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Restraint? Sure. Oppression? Hardly. {Muslim women}
Washington Post ^ | July 22, 2007 | Leila Aboulela

Posted on 07/22/2007 10:07:15 AM PDT by 3AngelaD

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates-- The West believes that Islam oppresses women. But as a Muslim, descended from generations of Muslims, I have a different story to tell. It starts like this: You say, "The sea is salty." I say, "But it is blue and full of fish." I am not objective about Islam, and although I am considerably Westernized, I can never truly see it through Western eyes. I am in this religion. It is in me. And articulating the intimacy of faith and the experience of worship to a Western audience is a challenge and a discovery...

Recently, Muslim progressives have softened their stance against the veil. In some countries, the hijab's widespread popularity has made it almost the norm, rather than a gesture of defiance by a minority. Also, the veil has turned out to be a red herring; it has not stalled Muslim women's advancement, as was feared.

I hope that in time the West will come to look at the veil in a different light. It encourages me when a Western woman comments on my head scarf. When one says "That is a lovely color" or asks "Is that batik?" I feel that she has reached out to me. She has seen that beyond the symbol is an item of clothing not unlike the veils that Western women once wore to church, or the bonnets Laura sported on the prairie. That mark of perceived female submissiveness is also an accessory that can be purchased in any department store in the West; it comes in gorgeous silks and beautiful hues....

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: babushka; burkha; hejab; hijab; mullah; nijab; niqab; niquab; veil
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The entire Wash Post comment section today was dedicated to telling us how harmless, tolerant, thoughtful, non-violent and nice Muslims are, and that Islamic Jihad is just a fig newton of our imaginations. If they want to go around with a table cloth on their heads, fine, as long as they do it in their ancestral and natal hell holes. Not here. See my tagline.
1 posted on 07/22/2007 10:07:17 AM PDT by 3AngelaD
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To: 3AngelaD

She’d slit your throat while you slept... if given the order.


2 posted on 07/22/2007 10:09:43 AM PDT by johnny7 ("But that one on the far left... he had crazy eyes")
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To: 3AngelaD

What tagline?


3 posted on 07/22/2007 10:10:51 AM PDT by RockinRight (Fred Thompson once set fire to a crowd of liberals simply by smoking a cigar and looking upon them)
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To: 3AngelaD

I’m sure Mizz Leila’s headscarf is beautiful, it’s just that the fact that if she takes it off in public, her husband/brothers/father will beat the crap out of her that gives the lie to all her proud rhetoric.


4 posted on 07/22/2007 10:11:00 AM PDT by sinanju
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To: 3AngelaD
The West believes that Islam oppresses women. But as a Muslim, descended from generations of Muslims, I have a different story to tell. It starts like this: You say, "The sea is salty." I say, "But it is blue and full of fish."

No arguing with that kind of crackerjack thinking.

5 posted on 07/22/2007 10:12:23 AM PDT by HitmanLV ("Lord, give me chastity and temperance, but not now." - St. Augustine)
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To: 3AngelaD
My hunch is that this gal has never experienced an "honor rape".

Yet.

6 posted on 07/22/2007 10:12:26 AM PDT by Gay State Conservative (If martyrdom is so cool,why does Osama Obama go to such great lengths to avoid it?)
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To: 3AngelaD

I think we all should adopt the burka dress. We can wear the mask on the public streets too. I’ll take mine in bright red. My eyes are brown and it will look so cool—and best part of it—no one will know who I am or my sex.


7 posted on 07/22/2007 10:13:50 AM PDT by Snoopers-868th
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To: RockinRight

I don’t know what happened to it when I posted, but here it is.


8 posted on 07/22/2007 10:13:54 AM PDT by 3AngelaD (They screwed up their own countries so bad they had to leave, and now they're here screwing up ours)
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To: 3AngelaD
Restraint.


9 posted on 07/22/2007 10:14:01 AM PDT by oldleft
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To: 3AngelaD

Your tagline got repo’d when you weren’t lookin.


10 posted on 07/22/2007 10:15:25 AM PDT by txhurl
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To: 3AngelaD

And who could argue with a good old fashioned stoning?


11 posted on 07/22/2007 10:18:09 AM PDT by Mikey_1962 (The last Americans to allow unchecked immigration...... were Native.)
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To: 3AngelaD

There are reasons to wear a scarf where desert sand blows. But wearing cloth that covers all but the eyes is plainy an indication of Taliban, Muslim Brotherhood or extremist Muslims in the vicinity. The men often beat women who show their faces. Another reason women must cover their faces is because they have married a first cousin or nasty old uncle and this way, nobody knows it.
Tunisia has banned the niqab and is enjoying a renewed economy with large increases in tourists. Banning this outward sign of extremism is the surest way to get rid of the jihadists.


12 posted on 07/22/2007 10:19:40 AM PDT by bukkdems (Western democracies! Ban the niqab in public.)
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To: 3AngelaD

“”That is a lovely color” or asks “Is that batik? Is that a bomb?”


13 posted on 07/22/2007 10:20:03 AM PDT by Dr. Bogus Pachysandra ("Don't touch that thing")
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To: Snoopers-868th

In Northern Virginia there are some high rise condos at Bailey’s Crossroad full of Muslims from some country that requires the women to wear a truly frightening metal mask over their faces, in addition to the table cloth and the bathrobe-like clothing. The men wear sandals with their dirty feet and talon-like toenails showing. The women all look like Darth Vader’s concubines, and the entire building smells like some kind of unspeakable food. I suspect there is some goat roasting going on in the parking lot, too, not to mention the planning of the next horrific attack on our country. My brother-in-law was living there until Islamic Jihad took over, but he sold his condo and moved somewhere that women aren’t wearing metal masks.


14 posted on 07/22/2007 10:21:39 AM PDT by 3AngelaD (They screwed up their own countries so bad they had to leave, and now they're here screwing up ours)
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To: 3AngelaD
"The sea is salty, I say. But it is blue and full of fish."

I've heard that you Islamic death cultists would prefer the sea was red with the blood of infidels.


15 posted on 07/22/2007 10:23:18 AM PDT by I see my hands (_8(|)
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To: 3AngelaD; Trueblackman; mhking

Amazing, isn’t it, how the LameStream Press goes to all sorts of genuflections to find “moderate Muslims”...and yet, they dismiss conservative African Americans as an anomaly—unworthy of being covered?


16 posted on 07/22/2007 10:24:27 AM PDT by Recovering_Democrat (I am SO glad to no longer be associated with the party of Dependence on Government!)
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To: Recovering_Democrat

Have you see the Hot Ghetto Mess website? They are trying to close her down, too.


17 posted on 07/22/2007 10:27:04 AM PDT by 3AngelaD (They screwed up their own countries so bad they had to leave, and now they're here screwing up ours)
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To: 3AngelaD
In my mind, the hijab is one thing. The burkha is quite another.

Also, in my mind, the hijab is but a symptom. The real issue is ownership of women - multiple wives, betrothals as debt payments, child marriage, honor killings. Where the hijab is truly a choice, that's great (though it's pretty hard to separate when something is a "choice" from when it is more or less expected because "every nice girl wears it"). But where it becomes imposed (because the "honor" view of women is becoming prevalent, at least among the society's most boldly violent), it's symptomatic of a deep problem.

Of course, these things may happen more in some Islamic societies than in others. They may also not be "Islamic" per se, but rather, tribal (though I don't think that matters really to any discussion). Maybe things are just swell for this chick in UAE. Great! That doesn't mean there isn't a serious problem for women in many places.

18 posted on 07/22/2007 10:28:24 AM PDT by Dr. Frank fan
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To: 3AngelaD

Never heard of the metal masks! How frightening!


19 posted on 07/22/2007 10:30:19 AM PDT by bukkdems (Western democracies! Ban the niqab in public.)
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To: 3AngelaD
>>Recently, Muslim progressives have softened their stance against the veil. In some countries, the hijab’s widespread popularity has made it almost the norm, rather than a gesture of defiance by a minority. Also, the veil has turned out to be a red herring; it has not stalled Muslim women’s advancement, as was feared.<<

MORE LIES FROM THE MUSLIMS.

The mullahs have their thug police force beating and arresting women in Iran, particularly Tehran, for violating their insane dress code. They are all insane, and once the West realizes that, we can nuke them, as they so richly deserve. There can be no peace with Islam in the world.

20 posted on 07/22/2007 10:40:28 AM PDT by ishabibble (ALL-AMERICAN INFIDEL)
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