Goddess

A dress code for golfing lets everyone know you are a golfer. This "dress code" is to let everyone know you are a piece of crap woman and inferior to men.

My understanding is that they elected a terrorist government - Hamas. On purpose.

No. In Canada, you are free to practice whatever beliefs your religion imposes on you, within the framework of our laws. If you want to treat your wife like crap and force her to stay home, with a blanket over her head and force your daughters to wear covers everywhere they go, that is your choice. But NO....I do not HAVE TO respect that. This makes me very angry. Because you are the one who said that all Israeli children are future murderers and criminals. You insult and denigrate everything Canadian. You only want respect and free speech for yourself, not for all.

Thought I would add this Youtube. L. Ron Hubbard's grandson.

This part is of concern to me. There was a just a rash of Muslims claiming to have been assaulted and screamed at that turned out to be liars.....I suspect that some (certainly not all ) of the cases of graffiti and vandalism may also be done by Muslims to push forth this agenda.

Hmmm....a law on the books banning "Islamophobia" with no definition as to what that would entail. What could go wrong?

Haha! Yes, that's sometimes true. My prediction is that within the next couple of generations, religion will go the way of the dinosaur. It has waned a lot in the last generation, and the slight upturn these days in interest for religions of one's culture is merely its death throes. Of myself and 4 other siblings, 3 of us are completely out of the religion we grew up in. Out of 12 grandchildren, 6 are still in, but they are still very young and under their parent's direction. The older ones have all left.

Letter #3 - Cultural Identity The author begins with the story of Amina, a senior at a NYC college, who began veiling and wearing the long coat in 2003. She was critical of the treatment of Muslims in the media and felt that wearing the hijab would show that she was proud of her Muslim heritage. The author relates the story of Qama, who similarly took up the hijab to “make a statement, to say that you don’t have a hold on me and tell me what to do. Given the circumstances, I’m going to do what you don’t like me to do and there’s nothing you can do about it.” She continues with Qama’s story: The next story is quite long but it's very enlightening, so I'll post it all: The author mentions briefly some of the lawsuits brought about by Muslims for their rights, including the "private swimming times for Muslim women" one: (But it reminds me of the woman who sued the Canadian government for the right to wear the hijab during the oath of citizenship.) She tells of an interesting personal experience and her thoughts on it: (Bold parts here are mine) This part struck me because I don't think Muslim people are aware of the feelings the shrouding evokes in others. They may fell that Western objections to hijabs, burkas, etc. is nothing but racism and Islamphobia, but I think it is mostly just a natural concern for other human beings when we see them being mistreated.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this, but it makes me sad when women participate in their own oppression. I think it would be different if it were just the headscarf and it was strictly cultural. The religious spin on women's covering makes it difficult - most people will suspend logical thinking and go against what their "gut" tells them is right or wrong when it comes to religious things.

Again, I believe the issue is the scale of it. As Argus made the point: I've known families who allow their young girls to dress in ways that I would consider too provocative for their age. But that is their choice. And again, it's fairly rare. Not the norm.

Definitely, I agree. Both manners of dress sexualize young girls. But yes, the "Western" one is not the norm, not accepted in general, and not how most 8-10 year old girls dress.

I know this meme oversimplifies (as memes often do) but the point it makes is valid.

Letter 2 - Sexual Harassment The author tells about being in the office of a businessman in Algiers who picked up the phone and asked his assistant to bring him a file. The woman was wearing hijab but was very beautiful. The author noted the “long eye” given her by the businessman. She continues: The author then addresses the issue of the inordinate amount of interest men seem to have in women’s grooming habits. She tells of several experiences where men denigrate women who wear a certain kind of “kohl” eyeliner or other things. She continues: She then relates experiences of women who have been forced by their young sons to veil, even in situations where they are not in public.

Yes, I really want to spend an evening with her.

Oh, I meant to include that part of her introduction. Sorry. She describes the different forms of veiling, then says, "To avoid linguistic confusion, I will use the concept "veil" to mean hijab, the most common style of veiling". Other places in the book, if she says burka, she means burka. I can't remember where she's from....she is Muslim, still is, and she interviewed Muslim women from all over the world for the book. Their stories are very interesting.

I thought I would share some quotes from this book, as I found it very enlightening. I realize it’s a “hot” topic, but I feel the author of this book takes on the subject in a very respectful manner. It helped me to better understand the reasons for veiling, they are as individual as the women who wear it, and the real life experiences presented in the book give a human feel to the issue that I think is lacking in a lot of discussions. There are so many good points in the letters, so I will add them to the thread as I have time, but I'll start off with the introduction to the book and the first letter - tackling the issue of Modesty. From the Introduction: Early in the book, Lazreg speaks of her mother and how she could not come to rescue her (the author) when a boy from the neighbourhood was hitting her. Her mother did not have her veil on, thus she could not walk into the street in public to help her daughter. Her mother threw a shoe at the boy, missed and hit her daughter in the forehead, leaving a permanent scar. As she grew up, she wondered, “If the boy had been older and carried weapon, would the veil have prevented my mother from saving me?” Letter 1 - Modesty The author begins with the story of Mina, who at 13 was told by her mother she needed to start wearing the veil. Her first veil was a bedsheet, and she felt “disoriented” when she first stepped onto the street. She said, “I did not feel good at all wearing the veil. I felt camouflaged. But then I thought, ‘This is life, you know.’” She decided to make herself look good under the veil and bought expensive silks to drape over her face. From the book: There is also an interesting part of the chapter that gives the experiences of older women who took up wearing the veil as a way of “accepting their age”. The second letter is called Sexual Harassment, and looks at the views of women who veil because they feel it is the best way to ward off men's advances. I'll post quotes from there later.

NVM Upon further research, I didn't trust this source.

No one here has said it's a problem exclusive to Muslims. It's the scale of it. And to say "IF" there's a problem with it in Islam.....are you really not sure it is a problem in Islam? Yes, Canadian men can be pigs, I don't think there's a female here that hasn't been groped and propositioned. Multiple times. That is obviously not what I'm talking about. I really really really hope you are right, and things like the Muslim Rape Game never happen in Canada. I'd really really really like to believe that if I'm at a New Year's Eve party, 250 Canadian men at the party would not suddenly decide to rape me while 1000 other Canadian men stood by and cheered them on.

Yes, you are misunderstanding me. I agreed with you that violence seems to be a naturally occurring human phenomena so I don't think it will ever be eliminated from any country or religion. I respect your experiences with Islam but they are different from mine. When you visit your sister (Egypt?), you're under their protection and likely do not experience the things I have. Yes, I believe spousal abuse is tolerated in Islam in Canada. And in many other Muslim countries, it is not just acceptable but expected. When I see neighbor women getting cuffed across the back of the head, have my hand slapped away by a man because I dared to hand food tickets to his wife instead of their 6 year old son, get assaulted because I dared to tell a man No on something he's being clearly unreasonable about, when I can't accept a job offer in Saudi because others who have worked there warn me about how I'll be treated and/or killed, when I see a group of Muslims attack an Israeli girl on a hometown Facebook page telling her she should kill herself and they hope all her family in Israel are killed.....yes, it is tolerated and acceptable. It makes me wonder if they treat their wives like that public, how much worse is it at home? But I dare not say anything or I'm a racist Islamophobe.

Individual people can and do certainly interpret things however they want. How do you explain entire countries based on the violent interpretations? Does the religion still bear NO responsibility? I agree that violence is a naturally occurring human phenomena. Take out the extreme fundies and the terrorists from all religions and I still think Islam has more than its fair share of beliefs that promote violence.

I believe it is a factor. Not the only one. Either it's okay to beat and kill your wife in Islam or it's not. If it's acceptable in Islam, then it's a bigger factor than we know. If it's not acceptable in Islam, it certainly seems to be one of those things that Islam tolerates. This is just one example.

I asked that question a while ago: At what point can the religion be blamed for the way its followers are acting on it? And the answer was given: At NO point is the religion in any way responsible.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/opinion/mosque-shooting-narrative-1.3958357 This made me chuckle....it's all here in this thread!

No worries

I don't know what you mean here. I'm just saying that I haven't been here for a long time, but I can already see from Dialamah's posts that she is a very compassionate person. Expressing her compassion for the parents doesn't mean she has no compassion for the ones who died.