Nine Parts of Desire (36 page)

Is it even our fight? As a mental test, I always try to reverse the gender. If some ninety million little boys were having their penises amputated, would the world have acted to prevent it by now? You bet.

Sometimes substituting race for gender also is an interesting exercise. Say a country, a close Western ally and trading partner, had a population half white, half black. The whites had complete control of the blacks. They could beat them if they disobeyed. They deprived them of the right to leave the house without permission; to walk unmolested without wearing the official segregating dress; to hold any decent job in the government, or to work at all without the permission of the white in control of them. Would there have been uproar in our countries by now? Would we have imposed trade sanctions and subjected this country to international opprobrium? You bet. Yet countries such as Saudi Arabia, which deprive half their population of these most basic rights, have been subjected to none of these things.

It is, I suppose, possible to argue that outside pressure is counterproductive when it comes to traditions that are seen to be religious, even if in fact they aren’t. Early attempts to ban genital mutilation by colonial-government fiat were dismal failures. But, even if we decline to act on what goes on inside others’ borders, there is no excuse for not acting inside our own.

In an era of cultural sensitivity, we need to say that certain cultural baggage is contraband in our countries and will not be admitted. We already draw a line at polygamy; we don’t recognize divorce by saying, “I divorce you.” We have banned these things even though the Koran approves them. It should be easier to take a stand against practices that don’t even carry the sanction of the Koran. “Honor” killings need to be identified in court and punished as the premeditated murders they are. Young women need to be protected against marriages arranged during hasty “vacations” abroad for teenagers too young to give informed consent. And, most urgent of all, clitoridectomy needs to be made illegal.

In 1994 the United States still had no laws whatever banning migrants from countries such as Somalia and the Sudan from mutilating the genitals of their daughters, and the operation was taking place in migrant communities throughout the country. The first ever bill on the issue had just been introduced to Congress by Colorado Democrat Patricia Schroeder. While it addressed education of migrants and laws against carrying out mutilations within the United States, it didn’t propose any means of protecting girls taken out of the country for the procedure.

There is something else we can do: advance the right to asylum on the grounds of “well-founded fear of persecution” to women from any country where fathers, husbands and brothers claim a religious right to inhibit women’s freedom. In January 1993 the Canadian government, after almost two years of consideration, granted asylum to a Saudi student who had requested it on the grounds of gender persecution. It was, they said, “an exception.” Why should it be? “Nada,” as she asks to be called, experienced the same violent harassment that any woman is subject to from her country’s authorities for the “crime” of walking outside her home with uncovered hair. If Nada had remained in Saudi Arabia, and continued to disobey, she might have found herself imprisoned and even tortured, without formal charges ever having been laid.

There is, unfortunately, no chance that granting of automatic asylum to women suffering such gender persecution would lead to a flood of refugees. Only a minority have the means to leave their country, or even their house, when men control the keys to doors and the car, and must sign their approval for the shortest of journeys. But such a step would send a signal to regimes whose restrictions have nothing to do with the religion they claim to uphold. And that signal would be that we, too, have certain things we hold sacred: among them are liberty, equality, the pursuit of happiness and the right to doubt.

It is a long time since I stood under Rafsanjani’s gaze at a press conference in Iran and told him I was wearing a chador “in a spirit of mutual respect.” At that moment, standing in my black shroud under the hot TV lights, I had a mental image of myself, as I liked to be in summer, bare-skinned on the beach near my parents’ home. The “mutual respect” I had in mind demanded that he, and those like him, acknowledge my right to sunbake on those Australian sands and, if I chose, to take
The Satanic Verses
along as my beach reading.

Last year, when I was home in Sydney, I lay on that beach beside a Muslim family who seemed not the least bit troubled by the exposed flesh surrounding them. While the man splashed in the shallows with his toddlers, his wife sat on the sand, her long, loose dress arranged around her. It made me sad that the woman’s tiny daughter, splashing so happily with her father and baby brother, would be, one day soon, required to forgo that pleasure. But that would be her fight, not mine. At least, in Australia, she would have a choice. She would choose between her family’s values and what she saw elsewhere.

Every now and then the little girl’s mother fiddled with her headscarf as it billowed in the sea breeze. That woman had made her choice: it was different from mine. But sitting there, sharing the warm sand and the soft air, we accepted each other. When she raised her face to the sun, she was smiling.

G
LOSSARY

Abaya:
A black cloak with arm slits that falls from the top of the head to the ankles. Generally worn in Persian Gulf countries.

Abu:
Father

Allah:
The core of the Islamic faith is its monotheism.
Al Lah
is simply the arabic for the God.

Andarun:
In traditional Persian homes, the inner, or private, quarter where women live, barred from contact with the outside world.

Anfal:
Literally, the spoils of war. The name of a chapter of the Koran and the code name given by Saddam Hussein to his terror campaign against the Kurds.

Aqd:
A wedding contract.

Ayatollah:
Literally, reflection of God. In Shiite Islam, the most learned of religious teachers and law interpreters receive this title.

Burka:
The face mask, made of leather or stiff fabric, worn by women of the Gulf countries. Covers the entire face except for the eyes.

Caliph:
Literally, one who comes after. Muhammad’s successors as leaders of the early Muslim nation.

Chador:
A square of fabric that falls from the top of the head to the ankles and is held or pinned closed under the chin. Worn in Iran and among Lebanese Shiite women.

Dhow:
A boat commonplace in the Persian Gulf.

Esma:
A clause in a wedding contract giving a woman the right to divorce.

Farsi:
The official language of Iran.

Fatwa:
Aformal legal opinion or decision by a religious leader on a matter of religious law.

Feast of the Sacrifice:
The last day of the Hajj. All pilgrims, and other Muslims who can afford to, slaughter a sheep and distribute its meat to the poor.

Fitna:
Chaos, civil war. In some Arab countries, fitna is also a slang term for a beautiful woman.

Hadith:
A saying of the Prophet Muhammad or a saying about him or his teachings by contemporaneous sources.

Hajj:
The pilgrimage to Mecca that all Muslims are obliged to make at least once in their lives, if they can afford it. Also, the month of the Islamic calendar in which the pilgrimage takes place.

Halal:
Religiously lawful, fit, permitted.

Hanafi:
One cf the main schools of Sunni religious thought.

Hanbali:
The strictest of the four main schools of Islamic thought.

Haram:
Religiously forbidden. It is necessary to abstain from that which is haram. If one performs a haram act, one will be punished by the Islamic court, or in the hereafter, or both.

Harem:
The private quarters of a house, or the women’s rooms. Also the women of a family.

Hezbollah:
Literally, the Party of God. The political/religious group associated with Khomeini. Influential among Lebanese Shiites.

Hijab:
Literally, a curtain. Generally, any women’s dress that follows Islamic principles.

Hijrah:
The flight of Muhammad and his followers from Mecca to Medina on July 16, in the year 622 of the Christian calendar. The date from which the Muslim calendar begins.

Husseiniya:
A Shiite center for study and prayer.

Imam:
Leader of community prayers. Also, among Shiites, the first twelve leaders of their community were given the title. Many Iranians revived the title for Khomeini.

Jalabiyya:
A button-through, neck-to-ankle coat worn by women, or a loose-fitting robe worn by men.

jihad:
Holy effort, or struggle, or war to defend Islam. The closest English equivalent is crusade.

Kaffiyah:
A checked headdress, black-and-white or red-and-white, widely worn by men in parts of the Arab world but particularly associated with Palestinians, for whom it has become something of a nationalist symbol.

Kunya:
The practice of naming a man or woman after a first-born son. A woman known as Umm Walid (mother of Walid) has an eldest son named Walid.

Kurd:
A non-Arabic, mostly Muslim people who inhabit the mountainous region between Iraq, Iran, Syria, Turkey and the former Soviet Union.

Maalimah:
In Egypt, a woman skilled in folk music and dance who passes her knowledge to others.

Madrassa:
School.

Magneh:
A cowl-like head covering worn, mostly in Iran, by women.

Majlis:
Gathering or council. Majlis-as-shura is a consultative council, the closest concept to parliament in Islamic teachings.

Makruh:
Religiously discouraged, disliked. If one does a makruh act, one won’t be punished as for a haram act; but if one refrains from it, one will be rewarded.

Maliki:
One of the major schools of Islamic thought.

Meuzzin:
One who sings or chants the call to prayer.

Minaret:
The spire of a mosque from which the meuzzin traditionally calls the faithful to prayer. In modern times, loudspeakers often broadcast recordings instead.

Minbar:
The pulpit in a mosque.

Mosque:
In Arabic,
masjid. A
place of Muslim worship. It may be a simple room or a magnificent marble edifice.

Mujtahid:
A religious scholar who is an authority on Islamic law and may advise others.

Mullah:
A clergyman or religious leader.

Muslim:
Literally, one who submits to God’s will and laws.

Mutawain:
Saudi Arabia’s religious police.

Muwazzaf:
A government bureaucrat.

Niqab:
A veil worn by women that completely covers the face.

Roosarie:
An Iranian name for a head scarf.

Salwar Kameez:
A calf-length tunic worn over pants.

Sharia:
Islamic law. Literally, the road to the water hole.

Shayla:
An Arabic word for head scarf.

Shehada:
The first pillar of the Islamic religion. Literally, profession of faith: “I testify there is no God but God and Muhammad is the messenger of God.”

Shiite:
Adherent to the Islamic faction that arose in the seventh century in a split over who should be caliph, or successor, to Muhammad. The Shiat, or partisans, of Ali ibn Abu Taleb, Muhammad’s cousin and son-in-law, believed that Ali was the legitimate successor and that the leadership should stay with Muhammad’s descendants. The number of Shiites worldwide is estimated at around ninety million, or some 9 percent of all Muslims. They are the overwhelming majority in Iran and a slight majority in Iraq, Dubai and Bahrain. Elsewhere, such as Lebanon and Saudi Arabia, they have traditionally been a disadvantaged minority.

Sigheh:
A temporary marriage recognized by Shiites.

Sunnah:
The traditions of the Prophet Muhammad. Those things he did himself, or approved of by him, or that were done in his presence without earning his disapproval.

Sunnat:
Recommended, desirable, in keeping with Muhammad’s traditions. One will not be punished for neglecting to do sunnat acts, but will be rewarded for doing them.

Sunni:
An orthodox Muslim. Literally, one who follows Muhammad’s tradition.

Talaq:
Divorce by repudiation. The husband merely repeats the words
“I
divorce you” three times.

Thobe:
The long robe, usually made of white cotton, worn by the men of the Arabian peninsula.

Ulema:
A body of religious scholars who interpret Islamic law for the community.

Umm:
Mother.

Ummah:
The worldwide Islamic community.

Wahabi:
Puritanical, ultraconservative movement founded in the 1740s in what is now Saudi Arabia by a preacher named Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahab. Women under Wahabism are denied many rights considered due to them according to more orthodox readings of the Koran and hadith. Backed by Saudi oil wealth, Wahabi teachings are increasingly influential throughout the Islamic world.

Wajib:
A religiously obligatory act. One will be punished in the afterlife for neglecting a wajib act such as daily prayer or annual alms-giving.

Zakkat:
Compulsory giving of charity to the poor. One of the five pillars of the Islamic faith, all Muslims are required to give a percentage of their wealth each year, usually calculated on net worth rather than annual income.