Hi! I'm Sammy, the doodler behind Haram Doodles. I'm an ExMuslim atheist, artist and activist who grew up in the U.S. as a first-generation South Asian Muslim immigrant. I left Islam over a decade ago because I'm a woman. 

After almost a decade of deconstruction and reflection, my Muslim childhood love of art turned into ExMuslim adult fuel to launch Haram Doodles in March 2022.

#SinceILeftIslam doodle made for an ExMuslim

Haram Doodles is a collection of forbidden doodles, comics, stories and memes created in collaboration with courageous ExMuslims using a feminist, humanist, sometimes cheeky, approach. These doodles are freely and publicly available online and in protest of Islam and its strict rules and restrictions on freedom, gender, sexuality, critical thinking, science, art and life itself.

With a coalition of ex-Muslims and activists, she organized the first ever "ExMuslim Awareness Month" in 2022, an event now in its fourth year. She volunteers with the Ex-Muslims International coalition and is a 2025-2027 Borgenicht Fellow.

Why is it haram (forbidden, sinful or impermissible) to recreate people and animals in Islam?

"How dare I mimic Allah? How dare I recreate his creations?"

This is what I heard from my Muslim parents as a kid who was obsessed with art. I was told I couldn't waste my time anymore and had to get serious about life, which meant throwing out all of my art materials and becoming more Muslim.

You see, Aniconism in Islam, or the absence of living beings in art, exists in Hadith, Muhammad's sayings and doings. And, this absence of people and animals in Islamic art is nothing but a divine restriction of freedom of expression, creativity and imagination, the very things that also make us human.

Mohammed was afraid of idolatry at the time he was convincing, forcing, warring and coercing everyone around him to follow Islam and Allah to become Muslim. And now, in the 21st century, some Muslims have taken the "no drawings of Mo or people" rule way too far.

One of the unfortunate downsides to this artistic restriction in Islam is that Muslims end up taking away a child's curiosity and imagination to dream and create with a sense of humanity, while restricting adults to never explore art to its fullest glory. Heck, it's even caused Muslims to enact violence to defend aniconism in Islam (i.e. Charlie Hebdo).

Narrated Said bin Abu Al-Hasan:
Said bin Abu Al-Hasan narrates a conversation between a panicked man who makes his living by making pictures with Ibn 'Abbas. Ibn 'Abbas relays the message heard from the Prophet that whoever makes a picture will be endlessly punished by Allah until he is able to put life into it - though he declared that would never be possible. The Hadith reports Ibn 'Abbas further advised the panicked man to make pictures of trees and any other inanimate objects.
— Muhammad al-Bukhari, Sahih al-Bukhari
Reference (English Book) Vol. 3, Book 34, Hadith 428
Reference (Arabic Book) Book 34, Hadith 172

You can find Haram Doodles on Instagram, TikTok, BlueSky and X.

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