Friday Links — December 11, 2009

December 11th, 2009
Fatemeh
  • A supermarket in the U.K. has apologized after it forced a woman to remove her headscarf to enter the store.
  • Miss Arab World wasn’t enough: the first Miss Palestine will be held on December 26 in the West Bank.
  • Tunisia’s first lady won an award based on her social service initatives.
  • The book Muslim Women and the Challenge of Islamic Extremism, published by Sisters in Islam, was banned by the Home Ministry because it was prejudicial to public order.
  • The Feminist School charts seven ways that the Iranian government has moved to crush the movement opposing violence against women.
  • Muslim women in Selangor will receive a minimum dowry from prospective husbands. The Selangor Islamic Religious Department said the move was aimed at giving a better impression and elevating the status of women in the state.
  • A Muslim women’s association is donating toys to a U.K.-based charity Little Heroes.

See something about Muslim women in the news that we didn’t? Post it in the links!

3 Responses to “Friday Links — December 11, 2009”

  1. I hope something really bad happens to those 2 Liverpool assholes for their racist, xenophobic assaults on that poor woman. Stupid jerks.

  2. Very interesting debate on Reset Doc.
    Joseph Massad’s analysis is just great and not as simplistic and hateful as Ghassan Makarem wants it too be. “Homosexuality and heterosexuality were both produced in Western Europe and the United States in the nineteenth century.”

    1) The West and the Orientalism of sexuality (Joseph Massad talks to Ernesto Pagano)
    http://www.resetdoc.org/EN/Massad-interview-gay.php

    2) We are not agents of the West (Ghassan Makarem replies to Joseph Massad)
    http://www.resetdoc.org/EN/Helem-replies-Massad.php

    3) «I criticize Gay Internationalists, not gays» (Joseph Massad counter-replies to Ghassan Makarem)
    http://www.resetdoc.org/EN/Massad-counter-replies.php

  3. Zahra (with a Z) says:

    @ Princesse de Cleves, islamogauchiste

    That is a very interesting debate; thank you for the links. I have to say I found Massad less than convincing despite some very good points about gay Western cultural imperialism; the claim that homosexuality and heterosexuality were invented in the 19th c is undercut quite a bit by the fact that he ignores the Arab social categories for sexuality and same-sex desire (including in-groups and out-groups) before that time.

    Also, I am tired of reading pieces about x topic (homosexuality, say), and then coming across the throwaway line that the author’s not including women because not enough other scholars have covered the topic. Either come out and say you’re talking about male homosexuality, or do the research and redress this imbalance. Don’t just pretend women don’t exist, or matter enough to include.