my thoughts are with all the muslim women and girls pressured or forced into wearing the hijab/niqab/burqa this summer, sweltering from being covered from head to toe in heat absorbing black clothes
i hope they all walk past free, clean water fountains and get some refreshment
Masih Alinejad has a blunt message for Western feminists trying to help her country’s women: You’re making it worse.
“I keep hearing in the West especially, Western feminists who go to my country — the female politicians — we don’t want to break the country’s law,” Alinejad said at TheWrap’s Power Women Breakfast in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, noting that many well-intentioned foreigners choose to wear veils when traveling in Islamic-dominated countries like Iran.
“Women of Iran don’t want to be slaves,” she said. “They don’t want to be told by men or the law of the Islamic Republic of Iran what to wear.”
Too often, Alinejad said, women seeking to be culturally sensitive in fact manage to exacerbate the problem.
“In America when I talk about compulsory hijab, I often get this question that, ‘You know, this is a cultural issue.’ It’s not,” Alinejad said. “Before the revolution we had the right to choose what we wanted to wear in Iran. Compulsion was never part of Iranian culture.”
In addition, Alinejad said some Western feminists resisted legitimate criticism of the regime out of a desire not to appear in line with the policies of President Donald Trump. This too, she said, was a mistake.
Alinejad, an activist and author of the new book “The Wind in My Hair: My Fight for Freedom in Modern Iran,” has launched a social media campaign against the compulsory head covering, which has often put her on the wrong side of the nation’s ruling clerics.
But her prolific use of social media to connect women in the country has nevertheless made her a powerful force to be reckoned with. She currently lives in exile in Brooklyn, New York.
Alinejad told attendees that she got much of her strength — and wisdom — from her mother.
“If you let your fear win, then the darkness can devour you,” she said her mother told her. “I experienced a lot of darkness in my life. I got expelled from my high school because I had too many questions. I got expelled from parliament again because I had too many questions.”
Michèle Flournoy, a former Under Secretary of Defense also on the panel, shared her own story of being a woman in the Middle East.
“A lot of Western women who go to the Middle East think that they’re being culturally respectful — that’s what you’re told — to put on a scarf, not a hijab necessarily, to cover your hair in some way,” Floournoy said. “I think there is a misunderstanding.
“When I would go to Saudi Arabia, I would not put on a hijab and I would not put on a scarf,” she said, adding she was once told she was able to get away with it because she was an “honorary man.”
“It was supposed to be a great compliment,” said Flournoy.
The Power Women Breakfast series brings together influential women of entertainment, media, technology and brands in key cities to network and connect. TheWrap has built a broad power base of professional women who are decision makers and mothers, leaders and wives, innovators and activists. The franchise is now in six cities including Los Angeles, New York, Austin, San Francisco, Washington, D.C. and Miami.
In addition to Alinejad and Flournoy, the event hosted panels and welcomed speakers on the Times Up movement in Hollywood and how women photographers and explorers were pushing the envelope for National Geographic. Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar also spoke at the event.
Masih Alinejad has a blunt message for Western feminists trying to help her country’s women: You’re making it worse.
“I keep hearing in the West especially, Western feminists who go to my country — the female politicians — we don’t want to break the country’s law,” Alinejad said at TheWrap’s Power Women Breakfast in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, noting that many well-intentioned foreigners choose to wear veils when traveling in Islamic-dominated countries like Iran.
“Women of Iran don’t want to be slaves,” she said. “They don’t want to be told by men or the law of the Islamic Republic of Iran what to wear.”
Too often, Alinejad said, women seeking to be culturally sensitive in fact manage to exacerbate the problem.
“In America when I talk about compulsory hijab, I often get this question that, ‘You know, this is a cultural issue.’ It’s not,” Alinejad said. “Before the revolution we had the right to choose what we wanted to wear in Iran. Compulsion was never part of Iranian culture.”
In addition, Alinejad said some Western feminists resisted legitimate criticism of the regime out of a desire not to appear in line with the policies of President Donald Trump. This too, she said, was a mistake.
Alinejad, an activist and author of the new book “The Wind in My Hair: My Fight for Freedom in Modern Iran,” has launched a social media campaign against the compulsory head covering, which has often put her on the wrong side of the nation’s ruling clerics.
But her prolific use of social media to connect women in the country has nevertheless made her a powerful force to be reckoned with. She currently lives in exile in Brooklyn, New York.
Alinejad told attendees that she got much of her strength — and wisdom — from her mother.
“If you let your fear win, then the darkness can devour you,” she said her mother told her. “I experienced a lot of darkness in my life. I got expelled from my high school because I had too many questions. I got expelled from parliament again because I had too many questions.”
Michèle Flournoy, a former Under Secretary of Defense also on the panel, shared her own story of being a woman in the Middle East.
“A lot of Western women who go to the Middle East think that they’re being culturally respectful — that’s what you’re told — to put on a scarf, not a hijab necessarily, to cover your hair in some way,” Floournoy said. “I think there is a misunderstanding.
“When I would go to Saudi Arabia, I would not put on a hijab and I would not put on a scarf,” she said, adding she was once told she was able to get away with it because she was an “honorary man.”
“It was supposed to be a great compliment,” said Flournoy.
The Power Women Breakfast series brings together influential women of entertainment, media, technology and brands in key cities to network and connect. TheWrap has built a broad power base of professional women who are decision makers and mothers, leaders and wives, innovators and activists. The franchise is now in six cities including Los Angeles, New York, Austin, San Francisco, Washington, D.C. and Miami.
In addition to Alinejad and Flournoy, the event hosted panels and welcomed speakers on the Times Up movement in Hollywood and how women photographers and explorers were pushing the envelope for National Geographic. Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar also spoke at the event.
this one time i was with some muslim friends of mine, and one of them mentioned the idea of a road trip with us and our moms, and we were planning on locations of where to go, and we mentioned Santa Cruz or something and then one of them goes “oh no wait, i think thats past the mahram limit, we cant do that”
mahram means any close male (husband, father, uncle, brother) and in islam, women cant travel w/o them farther than i think a 50 mi radius.
And..its just so heartbreaking and degrading how brainwashed these women are?? they live in the fuckign west and yet here they are , restricting themselves like this ? women will never be free until they free themselves from religion.
this one time i was with some muslim friends of mine, and one of them mentioned the idea of a road trip with us and our moms, and we were planning on locations of where to go, and we mentioned Santa Cruz or something and then one of them goes “oh no wait, i think thats past the mahram limit, we cant do that”
mahram means any close male (husband, father, uncle, brother) and in islam, women cant travel w/o them farther than i think a 50 mi radius.
And..its just so heartbreaking and degrading how brainwashed these women are?? they live in the fuckign west and yet here they are , restricting themselves like this ? women will never be free until they free themselves from religion.
can people stop saying prophet muhamad was a feminist he literally said women are intellectually inferior, that they are the snares of satan, and that if he would make anyone bow down to anyone besides god, it would be to make women bow down to their husbands.
can people stop saying prophet muhamad was a feminist he literally said women are intellectually inferior, that they are the snares of satan, and that if he would make anyone bow down to anyone besides god, it would be to make women bow down to their husbands.
All she wanted was to be able to remove her burka. That was enough for people to call violence on her, call her a bitch, and go all to shame her and provoked her to have to run away. Religion of bigots.
People are freaking out in the comments, and then there’s this “hidden pearl””
Yeah Nas! Why don’t you talk about me NAS?! It’s not like these girls are ostracized and, in worst case scenario, killed by muslims in the name honor, NAS! Talk about my conforming covered ass NAS!!!!!
muslim handmaiden: “what about me, I love being a sex object, why don’t you praise me!!”
Not trying to derail but that comment reads just like libfem defending prostituton and gender roles
I kept the four girls in an abandoned house. Each night I would have sex with a different one,” the dishevelled-looking man told the judge matter of factly. “Sometimes they seemed scared, but they never said no. They were all virgins when I got them and more beautiful than you can imagine.”
The suspected Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) fighter standing before the Nineveh investigations court, 20 miles southeast of Mosul, seemed unrepentant as he confessed to his crimes; four counts of kidnap and rape of women belonging to the minority Yazidi sect and 10 counts of the murder of its men.
The evidence against Mohammed Ahmed filled several folders, which were stacked on top of a pile of a dozen or so others on Judge Arif’s desk.
Mr Arif continued to question 40-year-old Ahmed, who was struggling for breath and shaking. His eyes rolled and his chin lolled down to his chest. He had been made to wait outside in the blistering Iraqi sun since early morning and was evidently suffering.
“Give him some water,” the judge said to the clerk, gesturing towards the fridge in the corner of the room. The man gulped down the contents of the bottle in seconds and Mr Arif agreed to make an exception and let him sit for the remainder of the hearing.
Ahmed was then made to recount the story of how he and other Isil fighters rounded up scores of Yazidi men and boys in a primary school in the Sinjar region of northern Iraq after capturing their homeland in the summer of 2014.
“I shot them there in the school hall,” he told Mr Arif. “I think I killed 10 or 12 of them, including some children.”
He said his commander, an Isil emir, then ordered him to take the prettiest girls in the town back to Mosul. From there, they were sold into slavery and passed around senior members. Ahmed said he was presented with four, the eldest of whom was 30 and the youngest 22. “We found a lot of Isil paperwork in Mosul… They weren’t a ragtag militia, they were incredibly organised, like an army, and documented everything"Nineveh investigations court judge
“They were part of my salary, I received 60,000 dinars (£450) a month and the women as a bonus,” he said. “What did you do when you were done with them?,” the judge asked. “I gave them to another fighter in return for $200 each,” he replied.
“I was brainwashed,” he suddenly recants. “I thought the Yazidis were infidels, like Jews. That they were lower than Muslims and that what were were doing to them was ok.
“The leaders injected me with drugs, which made me act that way.
“I’m as sorry as there are numbers of hairs on my head.”
But Mr Arif was no longer interested. After 10 minutes listening to Ahmed’s testimony, he shut his file.
“He says he’s sorry and regrets what he did, but apparently not enough to hand himself in. We had to find and arrest him,” he told the court, located inside a commandeered house in the once Isil-held and now largely destroyed Christian town of Qaraqosh.
“We have a lot of evidence against him and several witnesses, it won’t be hard to convict.”
Mr Arif will now pass Ahmed’s case on to a more senior judge in an adjacent court for sentencing, where he could face life in prison or even beheading.
“drugs made me rape :((”
I’m not an expert on drugs but while some can make you violent I don’t think they can make you rape
I kept the four girls in an abandoned house. Each night I would have sex with a different one,” the dishevelled-looking man told the judge matter of factly. “Sometimes they seemed scared, but they never said no. They were all virgins when I got them and more beautiful than you can imagine.”
The suspected Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) fighter standing before the Nineveh investigations court, 20 miles southeast of Mosul, seemed unrepentant as he confessed to his crimes; four counts of kidnap and rape of women belonging to the minority Yazidi sect and 10 counts of the murder of its men.
The evidence against Mohammed Ahmed filled several folders, which were stacked on top of a pile of a dozen or so others on Judge Arif’s desk.
Mr Arif continued to question 40-year-old Ahmed, who was struggling for breath and shaking. His eyes rolled and his chin lolled down to his chest. He had been made to wait outside in the blistering Iraqi sun since early morning and was evidently suffering.
“Give him some water,” the judge said to the clerk, gesturing towards the fridge in the corner of the room. The man gulped down the contents of the bottle in seconds and Mr Arif agreed to make an exception and let him sit for the remainder of the hearing.
Ahmed was then made to recount the story of how he and other Isil fighters rounded up scores of Yazidi men and boys in a primary school in the Sinjar region of northern Iraq after capturing their homeland in the summer of 2014.
“I shot them there in the school hall,” he told Mr Arif. “I think I killed 10 or 12 of them, including some children.”
He said his commander, an Isil emir, then ordered him to take the prettiest girls in the town back to Mosul. From there, they were sold into slavery and passed around senior members. Ahmed said he was presented with four, the eldest of whom was 30 and the youngest 22. “We found a lot of Isil paperwork in Mosul… They weren’t a ragtag militia, they were incredibly organised, like an army, and documented everything"Nineveh investigations court judge
“They were part of my salary, I received 60,000 dinars (£450) a month and the women as a bonus,” he said. “What did you do when you were done with them?,” the judge asked. “I gave them to another fighter in return for $200 each,” he replied.
“I was brainwashed,” he suddenly recants. “I thought the Yazidis were infidels, like Jews. That they were lower than Muslims and that what were were doing to them was ok.
“The leaders injected me with drugs, which made me act that way.
“I’m as sorry as there are numbers of hairs on my head.”
But Mr Arif was no longer interested. After 10 minutes listening to Ahmed’s testimony, he shut his file.
“He says he’s sorry and regrets what he did, but apparently not enough to hand himself in. We had to find and arrest him,” he told the court, located inside a commandeered house in the once Isil-held and now largely destroyed Christian town of Qaraqosh.
“We have a lot of evidence against him and several witnesses, it won’t be hard to convict.”
Mr Arif will now pass Ahmed’s case on to a more senior judge in an adjacent court for sentencing, where he could face life in prison or even beheading.
“drugs made me rape :((”
I’m not an expert on drugs but while some can make you violent I don’t think they can make you rape
Celtyradfem 