Surprise, Surprise, the US Chooses Islam Apologist Asifa Quraishi over Feminist Hawk Ayaan Hirsi Ali for Women’s Rights Commission
Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a courageous freedom fighter, a true Feminist Hawk who lives under threat of death for her fierce opposition to Islamic subjugation of women.
Asifa Quraishi is a University of Wisconsin law professor who publicly insulted Hirsi Ali’s integrity last month by accusing her of highlighting cherry-picked portions of Islamic law that portray Islam unfairly.
Care to guess which woman’s views will be represented by the United States delegation to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women this month? Ding, ding, ding! That’s right, Asifa Quraishi is one of five public delegates joining the U.S. delegation headed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Quraishi is a specialist in constitutional law and Islamic jurisprudence who has written at length about the viability of Islamic law tribunals in the United States and the similarities between the Qur’an and the Constitution. She says “the inherent gender-egalitarian nature of Islam” has been perverted, and that Islam and democracy go hand-in-hand.
When Ayaan Hirsi Ali took the stage at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on February 2, she painted a starkly different portrait of Islam. “The American creed and the Islamic creed are two competing ideas. They are as different as day and night,” she told the crowd of 1,300. “Islamic doctrine is incompatible with American theory,” she said, noting that in Islam it is “a matter of principle to oppress women.”
Hirsi Ali described her experiences as a young Muslim in Somalia. She explained that “Islam sanctions a special kind of hatred against women,” and that “the emancipation of the Muslim woman is the key to reforming Islam.” Watching the video of her lecture is well worth your time:
After Hirsi Ali concluded her prepared remarks, she fielded questions and comments from the audience, including one from Professor Quraishi. A student newspaper, The Badger Herald, reported:
UW constitutional law professor Asifa Quraishi cautioned audience members during a question and answer period not to take Hirsi Ali’s message as the whole story.
Just as American constitutional law cannot be reduced to specific controversial laws, Quraishi said neither can Hirsi Ali’s message.
“I advise all of us to take a pause and think that maybe there is a little bit more to this story than we have heard tonight,” Quraishi said.
To watch Hirsi Ali rake her talons over the moral parallels Quraishi sees between constitutional law and Islamic law, skip ahead to the 8:40 mark on this video:
Ayaan Hirsi Ali makes clear that you can support equality for women or you can support unreformed, scripturally-dependent Islam. You can’t do both and still claim intellectual honesty.
But as the appointment of Asifa Quraishi as a public delegate to the UN Commission on the Status of Women makes clear, intellectual honesty isn’t a high priority for the Obama administration. Unfortunately, neither is an uncompromising approach to the emancipation of women.
Luckily, brave Feminist Hawks like Ayaan Hirsi Ali can tear into the inequality of women under Islamic law without a perch at the UN.
It has amazed me for years the apparent willingness of 'feminists' to ignore the treatment of women under Islam. Worse, are the women that proclaim elements of that repression are in fact freedom or liberty. As a conservative lesbian, almost nothing else has illustrated the bankrupt nature of 'women's organizations' in the United States quit as starkly as the anti-American, pro-Islam stances of those organizations.
I opposed the 'equal rights' movement specifically because it REDUCED liberties and rights to a common level that was and is less than the full birth right of every human. I don't want equal rights, I want FULL rights. Such a concept is beyond the grasp of most organizations that purport to be for a minority's rights.
I shall visit often and watch to see if FULL rights continues to be the focus. In the meantime, you might not consider me a hawk, so accept my own description as a Falcon…
It is interesting that Quraishi speaks of Hirsi Magan's ideas as "alternative ideas" while they are the simple result of the implications of the standard Western position. This already says a lot about her bias and her (lack of) intellectual honesty.
What makes it rather difficult to debate with these people at all, just as with for example postmodernists and cultural marxists (like Obama), is the idea in these ideologies that one is permitted to bend the rules of logic or flatout lie when intellectually challenged. In Islam it is called Taqiyya: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taqiyya
hmmm…both women are well qualified for this position, and I'm not so convinced Asifa Quraishi is an apologist past the point she has obviously decided to stay within her faith. In the video, she appears to agree with Hirsi Ali that her question did, indeed, significantly miss the main point of the talk given. She also appeared to agree she had a heightened moral/ethical obligation to speak more directly to the issue from 'within' Islam because of her position and qualifications…although, I am only viewing a single tape. Certainly both womens' CVs are impressive.
Kudos to the U.S. government for not following the stupidly Islamophobic European governments, who have given Hrisi Ali ample platform to spew her hatred of Islam. Asifa Qureshi is a great pick. She may not have a Fatwa against her, but it would be utterly stupid to pick a woman who has left Islam and hates it (Hrisi Ali) to be on a Commission on Women. If you want to improve Muslim women's lives, then cut the Islam-bashing crap. They are just as entitled to their views and faith as you are. There are many, many devout Muslim women the world over who choose to better women's lives within the Islamic tradition, just as there are Christian and Jewish women, as well as those of other faiths doing the same.
And for all you feminists who think change for women can never come from within Islam, read Women and Gender in Islam by Leila Ahmed. This Muslim feminist can help you see things in a more balanced way – if you're interested in real change and not the kind of hawkish intolerance that has characterized a number of feminists' attitude towards Islam in particular and religion in general.
So you're saying that Ayaan Hirsi Ali is mistaken in her view that Islamic law made her life miserable. Likewise the women and girls around the world who have been killed by fathers and brothers because their behavior was deemed insufficiently Islamic. Oh, sorry, they can't express their opinions, can they?
In case you come back with the old "it's cultural, not religious" line: Muslims tell us that Islam covers every aspect of life. Why have centuries of Islam done nothing to end clitorectomies or forced marriages to old uncles or killing daughters for not shrouding themselves?
And that fatwa against Hirsi Ali: I suppose that's a mark against her in your book. Nothing to do with Islam, of course.
First thing. There is no such thing as "Islamophobia", A phobia is an irrational fear of something. Considering Ms. Ali must live under 24 hour guard due to attempts on her life, that is not a phobia.
It is obvious you haven't read her book nor have you seen the short film Submission. The man who made the film with her was killed by a Muslim who remains in jail today, the threat on her life was stabbed into his chest.
You are obviously ignorant about Islam. The one book you quote may have good historical context about gender separation, but it isn't the only one.
Ayan Hirsi Ali also was raised Muslim in several Muslim and sharia dominated countries. Noni Darwish and Wafa Sultan as well speak very clearly about the history of the veiling of women and gender rolls, these women have actually lived it.
I fail to see where defining Islam as a totalitarian ideology, where women are considered worth half a man, her testimony in court is worth half a man, where if a woman is raped she is the one prosecuted for adultery… the list can go on.
In my opinion any ideology/religion that codifies the acceptability of domestic abuse into its dogma is worthy of nothing by contempt. Yes wife beating is okay according to the Islamic book of hate the Qu'ran.
Any effort to unveil the truth about Islam will continue to be obstructed by the free West's need for oil and now even worse: money. The governments of both the US and the UK have sold out to Saudi Arabia, which recently got confirmed again by BHO's boot licking bow before the king of SA and the non-bow before the Queen of England.
The bargain is as follows: the free West will offer up some freedoms in return for oil and money. I wonder who will run out first?
I in fact attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison event and was deeply moved by Ayaan Hirsi Ali despite having read her book and feeling as though I might be familiar with much of subject matter that she would speak about. I literally choked Ayaan said feminism had become “a force that protects only white women.” I choked because I know this to be true, having been places and having seen the things that I have.
And the Badger Herald, same on them, highlights within their story, with not account of Ayanns swift, powerful and prudent response –
UW constitutional law professor Asifa Quraishi cautioned audience members during a question and answer period not to take Hirsi Ali’s message as the whole story.
“I advise all of us to take a pause and think that maybe there is a little bit more to this story than we have heard tonight,” – Quraishi
Quraishi, who opened her message of "caution" by extolling herself and her Harvard credentials for many minutes that could have been better spent by fielding questions from the audience.
The appointment of Asifa Quraishi as a public delegate to the UN Commission is a disgrace, Yet another Obama attempt to straddle the issue, as he seems to do in every case that it is politically “correct” to do so. When it is politically convenient (or calculatedly advantageous) however, Mr. Obama is all one way. He’s a Black man. This is a man who could take a lesson from a true black leader and unifier such as Nelson Mandela.
You may have mistakenly judged Asifa Quraishi’s character. She is a proponent of Muslim Women’s rights. Not only is she a proponent but she is in a position to make a difference towards improving unjust practices and she has been outspoken to do so. Early on in her career she examined the rape laws of Pakistan and clearly demonstrated how these laws violate Quranic injunctions. She then suggested how the laws could be written to protect women based on principles of Islamic jurisprudence of which she is well versed. She is openly tolerant of people of all beliefs. From what I know of her work and personality I am quite sure that she is a women of rare intellectual honesty and speaks the truth.
Ayaan Hirsi makes some very good and true points regarding the shortcomings of Muslim men’s treatment of women today, but she makes many false statements mixed in with the true. Ms Quraishi’s point to Ayaan Hirsi to view the whole picture was very appropriate. There is a long tradition of Islamic jurisprudence that can not be washed away by modern fundamentalist views or anti-Islamic views which both discard years of intellectual religious tradition. Asifa Quraishi is one of many examples of Muslim women who are strong, intelligent and making a difference to promote a compassionate, progressive and all-inclusive view of women. And she is able to do that within her faith.