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Sexism and Islam

We often hear Muslims of both sexes parroting that Muslim women are treated equally, and I have commented before about how this is at odds with much of what we see. It really does appear to be a veneer of disingenuous obfuscation. But sometimes the façade slips, and we see the true prejudices unmasked and undiluted.

Last month the Hudson Islamic Centre in upstate New York had a high-profile ground breaking ceremony for a new mosque after years of praying in a basement. Local dignitaries were invited, speeches made, and the project unveiled. The entire community of mostly first-generation Bangladeshis had been invited. Unless you were female.

One of the local Muslim women, Jabin Ahmed Ruhii, was frustrated enough to expose the farcical situation on social media, and a storm blew up. The president of the Islamic Centre, Abdul Hannan, said that no discrimination is allowed in their mosque or religious ceremonies. Are you ready for what he said next?

He explained with no hint of embarrassment that the lack of women at the ceremony was due to a lack of space. That’s right – if there is limited space then all men come before all women. To him that is not discrimination.

Many will not have read the Quran and, again, may have heard Muslims claiming that it beseeches equitable treatment for women. That is so far from the truth to be called a deliberate and intentionally deceitful lie. There is whole chapter (Surah 4) on women and I encourage you to read it. Here are some highlights:

  • If you decide to exchange one wife for another, then you should not try to reclaim any gifts from the first wife. [Because presumably you might be tempted to.]
  • If by chance you haven’t had sex with one of your women, then it is okay to have sex with her daughters by another man. [Presumably at any age.]
  • You must not have sex with a married woman unless she is a slave. [Words fail me.]

But just in case you are still in doubt, verse 34 says “Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other”. It goes on to say that a woman should be obedient and that a man should beat her if he is worried about even the possibility of disobedience.

This is the book regarded by believers as profoundly holy and irrefutable, and claimed to be the basis for their morals. And no, I am not twisting it or quoting out of context or mistranslating from the Arabic. I leave that to others. I am giving you the plain meaning, free from conceits; the meaning accepted by Islamic clerics and adherents. (The Muslim scholar Laleh Bakhtiar has translated the Quran and bowdlerized out everything that betrays its true barbaric nature. She has removed derogatory references to Christians and Jews, and dishonestly emasculated the reference to beating women.)

Sexism isn’t confined to Muslim communities, but they do seem particularly prone to extreme forms of it. And there is no doubt that these obnoxious views are to many, validated by their religion and by the Quran.

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