by Eman Hassaballa Aly I have a vessel in me. I don’t know where it’s housed or how big it is, but I know when it’s full, because that’s when I get the urge to write. Maybe it’s my inner pen, and it gets full of ink. Whatever it is, it’s full now and I’m ready to write. I’d like it to be a rant, but rants are boring. Rants don’t do anything but stir people’s emotions and make them... Read more
Addressing sexual abuse in faith communities can be particularly challenging given some of the cultural barriers, the stigmatization and blaming of survivors, and the social and emotional consequences that many survivors face by coming forward. While it is easy for many in the community to pass the onus of justice on to law enforcement, the reality is that often is just not enough. According to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN), nearly 70% of sexual assault goes unreported... Read more
by Nadiah Mohajir originally published on altmuslimah.com Up until a few years ago, Jian Ghomeshi was known to many Canadians as a singer, musician and radio broadcaster. In 2014, he gained notoriety for a much more sinister reason. Ghomeshi faced 23 separate allegations of sexual assault. Despite the fact that there were multiple brave women who came forward with their stories, the court acquitted Ghomeshi due to insufficient evidence on March 24, 2016. So what precisely is sexual assault? Sexual... Read more
by Nadiah Mohajir As we embark on Sexual Assault Awareness Month, you will hear many important facts and information about sexual assault, its impact, its prevalence, and how we can begin working toward prevention. This year, at HEART, we would like to raise awareness on why victims don’t tell. Disclosing sexual assault is a complicated and personal decision. Often, victims tell and are not believed or are blamed. Other times, they don’t tell because of the numerous emotions they may... Read more
by Nadiah Mohajir & Hannah El-Amin To breast feed or bottle feed? Perhaps one of the most emotional – external and internal – dilemmas facing new mothers these days. Every few decades, new research comes out promoting the benefits of one or the other. I was born to a generation of mothers who were told that bottle feeding was superior to breast feeding, while my daughters were born to a generation of mothers who were told the opposite: that breast... Read more
by Nadiah Mohajir The Academy Awards, to me, are like Superbowl Sunday: they are never missed and usually watched with the company of a number of friends. In the past, the “pregame show” – the red carpet – has been watched much more meticulously than the actual show itself – hearing the interviews, seeing the dresses, and who the movie stars are interacting with has always been a guilty pleasure of mine. Something happened at this year’s Academy Awards –... Read more
Everyday Messages that Excuse Bad Behavior and Promote Rape Culture and What We Can do About it by Nadiah Mohajir As a follow up to Sobia Ali-Faisal’s post, I’d like to explore a little deeper on how misogyny has become a part of our everyday culture. In the last year, I have had two parents reach out to me about incidents at their childrens’ schools. Both were young girls not even yet in upper elementary school, at two different schools,... Read more
by Sobia Ali-Faisal To best understand the relationship between misogyny and sexual health I’ll begin this piece with a comprehensive definition for each term. Misogyny: “[M]isogyny is primarily a property of social systems or environments as a whole, in which women will tend to face hostility of various kinds because they are women in a man’s world (i.e., a patriarchy), who are held to be failing to live up to men‘s standards (i.e., tenets of patriarchal ideology which... Read more
by Nadiah Mohajir Is there a difference between sexuality and sexualization? How can we determine if our young girls want to dress sexually because they feel empowered, or because they feel pressured to fit in? The age at which girls are expected to dress sexually has become younger and younger, and if we don’t teach young girls to push back on those pressures, we will not be preparing them for when they will need to make decisions regarding their sexual... Read more
by Nadiah Mohajir The act of reporting is one of the single most courageous acts ever. The revictimization is so overwhelming, the social, emotional and physical consequences can be so overwhelming, that many find it nearly impossible to report. Because of this, the likelihood of it being a false report are slim to none, with only about 2%-8% of reports being false. As the third in a series of articles on sexual assault prevention (read part 1 here and part... Read more
Heartfelt
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In