In Saudi Arabia, children are indoctrinated at a young age to hate Shia Muslims, minority sect muslims and non-muslims. The state religion is implemented by state-sponsored preachers that ensure a distorted version of reality is delivered to each student. This culture of hatred is aligned with Saudi foreign interests, which include funding extremists around the world that kill Shia Muslims, minority sect muslims and non-muslims alike. This curriculum is then exported to countries abroad, where it is preached and delivered by teachers. Textbooks from Saudi Arabia are found globally, from Syria, to Pakistan, to Canada, the U.S., and U.K. Saudi Arabia funds the building of mosques and Islamic centres in western and non-western countries to promote their ideology. The result of this indoctrination is the creation of fringe terrorists groups dedicated to the decimation of Shias, and other minority sects, and of course non-Muslims.
Despite this public knowledge, countries like the U.S., U.K., Canada, France, Spain, Pakistan and a litany of others are allies with Saudi Arabia and protect and further its foreign interests.
Holy God in heaven, finally, someone talking about this.
Do you want to know how it feels to be a Shia in Saudi Arabia?
it feels like being forced to sit in a class room for 12 years while a Wahhabi teacher belittles you and calls your beliefs heresy, calls you and your people heretics who deserve to be killed.
That. is how it is like being Shia in Saudi Arabia.
END MALE GUARDIANSHIP LAWS IN SAUDI ARABIA. With enough global pressure, this could end in the next 5 years.These women could get in serious danger if they publicly speak for this cause, which rests a lot of the pressure squarely on the shoulders of people from outside Saudi Arabia to help spread awareness.
“Imagine that you have no control over your own life. Every decision is either already made for you, or has to be approved by someone for you. Feeling that even though you are a responsible adult you still have to be treated like a minor. Everyone tells you that it’s best for you, that they are protecting you.”
This is the life of women in Saudi Arabia because of the Male Guardianship laws. They have had enough, this has been going on too long. There is a hashtag trending right now called #StopEnslavingSaudiWomen, and with enough global pressure on this issue, it could end within the next 5 years. Another generation should not have to go through this. Please listen to these women’s stories, which you can find readily by searching this tag, and reblog this post and get involved further if you have the time.
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SAUDI WOMEN DESCRIBE THEIR LIFE IN HELL IN THEIR OWN VOICE! PLEASE LISTEN!
if you are tagged in this, it is because i am under the impression that you either have a large follower base or are a feminist. i’m not very popular on this site and i don’t know many popular blogs, so i’m resorting to what i can think of and if i figure out more, i will add more. i have tried to add the most info i could and also keep this short enough for people to actually read, but please add more if any rebloggers of this have more info.
and to the people i tagged, it takes a literal second to click this reblog button
Iranian Women Snap ‘Stealthy’ Photos Free Of Hijab
An unveiled young woman stands in front of a sign that reads: “Sisters, observe your hijab.” Another with red hair and dark glasses stands next to the ruins of Persepolis, while two others, also sans hijab, dance happily on the shores of the Caspian Sea.
They are among dozens of Iranian women inside the country who have posted their hijab-less photos on a newly launched Facebook page to share their “stealthy” moments of freedom from the veil.
The administrators of the page, titled “Iranian Women’s Freedoms Stealthy,” say they do not belong to any political group and that the initiative reflects the concerns of Iranian women who face legal and social restrictions.
The page is the brainchild of exiled Iranian journalist Masih Alinejad, who says she’s receiving scores of unveiled photos of young and old Iranian women who want to share their brief moments of freedom from the hijab with others
Page administrators say all of the photos and captions posted have been sent by women from all over Iran. Launched on May 3, the page has garnered more than 27,000 likes.
I’m always uncomfortable when I see pictures such as these because of our (Western) eagerness to colonise the bodies and practices of women of colour. I find it hard to identify if such acts are liberating and empowering or, rather, a capitulation to Western values and culture. (See, for example, research evidence which suggests that we in the west have little understanding of the experiences of women of colour – in this case, their wearing of a veil – yet we are quick to assume that a veil is oppressive, patriarchal, and unacceptable.)
Maybe it’s best to see this as not having anything to do with the West at all. Maybe it’s about women of color bravely defying a very real and very terrible patriarchal regime that literally makes it illegal for women to not dress in a certain way.
And yet, you dismiss these photos of these brave women of color, risking punishment from the authorities just to show their defiance, as “capitulation to Western values and culture” when there is zero evidence to support this. This represents a very white-centric and West-centric worldview that is endemic to white feminism these days. Maybe it isn’t all about us white people?
cultural relativism is a plague.
Women taking a stand for their own freedom always have my heart.
yep. I’m Iranian and this stuff just warms my heart because the Iranian regime has some very cruel policies in place against women. It makes my blood boil actually that people would be dismissive of this and feel anything but pride and solidarity towards these women just because “oh maybe the West blah blah blah.” It’s not always about the freaking West.
like do these people know that before the revolution women were not required to wear hijab & many, if not most, women did not? not wearing a hijab is not a new phenominon inspired by americans or whatever. do they realize that iranian women have been protesting against these laws since the very beginning, in huge numbers? and that these laws are enforced differently to restrict women during time of political tension? do people even get that not every single thing iranian women do is about the West, and iranian women are not “conforming” to Western ideals by being against patriarchy.
But anytime any iranian says anything against the regime, against oppressive laws, against anything, it’s brushed off as us “adopting western values”, by westerners themselves.
cultural relativists are ignorant scum, pretty much. In the name of anti-colonialism, any and all misogyny is acceptable, provided it’s men of colour doing it to women of colour. And when brown women actually speak up for themsleves, there’s absolute radio silence (look at the discrepancy in attention and outcry, even on here, that any US case where a woman was wrongfully imprisoned/threatened got to that of the late Reyhaneh Jabbari, for example) to actual accusations of…racism and colonialism. Against, uh…ourselves. We can’t win.
There’s a vast difference between a non-Western culture struggling to preserve itself through legitimate means and making oppressive laws against women.
International TV Interview with Fariborz Pooya and Bahram Soroush
Maryam Namazie: This is something that comes up a lot when
you criticise a cultural practice or norm or religion. You hear people
say that it is offensive to do so and that you need to respect cultures
and opinions. That is something that you often hear about from the
perspective of cultural relativism. What is your analysis on that?
Fariborz Pooya: Cultures and religions are not harmless
concepts. They are institutions; a part of the organisation of society.
Usually, people who advocate those views, reduce it to an individual
level and individual choice. But in reality, culture is part of the
institution of the ruling class. Religion is an establishment that
practises and advocates a certain way of life. As part of society’s
organisation and institution, it forms and regulates the way society
functions. And various political movements and social movements
intervene all the time and criticise it constantly. They try to improve
or change the shape of the society that exists.
So to argue that we need to respect those institutions, effectively
you are saying, keep the status quo; you don’t have the right to
criticise it. However, society does that all the time. I don’t think the
problem is limited to individual choice. After the 1970s and with the
advent of the ‘New World Order’ in later years, fundamental rights,
universal rights, have been chipped away. You have the movement to
undermine those concepts. You have the movement, organised by the states
and by the ruling class, to remove the basic standards in society. And
as part of that, suddenly they have found ready-made friends in cultural
groups and religious groups. … . This is a
strong political movement… I don’t think there’s anything sacred…
Maryam Namazie: Except for the human being.
Fariborz Pooya: Absolutely, the only thing sacred is humanity.
But everything else is subject to criticism and that is a very healthy
thing for society. Apart from the individual level, there is a political
movement that is constantly hammering and battering established
standards that humanity has fought for over many decades and which is
largely the result of the socialist movement and the progressive and
workers’ movements. You need to criticise and stand up against the
reactionary movement that is trying to eliminate these fundamental
rights. So it’s not a question of respecting this movement, but about
our strategy to give it a bloody nose.
The above is a TV International English interview dated July 26, 2004.
Maryam Namazie hosts International TV English.
TV International/English is a weekly hour-long news analysis and
commentary programme that focuses on the Middle East and rights and
freedoms from a progressive and Left standpoint. The programme also
plays music selected by Mona Razani, the programme’s VJ. Prior to the
English programme, Maryam Namazie also hosts a half-an hour long Farsi programme. Fariborz Pooya is the co-editor of WPI Briefing and Bahram Soroush is a civil rights activist.
The hijab/veil is an oppressive patriarchal tool. I’m really disappointed in radfems spewing liberal discourse around this subject because they’re afraid of being labeled Islamophobes vs actually caring about Muslim women. Muslim women are one of the most oppressed demographics on this Earth. Muslim countries commit some of the worst atrocities against women. Sorry but choice rhetoric is another method of upholding patriarchy, and in this regard, patriarchy in Muslim communities. It’s not a choice when you’re socialized into it. When you’re brainwashed into thinking it’s a sin to not cover your hair and body. And it has to be taken into account that many many Muslim countries are ruled by a theocracy and so the influence of religion is inescapable. You learn in school, at home, and in the media. This influence still holds strong when Muslims are living in the west.
So many “modern” Muslim women also still believe that yes they should be covering their hair but they don’t and often feel some sort of guilt for not doing so. For disobeying. For not conforming to Muslim patriarchal standards.
Then there are women who are FORCED to wear hijab/veil. So many stories of girls who take of their head scarves or veils when they go to school and then before they come home they put it back on. These women don’t have a “choice”. These women are at risk to be severely abused and/or killed for disobeying.
All this modestly/honor culture in Muslim communities is sickening. Don’t be afraid to speak up.
Very recently, when I was a on a plane there were a group of five Muslim couples. Wives and their husbands. These women were covered from head to toe. You couldn’t see their eyes or their hands or their feet. Nothing. All black. On the plane, when the women needed to go to the bathroom their husbands accompanied them and waited outside until they were finished. Not sure if they went with them because the women probably couldn’t see very well with their veil covering their eye or because these men saw these women as possessions. I think both. Can anything tell me how empowering this is? How these women are *not* being oppressed? How much *choice* really matters? You’re just an object for your husband. But lmao choice 🙂 🙂 🙂
Also, this is not to say to support dumbass liberal groups like Femen who go around topless to “liberate” Muslim women. I feel like so many people from the west who scream “oppression!!!!” when they look at Muslim women do it because they’re xenophobic/hate Muslims in general rather than actually caring about the plight of Muslim women. They just use it as an excuse to be racist. They don’t actually care about Muslim women. They just see someone who looks different from them and covers up so they gotta be oppressed on that basis alone.
I am 100% for always supporting women for what they wear. Just like I support women who perform femininity (which I actively engage in). But nothing is above critique. Patriarchy relies on you leaving to call it a “choice” so women can continue to feed into their own oppression.
In the book Headscarves and Hymens, Mona Eltahawy describes a group of primary aged girls in Saudi Arabia who were allowed to all take their headscarves off during class. There was a fire in the school and the girls were not allowed to leave the building because the men could not see them without their headscarves. So they died in the fire. It was decided that it was better for these 5-11 year old girls to die than be seen by adult men whilst not wearing their headscarves. I refuse to believe that wearing a headscarf is “empowering” when they are used to oppress women in such an awful and violent way.
As a muslim woman who is trying to break free of the holds of patriarchy, it makes me extremely angry when i see feminists, especially non muslim feminists, propogate the pro-hijab propaganda. This is literally what the preachers and the taliban want, they brainwash u by telling u all this rape culture bullshit is good for u. Since i was born i have been istening to these preachers say that religion gives the MOST rights to women (lol???) If u are a feminist I want u to break societal and cultural norms that oppress women, NOT the opposite!
“Perhaps the term “sexlamism” best describes the dogma of these terror groups due to the presence of institutionalised sexism and/or sexual violence, along with the sexual motivation that plays a crucial role in their recruitment. The governance of Daesh is deeply sexualised. Men are given the provision of Daesh’s lustrous heaven upon joining, with wives and slaves in ample supply, sins legitimised. Supposed martyrdom is encouraged with the distant mirage of making love to seventy-two hoors in paradise. They believe, however, that being killed by a woman will deprive them of their imaginative sensuous paradise, and they will perish in hell. Thus, the hatred of women has proven to be largely beneficial for the Kurdish army, as the Women’s Protection Units, an all women faction of the YPG which is estimated to be 10,000 troops strong, is fighting ISIS to re-take territory in north-eastern Syria. It has therefore helped them win victories.
Their ideology of “sexlamism” encompasses abuse against homosexuals, transsexual people or people of other orientations and religions. Not only is it prevalent in terror groups, but it’s also legalised in some countries such as Saudi Arabia, where everyday sexism determines the political discourse. Some examples in Saudi Arabia include victims of rape being punished rather than the offenders. This notion also infers a racist doctrine that views the world in a binary – the Muslims vs. the Infidels. These “infidels” are perceived as being sexually immoral and looked down as being too liberal on women. The illusion of an Islamic Caliphate is also entwined in this seductive textual interpretation to unite the Muslim ummah into one nation.
Nonetheless, Sexlamists in their private lives are obsessed with pornography (in a February 17, 2015 article, New York Post reported that Navy SEALs who killed Osama bin Laden found a fairly extensive stash of modern pornography in his possession), they communicate through it (media sources reported that terrorist cells embedded secret coded messages into shared pornography and onto pedophile websites) and justify their own salacious carnal practices on religious grounds. Al-Qaeda leaders, such as Osama Bin Laden and Anwar Al-waki, had also indulged in notorious promiscuity. Adultery and fornication are strictly prohibited in Islam, but in terror groups abhorrent sexual practices reign supreme. Daesh, for instance, has issued fatwas justifying rapes of Yazidi women to make them Muslims. Rape is the mechanism of Daesh to achieve their strategic objectives, since it humiliates and shames respective communities.
Daesh also sells Yazidi women held as captives in the slave market, where they are exhibited naked and priced according to their physique. Women are publicly gang raped and families and communities forced to comply with their code of conduct. Sexism dominates internal organisational structure of the Sexlamist groups where men occupy leadership positions; women on the contrary are placed in authority only over women to moralise their behaviour. The women in these groups serve patriarchal figures who protect the patriarchal misogynist structure within the organisation.
The issue of women’s rights, victimisation of women in terror groups gets sullied in terrorist debates. Pornography is rarely discussed in counter terrorism narrative, even though evidence suggests that increased consumption of pornography might cause radicalisation, it is a rare issue in the security discourse. Preponderant abuses in terror groups get masked under the cloak of Islam, under the current terms of Islamism, Islamist, jihad, as these words highlight Islam as the root of evil.
Women are largely absent from the domain of counter terrorism, as it is mostly men who make decisions on counter radicalisation. Women’s scholarship and their expertise are undermined in the realm of international relations as they are viewed as “peacemakers,” hence unfit for realist, rational decision making.
The absence of women in foreign policy decision making of Western countries explains the support of authoritarian regimes that has institutionalised misogyny for their political gains.
The book Sex and World Peace by Valerie M. Hudson shows that countries violating women’s rights have a higher propensity to indulge in conflict and terrorism. Thus, women’s rights need to be enacted in the realm of international politics, as abuse of women rights is a significant factor causing terrorism.”
Personally I agree 100% that feminists should be critical of patriarchal religions, but I think that discussing the link between the consumption of pornography and radicalised groups/far right ideology is equally important.
Celtyradfem 