What does it mean to be a feminist in a Muslim country? I would think it means fighting for equality of treatment and opportunity for women, which means, in part, opposing those tenets of Islam that stifle such equality.
We already know that many Muslim and Western women who call themselves “feminists” don’t hold such a view, and in fact see Muslim feminists as upholding Islamic law, proudly sporting the hijab as a symbol of empowerment. Indeed, as the links above testify, many consider Islam to be a deeply feminist faith. After all, wasn’t Aisha (Mohammed’s wife, whom he married when she was six and raped when she was nine) a very powerful woman? And haven’t there been women heads of state in Islamic countries, like Benazir Bhutto (part of a political family dynasty who was assassinated—probably by the Taliban—for being too secular and “Western”)?
But this argument, from an…
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