Let's Be Rational, Even When it Comes to Fundamentalism

The calamity in Boston busted open multiple conversational floodgates. A large portion of news coverage during yesterday's manhunt for bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev focused on the suspect's nationality, political beliefs and possible religious motives. Similar topics are still being discussed across the internet and in the Atheist Movement. As we continue the ever-popular discourse on religious Fundamentalism, we should try remain just as devoted to truth and reason in our analyses of this topic as we are in our assessments of other topics. There are two very important points that need to be made about religious Fundamentalism that the Atheist movement often forget:

1. Religious fundamentalism is not necessarily the most pure, most intellectually honest or the most accurate interpretation of any given religion.

If I had a dollar for every time I heard an atheist say something akin to "if Christians really followed their religion, they'd all hate gays" or "if Muslims really followed the Qur'an, they'd all support terrorism", I would likely be able to retire early. Unfortunately, assertions like these are very inaccurate and demonstrate a want of historical knowledge.

Fundamentalist religious movements* are reactionary almost by definition. They are relatively recent and very different in belief and practice from the "original" sects of the religions that they stem from. Evangelical Christianity originated in the 18th century with the First Great Awakening. Fundamentalist Christianity arose later, in the 19th century in response to the popularity of religious doctrines and practices that its adherents saw to be inaccurate. If we were to look at some of the oldest surviving Christian religious traditions, many of the Orthodox Churches, we would find that they are just as annoyed by Fundamentalist Christians as we secularists are. They do not take the Bible literally and most of them are not Creationists.

The same is true in the case of Islamic Fundamentalism. The militant religious groups we see shouting and burning American flags in the Middle East have not actually existed since the founding of the religion. Wahabbism, the sect of Islam that we see put into practice in Saudi Arabia, was also a product of the 18th century and thus, relatively recent as religious traditions go. It should also be noted the Saudi extremism is the exception, not the rule, in the predominantly Muslim Arab world. Following the colonial period, most of the governments in what we call the "Muslim world" were secular nationalist governments. Some nations, Tunisia in particular, actually repressed the open practice of Islam despite the fact that most of the citizens were Muslim. These secular governments were often repressive or ineffective in other respects as well and many of the Islamist groups that we hear about on the news arose in response to the perceived ineffectiveness or repressiveness of the powers in place at the time.

In the cases of both Islam and Christianity, no one sat down, read the Bible or Qur'an from cover to cover and then proclaimed, "hey, we're doing this wrong! Let's go stone some people!". That's why it's incredibly ridiculous for us as atheists to sit down, read the holy books and then suddenly proclaim to understand the religions in question. Religious fundamentalists often claim to have the most correct interpretations of their respective religions, but their views of history and philosophy are usually quite skewed. I fail to understand why claiming to take the Bible or Qur'an literally should be considered more intellectually honest than not doing so. Some denominations of Christianity and Islam truly believe that God's word requires careful interpretation and that it contains parable and mystery. This position is actually more honest than the literalist position because, in practice, Fundamentalists pick and choose from their holy books just as much as moderates do. They have to. As atheists love to point out, the Bible and Qur'an are full of contradictions. In order to "follow" them, one must choose one command or another, contradictory command. It makes no sense to ignore this fact in order to make Fundamentalism seem like a default interpretation of a religion.


2. Religious Fundamentalism cannot be divorced from the political and social climates in which it manifests.


Because Fundamentalist religion as reactionary, we cannot pretend that it arose from the ether or even that it arose only from religious fervor. When the potential tie between the Boston bombing and Islamic fundamentalism in Chechnya was suggested, people on Twitter immediately started hooting about how this 19-year-old was clearly brainwashed by the idea of Islamic jihad. While there may be a grain of truth to this assertion, the "radical Islam is what inspires this kind of violence" train of thought results in a gross oversimplification of the issues at hand. It ignores the political turmoil in the Caucuses that has created a fertile ground for radical religion. If you are under the impression that radical Islam in Saudi Arabia is the same as radical Islam in the former USSR, then you are very much in error.


One might ask why this second point matters. After all, religious extremism is undeniably bad, no matter how it originated. The problem with this objection is that it does not take into account the fact that we cannot properly address an issue without a full and accurate understanding of the issue. Sure, attacking extremism itself might help the situation a little, but if we fail to correct the underlying social and political issues that lead to the development of extremism, there's a good chance that it will crop up again. Also, if we, as outsiders, present solutions to the problems the religious extremism causes without understanding the situation at hand, our solutions will not be well received, no matter how clever they are. Take, for instance, the woman who was persecuted recently in Tunisia for her topless protest against Islamic repression. I doubt that suggesting a more secular Tunisia would go over well, considering how repressive the previous secular regime was.

None of this means that we need to cease our criticism of and fight against religious Fundamentalism. By all means, criticize Islam, criticize Christianity, hate the adherents of these faiths that use their beliefs as an excuse to kill and persecute. Just remember to do so in a reasoned manner keeping the facts in mind. These facts are often more complicated than we anticipate, but as freethinkers, nuance is not something that we should fear.

*I am talking mainly about the Abrahamic faiths here. My knowledge of the histories of other religions is too lacking for me to speak on their histories with regard to fundamentalism.

You Should Support Gay Marriage. Period.

In solidarity with the Human Rights Campaign's Stand for Marriage initiative, my Facebook friends list has been littered with these little red "=" signs:

I am finding it difficult to adequately express how much respect I have gained for a few of my friends and family members who I never thought I would see taking a public stand against bigotry and inequality. Seeing that some of them, especially the Christian supporters, got slammed in their comment sections by appalled social conservatives lead me to respect them even more.

Interestingly enough, social conservatives were not the only people who stood in opposition to the campaign. I few of my friends criticized the idea of gay marriage from a viewpoint on the left:

 

There are several different arguments being used here. The first is that marriage is inherently patriarchal and/or heteronormative, therefore LGBTQ+ community members should, as a matter of principle, not involve itself in it. Some people I saw even went to far as to call it "cultural imperialism" and "assimilation". I do not accept constructivist epistemology and I am not a cultural relativist, so these arguments mean little to me in the first place. I also strongly contest that idea that marriage is always and inherently patriarchal. Let's assume, however, that you disagree with me on all of these counts and you use these supposed facts to justify a lack of support for marriage equality. If you have done so, then you are effectively using the exact same arguments that social conservatives use to oppose gay marriage. Marriage is intrinsically X, which is inapplicable to members of the LGBTQ community. Therefore, members of the LGBTQ should not get married. The same objections that apply to the conservative variant also apply to the liberal variant. Marriage equality isn't about encouraging marriage between certain people. It is about giving certain people the right to enter into a specific legal contract. Marriage is currently a legal institution and it has specific rights and privileges that come along with it. It probably will remain so for a while. As long as it remains an important legal institution, all people, regardless of identity, should have the right to participate in it. Whether or not they choose to exercise that right is the business of the individual. Believe it or not, there are members of the LGBTQ community who want to get married. The people above who use the term "us" and assumed that all of the support for the campaign was coming from "straight allies" is pretty insulting and demeaning to members of the LGBTQ community who disagree with them and who want desperately to see their partnership legally recognized.

There is another argument against the overt support of gay marriage floating around that I would like to briefly address. The point has been made that marriage equality is somewhat of a first world problem. Compared to the plight of transpeople, for example, whether or not gay couples can marry is a small issue. While I can sympathize with the notion that there are worse problems out there for those of us who are LGBTQ, I still do not think that this fact diminishes the relative importance of gay marriage. 

Let me introduce you to the concept of the political opportunity structure. POS is topic that you might run across if you ever study the theory and practice of social movements. Political opportunity theory states that the political environment in which a social movement operates largely determines the success and/or failure of that social movement. That political environment is the POS. Right now, there is a huge political opportunity when it comes to gay marriage. It's a hot button issue, people are talking about it, the media is covering it, the political institutions are making decisions on it. While it may not be the only or even most important goal of LGBTQ activists, it is a goal that is in our sights. Focusing on gay marriage now is strategic because there is a political opportunity for change in this area. If the movement acts correctly, the achievement of this small goal could open doors for more opportunities in the future. Once LGBTQ people have the right to marry, people will slowly begin to realize that their presence will not lead to the collapse of society. Then we can take more steps in the direction of activism.

There is really no excuse for not supporting marriage equality. The issue at hand is not really marriage, per se. The issue is equality before the law. Heaven help you if your ideology causes you to stand in opposition to that.

Why Women in Secularism Matters for Students

(I was originally asked to write this for the CFI on Campus blog. Make sure to go over there and donate!)


I attended the first Women in Secularism conference in the summer between my sophomore and junior years of college. The Secular Spring was in full swing. I was brimming with passion spurred by March's Reason Rally and I had just been elected president of my university's CFI On Campus affiliate group. Though I was certain that I wanted to become more involved in the Secular Movement, there was a poignant fear lingering in the back of my mind, nagging at me. I wondered whether or not I had the power, the charisma or the authority to ever become an influential secular leader.


I soon realized that one of the reasons I doubted myself was that I had never been exposed to a powerful, charismatic female leader in the Secular Movement. I had been weaned off of my religiosity on a diet of Christopher Hitchens, Aron Ra and Matt Dillahunty. Influential though these men are, they are exactly that: men. I didn't have the deep, booming voice or the tall, imposing stature of these leaders. I worried that, without these qualities, I would be passed over. It was at the Women in Secularism conference that I abandoned this worry.

The conference was small, but the atmosphere was friendly and energetic. At the opening reception, it was easy for people, both women and men, to introduce themselves and to make connections. Even the distinguished speakers in the conference's impressive all-female lineup were kind and accessible. There was an immediately apparent sense of community from that night onward. We laughed together at the infectious wit of speakers like Susan Jacoby and Jamila Bey. We cried together when we heard the powerful, heart wrenching stories that Wafa Sultan told us about the effects of fundamentalist religion on women in Syria, reminding us to "never take anything for granted".

A part of me expected the conference to focus on feminism, but it was less about any ideology than it was about the experiences of secular women. Sikivu Hutchinson spoke of a unique pressure that society puts on women and minorities to be religious. As an African American woman, she had seen first hand how religion permeates both of these communities and how little the secular activists do about it. Being a woman who had both attended school and taught in an urban public school system, I despondently realized how true her observations were, making a mental note to do more volunteer work in Detroit with my SSA group. Bernice Sandler gave a talk about how women and men are treated differently and expect to act differently, especially in the workplace. When she asserted that women generally aren't expected to speak with the power and authority, it became clear to me why the thought of being a student leader made me so nervous. It also became clear though, that each and every woman who spoke at that conference had overcome that unfair societal expectation. This realization gave me hope that I would some day be able to do the same.

Though each charismatic and insightful speaker touched me in their own way, the presentation that touched me the most was Annie Laurie Gaylor's talk on the history of freethinking women. Gaylor had compiled an extensive collection of information on women who had been outspoken critics of religious dogma from the 1800s up until the present day. She projected a picture of each woman onto the screen and told her story. These women were writers, social critics, political activists and average people who simply dared to question the beliefs that they had been raised with. Many of them struggled or died for their beliefs. Never before had I heard the history that was being laid out before at this conference. I could feel tears begin to form as I realized that I, along with every other woman in that room, was a protagonist in the next chapter of that history. I, the newly elected student activist, was now a part of a proud and powerful tradition of women in the Secular Movement. I sincerely wish that every young secular activist could have the experience that I did in that moment.

I returned to my student group with a renewed passion for the Movement. I was keenly aware that there was so much left to do in order to make this country and this world a better place for nonbelievers, especially nonbelieving women and minorities. I wanted to become the kind of student leader who would make proud the secular women who came before me. I wanted to become the kind of activist who would help create a better world for the secular women to come.

Sex Work: Faulty Culture, Faulty Systems, Faulty Solutions

If you want a different perspective on sex work and sex worker's rights, I recommend these YouTubers  who often vlog about sex work (among other things), have personal experience with the subject and who frequently favorite other informative videos to that end.

Laws against this kill women. To prohibit it does not stop it. When women feel it is absolutely necessary or if they want to, they will choose to, in dangerous circumstances. When it is illegal millions of women do it illegally. Some die, some are hurt. All are forced to behave as if they were criminals. Legalizing it and providing safe circumstances for the practice helps protect the health and well being of the women involved.

If this argument sounds familiar to you, that's because it is one of the most common arguments heard in support of legalized abortion. It is rare that one hears a pro-life advocate pointing out the dangers of back-alley abortions as a reason why abortion is inherently bad and should be illegal. Strangely enough, I hear anti-sex work advocates use this train of thought constantly to justify laws against prostitution. I think everyone can safely agree that some prostitution as it exists now in most of the United States is a nasty business. So was back-alley butchery before abortion was legal. Regardless of the morality issues that may arise in discourse on either issue, we should not base our opinions of legal, honest sex work on the disgusting and dangerous nature of sex trafficking. I think that much is clear.

One of my Facebook friends post a link on Facebook today to a Guardian article from 2007. It reports on the findings of a book by Melissa Farley on problems in legal brothels in Nevada. This being an old article, I do not know how much of it still holds true, but I think it brings up some legitimate concerns. However, I do not think that Farley's conclusion that "legal prostitution is an institution that just can't be fixed up or made a little better. It has to be abolished" follows well from her presented facts and premises at all. It seems that Farley falls prey to the same pitfalls as those who oppose sex work and sex worker's rights in general based on the vices of illegal prostitution as mentioned above.

The article in question begins by explaining that, while legal brothels are actually fairly rare in Nevada, the ones that do exist are very good at PR campaigns. It then mentions an HBO series, Cathouse, that presents a rather positive view of one particular brothel. I had an eyebrow raised as soon a I read the first paragraph. There seemed to be an implication that this positive portrayal of the brothel in Cathouse was due to the fact that it was intended to by the brothel for PR purposes. I have yet to see any evidence that the documentary series in question was paid for or commissioned by the featured brothel. I am led to believe that this muddying of the waters may be in order to downplay potential overgeneralizations made in the paragraphs following. That is to say, we are being led to believe, possibly inaccurately, that the only reason some brothels are shown positively is because the brothels themselves manipulate the images we see. I could be wrong, but the lack of evidence seemed rather fishy to me.

The article continues:
"Melissa Farley, visited eight legal brothels in Nevada, interviewing 45 women and a number of brothel owners. Far from enjoying better conditions than those who work illegally, the prostitutes she spoke to are often subject to slave-like conditions."

Here lies the crux of Farley's argument: women in legal brothels are treated just as badly as illegal prostitutes, therefore legal prostitution should be abolished.  

 Let's analyze some of her observations:

"Described as "pussy penitentiaries" by one interviewee, the brothels tend to be in the middle of nowhere, out of sight of ordinary Nevadans. (Brothels are officially allowed only in counties with populations of fewer than 400,000, so prostitution remains an illegal - though vast - trade in conurbations such as Las Vegas."

Despite this point having been made explicitly from the start, Farley never once even thinks to correlate the lack of accountability of brothels implied here with the problems in those brothels. Even if sex work is legal, if its kept out of sight and largely ignored due to pre-existing stigma, this gives even the most unscrupulous owners free reign over their business. If sex work were treated as any other business and conducted in populated areas, people would quickly notice some of the more obvious problems and seek correction. Women in brothels located in populous areas would have more places to go to help in cases of abuse. The workers of most other industries are protected by laws or unions. Why not so with sex workers?

"The rooms all have panic buttons, but many women told her that they had experienced violent and sexual abuse from the customers and pimps."

Again, these are problems that could be solved by demanding accountability from brothel owners, instituting tighter controls and outlawing pimping rather than sex work as a whole.

"Another pimp told Farley matter-of-factly that many of the women working for him had histories of sexual abuse and mental ill-health. "Most," he said, "have been sexually abused as kids. Some are bipolar, some are schizophrenic.""

This is at best a non sequitur. If I walked into a store and interviewed the employees only to find that most of them suffered from some sort of mental illness, I would not mention their illnesses as a negative aspect of the store. To do so would be discriminatory against the mentally ill. What this point actually is, is an allusion to the all too common half-argument, half-stereotype that workers in the sex industry suffer from mental illness or abuse; no woman in her right mind would ever choose to become a sex worker. Not only is this point inaccurate, but even if it were true, it would still not be a good argument against prostitution. People use alcohol to cope with mental illness and abuse as well, often to a much more harmful extent than supposedly mentally ill prostitutes do. Should we ban the sale of alcohol to prevent this problem and implicitly accuse alcohol companies of profiting from the pain of alcoholics? No, we should seek to end the stigma surrounding mental illness and provide better treatment. In the case of prostitution, it seems rational to apply the same principles.

"The women must present their medical clearance to the police station and be finger-printed, even though such registration is detrimental: if a woman is known to work as a prostitute, she may be refused health insurance, face discrimination in housing or future employment, or endure accusations of unfit motherhood. In addition, there are countries that will not permit registered prostitutes to settle, so their movement is severely restricted."

None of these problems are the result of prostitution. All of them stem from our culture's stigmatization of prostitution. Discrimination is never that fault of the victim or the advocates for the rights of the victim, it's the fault of the discriminator and the society that primes for the underlying prejudice.

"Those who support the system claim that the regulations may help prevent pimping, which they see as a worse form of exploitation to that which occurs in brothels. According to Farley's research though, most women in legal brothels have pimps outside anyway, be they husbands or boyfriends. And, as Chong Kim, a survivor of prostitution who has worked with Farley, says, some of the legal brothel owners "are worse than any pimp. They abuse and imprison women and are fully protected by the state.""

Again, this is not a sex work issue, it's a domestic abuse issue. As for women being imprisoned by legal brothel owners, we could unionize sex workers restrict the number of hours they are required to stay at work. Or brothels could be set up communally, rather than hierarchically, so that the sex workers themselves own the establishment. Farley points out many, many problems that can be solved with tighter restrictions and expectations like the ones I keep mentioning.

"Investigating the sex industry - even the legal part - can be dangerous. During one visit to a brothel, Farley asked the owner what the women thought of their work. "I was polite," she writes in her book, "as he condescendingly explained what a satisfying and lucrative business prostitution was for his 'ladies'. I tried to keep my facial muscles expressionless, but I didn't succeed. He whipped a revolver out of his waistband, aimed it at my head and said: 'You don't know nothing about Nevada prostitution, lady. You don't even know whether I will kill you in the next five minutes.'""

Unfortunately, this brand of jerk exists both inside and outside the sex industry. A friend of mine from the Michigan backwoods up north reports having witnessed (and experienced) this kind of reaction to things as simple as a verbal insult. It's wrong, but when it comes to prostitution specifically, its a non sequitur.


"The effect of all this on the women in the brothels is "negative and profound," according to Farley. "Many were suffering what I'd describe as the traumatic effects of ongoing sexual assaults, and those that had been in the brothels for some time were institutionalised. That is, they were passive, timid, compliant, and deeply resigned."

To this point, we are compelled to ask whether these facts are the result of legalized prostitution as a whole or the result of the conditions in these particular institutions. Perhaps the suffering these women experience was the result of something else entirely. Also to this point is the fact that Farley's sample size for this investigation is painfully small. She only visited 8 brothels and interviewed 45 women. This is only 40% of the 20 legal brothels in Nevada and at best a fraction of the brothels that exist legally around the world. We do not know what Farley's criteria was for selecting these particular brothels or women either. If she seeks to demonstrate the effects of sex work on women, she is making massive generalizations based on the small amount of data that she actually has.

"Meanwhile, illegal brothels are on the increase in Nevada, as they are in other parts of the world where brothels are legalised. Nevada's illegal prostitution industry is already nine times greater than the state's legal brothels. "Legalising this industry does not result in the closing down of illegal sex establishments," says Farley, "it merely gives them further permission to exist.""


All this proves is that, even when business is legal, there are often still black markets. It's not a concern that is unique to prostitution.

"Farley found evidence, for example, that the existence of state-sanctioned brothels can have a direct effect on attitudes to women and sexual violence. Her survey of 131 young men at the University of Nevada found the majority viewed prostitution as normal, assumed that it was not possible to rape a prostitute, and were more likely than young men in other states to use women in both legal and illegal prostitution."

This information is very sketchy. For example, what's wrong with thinking prostitution normal? For all intents and purposes, prostitution is "normal". It exists in every culture, in every city, legal or illegal. How does Farley know that the reason why these students have sexist, rape-apologetic attitudes is a result of prostitution being legal and not a result of sexism in general? These questions are never answered. The fact that Farley automatically correlates sex work with rape and "using" women indicates a very strong bias against sex work from the outset. It is the lack of objectivity that really poisons the rest of her investigation, even though she does bring up legitimate concerns. 



The idea that sex work is inherently wrong because the workers are being "used" has always seemed fundamentally flawed to me. All manual laborers are required to use their body parts at their own risk for relatively little pay. It shouldn't matter which organs we choose to use. Unless of course we subscribe to the idea that sex organs are somehow "special" or that the worth of a woman is tied up in her sexuality. Both of these views are fallacious and rather sexist.


I have also heard concerns voiced about how sex with a prostitute is basically "masturbating into a human". This same argument could be made against any sort of unattached, unemotional casual sex. It could be made against relationships in which one person is only pretending to care about the other in order to get into that person's pants. I think there might actually be a question as to the morality of these actions, but certainly not a question of legality.

In Michigan, abortion clinics are so heavily regulated now that it's actually extremely difficult to get an abortion. If we can institute crackdowns of this nature on a necessary medical procedure, we can do so on the sex work industry in order to make it safer. We can also work to change the attitude that allows even legal brothels to become dens of iniquity. I personally am against infantilizing women of any sort. Even if prostitution is philosophically wrong, the "there should be a law!" attitude is never more productive than respectful, rational discourse.

It's All On Your Head

This is what I look like now:

This is what I looked like three years ago:

Yeah, I know, braces sure make a difference, don't they? All joking aside, most people I talk to are surprised that I used to be a very religious Muslim. Some of them are even a little freaked out. I read the whole Qur'an, prayed five times everyday, the whole nine yards. If someone had told me back then that I would become a full blown atheist activist now, I probably would have been offended.

All of that being said, I have a rather unique perspective to offer when the topic of Islam is brought up in atheist circles. I have become especially interested in the hijab, as it was a significant part of my life for a good portion of my high school career. The question of hijab was raised on the Secular Women Facebook group the other day. It was mentioned in response to this BBC article on World Hijab Day, an occasion on which non-muslim women are encouraged to try wearing hijab for a day so that they can see what it's like. On the Secular Women group, members were discussing whether or not the hijab is an instrument of oppression. There really is no simple answer to this question. I don't think we should even try to answer it simply. Here, I do not wish to discuss the merits or lack there of of the Islamic religion in general. Everyone should know where I stand here; I am an atheist. I intend to elaborate on the post I made in reply to the original post on Secular Women and, hopefully, bring up some relevant points that may not be initially obvious or apparent when it comes to the single issue of the hijab.


What is hijab anyway?
Explaining exactly what a hijab is might be a patronizing way to start this discussion, but it's surprising how many people aren't familiar with the different types of headcoverings you might see Muslim women wear. A hijab is the the one that goes on your head, neck and shoulders. Nothing more. Sometimes, hijab is worn only on the head. The difference is often cultural. I have also heard "hijab" used for the practice modesty in general for both men and women. In this context, I am focusing on the physical garment. A hijab is not a burqua, a hijab is not a niquab, a hijab is not an abaya or a chador. All of these types of clothing are sometimes associated with Islamic modesty, but they are not the same and the all have cultural histories and traditions that I am not entirely qualified to discuss. It's pertinent to remember for our purposes, though, that when talking about hijab and the oppression of women, we are not talking about women with every inch of their body and face covered. We're only looking for now at the head veil, which is probably the most common in the west.

Myth: Women who wear hijab are more "conservative" than those who don't.
We cannot deny that the culture of United States is saturated with Christianity. Though the Bible technically calls for women to cover their heads, the only women who we see wearing head coverings (or any sort of specifically modest dress) in American Christianity are those who adhere very strongly to the old traditions of their church or denomination. Orthodox Christians, conservative catholics, the Amish and the lovely ladies of the WBC cover their heads and these happen to be the more old-fashioned, conservative sects of Christianity. This is not always the case in Islam. There is no official Muslim church or pope, so Islamic religious practices are quite variable. As such, womens' reasons for wearing hijab are also variable. Some women who wear hijab are very religious. On the other hand, there are other women who are very strongly Muslim who do not wear hijab.

When I was in high school, I went several times a "foreign language day" at Michigan State University, where we participated in mini-sessions to learn about foreign languages and cultures. During one session I attended on women in Islam, some of the presenters wore hijab, others didn't. One of the women with hijab asserted that her veil was a choice, but not required. Another woman in hijab said that she was taught that every hair a woman exposes is equivalent to time she will have to spend in hell for it. Even between those two women, there was a huge difference in opinion as to whether or not a Muslim woman should wear hijab. Within the subset of Muslim women who believe that hijab is required, there is debate as to precisely which body parts should be covered. There are still others who believe that hijab is technically required, but that forsaking it is forgivable in the West where it may be frowned upon or even banned and thus, might cause the woman more harm than good.

Some women wear hijab for reasons other than religious requirement. There are those who do it as a symbol of their identity. Some do it as a matter of culture or because the country they live in requires it. In my case, I just wanted to. I liked how it looked, it was practical. All of this complicates the issue of whether or not hijab is inherently oppressive to women. Free choice and agency is a deciding factor in the matter of oppression. If someone covers their head because they want to, the head covering is likely not oppressive. This brings us to another big issue that comes along with the choice or obligation to wear hijab: modesty.

Modest is hottest?
Whether a woman chooses to wear hijab or whether she feel obligated to do so by her religious beliefs, the reason most Muslim women give for wearing hijab is "modesty". Modesty and humility are seen as virtues in all of the Abrahamic faiths and in much of the secular world as well. Most of us are "modest" to some degree. In the United States, it is generally considered inappropriate to reveal the breasts or sex organs in public. Some (myself included) go so far as to never remove their clothes in front of anyone but an intimate partner or doctor. Judaism, Christianity and Islam all have followers that express modesty and humility in a different way, through head covering. We frequently associate modesty with the downplaying of the sexuality, but "plain" or modest clothing is often symbolic (as with the head coverings of the Jews and Amish) and has little to do with sex. In this case, we cannot fairly say that the outward projection of modesty is inherently oppressive.

There is another side to modesty in Islam, however. Many Muslim women are taught that one of the purposes of hijab is to downplay their sexual assets so as not to attracted the unwanted attention of men. This notion is sexist and, arguably, oppressive. Women should not be expected to cover for the benefit of men or to protect themselves from the supposedly wild male sex drive. To have this expectation, especially with equivalent for the male, is akin to slut shaming and, by extension, victim blaming. Unfairly gendered expectations such as these should always be challenged. Covering one's body does not, in fact, prevent rape. That being the case, compelling a woman to dress a certain way for no practical reason is simply oppressive.

What should female secularists do?
Secularist women who wish to irradiate gendered religious oppression are faced with a glaring problem when it comes to hijab. It is not always clear whether and to what extent its presence in our society should be addressed.

I took off my hijab long before I became non-religious. I got sick of being looked at funny, of getting discriminated against or getting pity for supposedly having been beaten and brainwashed. Even my own family treated me badly because of it. Even now, one of the reasons I rarely tell people about my religious history is that I haven't yet made peace with the way I was treated as a Muslim. Not to mention the fact that people are made uncomfortable by the thought that I used to be Muslim. Whether or not we think Islam is incorrect philosophically, we have no excuse for discriminating against people who happen to subscribe to that religious persuasion. I fully support wearing hijab for a day to see what it's like if need be. If we ever want to convince anyone that we're right, we have to be able to empathize with them rather than making assumptions. Are all Muslim or ex-Muslims going to agree with me on these points? Nope! Almost every point I have made here is contentious. Everyone has a different experience with them. In the end, female Muslims are women too. We will solve no problems with oppression if we ourselves become the oppressors.

U of M Was in the Right

I was disappointed this morning to see that the University of Michigan had tucked its tail between its legs, so to speak, on the issue of the Christian group that was in violation of the University non-discrimination policy. It issued this statement this morning, referring specifically to the Fox News article on the situation: 

This apparent attempt at damage control twists the situation, citing "not meeting the re-registration deadline" as the University's reason for not recognizing the group. There is no reason for this kind of dishonest clarification and the University needs to stick to its guns. Requiring a group to follow the rules is not discrimination. Allowing exceptions to the rules for stubborn Christian clubs is affording special rights to an already privileged groups.

A Facebook group has gone up in support of the InterVarsity Christian fellowship's claims. The title is ridiculous. There is already freedom to form religious groups and to have them recognized by the University. They are treated the same way as every other group and this is absolutely the way it should be.

Discrimination? Not On My Campus!

One of the Christian student leaders at my university posted a link today to a Fox News article about a Christian group that was supposedly "kicked off campus". I love the colorful rhetoric employed in the headline: "kicked off campus". It's as if security shut down their worship service and told them to take their Bibles and be gone to wander alone in the Ypsilanti wilderness. As you might suppose, this is not at all what happened and, as as is to be expected, Fox News and other religiously oriented news sources are blowing this out of proportion.

The situation has been framed as a discrimination issue, which is ironic considering what actually happened. Here at the University of Michigan, we have an anti-discrimination policy. It's pretty straightforward; student organizations that are sanctioned by the University must be inclusive to all people regardless of their race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, etc. All of a student organization's policies and activities must adhere to University policy or the University will not recognize them. There are plenty of benefits to being a recognized student organization; RSOs are elligible for funding, facilities and resources from the University that they would otherwise have to provide themselves. Following the rules is a very small price to pay for the sanction that the University provides.

Enter the InterVarsity Christian fellowship. This Christian student organization on campus had the signing of a statement of faith as a requirement for leadership in the group. It seems obvious that a Christian group would have Christian leadership, but the requirement in black and white that leaders MUST be Christian violated the University's anti-discrimination policy. The University asked them to change their policy and they refused, meaning that they are no longer recognized as a student organization at the University of Michigan. The result is of course a projection of the image of martyrdom.

Clearly, this is senseless. Both in the article and in the comment section, it was heavily implied that the Christians were being discriminated against. One Facebook commenter who has since requested anonymity proposed a scenario in which a Christian could walk into a "Secular Student Association" meeting wearing a John 3:16 t-shirt, get mocked and kicked out and then told to suck it up by the same people who accused the Christians of discrimination. He finished the screed by suggesting that it "would be great" if that hypothetical student used that hypothetical situation as grounds to sue the school. This is utter poppycock. Our "Secular Student Association" actually was asked to amend our own constitution last year because it didn't meet University standards. We did so. There is no reason on earth that removing a signed profession of faith from the requirements would hurt the organization. Even if a non-Christian did want to run for office in that club, no one would vote for him/her. The InterVarsity Fellowship's decision to defy their superiors was made out of pure stubbornness. Being reprimanded for not abiding by the same rules as every other group is NOT discrimination.

There seems to be a disturbing trend in evangelical America of mistaking the lack of special rights for Christians for persecution. It's not that prayer is not supposed to be in schools, it's that we "took prayer out of" schools. It's not that we are gradually becoming a nation that does not elevate one belief over another it's that "Christian values are under siege" in America. Christianity has long been a dominant power in America and theists still hold much residual privilege. One of my officers told me that she has been advised to keep SSA volunteer work off her resume so that it will be easier for her to find a job. I doubt any of the Christians in the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship even had to think twice about putting their community service work with their church or their mission trips on their resumes. No one ever says to them "you believe in jesus... but you're not really a Christian, are you?" It's not normal for them to have their morality and their humanity questioned as soon as someone hears that they believe in a god. No matter where they go in the United States, they can commune with people of similar belief. The same can't be said of nonbelievers.

In an almost ironic twist, atheist groups on campuses are actually concrete examples of groups that ARE forbidden or have been forbidden in the past simply on ideological grounds. We're fortunate to go to a University that doesn't discriminate based on religion. We are a subset that policies like the this one exist to protect. That being said, I don't begrudge this Christian group for making such accusatory remarks against my school. I wish them all the best as they attend the worship meetings of their choice at one of the 20 other Christian clubs on campus.