As an ex-Muslim, I can also relate. I feel like I'm caught up between two sides that constantly judge me to see if I'm worthy to be "one of them". On one side there are the people who think of me as 'newly liberal' that has finally left his 'backwards' culture, as if I magically became a logical and reasonable person the second I abandoned religion. Then on the other, there are the Muslims who assume I'm still a Muslim from the way I look or know I'm an atheist and are surprised if I don't do 'non-Muslim' things like drink alcohol or eat pork. They think that, deep down inside, I still believe in God and there's hope for me yet.

Both sides throw mad generalizations around me and want me to accept them because I'm part of their 'group'. If I try to make a point about how there's a double standard on how the media handles events where Muslims are involved, people accuse me of being a 'secret Muslim' or biased towards Islam. If I criticize the something about the Islamic world, I get called out for being an "ass kisser" who has abandoned his culture.

The truth is I'm tired of having to walk on egg shells around everyone. I feel like I can't defend generalizations against Muslims or criticize anything related to that issue (like Israel/Palestine conflict, for example) without getting called out for having bias regardless of how logical and unbiased my argument was.

After living on both 'sides', I learnt that ignorant people are everywhere regardless of their beliefs or background. There aren't really any sides. You'd be surprised how similar everyone is around the world. Even being progressive can be something that is indoctrinated or learnt, and reached by thinking dissidently and challenging inequality. I guess what I'm trying to say is, us smart people have to band together if we want to change the world we live in. We exist in every single culture, every single place on this planet, and it's our responsibility to keep an open mind towards one another if we ever want to stop injustice.