Shit Straight White Guys Say

I think some women are able to feel like they find spaces within religion that are safe for them, even empowering. But I’m not religious, so you’ll have to get an answer from someone who is.

ideas within them but they can always be reclaimed by women as time progresses. I mean almost everything is hostile to women but with equality women can fully embrace these things and take it beyond the ‘mansview’, islam has done quite a few feminist things too like back then the pagans used to bury girl babies but muslims stopped that by preaching stuff like if you have three daughters you’ll go to heaven, and the beneath that heaven lies under the feet of the mothers. Also unlike christianity, women could actually get a divorce and as far as I can tell protection and abortion weren’t deadly sins cause the life of the living was more important. Also for example the concept of 4 wives was a contemporary thing cause so many muslim men were dying in war and there was an inequality in numbers of men and women (but the man had to treat them all equally) but obviously just like in any patriarchy men abused that power sometimes it is not exclusive to religious men also female ‘circimcision’ is not a islamic law or a muslim tradition. It is something some ethnic groups do, like the avars traditionally did it no where in the quran or the canonical preachings of islams is female genital mutiliation even mentioned (also muslims believe sex is for reproduction, pleasure and an overall spiritual act. Muhammed and his wives were very open about sex (for the era you know), stop confusing extremists or cultural traditions with the religion and its preachings. Also (i talk too much!) by supporting islamophobia do you realize you aren’t only putting ‘the oppressive muslim men’ under the fire but the ‘oppressed women’ too? You are not doing anything for them basically. Also believe it or not there are feminist muslims, there are gay christians and muslims there are oppressed people who willingly embrace these religions, with this you are denying them something they love (oppressive) its not religions which must be abolished but patriarchy and racism.

Also, as non-religious people, we don’t believe that holy texts come from a deity, instead, we think they come from people (and let’s be honest, almost exclusively men). So really, sexism isn’t a religious problem. Sexism is a MEN problem, it’s just sometimes reflected in religion.

(thanks for writing that all out!)

Sorry I have to catch a plane soon and I just don’t have the stamina for bunches of questions, so I’m taking today off.

Guess this is a good time to mention for the new followers: just so y’all know, anon is usually off except for a few hours on Thursday. So if you need to ask something anon, hang on to it until then. Cuts down on the trolling because most trolls don’t care enough to wait.

If any Muslim people would like to respond, please send something in.

My primary thoughts (as a fellow non-religious person) are:

1. I see a lot of atheist guys (like Richard Dawkins) criticize sexism in Islam but they themselves also perpetuate sexism. So really, it’s just them using the existence of sexism as a tool to support their dislike of Islam. They don’t actually care about sexism, they just pretend to care about it when it’s convenient to furthering their anti-Islam agenda. I don’t know if you are one of those people, but there’s a chance. So just think about to what extent this may apply to you and how seriously you take sexism/homophobia outside of this issue (do you call out sexists and homophobes when you see them?)
2. Related to that, I really hate the attitude that I see in so many atheist circles of “well, at least we aren’t slicing apart people’s genitals or marrying them off before puberty. Now that’s sexism. All you western women can shut the fuck up, you’re just whiny.” So be really careful about putting too much emphasis on sexism in Muslim countries and using it to ignore sexism elsewhere. Men of all cultures are capable of sexism, none of y’all get a free ride cause someone else is doing it worse. You want to criticize Muslim men, you should be willing to take a long hard look at yourself and other white men too.
3. If you want to criticize Islam, it’s important to be educated about it because many things seem sexist without context but actually aren’t that bad. One example that comes to mind (and I’m going to do a terrible job of paraphrasing it because it’s been forever since I’ve come across this so I apologize) is that a section of the Quran forbids menstruating people from participating in a certain prayer or ritual. At first, it may seem like they think menstruation is shameful or unholy, but really, anyone with blood on them is banned as well. So it’s not about people with vaginas specifically, it’s about physical purity. You may be surprised, context can be very important. Context may not explain away everything, but it’s not really fair to critique something that you’re not educated in, so make sure that you’re very familiar with what you’re talking about.
4. Islamophobia kills. Completely innocent Muslim people are actually killed or attacked after terrorist attacks, on the anniversary of 9/11, whenever people feel like it, etc. Think twice before defending a word and attitude that is linked so heavily with needless and bigoted killing.