In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Tag: Mid-East

No School for Girls in Afghanistan

But, but, but, I thought we won in Afghanistan! Remember? We went in and we liberated all those burqa-wearing women, because feminist goals are laudable when we can use them as an excuse to bomb the hell out of countries we dislike. We liberated them, didn’t we?

Well, not exactly. And now that we’re waist-deep in our little Iraqi quagmire, the rights of women in Afghanistan aren’t exactly priority numero uno.

Summer vacation has only begun, but as far as 12-year-old Nooria is concerned, the best thing is knowing she has a school to go back to in the fall. She couldn’t be sure the place would stay open four months ago, after the Taliban tried to burn it down. Late one February night, more than a dozen masked gunmen burst into the 10-room girls’ school in Nooria’s village, Mandrawar, about 100 miles east of Kabul. They tied up and beat the night watchman, soaked the principal’s office and the library with gasoline, set it on fire and escaped into the darkness. The townspeople, who doused the blaze before it could spread, later found written messages from the gunmen promising to cut off the nose and ears of any teacher or student who dared to return.

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Muslim and not an American citizen? That’s enough to detain you indefinitely.

A disturbing result in an immigration case:

A federal judge in Brooklyn ruled yesterday that the government has wide latitude under immigration law to detain noncitizens on the basis of religion, race or national origin, and to hold them indefinitely without explanation.

This is pretty scary stuff — an immigrant can be detained because of their religion, skin color, or country of origin. They can be held without access to counsel, for as long as authorities see fit, without being told why.

We should keep this in perspective, as it’s only a district court case. But it is the first time that a court has addressed the issue of discrimination in these indefinite detainments, and it’s troubling that this is its conclusion.

“This decision is a green light to racial profiling and prolonged detention of noncitizens at the whim of the president,” said Rachel Meeropol, a lawyer for the Center for Constitutional Rights, which represented the detainees. “The decision is profoundly disturbing because it legitimizes the fact that the Bush administration rounded up and imprisoned our clients because of their religion and race.”

As an aside, if this kind of stuff troubles you and you’d like to do something about it, consider making a contribution to the Center for Constitutional Rights. They do amazing work, and are on the front lines of cases like this. They employ some incredibly bright legal minds, who are willing to work for very little. They have far fewer resources than similar organizations (like the ACLU), and they often take on tougher and less high-profile cases.

But David Cole, a law professor at Georgetown University and a co-counsel in the lawsuit, said the ruling was the only one of its kind and made New York “an equal protection-free zone” because the government can detain immigrants wherever it chooses.

“What this decision says is the next time there is a terror attack, the government is free to round up every Muslim immigrant in the U.S., based solely on their ethnic and religious identity, and hold them on immigration pretexts for as long as it desires,” he said. “We saw after 9/11 what the government did in an era of uncertainty about how far it can go. Judge Gleeson has essentially given them a green light to go much further.”

Feeling nervous yet?

Sometimes, There Are No Words.

When debating feminism and religion, the conversation inevitably turns to Islam, and inevitably focuses on the headscarf. My view on the headscarf is that, while I have a big problem with legally mandating what an entire gender wears, debating whether or not Muslim women should voluntarily wear it is kind of silly. It’s an important conversation to be had, certainly, but it grates on my last nerve that when we’re discussing women and Islam, the headscarf is the primary topic — instead of, say, the thousands of other issues that women face around the world.

But all that said, it remains true that symbols matter. They’re meaningful, they project our cultural values, and their visual presence is compelling. Which is why, when the law mandates that we present particular symbols in our dress, it can be a pretty big deal. Case in point:

Iranian expatriates said Friday that the “National Uniform Law” authorized by the Iranian parliament a few days ago, which is aimed at getting “Western” style clothing off the streets and advancing more traditional “Islamic” attire, also includes a clause obligating Iranian Jews to wear a yellow ribbon.

Members of the country’s Christian minority will be forces to wear a red ribbon, while those practicing the ancient Persian religion will be obligated to place a blue ribbon on their clothes.

Now, I can’t find any more information about this other than this single article, and their only source seems to be “Iranian expatriates,” which makes me a little skeptical. But if it’s true, then wow. I have nothing else to say.

Egypt Looks Democracy in the Face

The biggest challenge that Egypt faces right now is dealing with an independent judiciary. We’ll see how they fair — right now, it’s not looking good.

There have been numerous demonstrations, and there’s apparently supposed to be another big one tomorrow in Tahrir Square. A good friend of mine is studying in Egypt, and promises to post pictures. I’ll link as soon as they’re up.

The Arabist has much, much more.

This is Rather Cool

Afghan women admitted to US universities start graduating.

Sahar is one of three women graduating from Roger Williams University on Saturday who came to the United States as part of a scholarship program started after the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan following Sept. 11.

The program, called the Initiative to Educate Afghan Women, provides a free college education for Afghan women, who under the Taliban were not allowed to go to school after age 8.

Age 8. Remember that. Remember some other things about the Taliban: women weren’t allowed to work, and a lot of women died because male doctors weren’t allowed to touch their female patients. Men were killed if their beards weren’t long enough (barbers in Baghdad, which had long been as cosmopolitan as you can get under sanctions, were being killed once Saddam Hussein was deposed and the religious fundamentalists started coming to power).

Oh, and the Taliban is on the rise again. So think about that as you read the next few paragraphs.

Sahar, 20, a political science major, Arezo Kohistani, 24, a business management major, and Mahbooba Babrakzai, 21, a major in finance, are among the first women to graduate from the program, which requires them to return to Afghanistan after their studies.

“Coming here was a great experience,” Babrakzai said. “It just, I think, changed the future of all the girls in this program and will make a change in Afghanistan as well as we go back and work there and bring our experiences from here to Afghanistan.”

Babrakzai wants to become the country’s finance minister, and Kohistani hopes to become an ambassador. Sahar aspires to become Afghanistan’s first female president.

Karzai is called “The Mayor of Kabul” for good reason — his influence doesn’t extend far beyond the borders of Kabul, if even that. The rest of Afghanistan is a no-man’s-land where the Taliban can rise. And this is the conflict where the US has had international support for nearly five years.

I do hope that democratic institutions take strong enough root that these women, and the other Afghan women who made it to the US (and who were likely from the upper classes) get to use their talents.

Most other women in Afghanistan are going to wind up like Sharbat Gula, the famous “Afghan Girl” from the cover of National Geographic, who grew up in a refugee camp and is now a married woman afraid to show her face to strange men, even the photographer who made her image famous, though she didn’t know it.