"Why Do They Hate Us?" asks the latest cover of Foreign Policy magazine. Beneath the title stands a cowering woman wearing nothing but black body paint resembling the niqab, or full Islamic face veil.
Egyptian feminist Mona Eltahawy authored the article. Her central contention -- that Arab Muslim culture "hates" women -- resurrects a raft of powerful stereotypes regarding Islam and misogyny. It also situates Ms. Eltahawy's work within a growing trend of "native informants" whose personal testimonies of oppression under Islam have generated significant support for military aggression against Muslim-majority countries in recent years.
Books by these "native voices" -- including Ayaan Hirsi Ali's "Infidel," Azar Nafisi's "Reading Lolita" in Tehran, and Irshad Mandji's "Faith Without Fear" -- have flown off the shelves in post-9/11 America despite being roundly rebuffed by leading feminist academics such as Columbia University's Lila Abu-Lughod and Yale's Leila Ahmed. Saba Mahmood, another respected scholar, noted that native informants helped "manufacture consent" for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan by serving up fear-inducing portrayals of Islam in "an authentic Muslim woman's voice."
Although such depictions have proven largely inaccurate and guilty of extreme generalizations, they have become immensely popular. Why? Because these native "testimonials" tell us what we in the West already know -- that there's something inherently misogynistic about Muslims and Arabs.
By stirring up our sympathies and reinforcing our prejudices, individuals like Ms. Hirsi Ali and Ms. Eltahawy have climbed to the top of the media ladder. Their voices are drowning out the messages of more nuanced, well-respected scholars.
High-profile conservatives like Rick Santorum, Rush Limbaugh and Pat Robertson -- men who have impeded the feminist movement at virtually every turn within the United States -- have enthusiastically argued that Islam oppresses women. Indeed, the only women George W. Bush seemed to care about "liberating" lived in Afghanistan and Iraq. As Guardian correspondent Polly Toynbee noted, the burka became "shorthand moral justification" for the war in Afghanistan.
Though neoconservative pundits have yet to fully embrace Ms. Eltahawy, they will doubtless applaud her efforts to reveal "the pulsating heart of misogyny in the Middle East" as well as her assertion that "the Islamist hatred of women burns brightly across the region -- now more than ever."
Ms. Eltahawy, like most critics arguing that the Arab Spring is bad for women, grounds her argument in examples from Egypt. She is justifiably incensed at the military's sickening abuses of female protesters, something she experienced first-hand. Ms. Eltahawy is similarly correct to lambast female genital mutilation, a practice that is disturbingly widespread in both Egyptian Muslim and Coptic Christian communities.
Her fault lies in extrapolating broad cultural judgments from context-specific abuses, implying that Islam and Arab culture writ large are have toxically combined to create a hopelessly backward region that "treats half of humanity like animals."
Ms. Eltahawy further suggests that Islamists are all the same -- bearded, dangerous men intent on robbing Arab women of the few freedoms they have. While Ms. Eltahawy's claims will no doubt generate impressive magazine sales, they fail to reflect the complex reality on the ground.
I spent the better part of the past year interviewing Islamist women in Tunisia, Egypt and Turkey. Islamist movements within and among those three countries differ widely, just as conservative & faith-based political movements differ widely within and among Christian-majority countries.
The Tunisian "Islamists" she mentions, those who protested in favour of the niqab in Tunisian universities, are Salafis -- extreme conservatives. The moderate Islamists in Al-Nahda Party who hold a plurality of seats in Tunisia's current government oppose the tiny Salafi minority. Nearly half of Al-Nahda's assembly members (42 out of 89) are women. Al-Nahda is an Islamist party.
Asking why "Islamic culture" oppresses women is as meaningless as asking why "Christian culture" oppresses women. Women's lived realities in Christian-majority countries differ depending on the historical and socio-political contexts in which they live. What oppresses a woman in America differs from what oppresses her sisters in South Korea, Bolivia, Greece, Australia, or Zimbabwe. We cannot divorce Christianity from the cultural and historical contexts in which it is practiced.
Sensationalist photos like the one on this cover of Foreign Policy magazine perpetuate the assumption that all women who wear the niqab do so because they are oppressed. However, the niqab -- like the headscarf, miniskirt, bikini, or any other garment -- is polysemic. It has many meanings. Some women wear the niqab to move around more freely. Others believe that modesty is liberating to women, and find more personal liberation in covering their bodies than in exposing them.
Many people in the Middle East believe that Western women who wear miniskirts and bikinis do so because they are oppressed by a culture that objectifies & sexually commodifies women's bodies, or because they are simply morally loose women. It is unfair to say that all women who wear high heels do so because they are "oppressed." It is similarly over-simplistic and highly inaccurate to assume that all women who wear niqab do so because they are cowed by men.
There are many outspoken female Islamists -- I've met and interviewed hundreds -- who are politically active, socially engaged and highly educated. These women are far from being pliant, oppressed foot soldiers. Does this mean I agree with their theological views? No. But it does mean I have enough first-hand knowledge to see beyond simplistic distortions of complex cultures such as this piece by Mona Eltahawy.
Westerners often have good intentions -- we want to help women. But most of us haven't been to the Middle East, let alone interviewed a female activist who wears a full face veil.
Ms. Eltahawy has every right to speak out aggressively against injustices -- both real and perceived -- in the Arab world. It is important for her readers, however, to understand the dangers of sensationalist coverage that over-simplify complex matters of gender, politics, and religious observance in Muslim-majority countries.
History is rife with examples of seemingly women-friendly arguments hijacked in the service of imperialistic and aggressive ends. While emotional and sensationalist portrayals such as this most recent Foreign Policy cover will sell copies, they do little to deepen our understanding of the contexts and conditions shaping women's oppression in Arab countries today.
Do Arab men hate women? It's not that simple | Nesrine Malik ...
Are Arabs inately misogynistic? - Yahoo! Answers
I am Sid Harth.
The correct answer:
NO!
NOTE:
HUFFPOST, where did you hide, Monica L. Marks, the jewel in the crown?
...and I am Sid Harth@mysistereileen.com
The Quran is written in Arabic. And the people of Egypt, the largest Arabic-speaking Muslim country in the world, largely believe it to be the immutable, divine word of God -- not unlike most people in other Arab and Muslim countries. The majority of Muslims won't even touch or recite the holy book unless they have done wudhu (cleansing) and/or ghusl (bathing). Women are not allowed to recite it while they're menstruating. That is how much it's revered.
The classic response to these kinds of citations is that...more below!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ali-a-rizvi/islam-women_b_1466571.html
There is no place for celibacy like, for example the Roman Catholic priests and nuns. The prophet has said “there is no celibacy in Islam.
Marriage is a religious duty and is consequently a moral safeguard as well as a social necessity. Islam does not equal celibacy with high “taqwa” / “Iman”.
The prophet has also said, “Marriage is my tradition who so ever keeps away there from is not from amongst me”.
Marriage acts as an outlet for sexual needs and regulate it so one does not become a slave to his/ her desires.
It is a social necessity because through marriage, families are established and the family is the fundamental unit of our society.
Furthermore, marriage is the only legitimate or halal way to indulge in intimacy between a man and a woman.
Islam takes a middle of the road position to sexual relations , it neither condemns it like certain religions, nor does it allow it freely.
Islam urges us to control and regulate our desires, whatever they may be so that we remain dignified and not become like animals.
Exactly right!
If you tell me that a certain group of people hate women, then my first question would be what does their religion say about women?
Islamic Nations Fail to Weaken Women’s Rights Resolution at U.N. Human Rights Council
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/islamic-nations-fail-weaken-women-s-rights-resolution-un-human-rights-council
UN aimed by this to revoke any remaining laws that discriminate on the basis of sex and remove gender bias in the administration of justice. This provision poses a direct challenge to Islamic legal systems in which a woman’s testimony in court carries half the weight of a man’s testimony.
In countries such as Saudi Arabia, Iran and Pakistan, a rape victim is required to present four male witnesses to back her claim, failing which she can herself be charged with adultery.
===========
Then how do you explain the fact that in several Muslim countries women have been able to become presidents and prime ministers while in other Muslim countries women can't vote? Just on a basic empirical level, it is clear that within Muslim countries there is a wide variation in terms of the condition of women. Religion isn't the variable, so what else is there? social, cultural, political, economic factors.
Bukhari (4425)
“A nation which placed its affairs in the hands of a woman shall never prosper!”
Al-Baqarah 2:228
But the men have a degree over them [in responsibility and authority].
Bukhari (6:301) - "[Muhammad] said, 'Is not the evidence of two women equal to the witness of one man?' They replied in the affirmative. He said, 'This is the deficiency in her intelligence.'"
al-Nisa’ 4:34
“Men are the protectors and maintainers of women, because Allâh has made one of them to excel the other”
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/apr/29/chechen-women-in-mortal-fear-as-president-backs-ho/
Chechnya's government is openly approving of families that kill female relatives who violate their sense of honor, as this Russian republic embraces a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam after decades of religious suppression under Soviet rule.
In the past five years, the bodies of dozens of young Chechen women have been found dumped in woods, abandoned in alleys and left along roads in the capital, Grozny, and neighboring villages.
Some people attribute these barriers to the teachings of Islam, but this is false.
The teachings of the Holy Prophet of Islam emphasize “the acquiring of knowledge as bounden duties of each Muslim from the cradle to the grave” and that “the quest for knowledge and science is obligatory upon every Muslim man and woman.”* One-eighth (that is, 750 verses) of the Quraan (the Muslim Holy Book) exhort believers to study nature, to reflect, and to make the best use of reason in their search for the ultimate truth.
Muslim countries vary greatly in their culture, traditions, and social systems, and there is a wide range of attitudes toward educating women at the university level.
For example, in Egypt, women have attended university since the 1920s
The percentage of females enrolled in science and technology university courses ranges from 70% in the United Arab Emirates to 8% in Djibouti; in Egypt, 35% of science undergraduates are women
For example, at The Lebanese University, the percentage of women studying engineering increased from 16% in 1992–93 to 20% in 1996–97, and in Syria, the total percentage of women studying civil engineering increased from 14.4% in 1980 to 30.5% in 1994.
A few female scientists from Muslim countries serve on national and international committees
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/290/5489/55.full
"The problem is that some clerics integrate cultural traditions and say that they are sanctioned by Islam. It really is not the case that circumcision for women is mandated in Islam. Why wouldn't the Bosniaks, Chechens, Turks, etc be doing it? (answer because it is mainly an African (Christians and Muslims) tradition."
- I have to disagree with you as Umdat al-Salik that I quoted is a classical manual of fiqh for the Shafi'i school of Islamic jurisprudence. It is certified by Al-Azhar and certainly no cultural tradition matter. It is in fact described as the soundest positions of the Shafi'i school.
You can check it on:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reliance_of_the_Traveller
Why some don't do it? Probably because they have some common sense. And by that they disobey what religion is commanding. At the end it is not what people want that matters it is what God wants. Therefore you should refer to their holy and agreed upon texts for guidance.
If you disagree with me, then please provide references to your statements. I have no use for baseless ones.
Secondly, the type of female circumcision that is practiced is the complete removal of the external features (I don't know how sensitive the sensors are for huffpo but I think you know what I mean). That would be considered mutilation under Islam and is definitely not allowed. http://seekersguidance.org/blog/2012/04/mutilating-facts-setting-the-record-straight-about-female-circumcision-genital-mutilation/ (This is a good site telling the difference between the two. Also provides hadiths and explanations.) Saying that actual circumcision is preformed on the female and not mutilation, Hanbali jurisprudence says it is not obligatory, Hanafi says it is a choice, but Maliki and Shafi'i say it is required (again these last two are practiced in Africa for the most part) So this kind of answers my third point, and to your question why some don't do it. Those in Hanafi and Hanbali do not believe it is required. It depends on what jurisprudence you follow.
Also found some links where Imams were against female circumcision.
http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/mauritanian-muslim-imams-initiate-rare-ban-on-female-circumcision
http://www.onislam.net/english/news/africa/454297-kenya-imams-fight-female-mutilation.html
Enjoy!
Hanafi says it is a choice,
but Maliki and Shafi'i say it is required"
"Saying that actual circumcision is preformed on the female and not mutilation"
- Whether it was circumcision or a complete removal, I am glad that we agree that it is clear now that it is a religious requirement practiced in at least some MSM circles and not a mere cultural or a traditional practice.
Specifically, the Sunnipath website is an Islamic site which is actually associated with Nuh Ha Mim Keller (the translator of Reliance of the Traveller) and here is their contemporary ruling.
http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?ID=4932
-------------
Female circumcision is it itself obligatory in the Shafi`i school, and Shaykh Nuh Keller’s translation in the Reliance of the Traveler is accurate and defines the meaning well.
It does not call for the removal of the clitoris (badhr), but rather a slight trimming of it (khafad) to increase sexual pleasure. If the removal of the clitoris was intended, the word badhr would have been used alone. See the following link:
Female circumcision
Since the correct practice has become so lost, and has deviated in many cultures to gross mutilation, many opt to take the Hanbali or Hanafi dispensation, because the former considers it a sunna while the latter considers it a courtesy to the husband. [And living Shafi`i scholars in many lands mention that given that the correct practice has become an almost-lost art, the ruling within the school of the prevalent forms of circumcision would be impermissibility - ed.]
And Allah knows best.
Shazia
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/27/opinion/can-islamism-and-feminism-mix.html
- lol this is madness and speaks tons about who Monica is and how she thinks. From your link Morabit:
MONICA MARKS
Can Islamism and Feminism Mix?
"Vocal, active, and often veiled, they are comfortable with the language of piety and politics. Despite the fear mongering of secular skeptics and Western pundits."
AMJA (Association of Muslim Jurists of America (AMJA) ) Senior Committee Member:
Female Genital Mutilation Is 'an Honor' per Islam
Dr. al-Haj, a medical doctor and fellow at the American Academy of Pediatrics, ignores FGM's detrimental effects on women's health, and instead argues that it is 'an honor' for women.
http://www.translatingjihad.com/2012/04/amja-senior-committee-member-female.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circumcision
Enough said I guess.
We're constantly told that female genital mutilation is a cultural practice that has nothing to do with Islam. Yet Mohammed Abdul not only didn't get this memo, but apparently he assumes that his hearers all share his point of view. What are the Vast Majority of Moderate Muslims planning to do about this spectacular misunderstanding of Islam?
A British Muslim leader has been caught on camera advocating female genital mutilation.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2136907/Genital-mutilation-British-muslim-leader-caught-camera-advocating-female-circumcision.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
Nowhere in the Qur’an and Hadith does one come across even a vague reference to female circumcision, though it’s still practiced in isolated Muslim communities of North African countries like Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt.
Imam Ghazali, considered to be the greatest ever authority on Qur’an, criticised FGM in no uncertain terms in his eleven treatises.
Female genital mutilation predates Islam in North Africa. The African tribes of pre-Islamic North Africa used to practise ‘Geza’ which is an old Swahili word meaning “cutting an unnecessary growth.” To the primitive people of North Africa, a woman’s tiny growth in vagina was a ‘witch’s curse.’
After the advent of Islam, this abominable practice became less widespread. Cultural and ethnic undercurrents are always stronger and deeper than religious influences. So this practice is still sporadically prevalent in that region reverting to Pre-Islamic Jahalia days.
And as regards the prevalence of FGM in Egypt, one ought to be aware that it was the custom of Coptic Christians .
Almost all Egyptian Muslims are descendants of Coptic Christians,.
The great Muslim scholar, Professor Taha Hussain of Egypt, explained this pre-Islamic phenomenon in his book Perpetuation and percolation of primitive practices. Arab society never approved of this heinous practice.
http://www.milligazette.com/news/3255-fgm-an-attempt-to-tarnish-islam
They want us to be a commodity. Identical and soulless.
In my opinion, Christian culture *does* oppress women. Christians who strive not to oppress women have to go out of their way to go against our traditions (I am a Christian). It requires deliberate intentionality. The default is oppression. Based on what I've seen, I believe Islam is similar. Until, really, the 20th century, women were oppressed in different ways and in different contexts in just about every civilization on Earth. Any religion based in a time before the 20th century is going to have to contend with historical oppression of women. Anyone who believes that her or his religious tradition should be set in stone and unchanged (and we certainly have a number of Christians who believe this and who need to be called out on it) is *inherently* supporting the repression of women's voices and limitation of our potential.
All that to say that I don't find this article persuasive. It seems to be a "they're not all that bad!" Pollyanna cry.
People are usually not nearly so eager to look kindly upon Islam, even though it is the third religion of Abraham and more in tune with our own Judaeo-Christian tradition.
The old hatred of lslam continues to flourish on both sides of the Atlantic and people have few scruples about attacking this religion, even if they know little about it.
The hostility is understandable, because until the rise of the Soviet Union in our own century, no polity or ideology posed such a continuous challenge to the West as Islam.
Western scholars denounced Islam as a blasphemous faith and its Prophet Muhammad as the Great Pretender, who had founded a violent religion of the sword in order to conquer the world. ' Mahomet' became a bogy to the people of Europe,
This inaccurate image of Islam became one of the received ideas of Europe and it continues to affect our perceptions of the Muslim world.
The problem has been compounded by the fact that, for the first time in Islamic history, Muslims have begun to cultivate a passionate hatred of the West.
It is a mistake to imagine that Islam is an inherently violent or fanatical faith, as is sometimes suggested. Islam is a universal religion and there is nothing aggressively oriental or anti-Western about it.
- In other words Monica wants to say:
The sources of misogyny in the Arab world are not from Islam, but imperialism and colonialism that reigned over the Arab world for centuries. At the end it is the West fault.
"While emotional and sensationalist portrayals such as this most recent Foreign Policy cover will sell copies"
- What a total disrespect for a brave woman like Mona coming from a student with too much Islamism in her little brain.