Mohammed Miah
Professor Dowd
ENWR 105/E4-3
9 December 2014
Muslim Women vs. the Media: Who is the Real Terrorist? Are Muslim women across the world victims of the religion that they follow or are they serious victims of the media? For years, people have misconceived how women of the Islamic faith live their lives, and those who are victimized cannot even get the opportunity to speak their minds about their own lives to justify how the media has been portraying them. Society today has varying views on the subject, with some disagreeing with the media, while others are in complete support of the media; they truly believe that Muslim women are indeed victims. However, the media has only desecrated the truth of the lives of Muslim women by
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When she stated, “They did not always have an opportunity to speak for themselves,” she was referring to the Muslim women in Islam dominated countries with people seeing them as victims of a patriarchal society where they cannot voice their opinions without having to suffer from a punishment. Also, because the images within the media showed women wearing burqas, which are also worn by Muslim women in America, people in the West see them as victims who are just crying out for help. It is not the social norm to wear a veil in the West because people believe in liberation when it comes to clothing, even if certain clothes may be terrifyingly revealing. They are unaware of the Islamic beliefs and that in countries, such as Afghanistan, the women accept the veil because it is part of their religion. Muslims follow rules and regulations that were divinely written within the Quran, and the burqa, which is considered to be a hijab (a veil/covering), is outlined within the Quran as follows: And tell the believing women to reduce [some] of their vision and guard their private parts and not expose their adornment except that which [necessarily] appears thereof and to wrap [a portion of] their headcovers over their chests and not expose their adornment except to their husbands, their fathers, their husbands ' fathers, their sons, their husbands ' sons, their
Muslim women living in North America and Europe often face scrutiny over their choice to wear the veil, even though many Western people do not fully understand the practice.
“I wear it to work. I wear it to school,” she told The Signal about her niqab. “Many people have this misconception that, as Muslim women, we’re oppressed or forced to wear it. For me, it’s a choice. My parents never forced me to wear it.”
The author, Naheed Mustafa, starts out with two points of view others have of her, a “Muslim terrorist” or an oppressed woman (Mustafa 1). However, with these two points of view, Mustafa is suggesting that people only view her in these two ways because in their eyes a Muslim woman cannot be more. Then she introduces the hijab, a scarf which covers her neck, head, and throat, but explains that young Muslim women like her are “reinterpreting” the purpose of the hijab: give women absolute control over their bodies. According to Mustafa, the hijab does not only give women absolute control but freedom. Yet, others do not understand this concept or why a young woman who was born in a land that is free and full of opportunities like North America
Evelyn Alsultany takes a different approach to the oppression of Muslim women that the U.S. portrayed in the media to fuel the War on Terror and analyses that the U.S. portrayed Islam as backwards and an uncivilized culture. Alsultany analyzes published stories and news shows on CNN, NBC, CBS, and Fox after the 9/11 attacks and concludes that these news stations used women’s oppression and linked it with terrorist attacks because they conveyed that Muslim men hated the West’s cultural ideals of women being free and wanted to impose Islam on the West. The media portrays women’s veiled oppression, female genital mutilation, honour killings, and women being beaten as they did not dress properly as the nature of Islam’s backwardness and
“The Hijab limits me from doing certain things. When I have the Hijab on…as a Muslim woman, I consider myself basically representing the whole community” (Ruby 29). Aspects like this set this woman apart from her peers because she is now labeled as just one thing, a Muslim, when in fact she is much more than that. Women who wear the Hijab, Muhajibah, living in the western world, I believe, have it harder than they do living back home. Here, they are subject to a lot more attention when not necessary such as weird looks walking down the street and subject to stereotypes ie. being a terrorist. Islamic women are not the only ones being oppressed by their choice of clothing; in fact every woman around the world is target towards oppression. Islamic women are just targeted more than women of other religions. This is because of the strict faith that they endure from the Qu’ran telling them that they need to dress a certain way. However, it has been debated that the Qu’ran actually doesn’t mention anything about a women needing to wear a Hijab to be a good Muslim. (Kawaji)
The issue of women in Islam is highly controversial. As a Muslim American living in the United States many times I get judged about my religion. People think that because I am a Muslim woman in America I am being restricted from many things and can’t be like every other woman in America. Islam has many similarities with other religion and it does have its differences. Being raised as a Muslim woman in America has made me the strong and independent woman I am today. I am going to be talking about my own religion that I’m well knowledgeable of. What the media shows and how people talk badly about the religion is truly ruining the religion and its true beauty. Woman in Islam are not being oppressed for anything there’s true beauty behind this
The witches in Macbeth do not just predict the future; they weave a web of temptation that ensnares Macbeth, egging him on with visions of power. The witches prophecy sparked Macbeth’s ambition and made him thirsty for power. He started to believe he was destined to be king, which led him to murders and spiral into tyranny and paranoia. In Macbeth, William Shakespeare presents the idea that ambition can get out of control and corrupt power. The witches’ cryptic words ignite a spark of ambition in Macbeth, fueling his descent into treachery and tyranny.
unequally in marriage, in court, and in society. Difficulty through marriage for Muslim women can come from age, divorce, and having to be subservient to their husbands. Not only is there difficulty in marriage, but also in the unequal treatment in the islamic justice systems, such as when “evidence given by a female witness counts for half that given by a man” (Dargie 22). Although the societies of major Islamic countries differ, it is clear that women are not represented equally to men in any of them, for example having to dress and act certain ways so as not to attract any attention from men. However, there are Islamic women who are willing to change how their religion views females by speaking out and encouraging others to do the same.
Culture permeates every part of life. As Americans, maybe this is harder to see. Yet, everything from the way we talk to what we choose to wear is the result of culture. This makes it vital to understand that many things have a cultural significance. Abu-Lughod expresses her dismay over the “obsession with the plight of Muslim women” being focused on the burqa (209). Many people have adopted the burqa as the symbol of the oppression of Muslim women. Yet, the burqa is simply a form of covering originally specific to the Pashtun people. Each form of covering is part of the Islamic religion. Each holds significance for the community that wears it. The purpose of women wearing a veil of any kind is to “assure their protection in the public sphere from the harassment of
The first chapter explores questions of possible Islamic liberation and why, given the choice, women don’t remove their burqas. In response to that first query, the author advocates that freedom and liberation for a country should be based on its people’s desires and values instead of what Westerners believe is the best way of life. Unfortunately, a key finding in this chapter was that the United States took advantage of Afghan women’s situation by using their rescue from the Taliban-and-the-terrorists as a justification for the War on Terror. Westerners view head coverings like burqas/hijabs as restrictive, a symbol of the patriarchy. In fact, many Middle Eastern women describe burqas as ‘portable seclusion’ that enables them to move out of segregated living spaces. Veils are worn as fashion statements or to express piety/virtue or belonging to a household. This exact worrisome practice of colonial feminism focuses more on the religious and cultural practices that persecute women, rather than more destructive issues like poverty, illness, malnutrition, politics, or lack of
She is standing up for what she believes in and her reasoning is based on observing many devout Muslim women. Some are devout but choose not the wear the hijab thus giving little credibility to the argument of using the hijab as a mandatory religious garment. The writer is very effective in providing evidence to support her point of view which reinforces her position and logical reasoning. Her example of how the influence of the media has jaded the entire ban is proof that she has a strong argument for the ban. Countries like France and Turkey have bans of the hijab in place which ban women from wearing them in public places and governmental buildings. Because of these bans some were hoping that other countries would
Public participation is an important aspect of any community and benefits realized from inculcating it in the system of any public setup treats any possible problem. Some of the core merits any public institution produces is enabling the community to participate in decision-making and planning. For this reason, they are more likely to interact with established mechanisms. Moreover, apart from helping bring about a sense of community, public participation enables institutions to set goals and objectives that suit that long-term service delivery. San Diego Unified district school is among the many educational centers in the United States that have embraced this useful method to warrant continuous progress. Therefore, they recently organized a school board meeting on 27th September 2016 to provide an update on what was going on in the institution as well give the public an opportunity to discuss their concerns and contributions. This paper analyzes the nature and role of public participation in uniting the community and institutions that serve its members. Evidently, although the meeting had some hitches in terms of short notices and low ethnic representation, it was successful because the community and the institution discussed agenda and non-agenda matters and settled for proposals to increase engagement in the future.
Individual women have the right to either be liberals or conservatives therefore the western ideas cannot be imposed on the Muslim countries. The westerners can avoid imposing their ideas on Muslims by cultural relativism. Everyone’s ideas and cultures are not the same this is why we are all unique in our own ways. The Muslim women have the right to either wear the veil or not. One should be able to respect all the cultures equally. If one doesn’t belong to a certain culture they are not supposed to levy their ethics on them. People from all religion or culture don’t have to follow each other’s religion or culture but they can be respectful towards their beliefs.
In every country around the world, women's lives are shaped by the influences of both society and by religion. “The Quran, Islam’s holy book, mandates that women have the right to seek education, choose their own mates, work, possess and inherit wealth or property, divorce, and remarry” (Hurley 76). So despite the Quran’s clear support for women’s rights and equality, why do many people feel that Muslim women are oppressed? The hijab head covering worn by Muslim women has been in the news on and off for some time now and has been a topic of many debates. Here in America, one would feel this requirement on women as oppressive, but most Muslim women feel that this is a way to be looked at not for their beauty, but for their minds. The issues here is that people have a hard time differentiating between culture and religion, two things that are completely different but have a huge effect on each other. People also have a hard time understanding things that are different. Just because it is different than how we live, doesn’t necessarily mean it’s wrong.
Many people, both teens and adults, fail to become aware what marijuana can do to a college student’s academic performance. Marijuana is most commonly used illegal drug in the United States of America. According to Dr. Calvin Carey of Baylor University, marijuana has been widespread all over universities in the United States for college students to take in. For a student who hopes to meet success in school, taking in marijuana is not a good idea.