Women's status and oppression in Islamic societies: Muslim perspectives

Islamic Female Oppression

The objective of this work is to examine the history of the oppression and discrimination against women in the Muslim world and the female tradition in Islamic cultures. This work will answer the questions of: (1) How do Muslim women view their status in society? (2) Do Muslim women believe that they are oppressed? This work will also examine differing theories concerning the solutions to the oppression and why the theories might or might not work.

News reports in today's world are pervasively filled with stories of horror, inequity, injustice and oppression and one becomes desensitized to the effect of these stories or so one may believe until they read a story such as written by Soares (2009) entitled: "Oh Mother, I Can See the Noose" which tells of the death of a young Muslim woman, Delara Darabi. Soares writes as follows:

"It was 7am when Delara Darabi phoned home. "Oh mother, I see the hangman's noose in front of me," she garbled. "They are going to execute me. Please save me." Moments later a prison official snatched the handset away. "We will easily execute your daughter and there's nothing you can do about it," he barked at the parents. Then, with a chilling click, the line went dead." (Soares, 2009)

By the time that Delara's parents arrived at the Central Prison in Rasht, Iran, it was too late. Twenty-two-year-old Delara had been hanged. Delara had been convicted for murdering her rich relation however, it was not she, but her older boyfriend who had committed the deed. The boyfriend received ten years in prison and Delara was executed with a hangman's noose. The irony of the loss of this young life is that a stay to execution had been granted by the head of the judiciary only forty-eight hours earlier however, it was to no effect as local officials made the decision that Delara would be executed.

I. THE ROLE, POSITION AND RIGHTS OF WOMEN IN ISLAM

The work of Shorish-Shamley (nd) entitled: "Women's Position, Role and Rights in Islam" states "In the Islamic world, at the beginning of Islam, there were no restrictions or prohibitions toward women to seek knowledge and education. There were many women scholars in the fields of religion, literature, music, education, and medicine." (nd, p.1) Shorish-Shamley write that the position of women in Islam "in theory, according to the Qur'an and Hadiths (tradition) of the Prophet, differs vastly from Islam in practice." (nd, p.1)

Indeed, according to Shorish-Shamley "It is not the Islamic ideologies that determine the position of women in the Islamic societies, it is rather the pre-Islamic patriarchal ideologies existing in a particular society combined with the lack of education and ignorance, that construct the Muslim women's position." (nd, p.1) It is related in Shorish-Shamley's work that in the pre-Islamic world, and specifically in the Arab societies, "women were deprived of the most basic human rights that are required for human existence" and in fact The Qu'ran acknowledges the equality of men and women in marriage." (nd, p.1) Assuming that this is true, then the question of how and why genital mutilation, beating of women, honor killings and other prevalent forms of abuse and oppression continue in the Islam society.

II. PAKISTAN AND OPPRESSION AND ABUSE OF MUSLIM WOMEN

The truth about the injustices and pervasive abuses to women in the Islamic society are examined in the work of Zahra (2005) in the work entitled: "Women in Pakistan -- Victims of the Social and Economic Desecration" who states that the least gender sensitive region in the world is the South Asian subcontinent. In Pakistan it is stated that women are subjected to "…inhuman customs and laws such as Karo Kari, Hadood ordinance, Qasas and marriage to the Quran and half witnesses according to the state law." (p.1)

Zahra states that Karo Kari is that which refers to 'honor killings' and states that in 2004 there were 286 women murdered in this manner. Marrying for love in Pakistan is a crime punishable by death. Leila Ahmed writes in the work entitled: "Women and Gender in Islam" that Islam was influenced by the Zoroastrian regulations which suggested that "notionally women were somewhere between personhood and thingness…" (2005, p.1) Zoroastrianism in Iraq, stated to be distinct from Iran was "principally the religion of the Persians, who predominantly constitute the ruling, warrior and priestly classes." (Ahmed, 1993, p. 6)

IV. UNDERSTANDING THE HIJAB IN ISLAM

In the original conception of the Islamic religion the veil or 'hijab' is representative of "human dignity, privacy, humility and spirituality." (Khan, 2003, p. 110) The veil is a physical cover and is used for the purpose of allowing women to go about their daily business without distraction or sexual harassment. The original conception of the veil is for the purpose of discouraging sexual objectification of women and effectively "forces members of the society to respect women as full human beings and not reduce them to mere embodiments of beauty and sexuality." (Khan, 2003, p.110) The Islamic veil in actuality "rejects all displays of vanity, arrogance an aggression." (Khan, 2003, p.111)

V. THE VIEW OF WOMEN IN ISLAM OF THEIR OPPRESSION

For women in the lower economic classes in the Muslim society, oppression is a daily reality and that oppression as noted already in this work comes in various heinous forms of abuse and injustice. However, for those fortunate Muslim women who have been allowed and even encouraged to seek an education and to be gainfully employed intermingling among society and exerting themselves equally with the men in the Muslim world there is little understanding of what their chosen religion has perpetrated on women in their society but who in reality exist in a world that is far away from the world that the fortunate in this society exist within.

VI. THE FAILING AMONG THEORETICAL SOLUTIONS

Theory has failed to explain this oppression of women however, the work of Robert Staples (1971, 1985) reveals how "institutional racism, unequal educational and economic opportunities, public assistance policies that lock families into a cycle of poverty…" inescapable circumstances work in locking the individual, their family and the society into an irreversible cycle perpetuating marginalization within the society and driving the abusive and oppressive practices such as the selling of children into marriage and so forth.

V. THE TALIBAN AND OPPRESSION OF WOMEN IN ISLAM

The Taliban in the countries of Afghanistan, Pakistan as well as other countries in the same region of the world enforces and inflicts upon women in the lower classes a lifetime of abuse, hard labor, no say in their own lives including in becoming married or divorced and appropriates little in the way of resources to women and even in the way of basic needs for survival. Women are viewed as subordinate and lesser beings and completely against the tenants of the prophet's Islamic beliefs and the basis for those beliefs, objectifies women and oppresses them in every way imaginable from the first day of their life until death. Since infanticide of female babies is prevalent in some areas of the world among those who claim to adhere to the Muslim religion, the torture and oppression of women is often short-lived as many female children are born and killed on the very same day.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

The religion of Islam is very misunderstood and pervasively skewed within its true meaning and original intent by extremists in the Islamic society. Never did the prophet intend that the abuses and oppression which today's Muslim women suffer should occur. It is the conclusion of this writer that extremists exist in all religions and these are those who garner the most attention and receive the most press however, those who are moderate and who adhere to the true beliefs and meaning of the Islamic religions receive little attention and little press and even littler in the way of chances to convey the truth of this religion to the world. The abuses and oppression will continue however, it is hopeful that the ignorance surrounding the Muslim religion will eventually lose out to better dissemination of information and to more intelligent reporting backed by diligent investigation of the facts.