Bad news all day.
My sister (who lives in Mosul) called today and was very upset. The extremists put announcements in the streets forcing all women to wear the hijab (head scarf) even the Christians and this announcements was signed by five Islamic parties. And even for women who wear the hijab they should not wear trousers, just the Islamic dress as they said.
My sister already wears hijab, not because she is convinced with it, but because she looks different than the others around her, they all started to look at here as someone bad. Today she was upset because they forced her 14 years old daughter to wear hijab in the school, otherwise she will not be able to go to school again!
She said I don't want to force my daughter to wear something against her will and I don't know what to do? Her daughter became very angry, but there is nothing that she can do about.
What is making me nervous in all this, is the attitude of our new government against these acts. They simply don't do anything, why do they let them put these signs on all over the streets and do nothing about them, unless they are already agreed with these acts. Is this the freedom we are going to have? I think we will be a second Afghanistan and I don’t consider it faraway. I wonder what the president of the USA will say when he hears about this, this is his war against terror isn't it? And now according to him we are free people and free women. I think the only people who got free in all this war are the terrorists and the extremists.
Another thing happened today, my husband's friend called today warning us not to use our car (Peugeot model 2001) because a gang started to steal this kind of car in our neighborhood and killed till now about three people and stole their cars the last week. When some of the owners went to the police stations in our district they simply said they know about this and told him the gang is using a black BMW when they steal!
By the way the electricity did not come as it is supposed to, I think there is a problem with our local station so we have to stay till the morning till someone come and fix it, because simply there is no number to call for the maintenance of electricity !.
My sister already wears hijab, not because she is convinced with it, but because she looks different than the others around her, they all started to look at here as someone bad. Today she was upset because they forced her 14 years old daughter to wear hijab in the school, otherwise she will not be able to go to school again!
She said I don't want to force my daughter to wear something against her will and I don't know what to do? Her daughter became very angry, but there is nothing that she can do about.
What is making me nervous in all this, is the attitude of our new government against these acts. They simply don't do anything, why do they let them put these signs on all over the streets and do nothing about them, unless they are already agreed with these acts. Is this the freedom we are going to have? I think we will be a second Afghanistan and I don’t consider it faraway. I wonder what the president of the USA will say when he hears about this, this is his war against terror isn't it? And now according to him we are free people and free women. I think the only people who got free in all this war are the terrorists and the extremists.
Another thing happened today, my husband's friend called today warning us not to use our car (Peugeot model 2001) because a gang started to steal this kind of car in our neighborhood and killed till now about three people and stole their cars the last week. When some of the owners went to the police stations in our district they simply said they know about this and told him the gang is using a black BMW when they steal!
By the way the electricity did not come as it is supposed to, I think there is a problem with our local station so we have to stay till the morning till someone come and fix it, because simply there is no number to call for the maintenance of electricity !.
posted by rose at 1:45 AM
23 Comments:
Salaam Rose
This is not Islam. Think of Him and InshaAllah you'll get stronger.
Stay safe.
Rose,
This is the kind of issue on which the CPA under Paul Bremer spent a lot of its focus, but at the cost of laxity on larger issues like broad-band security and broad-band, quick economic relief.
You've also hit upon one of the cross-oceanic perceptual problems in OpIF, the war on terror, and on a macro level, one of the more controversial aspects of democratic and globalised reform.
The cross-oceanic perceptual problem is the fear from Americans of the US imposing 'cultural imperialism' or Westernization or Americanization on Iraq, which means you, your sister and your niece. Maybe it's something some of us would personally like to see, but that's also not our larger goal.
Unfortunately, by giving this cultural latitude via our policy on cultural norms, or lack thereof (I can't speak what the IIG's take is on this), the same freedom allows more localized forces to fill the freedom by instead imposing their own 'cultural imperialism'. It's happened before. I'll try a guess on the IIG: the IIG may be allowing this to happen because they're trying to work with these groups on other - what they see as larger, more pressing - issues, and at the popular level, you and your family are bearing the brunt of their macro-focus. The US probably doesn't want to interfere with the IIG's sovereignty on a micro-level 'internal' negotiation.
How we do it. I don't know if you have any viable avenues, other than your blog, to make known your discontent. In the US, it's common in our pluralistic society for groups to try to impose their cultural norms on the community at large. But we can do something about it. It's the kind of issue we commonly take up through political activism, administrative avenues, our law-makers and courts. More often than not, it works. (FYI, I'm at school right now, and a female classmate just walked by me in the library wearing her 'hijab'.) It's how an Asian like me can feel empowered in a predominantly Anglo society. However, this is the US where we've spent decades fighting hard for and building the LIBERAL institutions that allow average citizens protection for individual choices. You don't have that yet in Iraq.
The US is a society which largely runs on controlled, institutionalized conflict, to include our political system. From our conflicts, we reach compromises and resolutions. Sometimes, it takes many years for folks to reach a mutual common ground (see the African-American and various immigrant experiences, all still evolving), but our system facilitates the process.
In comparison, I imagine many UNRESOLVED individual differences in Iraq were repressed under Saddam. In that environment, the solution was superficial while differences were pushed beneath the surface without any cooperative evolution. When the broad-band social pressure of repression was released from Iraq, now all the individual differences are being released in force.
Best case: from this rocky start, you are now on the path to build a true pluralistic society in Iraq of empowered individuals. But you'll need strong social institutions to facilitate this reformation. Democracy and freedom, under the proper institutional control and guidance, should allow disparate Iraqis to resolve your differences and eventually re-join as a pluralistic, respectful-of-individual society. Easy? No. It's taken Americans over 200 years to reach where we're at in the US. It hasn't been easy and our grand social experiment is still on-going.
Worst case: Civil War, as in the former Yugoslavia after their social repression was lifted with the end of the Cold War. Instead of coming together with freedom, they used their freedom to turn on each other with their repressed, unresolved differences. They attempted to impose their cultural norms with means including displacement, even genocide.
The bottom-line for Americans is not an easy answer for you, Rose: YOU are the solution. This entire mission, from the start, hinged on our President's faith in the Iraqi people, and the Iraqi desire to fight for a better future.
If you do NOT want the US to push forward an imposition of cultural imperialism (which we fear would evoke Saddam's repressive rule), Iraqis - you - will need to do the hard, dirty work to resolve for yourselves how to live with empowerment and freedom while also facilitating individual plurality on a social level. The US, by our liberal goals, cannot be a strong-man in this area - in your society; however, your government needs to actively employ strong institutions for this pluralistic evolution to work. You, in particular, need to be strong and fight, as an empowered individual Iraqi, and most of all, a woman protecting her rights and fighting for her children's future. (I respect the difficulty of that, which I realize I barely suffer as a 21st century American.)
Rose, to close on this subject, keep this thought at the front of your mind for yourself, your daughter, your sister and your niece. There is a strong belief - even dogma - in American liberal academic circles, backed up by much evidence, that social empowerment of women is THE key to the success of Western-type liberalization of any society. That, in fact, the rate of US liberal evolution coincided with the socio-political ascendancy of American women.
This means, Rose, you along with all Iraqi women across your society may very well be more important to a liberal future for Iraq than all the males currently holding power in your government. Think about it.
I recommend you e-mail Tom Barnett (the expert strategist I cited to you) on this subject.
I agree with Faisal. This is not Islam. I say this and I'm a Christian who was brought up in Iraq.
Rose,
All I can tell you is that they're cracking down on the extremists, but it takes time to develop the Intelligence and Iraqi Forces to deal with all these evil people. But they are cleaning out the vermin.
As far as Faisal's comments that "this isn't Islam", but it is Islam. It may not be your particular beliefs or interpretations of the Quaran, but it is theirs.
And Rose, one of the biggest problems that I see, is that the Moderate Muslims are cowed by the Extremist Moslems. They don't fight back.
Fayrouz,
Do you have a blog or a recommended website for reading about the Christian Iraqi experience? Or, could you describe it yourself?
Eric,
You need to check my blog's archives. I usually write about the subject whenever there's a reason to talk about it.
Fayrouz,
Ah, I see. Click on your name and it opens your website. Well, I learn eventually. I look forward to seeing what you have to say. Like I said earlier in response to Rose, the success of Iraq's transformation may very well rely on the success of her women in making it happen. That's not so easy to say for a sometimes male chauvinist, but I've seen too many arguments and evidence saying that women are the key in transforming society.
Eric,
You made me smile. I believe Iraqi women will have a big role in moving Iraq into the next phase of its history. It's a slow process and I really hope it will be successful.
From John (can't seem to sign in)
Rose
Eric's preachy polysyllabic posts are rather tedious, and his tone towards you (and your poor nation) is patronising and paternalistic. But he seems to make a valid point in his comparison with the former Yugoslavia.
After the elections, if there are elections, the only hope for Iraq not coming apart will be if most of its citizens can make the adjustment to a democratic mind-set: i.e. that you accept the will of the majority, and disagree peacefully, not with guns.
How about you? If you were to end up with a government, which you quite possibly could, that imposed strict Islamic codes for women, what would your feelings be?
John via Anonymous,
Rose educates the world - and me - through her 'Diary' on subjects on which I'm largely ignorant (but learning), and she allows us this forum to communicate, to exchange ideas from across our world. It's an amazing thing, an opportunity Rose has given us.
I like to think that in return for the value of what Rose provides us from her perspective, experience, and knowledge, we can also provide Rose the benefit of our perspective, experience and knowledge.
After all, for Iraq's democratic and globalised transformation to succeed, it will require strength and cooperation, a partnership, not only between governments but also We the People.
The people coming together in freedom, not only in Iraq, but around the world. That's the point, right? A better world is possible, in Iraq, too.
Female Iraqi Candidates a Diverse Group
Thu Oct 14, 2:57 AM ET Middle East - AP
By SCHEHEREZADE FARAMARZI, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Salama al-Khafaji, a deeply religious woman in an all-enveloping black robe, says that if elected, she'll bring "bright Islamic thoughts" to Iraq (news - web sites)'s legislature.
AP Photo
On the other hand, Wijdan al-Khuzaei, who wears a lavender pants suit and dyes her hair blond, wants to keep religion out of politics.
What they and many other potential female candidates have in common in running in the January election is a desire to ensure that Iraqi women vote their own way, not as their husbands demand.
"We want ... to have our own voice, our own choice and our own vote," says Salam Smeisem, 45, an economic adviser in the interim government who is also thinking of running.
They have been encouraged by a clause in the interim constitution guaranteeing at least a quarter of the 275 seats in Iraq's new National Assembly to women.
The big obstacle in this extremely conservative and deeply religious society is to get women, more than 50 percent of whom are illiterate, to make their own choice at the ballot box.
Nesreen Berwari, public affairs minister in the interim government, says: "Eighteen months after liberation, women have become active." But her own situation reveals some of the touchy issues that arise for women in politics in tradition-bound Iraq.
The fact that Berwari is the third wife of President Ghazi al-Yawer has raised eyebrows and made many women question whether she is the best spokeswoman for gender equality. Although Islam allows men to have several wives, the practice is frowned upon by many secular women.
Asked about it by The Associated Press in an interview this week, Berwari snapped: "I'm not the third wife. I don't want to talk about this," and abruptly ended the interview.
Some officials have said the union between Berwari, a member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, and al-Yawer, an Arab leader of the powerful al-Shammar tribe, was a political marriage. But others simply say they love each other, and al-Khafaji, the Islamic candidate for the legislature, praises her as a competent politician who works tirelessly for women's causes.
"Islam allows men to tie the knot for political reasons," she said.
Al-Khafaji, who survived an assassination attempt in May that killed her 17-year-old son, was one of only three women on the 25-member U.S.-appointed Governing Council until the transitional Iraqi government took over in June. She now has a seat on a national council that oversees the work of government.
She plans to run on an independent Islamic platform, though that doesn't mean she wants Sharia, or Islamic law, to rule. Instead, she wants to it to coexist with secular law.
Secular candidates like al-Khuzaei concede they will have a harder time overcoming what she describes as the strict social and religious curbs on women.
"The seculars need a powerful hand to help them win. They need economic support and support from the media," said al-Khuzaei, a 40-year-old mother of two who heads the Democratic Iraqi Women's Society and Iraqi Society of Businesswomen.
"But all this will not deter us," she said. "We are determined to reach our goal — to empower women to live their own lives and not be subservient to their husbands."
She wants to help women become self-reliant through small projects and loans. Al-Khafaji, on the other hand, wants to improve the health and education of the poor, from whom she draws most of her support.
Al-Khuzaei says her journalist husband is fully behind her. Al-Khafaji says she has a harder time persuading her husband, an architect, to support her.
"He likes to see me as a woman doing everything in the house, like other Iraqi women," she said.
She says she has asked higher religious authorities to rule on whether Islam obliges women to cook. They assure her it doesn't.
But willl her husband accept the ruling? "I am a political woman," she says, flashing a mischievous smile. "I use diplomacy in my house, too."
To poor John (who can’t sign in) the answer to your question :
I will leave Iraq if any new government forced me or any one of my family to do something against our wills or beliefs. We have suffered enough before, and now I’m looking forward for a better future to me and my family I will not stay one day after the elections if the new government will impose strict Islamic codes . because if they do so that means they are not democratice and I want to live in new democratice Iraq not behind some turbaneds.
From John
Whoo-eee! You sound like one feisty girl, Rose.
Do you realise that you have just said that democracy and strict Islamic codes are incompatible? Did you mean to say this?
Anyway, come to N.Z. if you leave Iraq - its the most democratic country in the world, and it is run by women - Governor General (like a President), Prime Minister, Minister of Justice, Chief Justice, CEO of the biggest company, half our lawyers and doctors, etc.
Even our fighting Infantry Company in Afghanistan has a female captain.
You would fit in well here.
Ramadhan Mubarak Rose. May the coming month brings you only good news.
johnny,
You know, I actually grew up in a heavily Irish neighborhood in NYC (Woodside, Queens). For a while, I was even a member of St. Sebastian's (local Catholic church) Boys Brigade. As a non-Irish and a non-Christian, an interesting experience.
I try to stick to what I know in my comments, and I have US-centric knowledge. I don't know nearly enough about the Catholic-Protestant conflict in n.Ireland. When I get the chance, I'll take a look through your links to put some more, maybe even better, analogies in my mind. Perhaps you can expand more on what you know for Rose's benefit.
The 2 main points in this thread that I hope we convey to Rose is 1st point, she's involved in an early stages of a socio-political struggle for a democratic form, but it's not a wholly new or unique struggle to Iraqis. Fierce divisive struggles for the kind of democracy Rose wants - and deserves - have succeeded elsewhere in pluralistic democracies. The nations most enthusiastic about democratic reform in Iraq are also nations with a cultural memory of their own often harsh (in some cases, still continuing) struggles for democracy. The reality is that in some real ways, tyranny IS easier than democracy. 'We the People' doesn't happen overnight nor, unfortunately, bloodlessly in many instances.
The 2nd point, and I think the more important applicable idea, is the central role of women in liberal socio-political reform, as John via Anonymous expanded upon regarding NZ (a fact about Kiwi society I didn't know). Rose is a mom, and it's not my place at all to tell her where and how to raise her family, but I hope she sticks it out in Iraq, because a successful outcome for Iraq's future will depend a lot on women like her.
On the topic of the strictly religious making compromises, here's an article from today's yahoo news page. This isn't me saying a disagreement over Halloween on Sunday in the US's South is the same as Rose's controversy over fundamentalists (turbaned? - is that a local slur?), women and the hijab. Just a statement that even in 21st century America, we still have our ideological differences and disagreements. The point, rather, is about building better traditions for dealing with each other, and compromising with our differences. Americans aren't somehow fundamentally better as people than Iraqis (and what about Iraqi-Americans?); we've just been working at this stuff for a little bit longer.
Sunday Halloween Irks Some in Bible Belt
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=13&u=/ap/20041015/ap_on_re_us/halloween_on_the_sabbath
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Rose-
This post is very old, and I do not know if you still post or if you read comments on your blog, but here goes anyway.
I am a high school teacher in Middlebury, Vermont, United States. I am taking a course on Gender in the Middle East, and our professor has asked us to follow and comment on blogs from people in the Middle East. I've found your blog fascinating. I want to first apologize for the behavior of my government - we never should have invaded your country, and certainly the way the American army has been conducting itself in Iraq is inappropriate. Not all Americans supported this policy.
Second, I wanted to respond to your concerns that a more conservative faction might take over Iraq and impose restrictions, like hijab, on women. How many women do veil in Iraq? Does it vary by social class? Were women permitted to veil under Saddam? How is life in Dubai different in this respect?
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