Projection

The following is a quote from Wikipedia

"Projection is the opposite defense mechanism to identification. We project our own unpleasant feelings onto someone else and blame them for having thoughts that we really have."

• "A defense mechanism in which the individual attributes to other people impulses and traits that he himself has but cannot accept. It is especially likely to occur when the person lacks insight into his own impulses and traits."
• "Attributing one's own undesirable traits to other people or agencies." The individual perceives in others the motive he denies having himself. Thus the cheat is sure that everyone else is dishonest."
• "People attribute their own undesirable traits onto others. An individual who possesses malicious characteristics, but who is unwilling to perceive himself as an antagonist, convinces himself that his opponent feels and would act the same way."

I found out about the power of projection when I got divorced. My ex-wife who had voluntarily engaged in numerous sexual perversions (without me, I may add!) used the Texas legal system to accuse me of desiring various perversions. It is projection that leads to Muslims who support the attack on Western nations by terrorism to complain about the subsquent invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. It protects Muslims, who look at Mohamet as an ideal man, from acknowledging both his guilt as a child molestor (for his marriage of Ayisha at 6) and the guilt of Abu Bakkar, her father, who sold her to Mohamet in return for a leg up in the subsquent power struggle wherein Abu Bakkar became the first Caliph. It protects Muslims who demand that non-Muslims follow Muslim practice (such as not eating lunch at their desks during RAMADAN), even as Muslim taxi drivers refuse to take fares based on illegal discrimination against the blind (with guide dogs) or based on cargo (say a bottle of whisky).

Projection is a primitive defense mechanism. Reason has no part of it. You can not be reasoned out of things into which you were not reasoned.