Women and Religion.


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I caught a bit of Wafa Sultan on The Brian Lehrer Show yesterday morning. Sultan has capitalized on her 2006 YouTube rant against Islam and it’s treatment of women by writing a new book, called “A God Who Hates.”

I’m not saying Islam is always great for women, but I’m really skeptical of railing against any religion and its treatment of women. Firstly, women get a raw deal in just about every cultural institution, and it’s deeply rooted in our shared cultural perceptions of the role of women that probably extend back further than religion itself. Secondly, it just makes religious practitioners skeptical and defensive.

Take Dawn from Bed-Stuy, who called in at the end of the show to try to convince Sultan that Islam was about love and was a good guide for how to live one’s life. That’s great, but as Sultan pointed out, Dawn spoke from the perspective of someone raised under the Constitution that technically, if not practically, made her equal.

Which is why I’m not sure of the point of Sultan’s book. I feel her pain, I really do. I was raised in the land of the Promise Keepers, though I recognize that’s not nearly the same as the land of honor killings. But it’s all part of the same problem, and it’s not religion-specific.

  • People always seem to want some kind of cut and dry “correct opinion” about Islam…not possible. To me it’s really important to get all kinds of RELEVANT perspectives out there circulating so that people can inform themselves. Relevant to me means the words, opinions and ideas of people currently or previously involved in Islam. They’re going to differ from each other, yeah. There are all kinds of Muslims, all kinds of ex-Muslims too. Maybe Sultan’s point is just to speak her mind?

  • Okay, but what about the argument that religious institutions that have shown themselves to be highly resistant to democratic change (e.g. the Catholic church, certain forms of Islam) are uniquely pernicious? Many non-religious cultural institutions exhibit some degree of responsiveness to the concerns of their constituents—governments are popularly elected (in theory…), civil society orgs flourish and wither based on the fit between institutional and individual agendas, and businesses have to take public opinion seriously in order to remain afloat. But any institution that can almost completely ignore the grievances of its members has very little incentive to address its own oppressive policies and actions. Is that convincing grounds to consider the role of women in religion differently?

    • Yes, religious institutions are resistance to change, but Sultan kind of noted this point in her response to Dawn: they take a backseat when there’s a better government structure. I don’t think Islam is the problem, I think the fact that Islam is hardwired into many countries’ governmental structures is the problem. Dawn can eschew the parts of her religion that would force her to take a backseat because she lives under the Constitution. Women like Sultan, who grew up in Syria could not. Driving a wedge between Islam and other institutions seems the better way to spend one’s time. Not attacking the religion itself.

      • quadmoniker

        I should also say, here, that I mean a particular reading of Islam. In general, I think religion tied so closely to government is bad because it gives it a sense of divinity that’s hard to change. But I also think it’s the particularly fundamentalist reading of Islam that’s problematic. That’s part of what Sultan’s arguing against: she thinks it’s inherent to Islam.

      • BF

        The government of Syria is militantly secular, to a very violent point at times (see the Hama massacre). It is Arab, yes, with a large Muslim population (though also a lot of Christians), but an Arab Muslim population does not equate to a theocracy, and it is naive to assume that it does. The government is secular, and the people (especially in the cities) are quite liberal. Not all Muslim countries practice Shari’a law, people.

        • Syria is officially secular and does not follow sharia law, but its courts are influenced by Islamic jurisprudence and the constitution requires the president be Muslim.

  • Scott

    I think this issue is very complicated because it deals with both the religion itself, and as noted, the way it has been woven into the governments of many middle eastern countries. I think both are problematic. The larger issue probably is the governments themselves. I know it is not PC to say this, but many of the countries in the middle east have societies that are about 150-200 years behind the rest of the world. The western world had a long history of treating women badly as well, it is just that we move past that a long time ago (or maybe not so long depending on what measure you use). Middle eastern countries have unfortunately stalled their progress towards enlightenment. I’ve heard people argue that this is due in large part to Islam – to the way that Islam encourages a focus on a “traditional” way of life and way of thinking and in many ways rejects a lot of modern concepts about the world. So in a sense I agree that the problem is the governments, or maybe more accurately, the people. I don’t mean to disparage them, I would contend that the vast majority of the people in the middle east are good people, albeit a little backwards, and I think their belief in religion, in this case Islam, helps to keep them that way. In reality, a literal belief in any religion is dangerous. In the west, even while some people report to surveyors that they still believe in religious doctrine literally, I don’t think they really do. There is stuff in the Christan bible that suggests that stoning women for adultery is a valid punishment, but I think you’d be hard pressed to find anyone from a western country who would agree with that. We’ve moved far enough down the continuum of enlightenment that even very religious people aren’t that crazy. I don’t think the same can be said for a lot of the Muslim world. They really just need to embrace modernity a bit and catch up to the rest of us and learn to treat their religion in a slightly more sophisticated way. Sounds very ethnocentric, I know, but still true.

  • Heina

    You realize that Sultan is an ex-Muslim? From that perspective, not only does she live as a woman, but as an apostate (murtada)? Some interpretations of Islam condemn the apostate to death.

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