Summayyah Meehan’s article for the Khaleej Times starts out like this: “The headscarf, or hijab, is just a small piece of fabric but the controversy that often surrounds it is immeasurable. Muslim women who wear the hijab are often socially stigmatised, in non-Muslim and sometimes even Muslim countries, as being mindless drones who are under the thumbs of their domineering husbands.”
Agreed.
But then Meehan proceeds to educate us why Muslim women really wear the headscarf: “This could not be further from the truth. The reason Muslim women wear the hijab is because Allah commands us to do so.”
Really? All Muslim women who wear the headscarf wear it because of everybody’s favorite sura? Not a single one of wears it for political or traditional reasons? Not a single woman in Saudia Arabia or Iran wears it because the law tells them to?
This kind of generalization leads to outright ignoring of the facts later in the article, but I’ll touch on that later.
Meehan makes a good point that advertisements for movies are full of scantily-dressed women with “bulging bosoms and voluptuous bodies and hair” that “turn thinking and living souls into nothing more than sexual objects.” She contrasts this with the idea that women who are “dressed modestly and her hair is properly covered, she can only be seen for what she truly is, which is an intelligent woman with ideas and a voice of her own. She is not a piece of meat to be drooled over and defamed.” If this were true, and being “properly covered” allows others to see only an “intelligent woman with ideas and a voice of her own”, why is it that Meehan had to write an article slamming people for assuming that Muslim women who cover their hair are “mindless drones”? Why is it that a woman who wears a headscarf is just as aware of and subject to sexual harassment?
From here, we travel to Meehan talking about how Islam liberated every single Muslim woman in the world. Don’t get me wrong: I believe Islam and feminism (and humanism) are compatible and even synonymous. Nor am I insinuating that Islam didn’t improve the situation of Arabian women at the time of its inception.
But Meehan wants us to believe that the world holds no more ills because of Islam. When stating the lot of pre-Islamic Arabian women, she tells us,
“She was not entitled to hold property and her husband could divorce her at his whim without compensating her. He could also simply throw her out of the home, not divorcing her, which meant she would spend the rest of her life in limbo unable to remarry. And she had no voice in her society either. Women were not even allowed to seek an education. All of this changed when the Quran [sic] was revealed to the Last Prophet and women were given their rightful voices.” [my emphasis]
So…does that mean that none of this stuff happens in countries with predominantly Muslim populations, then? This article appeared in a Kuwaiti newspaper. Are we to assume that Kuwaiti women (who, by the way, only received the right to vote within the last three years) are never thrown out of their homes by vindictive husbands, are never ignored in societal debates, are never denied educations?
Meehan is writing from an American-in-Kuwaiti perspective. I can’t decide whether she is also writing from a naïve perspective or from willfully ignorant perspective. Because she lives and works in Kuwait, I have a hard time believing that she isn’t aware of the trafficking or domestic abuse issues in Kuwait or the rest of the Gulf. To pretend that there isn’t a problem doesn’t make the problem go away.
“With the advent of Islam, women were able to vote, seek a divorce and receive alimony, get an education and have her own property amongst other things.”
She is correct that Islam allows these things, but she is not correct in assuming that they are a “given.” Most women in the Gulf states were only recently (within the last twenty years) given the right to vote, and in most of Saudi Arabia, women still have no right to vote. Not to mention the social and cultural (not Islamic) restrictions on women’s travel, education, and divorce in not only the Gulf countries, but in other predominately Muslim states.
“Hey, now,” you say. “Stop ragging on a sister. She’s just trying to defend the hejab and Islam.”
The defense of both hejab and Islam are admirable arguments. I’m not disagreeing with the author on her main points. Meehan is correct: Islam isn’t the problem, nor is hejab. The problem is articles like this one, which run a public relations campaign that glosses away problems Muslim women face, while trying to package the beauty of Islam to make it appear that the religion solves everybody’s problems. In pretending that everything is shiny and happy, this article ignores real problems and real suffering of women who are Muslim and who may or may not wear the hejab.
The restrictions and hardship these women bear are not because of Islam, but because of governments and patriarchal societal systems that use Islam to further their own control. This argument shouldn’t be about Islam; it should be about who is controlling it.
For reasoned defenses on hejab, see the writings of Mohja Kahf. Or read this article.
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I once read a scholarly article which claimed that pre-Islam polyandry was sometimes practised. allegedly a woman once said to the prophet, “how i can i be committing zina when i am a free woman?”i agree with your analysis of the article, and that most of what is purported to be be Islamically mandated is in fact patriarchal crap, but there are certain areas that cannot simply be brushed aside. how can you say that Islam is synonymous with feminism and humanism when it permits polygamy but not polyandry, compels women to dress far more modestly than men, automatically gives child custody to the father when the children are of a certain age (different according to their gender of course), and places different weights on the testimony of female witnesses? I find that there is far too much glossing over of THESE drawbacks.
Salaam,I’m glad you wrote a critique of the article because many women who wear the hijab are quick to point out the objectification of models, actresses, etc., the sexual harassment that non-hijabis may face, and the fact that hijabis can be discriminated against but then will paint this idyllic pic of life in hijab. There have been plenty of times when I was seen as little more than a “mindless drone” or even a sex object while wearing hijab. When someone tries to hit on you by saying “you’re too pretty not to wear niqab” then you’re probably not much in his eyes. Some hijabis paint this black/white dichotomy of hijabis/non-hijabis that just doesn’t work and often proves divisive to Muslimahs at time when we need to be united. I think a lot of hijabs don’t know the history of hijab or women in Islam. I think of a lot of that can be attributed to (male) Muslim scholars who engage in revisionist history. This, in turn, can lead to a lot of the generalizations that are present in the article and are often given by some hijabis. Perhaps, for some women, it’s a way of comforting themselves. What I mean is, it’s easy to think in black/white terms thus it maybe easier to think Islam and hijab have made women’s life paradise while thinking that non-Muslim women and non-hijabis must have brutal life. It’s hard for a lot of people to think that the truth lies somewhere between.
Ladies, thanks for your comments.Forsoothsayer, you and I have talked about this a few times: my PERSONAL views of Islam don’t include some of the things that you say are glossed over, and there are many Islamic feminists who hold views like this. I believe that this goes back not to Islam, but to who is controlling it, interpreting it, and “making the rules.”
Faith, I agree with you. Let’s stop these generalizations once and for all. For all my hijabi sisters who believe because they wear a hijab, they won’t face discrimination or (sexual) harassment just go to a Muslim country like Egypt and face the facts. Even incidents like hijab women and non-hijab women getting sexually assaulted in broad day-light, to a degree that their clothes were ripped off their bodies.Research has thought us that sexual assault and harassment has nothing to do with a person’s sexuality, but everything to do with sex being used a means of power and control by men. Hence the sexual assault of children, elderly women, boys and men. We still are blaming the victim for harassment when it’s not their fault. Let me say it again. It is not the fault of the victim!Just another thing, today we live in a world where everybody has human rights and dignity. The woman who wears a hijab will have the same rights as the woman who does not wear the hijab and vice verse. So do not assume because you were a hijab will get more rights than a woman who does not. You will face the same objectifications and exploitations as other women will face. You will also face discrimination and sexual (and other sorts of) harassment; don’t let men tell you other wise. For example, nearly 80% of Egyptian women were Hijab and still get violated (there are no sexual harassment laws)! Don’t get me wrong, the QURAN honors women but that doesn’t mean that men will. The world is not black and white. Harassment is “violating a person’s dignity” or “creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment” for a person.Honoring yourself means that you must honor other women, let’s fight this together. It is a problem that is affecting all of us WOMEN. Let’s not pretend it’s someone else problem and wait until it festers
Well hate to burst her happy shiny bubble…but until women stop getting punished and or killed for failure to cover properly(which is always determined by men)then the hijab is not a blessing in any way shape or form. Women might wear it to please God ….but men by and large force women to wear it for various reasons…and usually none of those reasons concern God.I get so irritated by hijab articles because they paint only two kinds of stories…the happy shiny wear it for God stories…or the sad oppressed cant think for themselves stories…nothing in between. Muslim womens issues have been reduced to a scrap of material that either is or isnt ordered by God…how sad for us.Btw for all those Muslims that proudly stand on a soap box and declare that Islam gave women rights long before other faiths or countries etc…never seem to mention the fact that not even one Muslim country upholds those rights in anyway shape or form. So whats the point of making such grandiose statements when the facts speak for themselves…and everyone is well aware of those facts…so you just come off sounding foolish and uninformed.
Zeynab, Melinda, Duniya, and for everyone else, This is the standard for measuring oppression against women in the global gender gap. Please note that hijab or appearance is not included, perhaps because it is not a priority.1. Economic participation2. Economic opportunity3. Political empowerment4. Educational attainment5. Health and well-beingFor example in Morocco a Muslim country the educational attainment would show that 70% of women are illiterate. The rate of maternal morality is very high, and the life of expectancy of women is lower than men, the economic participation of women is extremely low (mostly unskilled ghetto jobs), economic opportunity (too sad to reveal, even in the West we still don’t receive the same wage for same job as men, and consider the developing world) this results in the poverty of women. The same with political empowerment, women are not include in the decision making process, their voices and concerns are not heard nor are they represented. Morocco is just one example of how Muslim countries do not honor their women, regardless of the issue of hijab or religion.Gender inequality is present in all the countries of the world, but the difference is how wide is the gap? This gap is even greater in Muslim countries, predominately in the Middle-East. Oppression is not the hijab, oppression is when 17 mothers of 100 women die in childbirths because of the lack of medical attention. Oppression is when 70% of women are illiterate and can’t get basic education let alone quality education. This is how you measure oppression. Yes, we Muslim women are oppressed in Muslim countries not because of our HIJAB”S but because we haven’t even come close to closing this gender gap. GOOD LUCK getting any of the above 5 basic requirements in a Muslim country. “Gender equality refers to that stage of human social development at which “the rights, responsibilities and opportunities of individuals will not be determined by the fact of being born male or female,”2 in other words, a stage when both men and women realize their full potential.” Summayyah Meehan you did Muslim women a disservice. You claim “that Muslim women are often ridiculed for wearing Islamic clothes or ‘garb’”, well let me remind you why we are ridiculed and why no western women will move into a Muslim country because we have the lowest rates in 1. Economic participation2. Economic opportunity3. Political empowerment4. Educational attainment5. Health and well-being
well said, zeynab. and for the record, i think MUSLIM countries like turkey and tunisia, which ban women from wearing hijab at places like university and public office, are just as repressive, misogynistic and controlling as places like saudi and iran that force covering. two sides of the same @#!$ed up coin.can we all PLEASE just GET OVER THE HIJAB?! Arghhhhhhhhhhhhh….
I need my sisters: “Don’t get me wrong, the QURAN honors women but that doesn’t mean that men will. The world is not black and white. “GREAT. POINT.
great comments, “i need my sisters”. zeynab, how do your views not include the things i mentioned? please point me towards the feminist scholars you speak of who have managed to allege that the things i stated are not true or due to sexist interpretations and the like. i myself have never read any such thing, even when i searched. there are all clearly mandated or permissible in the quran itself. while the quran does give women many rights, “equality” would be a stretch.i do not mean to be offensive: i just think that in advocating against negative perceptions of muslim women – an exercise that is fast growing to be of massive importance in protected life and limb – it is counterproductive to ignore undisputed instances of inequality in the actual text of the faith.
I’m kind of late on this but Morrocco has one of the leading overall illeteracy rates in the region along with Iraq, so they’re not really the best example(lebanon and Jordan for instance have literacy rates of around 90%.) I think this is because they were just slower to industrialize/urbanize than some of their neighbours, AFAIK the number of girls (and boys) enrolling in schools has been growing with each generation, but don’t quote me on that.