Muslim Women Cannot Catch a Break

I thought these two articles were are interesting juxtaposed next to each other:

• Muslim beauty queen faces abuse from all sides, she says (CNN)

• Telling Muslim Women What Not to Wear (Kari Ansari, Huffington Post)

Both stories describe different women, one wears provocative dresses -- she gets abuse from racists and non-acceptance from her Muslim community. The other one wears a very conservative dress -- the niqab (or face veil) she also gets abuse from racists and non-acceptance from her Muslim community.

Discrimination Against a Hijabi in Montreal

The stark actions against the Hijab in France and in Quebec have me wondering -- is there something special about the French? They seem to have a special dislike for the Hijab.

The saddest about this story is the non-reaction by the victim.

Waiting at the 165 bus stop on Côte des Neiges Rd. at Côte Ste. Catherine Rd. was a young family, the mother holding the handlebar of a large baby carriage, her husband standing close by, ready to lift the carriage into the bus.
Another woman and I stood behind them, apart from a lineup that was about seven or eight people deep, but still obviously waiting to board.
The last person in the lineup, a young woman, stopped and waved the couple with the baby forward, telling them to go ahead. The husband started toward the bus entrance, holding the carriage. The bus driver, staring at him, closed the door and steered the bus away from the sidewalk, off up the road. There were five of us left at the bus stop.

SOURCE: Montreal Gazette

6TH Grader Assaulted For Wearing a Scarf

I have little girls...who don't wear the hijab yet (oldest is 9). But this is one reason I don't plan to send them to public school:

The boy was taken from the school by officers from the North Shore’s 120th Precinct and charged with "harassing the girl, beating her, throwing her to the ground, asking if she is Muslim and trying to pull off her scarf," the law enforcement source said. 

The third-degree assault charge is an A-misdemeanor but the hate crime aspect bumps it up to an E-felony, the source said.

I do think it would be really a bad idea to ruin a kids life by making this a felony. Kids are stupid. They do this stuff in school. The misdemeanor seems like punishment enough.

SOURCE: State Island Advance

Hijab and The Arab Revolutions

Pleased to see that we weren't the only ones who noticed:

When the media images of women from Egypt, Tunisia, and Yemen began rolling in, I was thrilled. Here were women who were neither submissive nor silent, and their clothing appeared to pose no barriers to their participation in the demonstrations. There were pictures of young girls with hijabs tucked around animated faces, arms raised high and fingers split in the universal signs for victory and peace. There were images of women in black burkhas kissing soldiers and women in niqab bowing down in prayer shoulder-to-shoulder with men, in front of tanks and barricades. Also present were women in skinny jeans and uncovered heads, screaming revolutionary slogans in Arabic and English. In fact, some of the key leaders in the protests were women wearing burkhas and hijabs. In Yemen, Tawakul Abdel-Salam Karman, a fiery female activist managed to lead the protests while wearing a hijab and black burkha. Asmaa Mahfouz, who is credited with a significant role in igniting and then leading the revolution in Egypt, wore a hijab.

FROM: http://www.altmuslimah.com/a/b/spa/4211/

Mainstream Dutch Politician Calls for a Hijab Tax

Say what you will, but Geert Wilders is now a mainstream politician in Europe. He scores second highest in a  poll to become premier of the Netherlands (link, h/t Wikipedia). He is in the news advocating for a Hijab or "headscarf" tax.


It would be amusing to see how this would be implemented. How would a police office figure out whether a non-Muslim is wearing a headscarf? Would babushkas also be taxed? If not, could I get away with wearing a babushka? What about if a man is wearing a headscarf? Wouldn't it be discrimination not to tax a man for wearing a headscarf?


Actually I take that back, this is not an amusing exercise.

It is pretty sad that Mr Wilders claims Jewish ancestry as his story seems like the beginnings of the next Hitler (including the fake blond hair). He states he is an athiest but says he is a "friend" to Jews and Christians. I implore my Christian and Jewish neighbors to realize that his kind is also a threat to you, just further down the road. He might be for taxing the headscarf today, but he might be getting rid of the tax exemption for your church and synagogue next.

Maureen Dowd shows a reason for Hijab

Most of us automatically assume that the Hijab is all about covering hair. It is not just limited to that -- it is about dressing modestly. The Quran spends many words discussing modest clothing and only broaches, indirectly, head-covering.

Reading this Maureen Dowd, Op-Ed, I couldn't help but feel that the hijab would solve problems for everyone:

A male friend once told me he was looking for an unattractive personal assistant so he wouldn’t be tempted. And when I was hiring a Grace Kelly blonde as a researcher a few years ago, a male colleague asked me not to because it would be “too distracting” to him; two girlfriends cautioned me not to because it would be depressing — and therefore, distracting — for me to work with someone so good looking. (It wasn’t.)
“Sometimes, honestly, I wish I didn’t look the way I did,” Lorenzana says, “because people judge you right away. Other women have their guards up, they automatically categorize you as being conceited. I have to work three times as hard to prove that I earned this through my hard work.
“My life has been hard my whole entire life. People have this misconception that, ‘Oh, you do well in your life because of your looks.’ No, I am harassed.”

update: added tags, no change to the post

Different Justice for Different People

As a child I remember reading the story of the Prophet Muhammad (Peace and Blessings God be upon Him) declaring that the concept of having different levels of justice for different people destroys nations (This was in response to Usama bin Zayd asking for a pardon for a Meccan Noble who had committed a serious crime).
So I weep for my country when I read such posts by Glenn Greenwald.
I also feel strongly that this is what led to the decline of Muslims the world over. We stopped caring about justice.
As shown Greenwald, we in effect already have a dual justice system (and have had one for some time). Unfortunately President Obama has stated his intent to pass a "preventative detention" law:

"Once you open the door to that idea of holding people because of presumed dangers, or saying we have reason to believe but no evidence to convict someone of a terrorism crime, then you start to cut away at the very foundation of what our system of justice is based on," says Human Rights First CEO Elisa Massimino.
Despite those concerns, the Obama administration seems to be moving closer to a plan like Wittes'. Administration officials have met with many different people, including Wittes, about preventive detention. But this is the first actual draft legislation. According to several sources outside of government who are familiar with the administration's thinking, this proposal is getting a lot of attention.

This goes against the most basic concepts of any justice system. You could be a convicted child rapist in America, and you will get a trial if you do it again. . .even if everything is caught on camera. But if you are even suspected of being a terrorists (especially if you are Muslim), you might not get one.

Niqab Controversy in Quebec

Quebec, for us geography challenged Americans, is a province in Canada.

A bill, bill #94, has been proposed which would ban women wearing Niqab (face veil) from receiving government services. For me, this is the kicker:

What people are ignoring  is that Muslim women are human and deserve to be treated with dignity regardless of whether we agree with their choices or not.

Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/life/Quebec+veil+slap+face+Muslim+women/2741867/story.html#ixzz0jnRoCXcF

So...what happened?

OK.. . .our old hosted wordpress site got hacked. We haven't been able to recover the old posts yet. We figured we'd try to start over here. From now on, we'll make sure to save our posts on our hard drives as well.