excuse to have a dig at Islam, implying there is something inherently wrong with the religion as a whole simply because an unsavoury character embraced it!

That is blatant prejudice against the world’s second largest religion for which the Telegraph should apologise and be more considerate in future.