Deen Talk! Women and Islam - Part One - Sexual Harassment. (TW: Rape Culture)

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

Assalaamu alaikum everyone.  Today's Deen Talk! is on Sexual Harassment, an issue which affects women in nearly every part of society, but which affects Muslim women in a more unique way. In shaa Allah this will be the first of a three-party series on Women and Islam.

So, unfortunately, sexual harassment is pretty pervasive in society. Let me start off by saying that sexual harassment, assault, and rape have NOTHING to do with sex and sexuality but, rather, have everything to do with power. The perpetrator is doing this to gain a sense of power over the victim. If it had anything to do with sex, little kids wouldn't get harassed and raped. (Blunt - sorry.)

So when we look at a girl who gets harassed, we should not be blaming her. There is absolutely no basis for this. Especially in the Muslim Ummah, this is even more ridiculous, as we are telling girls in hijab and even girls in jilbab and niqab "you were asking for it, because of how you dress/you aren't modest enough/you post pictures online/your eyes and hands are uncovered/etc.."

The fact that I've had to say the above in justification for wearing niqab is ridiculous enough. But it's even more ridiculous that online I'm sexually harassed by my Muslim brothers. Every. Day. And then I have sisters blaming me, for having old pictures without niqab up, for posting pictures in general, etc.

[Prophet], tell believing men to lower their glances and guard their private parts: that is purer for them. God is well aware of everything they do. 

Surah an-Nur, 24:30  

Guys, this is exactly what rape culture is. We should not be excusing the actions of men and blaming them on women. It's ridiculous that I should be held accountable for someone else's behaviour, especially when they were first commanded by Allah 'azza w jal to lower their gaze. This is even more illustrated in the following Hadith:

We need to be working together against this. This is EXACTLY why I am a feminist, which I started to say in the video but at 15 minutes realized the video was getting quite long. We need to stop claiming men are completely out of control of their behavior - this just isn't true, and Allah al-Alim showed us this by telling men FIRST to lower their gaze, before giving the women any command on hijab. And we need to stop blaming women for men who aren't controlling their own behavior and claiming they aren't modest for some reason or another - hijab is for Allah ta'ala. Yes, He gave it to us for our protection, to keep men from assuming we were prostitutes so they would, in shaa Allah, leave us alone. But by putting focus on the "fitna" women create by not "properly" following hijab (more on this next Friday!), and NOT putting ANY focus on men and the fitna they create by failing to properly follow hijab (both for us and for themselves), we are buying into the idea that rape is about sex and it's ultimately the fault of the woman or victim.

And that's why people are now sexualizing children, because now even 11 year-old-girls are being seen as "asking for it."

Gross.

Jazakum Allahu kheiran,
Sajida.