This story absolutely breaks my heart.
Breaks. My. Heart.
Last week a Muslim woman in France suffered a miscarriage after being violently attacked in an apparent anti-Muslim motivated assault. Two men harassed her with anti-Islamic slurs, ripped the headscarf off her head, cut her hair, and repeatedly kicked her in the stomach — even after she allegedly told them of her pregnancy and begged them to stop.
Some media refer to this as “burqa rage” or “veil attack” — when one becomes so angry, upset and offended by the sight of a Muslim woman’s head covering, that they react with violence and lash out at the woman wearing it.
But it’s really just a catchy media phrase for Gendered Islamophobia.
Women in headscarves are immediately identifiable as representing Islam and due to the media reliance on negatively stereotyping Muslim women and the current anti-Muslim climate — women may experience deliberate gender-based violence, harassment or prejudice.
Muslim women then become the conduit by which others can exert their fear, prejudice and ignorance. In that moment women become voiceless, actionless objects, representing everything “we need to fear from the terrorists.” In this context, Muslim women are completely dehumanized.
Even the terms “burqa rage” and “veil attack” do Muslim women a disservice by reducing the experience of violence to the headscarf. As if it were only a piece of cloth that was left lying in the street. As if this attack has no impact on this young woman’s memory of motherhood. They didn’t attack a veil. They attacked a person.
On Monday I’ll be speaking about media stereotypes of Muslim women and the consequences that negative images and Islamophobia have on Muslim women and their families. My talk is part of a “Mega Conference” on motherhood held by the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement (MIRCI) — a feminist scholarly and activist organization on mothering run through York University. And I’ve been hijab-deep in research for weeks in preparation.
I’ve been looking at how Muslim women and mothers are responding to these stereotypes online — creating spaces where they celebrate their empowerment and work towards countering negative images of Muslim women. Intentionally or not, they’re propagating dialogue with authentic voices — encouraging the creation of positive narratives for themselves and their families.
This means, of course, that I’ll have a lot to share with you in regards to some pretty awesome happenings in the Muslim blogosphere. Something I’m pretty excited about. So keep an eye out for a new blog series filled with stereotype smashing and lots of blogger love.
June 24, 2013 at 10:38 am
While I don’t think that fear should cause us to abandon any part of our religion that we believe in, things like this make we wonder about the nature of Hijab. For sure the woman was targeted because she was Muslim and not her hijab , the Hijab was only the identifier that the thugs/criminals/disgusting pieces of scum. But the Quran says the Hijab should identify us as someone who should not be harassed. So then? I feel sometimes we have made Hijab more about an outfit to represent our allegiances, like a nun or monk,s habit will signal what group he or she belongs to. So we are doing something out tradition and not out of belief. Which in some communities makes it harder to integrate/assimilate and triggers backlash. Ppl mention the history of the Jews in the States as a model for how Muslims will eventually be accepted, but I sometimes wonder if that is an apt comparison. Will we as good as assimilating as they were? Will we adapt our religious practice to be more a reflection of the communities we live in? I feel most North American Muslims still suffer from “other” syndrome. Again, I am not saying this woman should have been doing something different. We should never act to appease ppl because whatever we do will never be enough. Only this incident brings these questions to mind. I sometimes feel Muslim leaders are willing to sacrifice logic and reason to further agendas. Anyway, this story broke my heart as well. I’m glad to hear you are speaking out. I’m so proud of all you do and always pray for your continued strength to do what you do and for more like you. Peace.
June 26, 2013 at 2:14 pm
Part of the reason I wear hijab is to be recognised as a Muslimah. I dont see the issue with this. The same way I gave my children Arabic names so they will be recognised as Muslims. It represents my commitment to Allah. That is my allegiance and my identity as a Muslimah. What do you mean by adapt our religious practices to be reflective of the communities we live in? Can you give an example? I feel fully integrated in to my community. In the area in East London where I live you will see Muslimahs in hijab as teachers, dentists, doctors, retail etc and it is not an issue. Yes Muslims suffer from other syndrome. But why is that? My experience is that I never questioned my belonging to the UK or me being part of British society. It was something inherent like my gender, I could not, not be British, what else could I be, I never even felt the need to reflect on that identity, Until I started wearing headscarf. Then suddenly because of the cloth I was told by the media, and by society that I was other. In the UK especially in East London we prefer Multiculturalism to assimilation. Salad bowl to Melting pot. Everyone is free to have their individual cultures and identities and that adds to the flavour of the area. We don’t all have to mix in to some sort of brown sludge of culture.
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