…if you’re Muslim. Sort of, anyway.
A German judge has stirred a storm of protest by citing the Koran in turning down a German Muslim woman’s request for a speedy divorce on the ground that her husband beat her.
In a ruling that underlines the tension between Muslim customs and European laws, the judge, Christa Datz-Winter, noted that the couple came from a Moroccan cultural milieu, in which it is common for husbands to beat their wives. The Koran, she wrote in her decision, sanctions such physical abuse.
Except that (a) German law is not Qu’ranic law, and (b) it is certainly not a settled issue that Islamic law allows men to beat their wives. In many majority-Muslim nations which apply Islamic law, physical violence is grounds for divorce. Under Moroccan family law, a wife is not legally obliged to obey her husband, and both parties have a right to divorce. I need to look this up, but I’m relatively certain that a man does not have the right to beat his wife under Moroccan law. Understandably, Muslims in Germany and elsewhere are pretty angry:
Muslim leaders agreed that Muslims living here must be judged by the German legal code. But they were just as offended by what they characterized as the judge’s misinterpretation of a much-debated passage in the Koran.
While the verse cited by Judge Datz-Winter does say husbands may beat their wives for being disobedient — an interpretation embraced by fundamentalists— mainstream Muslims have long rejected wife-beating as a medieval relic.
“Our prophet never struck a woman, and he is our example,” Ayyub Axel Köhler, the head of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, said in an interview.
It irritates me that the author of this NY Times piece pits it as a battle between “Western values” and “Islam.” No, it’s a battle of misogyny verses legal equality — and no religion has a monopoly on misogyny. This was a German judge who laid down this ruling, not an Islamic one. She had no obligation to use her own interpretation of the Qu’ran and Islamic beliefs — an interpretation that Muslims around the world disagree with — and yet she chose to anyway. And somehow this is still being billed as a case of crazy Muslims in conflict with Western values.
This is flat-out racism and misogyny. To wit:
In January, the judge turned down the wife’s request for a speedy divorce, saying her husband’s behavior did not constitute unreasonable hardship because they are both Moroccan. “In this cultural background,” she wrote, “it is not unusual that the husband uses physical punishment against the wife.”
Domestic violence is indeed common in Morocco, and Moroccan women face a hell of a lot of oppression. But there isn’t anything unique to Moroccan “cultural background” which makes abuse acceptable or oppression any more debilitating in Morocco than elsewhere. A woman is beaten every 9 seconds in the United States. Nutty Christian sects promote “domestic discipline.” Domestic violence is a pervasive and wide-spread problem, and affects women of every nationality and religious (or non-religious) tradition. And while one German judge’s interpretation of Islamic law may serve as a sufficient cover for her own misogyny and her general failure to properly uphold German law, it does not actually say much of anything about Islam, the experience of Muslim women, or the supposed battle of values between the “West” and the Muslim world. And I’m pretty sure that Morocco is west of Germany anyway.
This ruling is devastating to German Muslim women, who are not being considered full citizens under German law, and who are apparently not invested with the same rights that non-Muslim Germans are accorded. Protection from physical abuse should not be offered on a sliding scale. The German judge needs to be held accountable for her own woman-hating and her racist, uninformed justifications for her decision. This does not need to be framed as yet another example of how backwards Islam is — because while domestic violence is certainly ass-backwards, it’s not an Islamic invention, and the decision to justify that abuse came from a supposedly enlightened Western woman.
The person who needs to be held primarily accountable here is the man who beat up his wife. Secondary accountability needs to be held by the people who enabled that beating, and who made it more difficult for the woman to escape — including this judge.
Why is it so clear that it is a misinterpretation? More importantly, do you think it matters that it is a misinterpretation? Suppose there were some Muslims, of which there certainly are many, who think the judge ruled rightly as a matter of shaaria law?
Who cares? The question is whether the legal sanctioning of domestic abuse is just. It isn’t, whether it is done by kooky Christians, fanatical Muslisms, or wrong-headed secularists. Which, I take it, was your point…
But uh-oh, does this mean we have to reject the facile cultural relativism that has infested much of the academic left?
(Not you Jill, I think this is a good post and you are definitely on the side of the angels.)
But doesn’t this kind of ruling bring into stark relief the conflict between feminism and post-modernism?
I’m suprised you posted on this, Jill.
This is an issue most feminists choose to ignore considering the awkward moral alliance leftists appear to have with Islamists.
Considering there is no law that morally supercedes the law of Islam, I take Morroco’s laws against beating your wife with a grain of salt. Suely there are laws against beheading Jews in Pakistan, but I highly doubt your average Muslim Pakistani saw much wrong with the beheading of Daniel Pearl.
I’m not trying to say all Muslims agree with actions such as these, but law and reality are entirely different things.
I see any light on the subject as a good thing though…
Although I don’t really see why equivocation and false equivalencies are needed.
While i’d agree Islam surely does not have a monopoly on misogyny, it’s clearly institutionalized as evidenced with the hijab, the ultimate statement of dominance, submission, and misogyny.
It’s tiring discussing this subject. Every conversation becomes and indictment of Christianity at the same time. Not that I have a problem with that…
I just don’t see the necessity.
Either way, at least your acknowledging the problem.
Isn’t that the first step?
You’re missing the follow up news.
http://www.myfoxny.com/myfox/pages/News/Detail?contentId=2747535&version=1&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=TSTY&pageId=3.4.1
He was kicked off the case and condemned
1) itanshi – the judge was a woman (not sure if that changes anything)
2) the holding has been universally condemned both in Germany and more broadly. Though the ruling is – as Jill rightly points out – appalling and sure to only increase the marginalization of Muslim women in Germany (they already often lack full citizenship rights because of the country’s immigration laws), the case is not likely to have a broad impact or any precedential value. That doesn’t undermine the fact that it’s awful and should be decried, of course.
It’s worth noting that under the German legal system, prior decisions by judges have less precedential effect than in English common law systems such as the U.S. system (excluding Louisiana.)
That said, it seems bizarre that a judge would bend over backwards to apply the laws of another country in a divorce case. At least in the U.S., divorce law is one of the areas where “choice of law” concepts are least developed and local law most likely to prevail.
And what would this awkward moral alliance be?
Well, I for one continue to wish for the dominance of 7th century Quranic interpretations over not only Muslim women but all Western European and North American women as well.
At least #1 and #2, responding to the leftists in their head, now have something concrete to cite next time they spam up the comments with the “Great Leftist-Islamist Conspiracy” macro.
Silly zuzu — because we don’t like George Bush it means we have to looovvvve radical Islam. See? It’s all so simple.
Ah, yes. Dhimmitude!
1 – 2 – 3 – CUE THE ISLAMOPHOBES!!!!
I know that in the UK, the radical left and radical islam are very much in bed with each other. I expect there is a similar set up in other areas- love palestine, hate bush seems to go further than you would expect. Has led to womens rights really falling as a priority though- so its not something I would expect real feminists to be involved with.
Well, it’s not important that it’s a misrepresentation, which is why my first point was that the judge should be using German law and not Islamic law. But I pointed out the questionable interpretation because I think it’s important to recognize that “Islamic law” is an evolving jurisprudence, not a set-in-stone list of rules that everyone agrees with. I think it’s worth breaking down the stereotype that Islam allows all kinds of abuses toward women.
I don’t think there’s an awkward relationship between feminists and Islamists at all, if you’re using the word “Islamist” to mean a proponent of political Islam, which is how it’s typically used, and as a simple reference to a Muslim person. Most feminists agree that theocracy and political Islam are not good. Many of us, though, don’t buy that the ideal that Islam is the root of all misogyny in the Middle East, or that we need to step in and save the poor little Muslim ladies. I think blaming the problems on religion is incredibly simplistic, and historically ignorant.
The hijab is the ultimate statement of dominance, submission and misogyny? Why the eternal focus on the hijab? I rarely hear islamophobes pointing to a nun’s habit as the ultimate expression of misogyny, even though nuns often cover their hair, arms, torso and legs. I rarely hear islamophobes going after some Orthodox Jewish men for the “ultimate misogyny” of believing that their wives are unclean during menstruation, and believing they have a religious obligation to not even touch them. Many Haredi Jewish women cover their hair as well with a scarf or veil. Ultimate expression of misogyny?
I think that modesty rules are incredibly sexist. But I fail to see why the hijab is so much more sexist than the clothing that women of other religions wear, which cover the same parts of the body.
And lots of Muslim women don’t wear the hijab. The ones who do usually choose to because of complicated reasons — it’s not always just because their husband or father makes them.
The discussion is so one-sided. Why are these concerns always dismissed and the person who brings it up labeled an Islamophobe. You sound more protective of Islam than protecting women’s rights Why do you never discuss the misogny at the core of Islam. Countries with muslim-majority populations tend to be theocratic. Jill, I never see posts from you discussing the misogny in Islam. European liberals have very different views.
Well, European liberals also have a reputation of being pretty xenophobic, so I imagine that’s part of it.
I’m not dismissing the fact that there are horrible women’s rights violations in all majority-Muslim countries, and that these violations are usually justified by pointing to Islam. I don’t deny that the Qu’ran includes its fair share of sexism. But I think it’s stupid to argue that Islam is the direct and only cause for misogyny in majority-Muslim countries. Islam is used as a political tool by men in order to oppress women. But Islam itself is just a collection of words and beliefs. What matters is how those words and beliefs are interpreted by the people in power — and it’s those people in power who we should hold accountable, not a religious book.
Blaming Islam also ignores the entire history of colonialism in the Middle East, and the ongoing impact that has had. You see it in a lot of African countries too, although they aren’t our current favorite punching bag, so Middle Eastern Muslims get more focus. In places like South Africa, misogyny and abuse of women is incredibly rampant. Part of the reason behind that is a response to colonialism and post-colonial oppression wherein the people are trying to re-gain the power that was stripped from them. Hyper-masculinity is part of that attempt. You see that in the Middle East as well.
So my point isn’t that Muslims ever do anything wrong, or that Islam is feminist. Pretty much every religious document has a heaping helping of sexism. Pretty much every religious tradition does, too, and Islam is certainly not exempt. I just think it’s more complicated than that, and I think it’s silly to blame the Qu’ran for the actions of a few of the people who interpret it. I also think we need to look at the diversity of Islam. Just as the Christian Reconstructionists don’t represent my Christian values, radical proponents of political Islam don’t represent most Muslims. And I’m tired of seeing Muslims attacked on grounds that people of other religions get a pass on.
There is a difference between a nun’s habit and a Saudi woman’s hijab. In recent times, only those women who felt called to the vocation have taken vows and put on the habit. Yes, there are Muslim women who do wear hijab for their own reasons, but they’re very much a minority.
That said: What the fuck? Look, I’m all for multiculturalism, really I am. But I’m very much against there being any legal reason to beat a woman. Or a man. Or even a child. Or a dog for that matter.
I’m aware of that. I’m also aware that Europe has a somewhat sordid history of dealing with religious diversity. The people who murdered my great-grandparents and sundry other family members for being Jewish? They weren’t Muslim. They were, in fact, the grandparents of many of the people who now presume to lecture me about the misogyny at the core of Muslims’ essential nature. So thanks, but I’m going to take the views of Europeans with a grain of salt on this one.
Islamic law may be evolving, but it’s not evolving in a good way.
What I see happening is that liberals are being way too tolerant towards religion. If someone came up to you on the street and said, “You are a second class citizen not worthy of my respect, and furthermore, since you don’t agree with my basic beliefs, I am entitled to kill you,” you would rightly get the hell out of there and report this nutcase to the police. But if the person had said all those things and then followed up with, “because my God told me so,” then suddenly we have to be tolerant of the misogyny and violence? That’s ridiculous.
Anyone who thinks that Islam, Christianity, or Judaism are peaceful, loving religions hasn’t read the Old and New Testaments or the Koran.
From Sam Harris’ “The End of Faith”:
Then a few pages later, he says this about religious moderates:
His basic point is that religious moderates aren’t really adhering to their religion. They are uncomfortable adhering to it b/c in the modern world a lot of it makes no sense. So, yeah, there are Christians who are kind and loving, and Muslims who are peaceful, but the religions themselves are not. And I think the religions themselves should be held up for criticism. Just because there are religious moderates in each of the Abrahamic religions does not mean that the religion is not misogynistic and violent. They most certainly are. And saying that it’s only the work of a few crazed wacko fundies misses the point. The wacko fundies are actually living by the letter of the law. Well, everyone knows the Bible is symbolic and not to be taken literally. Well, which parts are symbolic? How do you know? Most people assume the worst parts are symbolic. But our decision is based on reasonableness and what we’ve learned and developed over the last few millenia. It wasn’t developments in the religion which led us to make changes; it was developments in secular society which led us to be slack about certain passages because they offend our modern sensibilities. The fact that we no longer kill women who aren’t virgins on their wedding night (Deuteronomy 22:13-21) doesn’t mean that the God of the Jews decided to be nicer about it and rescind that passage; it’s that we collectively stopped believing it.
So, yes, individual people can be perfectly nice and moral, but their religions are not and I think the religions are up for grabs in terms of fault finding. We are allowed to find fault with anything else in our culture, except religion and our refusal to criticize people of faith out of a misplaced desire to embrace multiculturalism and tolerance is going to be our downfall.
Do you see posts from me where I rail against the misogyny in Christianity or Judaism or Hinduism or any other religion?
No. I do rail against the people who use their religion to justify their misogyny, though. I do rail against the politicization of religion, and how that politicization is always about misogyny. I do rail against religious leaders who attempt to use their church as a means of social control.
And I have pointed out that misogyny is readily apparent in every major religious text. But as anyone can see, how the text is used is far more important than what the text actually says (see Christianity and gay rights; Christianity and abortion rights).
Railing against “Islam” would be pretty stupid, because “Islam” itself is pretty benign. The problem is the misogynists in power who use it to their advantage. The problem is the men who beat their wives and justify it with a religious text — and I put the blame squarely on them.
“The misogyny at the core of Islam”?
How about the misogyny at the core of Christianity?
Religious fundamentalists the world over are enormously, horribly misogynist; it isn’t an Islam-specific thing. Condemning one group of people because of their religion and ignoring another religious group (in our own country, no less) who mandate the same thing is the height of hypocrisy.
It’s evolving in a lot of different ways, depending on which country you’re talking about. In Morocco, for example, the re-vamped family code is most certainly a positive evolution.
I don’t think anyone here denies that the Bible and the Qu’ran and other religious texts have a whole lot of misogyny, violence and hate in them. But they also have a whole lot of talk about peace and justice and equality. I do think that we can look around the world and see just how much interpretation matters. The fundies aren’t living by the letter of religious law — not even close. They’re picking and choosing which rules to live by, just as progressive people of faith do.
We are not going to get anywhere by attacking religion or religious people. I think we’ve seen how well that’s gone over in the Muslim world, now that they feel their faith is under attack from the West. Has it shown them the error of their ways? Have they realized that their religious text is violent and therefore they should all shun it? Not even close. They’ve embraced the very things that we’ve criticized. We say that Islam is violent, and the radicals then have greater footing to assert the same thing.
Obviously people of faith should read and understand what their texts say. But have you read the Bible cover to cover? There’s a whole lot of contradiction, and a whole lot of stuff that we would agree should be placed in context, or should have no place in a modern society. Even the fundies don’t play by every rule. We can examine every single passage, but the fact is that most of it is irrelevant to the actual practice of religion today, and I’m not sure what good it would do.
And, again, I think this “religion is the root of all evil” thing is silly. Religion is a handy tool to carry out oppression. But if we eradicated religion, it would be something else. So why not focus on the oppressive people and hold them accountable for their actions, regardless of how they justify them?
That’s a good point. I was ready to jump on board with that until I realized that it does matter how they justify it. If someone uses their religion to justify their behavior, then they aren’t being reasonable and rational. They won’t be amenable to any discussion about human rights violations. They’ll just point to passages that say “death to infidels,” and “stone your disobedient son.” The only way to argue with them is to use the same holy books and find passages that support your belief, and I gotta say, I think if you took a census of bad passages and good passages, you’d find the bad outweighing the good. Even Jesus wasn’t all sweetness and light. Matthew 10:34-36–”Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.”
But I do agree with you that we should focus on the behavior more, b/c they will take an attack of their religion more personally than an attack on their behavior, and will thus become more entrenched and think we are even more of an infidel than before. So, it probably is a good tactic to stay away from direct criticism of their religion.
But as an atheist, I would like to see the day when people are more reasonable and rational about how they approach the world and the people in it. I think religion needs to go the way of the dinosaur so that loving, compassionate ideas can really bloom and grow among people. Religion is simply too divisive to be of much good anymore. Spirituality is fine. Religion is bunk.
I think religion can be a really powerful community-building tool, and can have great psychological effects for many people. It can bring personal strength, connection with others, and an organized way to do good. So I don’t think religion is all bad, although I do think that the people whose voices are the loudest tend to be the ones who are the nuttiest and exalt the worst about religious beliefs.
Which is why, even though I identify as a Christian, I think religion needs to be kept squarely out of the political and legal spheres. Religious people need the freedom to practice their own religion, but that practice cannot interfere with the rights of others, and should have no place in politics or law. Secularism is definitely the way to go.
A cultural milieu? Sounds a lot like a “You people” kind of remark to me. You know, the same kind of horseshit that we used on blacks for so many years. i.e. “You people beat your wives all the time.” Nice, big, fat generalization: no fuss, no muss.
I clicked on the hyperlinked and I found myself on the “Christian Domestic Discipline” website. WTF?!? At first I wasn’t sure this thing was either a joke, an S&M site marketed for Christians, or the real (fundamentalist) thing. Apparently, it’s the latter one…
It seems that “Christian Domestic Discipline” is the same thing as “Taking in Hand” (see http://www.takeninhand.com, if you can stomach Fundies justifying round-the-clock psychological submission, sexual accessibility, physical abuse and rape as the basis of a “true loving – heterosexual – relationship).
Jill, all of the things you listed: nuns, Jewish women, etc. are all examples of institutionalized misogyny. But you know that.
The difference is I don’t point to their general acceptance as a reasoning for accepting the hijab and the misogyny of Islam. I can differentiate between degrees of misogyny, but at the same time believe all are wrong.
Not too hard.
You’re perfectly displaying the awkward moral alliance I mentioned. Instead of condeming Islamic misogyny on its face you seek to equivocate rather than allign with your conservative counterparts and appear critical of Islam. Because leftists hate conservatives with all their lil’ heartts, they can’t handle standing on the same moral footing as them on virtually any discussion. They have to add qualifiers to their agreement…
Something like…
“Why yes, Islam does have misogynistic elements but no more than Christianity, blah, blah, blah.”
They always have to add an equal condemnation of Western culture.
Doesn’t work well with me considering i’m not a Christian and won’t fall into a discussion trying to rationalize Christianity.
Although, it’s laughable to even consider the brutality of modern Christianity at the same level of Islam, but you are correct, both have institutionalized the second-class status of women.
The difference is that while there are fringe groups who support beating your wife in Christianity, there is no grand theological debate over whether or not its accepted.
Step over to askislam.org and get back to me on whether or not abusing your wife is a settled issue.
Maybe you see abuse through the prism of cultural relativism when viewing other countries, I don’t know. But I do get the sense anything short of my tax dollars paying for your HPV shot is considered abuse here.
You say:
But don’t add any input as to what you think it could be…
Maybe the the brutal male zeitgeist that plagues the world with its dominant tendencies?
I don’t know, but your opinion it’s not Islam should apparently be enough for me.
Anything else and i’m obviously “historically ignorant.”
Let’s talk simplistic.
As a spiritual/religious person myself, I almost agree with you. I certainly agree that we could use more reason and rationality.
I’m curious, though, how you define religion as opposed to spirituality. (I study this stuff, so please don’t take this as confrontational.) Do you believe that it’s impossible to be religious and rational?
Erm, no kidding. But it’s not a liberal position. Anyone, religious or otherwise, who comes up to me, calls me a second-class citizen, and wants to kill me is nuts. Religion is just that nut’s way of justifying it.
You are also making the assumption that the second-class citizen and killing stuff is something all Muslims believe. Nonsense. That you believe this shows that you’re either prejudiced or ignorant.
You know something, though? That hypothetical someone in your story sounds very much like many a conservative Christian man. If you hadn’t posted it in a thread on Islam, I’d've thought we were talking about, oh, the wifebeaters of America or something.
Just goes to show that what we hate and fear in others is the monster in the mirror.
Let’s talk about Islamic feminism, an indigenous movement that has arisen in many majority Muslim countries. It is entirely possible to be a committed feminist and also a devout Muslim, just like it’s entirely possible to be a feminist and a devout Christian. Islamic feminists look to the Koran as providing support for their criticism of patriarchal societies. They don’t need to be rescued from their oppressors, they just need our support in fighting the oppression themselves.
Sure, you alluded to something, but you’ve never actually proved it exists.
What is this moral footing you’re speaking of? You keep typing, and words appear on the screen, but they make no sense.
Yeah … What religion are we condemning again? One more quote then I’ll stop:
Funny how many people miss these things…
Zuzu:
The moral footing i’m referring to is the simple idea that Islamic misogyny is bad.
Not too hard.
I guess I tried to “prove” the awkward moral alliance of the left and Islam by pointing out Jill’s tireless equating of Islam with Christianity. Instead of confronting each unto itself she has to snipe at Christianity while discussing Islam in hopes of distancing herself from conservatives who may be speaking similar ideas.
It often causes the victim to be defending against the things, ideologically, they are supposed to be against.
Vis a vis your disenfranchised hijab post.
LMAO.
But back to Jill…
In order to maintain her multi-cult street cred she has to minimize the role of Islam and instead infer some type of fascist boogeyman.
After decades of feminist shitting on the church for its patriarchy and role in hundreds of years of shitting on women, we now finally understand that it isn’t ignorant religions after all… Just inherently evil people who create systems of control.
Thanks Feminism, what is it now, 9.0?
I guess it’s a chicken and the egg kind of thing.
Either way, as long as religion is in the light, i’m happy.
Jill – This sort of stuff makes me so angry that I wanted to leave comments, but you’ve done such a great job that all I’m going to say is, “Everything Jill said” :)
I will add these two things:
1.) While I know that there is secular/atheist criticism of Islam (along with other religions), especially in Europe, in the US, the vast majority of criticism is done by conservative Christians and sometimes Jews, who dislike misogyny associated with Islam because they dislike Islam, and turn a blind eye to misogyny associated with Christianity and Judaism. In fact, although they may not approve of burqas, their ideas about women are often no different from that of sexist Muslim men.
2.) Feminists and humanitarian groups were the only ones who did care about the plight of women in places like Afghanistan and until 9/11, when it became wrapped up with the war on terror.
3.) While wife-battering may be part of Moroccan/Muslim culture (and is unfortunately part of the culture in all misogynistic societies), this woman as well as many other Muslim men and women have condemned it. They are Muslim, shouldn’t they have a better idea of their culture than a non-Muslim?
4.) I’m of Japanese descent, although I was born in America. Still, if culture is destiny, then is a Japanese-American man allowed to lock me up and force me to prostitute myself, because geishas were/are part of Japanese culture?
Jill, since you identify as a Christian, I wondered if you would write a post about being a Christian feminist, since so many feminists are secular/atheist. I think that it would be a fascinating topic.
Except this post isn’t about Islamic misogyny. It’s about a German judge’s misogyny and bigotry.
Why is it odd to point out religious misogyny in more than one religion?
I don’t like the attitude I hear from a lot of self-described conservatives that Islam is bad because people do bad things in its name; pointing out that people do bad things in the name of Christianity, too, means that one has to be consistent. Either a religion is bad when people do bad things in its name (and then Christianity is bad, too), or else the people who do the bad things are bad, regardless of their excuses.
I’m not entirely sure which side I fall on here, but one can’t make one claim for Christianity and a different one for Islam.
I didn’t miss anything, Alix. If you go back and read my first comment (#18), you’ll see that I impugn all the Abrahamic religions for being misogynistic and violent. I’m an equal-opportunity religion basher.
It’s not a misinterpretation of the text–although that’s a pretty good indicator of whether or not this judge is racist. It’s a misinterpretation of the position of the text.
I don’t think that this judge would agree that, say, a Christian wife should expect to be beaten by her husband because some Christians believe that they are obligated to beat their wives. There’s no imputed consensus; we recognize that Christians are a large and highly diverse group, and that Christianity, like all religions, contains a lot of internal controversy.
Islam also contains a lot of internal controversy, much of it based on interpretation of its own text. It can’t not; it’s a major religion with adherents living very different lives all over the world. If the judge failed to recognize this, then she does not understand that Islam is a proper religion, and she probably holds some pretty insulting and disturbing beliefs about the people who practice it.
Why are all the decent trolls over at pandagon?
I just had a thought. The idea that we can’t criticize Islam b/c Christianity isn’t perfect is ludicrous. We don’t have to be perfect to see flaws in something, and it’s not necessarily hypocritical to criticize something, provided we acknowledge that we aren’t perfect.
It’s like someone getting told that they don’t have a right to offer parenting advice if they don’t have kids. Or my managers at work telling us that we have it good compared to people in third world countries who have to ask permission to use the restroom (yes, this kind of thing is said). Just because it could be worse doesn’t mean we don’t have a right to complain and try to make it better.
Religion and culture are connected, sure, but they aren’t synonymous. You can criticize a religion without being a bigot or a racist or intolerant of multiculturalism. Food and culture are connected, but no one thinks you’re a racist if you say, “I don’t like flan.” And if you say, “I don’t like Islam,” it doesn’t make you a racist. How come the only religion white people are allowed to criticize is Christianity? Since all religions function the same (people do and believe what authorities and holy books tell them), then they are all equally up for grabs for criticism.
Certainly. But who’s saying that?
It’s a both/and proposition, not either/or. Both Christianity AND Islam have problems with misogyny!
However, I think it’s important, when criticizing Islam, not to fall into the kind of thinking that ethel is displaying — that ONLY Islam is worthy of criticism, or that criticizing Christianity when things are bad in some Islamic countries is some kind of way of excusing misogyny in Islam.
I, for one, am capable of holding more than one idea in my head at a time.
Troll-bogarters.
Right. Plus, when you agree that violent misogyny is intrinsic to being Muslim, you’re ceding the entire faith and all its potential variations to the violent misogynists. Then women who would like to be Muslim but who would not like to be beaten by their husbands get kind of screwed over.
Well, I might be over-reading into things, but I get that impression from some of the comments.
Don’t forget Judaism. And don’t forget violence. Misogyny and violence.
As I said, I’m an equal-opportunity basher. By criticizing Islam, I’m not implying anything whatsoever about Christianity, Judaism, or Zoroastrianism, for that matter.
Here’s a site criticizing Islam by people who are allowed to…former Muslims. Interesting.
My comments were not directed solely at you. I’m sorry if it seemed that way.
Marcy at 41:
1. Criticizing one religion does not excuse another.
2. Many, many people I’ve met online and in person believe that Islam is evil but Christianity is OMG SO PURE. My comments criticizing Christianity were an attempt to puncture that particular ego-bubble.
3. In this case, the faults of Islam are a complete non-sequiter.
If they won’t let her divorce, then the next time he tries to beat her, she takes a gun to his fucking head.
Domestic violence is not solely an Islamic issue, and this particular decision is not representative of Islamic thinking – it is representative of the thinking of a German judge.
The judge decided to pick and choose various portions of a religious document in order to condone/legitimize/encourage domestic violence. She interpreted this document in a way to further her own misogynistic (and I would argue racist and xenophobic) beliefs. This misguided attempt at cultural sensitivity makes a mockery of the idea of cultural sensitivity and only serves as a basis to legitimize violence against women in Germany (in particular, Muslim women).
I live in Germany. For me it is interesting to think about why a judge would think that this would be an appropriate decision to make. I think it has a lot to do with how Muslim women are treated in this country. Germany (as well as other Western European countries) has gone out of its way to punish Muslim women for being Muslim women. I see this decision as part of this trend.
The people that I have spoken to about this topic here tend to focus on the real problem with this decision: the legitimization of domestic violence against women in Germany by a German. They do not go off on rants about Islam because that is not the point of the outrage over this decision (that’s not to say that a discussion of religion and feminism isn’t a worthy one to have, but to do so in regards to this topic only serves to pull the blame away from the judge and her actions).
Besides, has it ever occurred to the people who use this case to rant against Islam that they’re agreeing with the judge?
Did I ever say that nuns and Jewish women who cover their hair are not examples of institutionalized misogyny? Did I ever say that the hijab is not an example of institutionalized misogyny? Did I ever say that the Qu’ran is totally egalitarian when it comes to gender?
No.
I’m simply pointing out that we focus on Islam much, much more than we focus on other religions. And in focusing on Islam, we ignore many of the other reasons for misogyny in majority-Muslim nations (see: Colonialism). I think that Islam is an easy target because Muslim women are often brown and from the “east,” which we consider inherently inferior. I think that we should criticize people who use Islam or any other religion as a tool to promote misogyny. But I think that the emphasis on Islam itself, as if there was never any sexism in the current Middle East before Islam, is completely ridiculous. Islam did not cause sexism any more than the Bible did. The people who created and continue to interpret it are the ones we should be blaming. But I think it’s easy to target Islam because Muslim women are more of an “other” than Christian or Jewish women. I think there’s a serious race issue involved that no one wants to talk about.
Oh lordy. I cannot believe he/she just cited askislam.org. If he/she had even *any* semblance of credibility he/she would know that the site hardly a bastion of Islamic jurispudence. But that would take work and reading stuff (sometimes in foreign languages, the horror!) and well, eh…why bother when I can just look up a website put up by some random asshole that costs $12.95 a year?
What really strikes me about this whole concept is that you have people like Ether and Marcy who are condemning a whole legion of people (yes, human beings and not animals) and doing so from a *humanist* perspective, no less!?
:: dumbfounded stare ::
They (Muslims) are mothers and daughters, fathers and sons who have the same abilities and needs to love and be loved NOT UNLIKE YOU. What does it say when you have so little faith in 1.2 BILLION people? Do you really think that any culture just accepts the blanket violence against their women across the board? Or could it be :: ghasp :: a wee bit more complicated than that? Do you really think that half a billion women just kind of wake up every morning and go “Hmm, I think I’ll gets me a beatin’ today after prayer cause that’s what Allah’s asked of me! Amen, Praise the Lord!!” Or that their husbands are thinking, “What better way than to show my piety by beating my wife senseless! Allahu Akbar!”
Somewhere in the recesses of your sanctimonious little heart it would mean you have to allow some leeway in that shallow mind of yours for all the shades of gray that involves the level of complexity pertaining to this issue such as (but not limited to) religion, misogyny, patriarchy, multiculturalism, domestic and internation law, human rights, and free will. But again, why do that when you can just take the intellectually less inferior and yes, less human, approach.
Hell yes.
Agreed. But as Zuzu said, who’s saying that?
The point I’m trying to make is that criticizing religion itself is silly. The Qu’ran cannot speak. The Bible cannot speak. There are a lot of things written in both that are contradictory. There are a lot of things written in both that followers do not follow. There are a handful of things that they do.
When criticizing misogyny justified by religion, I really think it’s important to take a holistic view and consider the various factors involved. As an example, I’ve spent quite a bit of time criticizing the Roman Catholic church for their misogyny and harm to women’s health. But I don’t argue that the problem is the Bible itself. I think the problem is the politicization of the Church, and the misogynist world view that the people in power hold, and which they use the Bible to justify. I think it’s fairly clear, with a cursory look at the history of Roman Catholicism, that the Church’s views on women and reproduction have shifted significantly with its waning power, particularly with regard to the Papal states in Italy. The decisions the Church makes do not happen in a vacuum. I think that church leaders absolutely must be called out on their misogyny. But I don’t think it’s particularly logical to argue that, if not for the Bible, women in currently majority-Christian nations would not be oppressed at all. As I said before, if it wasn’t religion, those in power would find something else to justify their misogyny.
Islam is similar. No one denies that Islamic texts include their fair share of misogyny. No one denies that assholes world-wide use those texts to justify their misogyny. We can absolutely criticize the actions of those who carry out woman-hatred and use their religion to justify it. But I think it takes the onus off of the misogynist to point to religion as the singular cause.
As I pointed out earlier, a history of colonialism is deeply tied to an idealization of hyper-masculinity and oppression of women, as people in former colonies are struggling to assert their strength and independence. Oppression breeds oppression, and those oppressions come from multiple sources. To pin it all on religion is pretty simplistic. That does not mean, however, that we cannot level criticism at those who use religion to justify their misogyny.
And again: This is a story about a German judge who justified wife-beating according to the Qu’ran. Where’s the outrage against Germans? Why are we positioning this as an Islam-verus-the-West thing, when the Muslim woman in question was arguing that she has a right to divorce and the German disagreed?
Jill, I always knew you were truly awesome.
Awesome post, Jill.
A similar case happened in Quebec some years ago. The (female, I believe) judge gave a reduced sentence to a man who’d been convicted of raping his young stepdaughter. The reason she gave for the shortness of the sentence? He and his victim were both Muslim, and since he had only raped her anally, not vaginally, he should be given credit for preserving his victim’s virginity. According to this judge, s/he had to take these cultural factors into consideration and thus judge him less harshly than a non-Muslim man who raped his stepchild.
Needless to say, Muslim Canadian groups were fucking furious. I think it was a rare moment of total unanimity. I don’t recall this judge, who like the German one relied on her own interpretation of Islam to come to a conclusion supported neither by Canadian criminal law nor by religious authorities, ever really got what all the fuss was about. And a lot of the public discourse degraded into “Those Muslims are just savages who want to rape their children, and look, multiculturalism means immigrants get preferential treatment” despite the fact that the only person expressing that point of view was the judge.
She seemed blissfully unaware of the implications of her decision, namely that:
a) we can’t expect Muslim men to keep to the same laws as all the other men in Canada. They’re just not that civilised.
b) this child suffered less than a non-Muslim child rape victim would have, or at any rate, her suffering is of less consequence to the legal system because she’s just a Muslim child.
And not too long ago, a (white) Australian judge gave an Aborigine man who’d raped a 14-year old girl a reduced sentence on the grounds that his cultural traditions were such that he didn’t realise he had to stop when his “fiance” tried to fight him off. The implications being once again that men of Race X are lower beings than other men, and just aren’t capable of understanding basic concepts of civilised behaviour. And of course that women of Race X are even lower beings, who should just put up with being treated like dirt because they were dumb enough to get themselves born into a culture where (according to the judge) they aren’t worth anything.
It always makes me wonder if the judge would be so ‘understanding’ of the poor, put-upon defendant if he were still Moroccan/Muslim/Aborigine but his victim were white. I’m thinking they wouldn’t be nearly so eager to cite cultural traditions as an excuse. Call me a cynic, but I bet if the victims had my skin tone, my accent, and my middle-class WASP background, the defendant wouldn’t get nearly so much sympathy. If he’s only abusing women of his own marginalised group, he’s not a threat to anyone who matters. Women of colour always seem to be at the very bottom of the pyramid.
Bloody hell, I always thought Germany was a civilised nation. I hope that judge gets tossed out of her courtroom for such an apalling ruling.
Benji: She has.
As for the larger discussion on religion and gender, there is no mainstream religion that is misogynistic (certain ancient pagan ones, yes, but not Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism). Every religious text that I know of can be read to justify nearly anything, depending on what you take literally and what you take figuratively, but it a stretch to get misogyny out of them. God knows, it took several hundred years for the Catholic Church to wipe out the most egalitarian strains of Christianity, despite having the might of the Roman Empire behind them.
The Qu’ran has particular problems with this because when it was written down there was no language called Arabic. It is an amalgam of many different tribal languages (we still see remnants of these in the fact that it’s difficult for an Iraqi and a Syrian to understand each other, even though they’re both speaking Arabic). So, there are a lot of homophones, and differing possibilities for many words, depending on the origin chosen. For example, the word that many conservative Muslims translate as “beat” in the context of marriage can also be translated as “leave.” Likewise, it’s possible that heaven is filled with “white grapes” rather than “70 virgins.” The translations we in the west have heard of (beating and virgins) all come from the government of Saudi Arabia, which is misogynistic for reasons completely unrelated to Islam.
Finally this “Judge” obviously has less knowledge of Sharia than I (a white college student who’s never left the US) do. Sharia is Islamic law. Nowhere in the Qu’ran does it say that Muslims living in a non-Muslim state should live by Sharia; that’s a ridiculous idea and contrary to many other concepts in Islam. As well, there are many, many different schools of Islamic jurisprudence. The Grand Mufti of Egypt and Ayatolla Khamenei, for example, don’t always agree.
While I understand you meant well, you are very mistaken. Spoken Arabic and Written Arabic not one and the same. There are many *MANY* dialects but there is only one proper way to speak and write PROPER Arabic. So while the Syrian and Iraqi may not understand one another’s dialects, if they spoke to one another in Proper Arabic (or ‘Arabi Fus’ha), they would be speaking in exactly the same vernacular.
Secondly, no Arabic before the advent of the Quran? Surely, you jest? That is so historically inaccurate, I don’t even know where to begin.
I know you mean well, but please, please, PLEASE be careful when speaking/commenting/writing about any one topic-esp in light of a topic you’re not fully versed in. Or at the very least add a disclaimer like (?) at the end of the sentence.
hey jill- i’m several days late reading this but i’m hoping you are still checking comments because i wanted to tell you thanks for writing this post, and thank you in particular for writing the following:
…But there isn’t anything unique to Moroccan “cultural background” which makes abuse acceptable or oppression any more debilitating in Morocco than elsewhere. A woman is beaten every 9 seconds in the United States. Nutty Christian sects promote “domestic discipline.” Domestic violence is a pervasive and wide-spread problem, and affects women of every nationality and religious (or non-religious) tradition. And while one German judge’s interpretation of Islamic law may serve as a sufficient cover for her own misogyny and her general failure to properly uphold German law, it does not actually say much of anything about Islam, the experience of Muslim women, or the supposed battle of values between the “West” and the Muslim world. And I’m pretty sure that Morocco is west of Germany anyway.
…This does not need to be framed as yet another example of how backwards Islam is — because while domestic violence is certainly ass-backwards, it’s not an Islamic invention, and the decision to justify that abuse came from a supposedly enlightened Western woman.
sorry for the long quote, but all of it was important to me. i just got through reading a comments thread at pandagon where i was starting to get some weird “at least our misogynistic culture isn’t disgusting like THEIR misogynistic culture is!” -type vibes, and i wish that more people instead thought about stuff like this the way that you’ve spelled it out right here. bleh. i don’t want to cross-bitch too much though, just, right on.