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Women in Islam: Hiding Her Story

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The discussion of women in Islam is a highly charged one. It is an issue infected with Orientalist and Islamophobic rhetoric about the assumed inferiority and subjugation of women intrinsic in Islam. Patriarchal and oppressive cultural norms are often couched in religious terminology and deemed “Islamic” in order to justify and validate them. However, notions that Islam is inherently oppressive to women are contradicted not only by an in-depth analysis of the Qur’ān but also by extensive evidence that demonstrates that women, during the formative years of Islam, enjoyed a high standing and were included in every aspect of life.

From the time of Prophet Muhammad, there were thousands of women scholars and jurists who exercised the same authority as men and taught male and female disciples, including judges and caliphs.1 Women who lived during the time of the Prophet, whose life example is seen by Muslims as the most perfect manifestation of the spirit of the Qur’ān,2 felt they had full rights and used to go to the mosque, pray next to men, pray in close proximity to the Prophet, fight in battles, teach men and women, move about freely, and interrupt scholars as they spoke to ask questions for which they demanded answers.

All this history has been forgotten or deliberately buried and erased. Recently, a conservative Sunni scholar of hadīthSheikh Mohammad Akram Nadwi, found written evidence of the existence of over nine thousand prominent women scholars and jurists who lived during the formative era of Islam. While in residence at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, Nadwi produced a forty-volume work on Muslim women scholars, jurists and prayer leaders.

This scholar, who studied in a traditional madrasa in Lucknow, India, came across countless mentions of women in early hadīth manuscripts and thus began to investigate, taking a detour from his intended work. He first assumed the detour would be a short one and that he would produce a small volume. However, he kept discovering more and more women scholars and concluded that “he does not know of another religious tradition in which women were so central, so present, so active in its formative history.”3

Nadwi explains that for centuries, women traveled intensively, fulfilling their religious duty of seeking knowledge and attending prestigious mosques and madrassas throughout the Islamic world.

Nadwi discovered a reality that surprised him and that is, unfortunately, quite different from the one many Muslim women experience today, primarily due to mistaken interpretations that aim at preserving patriarchal systems. Nadwi explains that for centuries, women traveled intensively, fulfilling their religious duty of seeking knowledge and attending prestigious mosques and madrassas throughout the Islamic world. The fact that over nine thousand women scholars were found by chance and are mentioned in writing means that there were countless more. It is commonly known that men did not want the names of their wives or daughters published.

Some interesting examples of the women scholars discovered by Nadwi are the following: In Samarkand, during the 12th century, Fatimah As-Samarqandiyyah, trained by her father in hadth and fiqh, used to teach men and women, train judges, and judge court cases. She also issued fatwās and advised her well known husband on how to issue his.

Another woman scholar, Umm Al-Darda, was a companion of the Prophet and a prominent jurist and hadth scholar in seventh-century Damascus and Jerusalem. Among her students was the caliph ‘Abd al-Mālik ibn Marwān. Umm Al-Darda was declared by Iyas ibn Mu’āwiya Al-Muzani, a qāḍī (Muslim judge) of undisputed ability and merit, known for her immense cleverness, to be a scholar superior to all the other scholars of the period.

In Medieval Mauritania, there is evidence of hundreds of girls who memorized books of fiqh by heart. Fatimah al-Batainiyyah was a fourteenth century Syrian scholar who taught men and women in the Prophet’s mosque in Medina. Students traveled from all over the Muslim world, some from as far as Fez, to study with her. She used to lean against the Prophet’s tomb as she taught, placing herself right beside the Prophet’s head.

A remarkable woman who took extremely seriously the duty to seek knowledge was Fatimah bint Sa’d al-Khayr. She traveled all over Asia studying with various prominent teachers, including another woman scholar in Isfahan, Fatimah al-Juzdaniyah, who was the primary narrator of a massive thirty-seven-volume hadth collections of Al-Tabarani. Al Juzdaniyah was a student of al-Tabarani, who characterized her scholarship as possessing one of the highest chains with the shortest links to the Prophet in her lifetime, which Fatimah bint Sa’d al Khayr learned and began to transmit as well.4

Throughout his life, the Prophet himself was surrounded by women he greatly respected. He constantly worked to raise their status. Ibn Ḥaẓm (994-1064), an Andalusian scholar who produced a reported four-hundred works on Islamic jurisprudence, history, ethics, comparative religion, and theology, cites a number of hadīths that prove that in the days of the Prophet, women moved freely and prayed next to men, a practice that has been curtailed today because it is viewed as “un-Islamic.”

Ibn Ḥaẓm describes a hadth where Caliph Umar wanted to prevent women from going to the mosque and was sternly rebuked by his father who stated it would be against the Prophet’s wishes. A hadth from the Prophet also narrated by Ibn Ḥaẓm states, “Do not prevent the women from going out to the mosques at night.” Ibn Ḥaẓm said that if the Prophet did not prevent women from going to the mosque, then it would be “a sin and bid’ah to do so in one’s own authority.”5

Ibn Hazm adduces a number of traditions that prove that in the days of the Prophet, women frequented the mosque together with men. He reports that, during this time, should anything happen during prayer, such as an error made by the imam, “men should praise God and women should clap their hands.” Similarly, a hadth reported in the Book of Muslim states that Umm Hisham said “I memorized sura Qaf from hearing it from the Prophet Muhammad because he used to recite it during his sermon on Fridays.” This is a clear indication that Umm Hisham stood in close proximity to the Prophet as there were no microphones or loudspeakers at the time. Finally, Ibn Abbas, the paternal cousin of the Prophet reported in a hadth with a strong chain of narration that “A beautiful woman, from among the most beautiful of women, used to pray behind the Prophet.”6

A striking example of the status and independence women had during the Prophet’s time is that of Nusaybah bint Kaab. Nusaybah was legendary for her bravery and military skills. She fought in numerous battles and in the battle of Uhud, saved the Prophet’s life. She was wounded severely while defending the Prophet and he said, “whenever I looked to my right or left, I would find Nusaybah fighting defensively” and praised her for her courage. Nusaybah was unwilling to stay at home while her husband and son went to battle, so she decided to join them. At first, her intention was to tend to the wounded and bring water to the warriors, but later, she proved invaluable in the battlefield and turned out to be highly skilled with the sword.7

It is thus clear from these and many other cases of female agency and freedom in the Islamic premodernity, that the problem of oppression does not lie in Islam and is not advocated by the Qur’ān.

It is thus clear from these and many other cases of female agency and freedom in the Islamic premodernity, that the problem of oppression does not lie in Islam and is not advocated by the Qur’ān. In fact, far from subjugating women, the Qur’ān can and should be read as liberating. It is not necessary to resort to secular or Western-style feminism to “empower” Muslim women. It is, however, of crucial importance to engage in interpretations that are in accordance with the Qur’ānic spirit.

Professor Asma Barlas, Ethica College NY

The strong refusal in the Qur’ān to perpetuate the religious depictions of God as a father-figure that exist in Judaism and Christianity, and the refusal to engender and sexualize God, can be understood as militating against patriarchy, which Asma Barlas considers to be “the chief instrument of women’s oppression in Muslim societies.”8

Barlas eloquently explains that it would be absurd for a God who is above sex and gender, who is Most Compassionate and Merciful, and will not transgress against the rights of others, to privilege men and take sexual partisanship. Even more absurd would be that this God should advocate the oppression of women. Not only does the Qur’ān not oppress women, “but it also affirms that women and men originated in the same self, have the same capacity for moral choice and personality and, as God’s vice-regents on earth, have a mutual duty to enjoin the right and forbid the wrong.”9

Not only does the Qur’ān not oppress women, “but it also affirms that women and men originated in the same self, have the same capacity for moral choice and personality and, as God’s vice-regents on earth, have a mutual duty to enjoin the right and forbid the wrong.”

The Qur’ān encompasses “a horizon of ethical possibilities and [counsels] to read it for its best meanings.”10 To put it simply, all interpretations that women should be subjugated, or their movements limited, or their choices controlled by men are erroneous interpretations: “Any religious opinion that tries to limit the rights or opportunities of any group of people is a false interpretation.”11

1  Nadwi, Mohammad Akram. Al-Muhaddithat: The Women Scholars in Islam. Oxford: Interface Publications, 2014.
2  His wife Aisha called him “the walking Qur’ān.”
 3  Power, Carla. If the Oceans Were Ink. New York: Holt Paperbacks: 2015, p. 130.
4  To clarify: Fatimah bint Sa’d al-Khayr was considered (by the student of Tarabani) to have one of the most reliable chains of transmission for the hadiths she narrated. Meaning, the hadiths she narrated were sound, and with relatively few links between the transmitter and the Prophet himself. It is essential for hadiths to have a sound chain of transmission (i.e., those who passed on the Prophet’s sayings must be reliable in character and sound mind and also, their narrations must have been confirmed by others…of course the closer in time to the Prophet the better a hadith’s chain is).
5  Marin, Manuela and Deguilhem, Randy, Eds. Writing the Feminine: Women in Arab Sources. London, New York: I.B. Tauris, 2002, p. 82., p. 83.
6  This hadīth was judged authentic by Sheikh Al-Albaani in his Silsilat Ahadeeth (Saheehah #2472). This hadīth was narrated by Ibn Majah, Abu Dawud, Attayalisy, Ahmad, and Tirmidhi among others.
7  Lings, Martin. Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources. London: Inner Traditions, 2006, p. 181.
8  Barlas, Asma. “Uncrossed bridges: Islam, feminism and secular democracy.” Philosophy and Social Criticism 39(4-5) 417–425, 2013, p. 421.
9  Ibid.
10 Ibid.
11 Abdulhameed, Sultan. The Qur’ān and the Life of Excellence. Denver: Outskirts Press, 2010, p. 207.

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Bibliography

Abdulhameed, Sultan. The Qur’ān and the Life of Excellence. Denver: Outskirts Press, 2010.

Barlas, Asma. “Uncrossed bridges: Islam, feminism and secular democracy.” Philosophy and Social Criticism 39(4-5) 417–425, 2013. 

Lings, Martin. Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources. London: Inner Traditions, 2006.

Marin, Manuela and Deguilhem, Randy, Eds. Writing the Feminine: Women in Arab Sources. London, New York: I.B. Tauris, 2002.

Nadwi, Mohammad Akram. Al-Muhaddithat: The Women Scholars in Islam. Oxford: Interface Publications, 2014.

Power, Carla. If the Oceans Were Ink. New York: Holt Paperbacks: 2015.

Source: https://insidearabia.com/women-in-islam-hiding-her-story/?fbclid=IwAR08tBUyb9xIfn5tZbRVMpo67Q1lgR8PHBGToNmY7WqvKFhCuq59-_cN2Gk

Women, home and the unimaginable in pandemic

By Lies Marcoes

For seven months now, the microscopic coronavirus has forced us to stop outdoor activities, work activities or studying. Morning rush hour has been sorely missed by some of us and many can no longer socialize or meet clients.
Suddenly, we have to adapt to these changes. Our lives now center on “home” and its “manager,” which is normatively associated with women.

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For those women who were already spending their days at home, working as homemakers, in these past seven months they have been forced to take on new jobs that were previously entrusted to others: to the state or semi-state institutions, the private sector, non-state entities, the community or the market.
Now, without warning, they have had to take over all these roles with virtually no preparation, without skills. They have to create a sense of comfort in the home, which has suddenly become an office, school, madrasah (Islamic school), prayer hall, Sunday school, a mini-church, playground, restaurant, public restroom, a place to receive basic healthcare services, a place for recreation and even a facility for relaxation like a massage parlor.
COVID-19 has forced us to change, but the change is neither familiar nor neutral. For certain income brackets, the economic change may not be felt too severely, as there are plenty of layers of fat left in their economic caloric reserves. But for many, this is a real disaster.

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I will bet that there will be a sharp increase in requests for loans from soft credit schemes and loan sharks. In the past two months, my WhatsApp feed was not just filled with news about A and B, whom I knew were receiving medical treatment or going into isolation because of being infected with COVID-19 but also requests for financial assistance just to buy food.
But the most powerful change, which is rarely noticed because the tool to observe it is unclear or unavailable, is the change in women’s lives as homemakers. This applies not just to those affected by this “disaster” but also to middleincome housewives who are nor
mally assumed to be not under so much financial stress.
One of my seniors who is studying the issues of the elderly, Ibu Saparinah Sadli, sent me a WhatsApp message asking me to think: What are elderly women to do now? For seven months now they have not met their friends, have no group activities, have not left the house, and have not even seen their children and grandchildren. This will accelerate the onset of senility.

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Many of these elderly ladies do not know how to use visual communication technology, and their adult children are busy with all their new duties, including managing their own kids who are studying from home. Imagine how it is for elderly women from poor families who live with their children and their families. Perhaps some of them have to take over some of the burden of house work from their daughters or daughters-inlaw because of the changes in the function of the home.
A middle-aged woman from a well-established family in Jakarta complains that her social activities have been disrupted. As a homemaker, she used to meet up with her friends and socialize but COVID-19 has stopped all this. For those who are suddenly solitary, this is almost unimaginable. Their existence lies not in themselves but in being with their community.

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This is a genuine but nameless disaster, something not considered suitable to complain about. So don’t be surprised if we see a sharp increase in requests for divorce during this COVID-19 era.
It’s been like this for seven months, with no end in sight. I truly empathize with young women, elderly women and middle-aged women whose lives have been shaken by the COVID-19 earthquake. I’m even more concerned because state officials don’t seem to care, or even notice, since they lack the sensitivity tools needed to read these shocks.
Yet if the tools to read them were sensitive, families that have children in school should be provided with intensive guidance on how to be teachers at home. They should receive compensation for teachers’ salaries and school fees, because they pay taxes and as citizens are entitled to the products of “the land and waters and the wealth contained therein”, which is utilized for the greatest possible prosperity of the people, according to the Constitution.
Housewives who are wives of employees should receive compensation for cleaning, electricity, rental of work space and office stationery. Likewise for the elderly or the middle-aged; they need to have some way out of the dead ends they face because their activities are halted. After all, haven’t they always contributed to keeping the economy and society running?

It has been seven months, and no one knows how much longer things will be like this. Radical changes are needed in how we look at the problems of women — those who manage the household — which are caused by COVID-19.
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Director of Rumah Kita Bersama Foundation

 

Source: https://www.thejakartapost.com/academia/2020/10/09/women-home-and-the-unimaginable-in-pandemic.html?utm_campaign=os&utm_source=mobile&utm_medium=android

Tilik and the gender order crisis

Tilik (The Visit, 2018), a short movie directed by Wahyu Agung Prasetyo, is a viral sensation in Indonesia. Within two weeks of being posted on YouTube, it attracted more than 20 million views.

 

The film follows a group of village women taking a trip to the city on the back of a truck to visit their female village head in hospital. During the journey, the women gossip about Dian, a pretty young woman in the village.

 

Tilik has stirred a public debate not only around representation of women and femininity but also around feminism in general. A number of feminists, including Intan Paramaditha and Feby Indirani, criticised the film for reinforcing negative stereotypes of women: that they are gossipers and annoyingly chatty, spread hoaxes, and lack media literacy.

 

Paramaditha, for example, invited her followers to situate the feminine stereotyping in the film in the larger context of cultural production, in which gender perspectives are almost absent. Feminist criticism of the film unfortunately turned into a heated, in some cases ugly, public debate involving feminists, film critics, and social media users. Even among feminists, views were divided on the film’s representation of gender.

 

The debate about Tilik is indicative of the unresolved crisis in Indonesia’s gender order. In my previous research on representations of ideal masculinities in Indonesia, I suggested that 2000-2014 was a vital period marked by a crisis in the gender order. During this period, ideological battles to secure hegemonic gender ideals intensified on various fronts, including cinema.

 

Six years on, the crisis remains unresolved, as the public debate stirred by Tilik demonstrates. This is indicated, on one hand, by the development of feminist film criticism and efforts to integrate gender perspectives into filmmaking, as a force to challenge stereotypical cinematic depictions of gender. And on the other hand, the debate is driven by a strong backlash attempting to preserve the status quo pattern of gender relations.

 

Gender order crisis is a concept in gender studies explaining processes of change in the pattern of gender relations. At the time of crisis, a gender order can be destroyed or restored by the outcome of the crisis.

 

Feminism has been an important force provoking changes in Indonesia’s “official” gender order, which centres on the family principle. The authoritarian New Order regime provided important institutional support to the maintenance of the official gender order. It did so by, for example, institutionalising men’s and women’s gender roles in the 1974 Marriage Law and supporting institutions that reinforced women’s reproductive role, like Dharma Wanita and the Family Welfare Movement (PKK).

 

Movements to advance women’s status and rights, motivated by feminist ideas, were allowed to develop only to a limited extent. For example, the regime facilitated the establishment of a junior ministry for women’s affairs in the late 1970s, following global pressure to promote women’s roles in state governance and politics. But the ministry had little power and a small budget.

 

When Soeharto’s authoritarian regime finally fell, state restrictions on feminist movements lessened. Feminism and its supporters become highly visible and stronger in post-authoritarian Indonesia. Feminists such as Musdah Mulia and Lies Marcoes Natsir were at the forefront of public debate surrounding Megawati Soekarnoputri’s rise to presidency and the affirmative action policy of a 30% quota for female candidates in elections.

 

Feminists have been instrumental in transforming the legal architecture, too, for example in the formulation and implementation of Law No. 23 of 2004 on the Elimination of Domestic Violence, and in advocacy for the gender equality and elimination of sexual violence bills.

 

In cinema, feminist filmmakers such as Nia Dinata and Mouly Surya have challenged masculine perspectives in filmmaking and representations of gender on the silver screen. Feminist film criticism, led by notable figures like Intan Paramadhita and Novi Kurnia, has also become as a strong force in raising awareness of gender perspectives and equality in cinema.

 

But the increasing visibility and significance of feminism has not been without contest. Ideological contestation surrounding gender relations has become extremely heated in post-authoritarian Indonesia. For example, growing Islamisation has fostered the development of Muslim feminist networks, while also posing challenges to the struggle for gender equality. Islamic discourse is often used to argue against laws aiming for gender equality and elimination of gender-based violence.

 

In cinema, too, Islamic discourse, among others, has been used to attack films that are critical of conventional gender relations, such as Nia Dinata’s Arisan! (2003), and Hanung Bramantyo’s Perempuan Berkalung Sorban (2009).

 

The criticism of Tilik offered by feminist film critics, and the backlash against them and feminism in general, is part of this gender order crisis. While feminist film critics attempted to inspire changes in Indonesian cinema and the broader cultural landscape, their ideas were criticised as foreign, elitist or unsuitable for Indonesia. They were accused of being social justice warriors and of ruining the fun of film consumption.

 

In several cases, the backlash against feminist film critics devolved into ad hominem attacks and catcalling. Unfortunately, such attacks are common against feminists on social media, especially those who vocally and critically engage with issues of gender inequality and gender-based violence. For example, Indonesian Solidarity Party (PSI) politician Tsamara Amani has repeatedly been subject to the same treatment when she has posted support for gender equality and the bill on the elimination of sexual violence.

 

Feminists and their opponents are engaged in a fierce battle for public opinion. Feminists are trying to inspire changes to realise gender equality, while their opponents attempt to preserve the established gender order. Advances in information and communication technology have made these ideological battles more visible and able to generate more extensive public engagement.

 

By placing the public debate around Tilik in the context of the gender order crisis, we can see that Indonesia is undergoing a critical period of social change. The deeply rooted pattern of gender relations fortified by the New Order is no longer taken for granted, despite its continued dominance. The official gender ideals projected by the state are being strongly challenged by emerging alternatives.

 

However, as the gender order crisis is unresolved, we are yet to see whether the existing gender order will be fundamentally transformed. What is certain, however, is Tilik will not be the last film to spark controversy for its depiction of gender relations.

 

Evi Eliyanah is a faculty member at Universitas Negeri Malang. Her research areas of interest include gender and cultural studies.

 

Source: https://indonesiaatmelbourne.unimelb.edu.au/tilik-and-the-gender-order-crisis/

Strengthening Religious Narratives in Support of Women’s Right to Work

On Thursday, 6 August 2020, Rumah KitaB, with support from Investing in Women (IW), an initiative of the Australian Government, held an online workshop with the theme “Gender, Islam, and Economic Empowerment of Women.” The purpose of the workshop was to inform foundational research for and the design of IW-backed campaigns for influencing gender norms (IGN) in support of women’s economic empowerment in Indonesia. Rumah KitaB is one of four organizations in Indonesia that IW is funding to implement such campaigns.

A total of 43 persons (8 men and 35 women) took part in the event, including representatives from Rumah KitaB and its network of researchers; IW and the three other IW-supported organizations in Indonesia for IGN campaigns—Sedap Films, Magdalene and Yayasan Pulih; the Indonesia Business Coalition for Women Empowerment; and other stakeholders. This three-hour event was facilitated by Lies Marcoes-Natsir, a gender expert and Executive Director of Rumah KitaB. The two resource persons also from Rumah KitaB were Achmat Hilmi and Fayyaz Mumtaz.

In opening the interactive workshop, Alison Aggarwal, IW’s Gender Advocacy Director, noted the strong interest from the IGN partners in Indonesia for discussions on how religious norms and interpretations of Islamic text and teaching inform the gender norms that limit the role of women and men at home, at work and in society. Alison also acknowledged Rumah KitaB’s experience and expertise in promoting religious narratives that address social challenges in Indonesia, such as child marriage and gender-based violence.

Lies then facilitated a discussion among participants about their experiences and observations on how religious views impede women from working. Participants talked about a range of issues, including that people now tend to push women to stay at home rather than working outside of home, and the view that men are the leaders of women (Arrijalu Qowwamuna Alan Nisa’), which is quoted from surah An-Nisa: 34.

The issues raised by participants were addressed throughout the workshop. In her first session, Lies shared a presentation on how the essential (biological) differences between men and women have been creatively interpreted by society through various forms of knowledge, including religion (tasawuf, fiqh, interpretation of the Qur’an). Menstruation, for example, is a biological occurrence, but in society or culture the monthly cycle experienced by women is given various meanings—including that women are impure, dirty or less logical because they bleed.

The essentialisation of men and women gives rise to “rules” or norms that inherently assign work roles based on gender. Lies noted that as social constructs, the gender roles of men and women (feminine-masculine, domestic-public, reproductive-productive), should be fluid but, because of essentialism, are seen as fixed, invariable and unalterable. Gender essentialism is also often justified using interpretations of religious texts that are closely intertwined with culture, politics and economics. Further, the roles assigned to men are considered superior to those associated with women. This stereotyping tend to subordinate women across social spheres. Stereotypes and subordination, Lies said, lead to other types of gender-based violence against women, such as physical violence, poverty, and double burdens of labour.

One of the ways to address the gender norms arising from religious views that essentialise women and men is the development of interpretations that empower rather than subordinate women. This was discussed by  Achmat Hilmi, who proposed maqashid syariah as an alternative “tool for reading” religious texts. Maqashid syariah works by not simply relying on the text itself but also at the same time considering the social reality in which the text was produced and understood, and also including a sense of spirituality. This way of reading that is offered by maqashid syariah clearly differs from the “literalist exclusive” way of reading, which tends to be rigid, and from an “eclectic” way of reading that selects only what is needed.

For example, a verse of the Qur’an that is often sued as a basis for domestication of sharia: al-Ahzab 33, which reads, “[O women] … and abide in your houses and do not display yourselves (and behave) as did the people of the former times of ignorance…” This verse is frequently used to “keep women at home.” This is traditionally interpreted to mean that women’s bodies can create disorder or temptation in society and  that the inherent nature of women is to stay at home. However, according to Hilmi, using maqashid syariah, the word “houses” in this verse could be interpreted to mean not only houses in the physical sense but, more broadly, the space in which women have agency. This interpretation could be used to advocate for workplaces, an economy and a society where women can participate without fear of sanctions.

Fayyaz Mumtaz supported the discussion on maqashid syariah by describing how Muslim women in the time of the Prophet Muhammad played an active role in society in many activities and lines of work. This historical example, he said, shows that there is no prohibition on women playing roles in the world of work.

Participants were then invited to ask questions or raise comments at the end of the session. One of the comments was, the participants found out that there are also verses from the Al-Qur’an and hadith that support gender equality. However, unfortunately these verses are less popular so that the religious preachers rarely use them.

In closing the session, IW highlighted the importance of discussions to highlight insights gathered from the implementation of the campaigns for influencing gender norms in support of women’s economic empowerment. IW foreshadowed follow-up sessions, particularly as Rumah KitaB and other IW partners complete their foundational research for their campaigns.  [] (NA)

 

 

 

After 36 years, who still remembers CEDAW?

Lies Marcoes

Director of Rumah Kita Bersama Foundation

The day before the commemoration of the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), which falls July 24, I exchanged greetings via WhatsApp with Ibu Saparinah Sadli and Nursyahbani Katjasungkana, two prominent figures in the implementation of this convention. I asked them which of the issues in CEDAW was most relevant nowadays, as this year marked the 36th anniversary of Indonesia’s passing the convention into law.

Ibu Sap, as we call her, was one of the most eminent persons, along with Ibu Achi Luhulima, the late Ibu TO Ichromi, the late Ibu Sumhadi, Ibu Syamsiah Ahmad, Nursyahbani, and several others, who were active in disseminating CEDAW.

But Ibu Sap sent a pessimistic message to me. “Other than activists and Komnas Perempuan [the National Commission on Violence against Women], are there still any government officials or legislators who remember CEDAW?” This question left me thinking. Indeed, who (still) remembers CEDAW today?

CEDAW is one of the most fundamental human rights agreements in the United Nations system of international agreements. It contains a guarantee of substantive equality for women through elimination of all forms of discrimination based on gender prejudice.

The UN adopted the convention in 1979. It is a global agreement that defines the principles of women’s rights as human rights. It contains norms and standards for the obligations and responsibilities of each state party for eliminating discrimination against women.

Indonesia passed the convention into  law on July 24, 1984 under Law No. 7/1984. Since then the convention became legally binding and mandated Indonesia to take efforts to eliminate gender-based discrimination against women and to report its progress. The government has an obligation to produce reports on developments in its implementation of elimination of gender discrimination.

Ibu Sap’s question is therefore relevant here. We simply need to ensure that the government is really doing something to eliminate gender-based discrimination and report it to the CEDAW Committee at the UN. As far as I know, Indonesia has often failed to submit the reports.

The most relevant issues with regard to discriminatory practices actually remain the same from year to year. Nursyahbani has reminded us about two important issues. First is eliminating stereotyping of women, which is currently becoming even more serious due to the rise in primordial and conservative religious views in defining the roles and status of women.

Rumah KitaB is currently conducting research in five regions to see how gender norms are applied to women, particularly women who work. Statistics show that women’s participation in the (formal) work force only stands at 58 percent against 80 percent for men.

The participation rate is stagnant in the productive years, particularly for women who hold mid-level positions. They resign after they marry and have children. Their income is too low to hire a nanny to care for their children, while the state also fails to provide safe and inexpensive day care centers.

The other even more serious problem is the growing belief that a “good” woman is one who stays at home. A process of “domestification” is occurring as a result of conservative ideological views based on religious arguments.

We should be thankful that the legal age for marriage has now been set at 19 for both males and females. Yet the efforts to prevent child marriage still require hard work, as 20 regions still record an inexcusably high rate of child marriage.

In fact, the Marriage Law needs an overhaul as it condones gender inequality. The law contains an article which explicitly states that the man (husband) is the head of the household, while the woman (wife) is a housewife. This definition leads to practices that are incredibly discriminatory against women, with far-reaching consequences, including in the world of work.

Normatively, women are always seen merely as supplementary breadwinners, whatever their actual marital status. In reality, there are many women who head households, whether married, single, abandoned by husbands or divorced, and are the main earners of support for their families. The Women Breadwinner Empowerment (PEKKA) Foundation has reported a rise in the number of members, and the average age of women breadwinners is getting lower.

Given their “supplementary” status, working women in every sector are vulnerable to marginalization or exclusion. And even when they manage to perform, they lack sufficient bargaining power to support themselves as employees. They are also vulnerable to violence, including sexual assault.

For Indonesia, CEDAW is indeed a pearl of great price. Efforts are needed to explore it further. The outreach on CEDAW needs to be mobilized again, as its pioneers did in the early 1990s. Some of them were grouped under the Women’s Studies Center of the University of Indonesia, who partnered with NGOs concerned with the issue of elimination of gender discrimination.

Implementation of CEDAW should not be entrusted to state institutions, such as the Women’s Empowerment and Child Protection Ministry, because discriminatory practices continue to occur everywhere. We need a large-scale campaign on the benefits of the implementation of CEDAW for fulfillment of women’s rights, with achievements that will be duly noted by the UN and by countries that are concerned about gender-based discrimination.

***

The writer is researcher at Rumah KitaB. The original article was published on rumahkitab.com.

What the Pandemic Reveals About the Male Ego

Why are the rates of coronavirus deaths far lower in many female-led countries?

By 

Opinion Columnist

President Tsai Ing-wen of Taiwan at a military base this spring amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Credit…Ritchie B. Tongo/EPA, via Shutterstock

 

Are female leaders better at fighting a pandemic?

I compiled death rates from the coronavirus for 21 countries around the world, 13 led by men and eight by women. The male-led countries suffered an average of 214 coronavirus-related deaths per million inhabitants. Those led by women lost only one-fifth as many, 36 per million.

If the United States had the coronavirus death rate of the average female-led country, 102,000 American lives would have been saved out of the 114,000 lost.

“Countries led by women do seem to be particularly successful in fighting the coronavirus,” noted Anne W. Rimoin, an epidemiologist at U.C.L.A. “New Zealand, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Norway have done so well perhaps due to the leadership and management styles attributed to their female leaders.”

Let’s start by acknowledging that there have been plenty of wretched female leaders over the years. Indeed, according to research I once did for a book, female leaders around the world haven’t been clearly better than male counterparts even at improving girls’ education or reducing maternal mortality.

There has been solid research that it makes a difference to have more women on boards and in grass-roots positions, but evidence that they make better presidents or prime ministers has been lacking — until Covid-19 came along.

It’s not that the leaders who best managed the virus were all women. But those who bungled the response were all men, and mostly a particular type: authoritarian, vainglorious and blustering. Think of Boris Johnson in Britain, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Iran and Donald Trump in the United States.

Virtually every country that has experienced coronavirus mortality at a rate of more than 150 per million inhabitants is male-led.

“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that some of the best-run places have been run by women: New Zealand, Germany, Taiwan,” mused Susan Rice, who was national security adviser under President Barack Obama. “And where we’ve seen things go most badly wrong — the U.S., Brazil, Russia, the U.K. — it’s a lot of male ego and bluster.”

I think the divergence has a great deal to do with that ego and bluster.

“We often joke that men drivers never ask for directions,” observed Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel of the University of Pennsylvania. “I actually think there’s something to that also in terms of women’s leadership, in terms of recognizing expertise and asking experts for advice, and men sort of barreling ahead like they got it.”

He has a point. Those leaders who handled the virus best were those who humbly consulted public health experts and acted quickly, and many were women; in contrast, male authoritarians who botched the response were suspicious of experts and too full of themselves.

“I really get it,” Trump said when he visited the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in March. Surrounded by medical experts, he added, “Maybe I have natural ability,” and he wondered aloud if he should have become a scientist.

(Given that Trump said in January that Covid-19 was “totally under control,” he has his answer. And peer review might not have been kind to his ideas about bleach.)

Jacinda Ardern, prime minister of New Zealand.

Credit…Pool photo by Mark Mitchell

Angela Merkel, Germany’s chancellor.

Credit…Pool photo by Andreas Gora

While women have generally outshone men as international leaders, that does not seem true within the United States. Some female governors have done better, others worse, so there isn’t an obvious gender gap at home.

It’s also possible that this isn’t about female leaders but about the kind of country that chooses a woman to lead it.

Companies with more female executives on average perform better than those with fewer women, but analysts think that the reason isn’t just the brilliance of women leaders. Rather, companies that are culturally open to having senior women are also more willing to embrace other innovations, and it may be this innovative spirit that leads to higher profitability. Likewise, countries willing to elect female prime ministers may be those more inclined to listen to epidemiologists.

Yet I think that there’s also a difference in the leadership itself.

“Women lead often in a very different style from men,” said Margot Wallstrom, a former Swedish foreign minister, citing examples from Norway, Germany and New Zealand of women with low-key, inclusive and evidence-based leadership.

Wallstrom also noted that public health is a traditional “home turf” concern for many women leaders. Grant Miller, an expert in health economics at Stanford University, found that as states, one by one, granted the vote to women in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, those states then also invested more in sanitation and public health — saving some 20,000 children’s lives a year. Boys were thus huge beneficiaries of women’s suffrage.

One trap for female politicians is that brashness can be effective for male candidates, but researchers find that male and female voters alike are turned off by women who seem self-promotional. That forces women in politics to master the art of communicating effectively in a low-key way — just what’s needed in a pandemic.

“Perhaps the skills that have led them to reach the top,” said Rimoin, the U.C.L.A. epidemiologist, “are the same skills that are currently needed to bring a country together.”

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.

Nicholas Kristof has been a columnist for The Times since 2001. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes, for his coverage of China and of the genocide in Darfur. You can sign up for his free, twice-weekly email newsletter and follow him on InstagramHis latest book is “Tightrope: Americans Reaching for Hope.” @NickKristofFacebook

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/13/opinion/sunday/women-leaders-coronavirus.html

Why Are Women (Still) Comfortable in Islam?

By Lies Marcoes (Researcher, Rumah KitaB)

Please show where and how women are placed with dignity in the conceptual framework (epistemology) of Islam? This question resounded in my mind following the discussion of Dr. Zahra Ayubi’s book Gendered Morality: Classical Islamic Ethics of the Self, Family and Society, (Columbia University, July 2019). This is not some strange or eccentric query, but rather an accusation that demands an honest answer. Where?The virtual discussion was held on the morning of 20 May 2020 by WE LEAD, an empowerment network of seven feminist NGOs, three of which are Islam-based. We all perceive the strong rising tide of fundamentalism that threatens women’s bodies and existence as well as the diversity of Indonesia. This was truly a very special discussion, in terms of the quality of the book, the discussants, and the dialogue. Dr. Ayubi herself participated throughout the discussion, even though it was before dawn in California. The discussion was led and notes were provided by Ulil Abshar Abdalla, M.A., who has for the past several years been an expert on Imam Ghazali’s work Ngaji Ihlya. It was important to have kyai Ulil involved, because one of the texts discussed in Gendered Morality is the works of Abu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazali, better known as Imam Ghazali. Meanwhile, Dr. amina wadud (who officially prefers her name written without capital letters), serving as one of the discussants, led the discussion straight to the heart of the problem. She asked Dr. Ayubi to explain about her motivation, the basis of her arguments, and her analysis of the three texts of tasawuf (mysticism) she explored: Kimiya’i Sa’adat by Imam Ghazali, Akhlaaq-i Nasiri by Nasiruddin Tusi, and Akhlaaq-i Jalali by Jalaluddin Davani. These last two books are more popular in Iran.In his introduction to the discussion, kyai Ulil- and I concurred,  explained that mysticism has long been considered a discipline that is friendly toward women – for example, by presenting the “feminine side” of God. For many Muslim feminists, tasawuf is a branch of knowledge that can help to console them in their frustration with the teachings of Islam in other areas, which are often misogynistic and patriarchal. For example, in fiqh or dogma, women are discussed by first of all positioning them as subordinate to men. A woman is the property of her father or of some other man in his line of descent, or of her husband. Women are deemed to be only half the equal of men, and this assumption pervades practical matters such as giving testimony, inheritance rights, polygamy, and not being allowed to lead communal prayers. Sachiko Murata’s book The Tao of Islam is a study on Islamic spirituality that explores the balance of Yin and Yang and the masculine and feminine aspects in the characteristics of God. Other books, such as My Soul is a Woman by Annemarie Schimmel, also explore the feminine aspect in Islamic spirituality. But Dr. Zahra’s study and analysis leads to a very different conclusion. The construction of the teachings on akhlak (ethics), as explored in these three mystical works, is full of male-centered bias. The entire conceptual framework of thinking in mysticism about ethics solely discusses how men should behave and achieve superior moral character. In her book, she presents evidence of how these medieval Islamic intellectuals created a system of ethical philosophy that inherently has gender implications by ignoring the experience of women as subjects.

Ayubi’s study is very important and counts as new because until now, scholars of Islam who explore the issues of gender have generally criticized the patriarchal interpretations of the Qur’an, the hadith, or traditions of fiqh. In the Sufi teachings as portrayed in the three works she studied, the ideal concept of a human is a man who is able to control his passions. Such an attribute can only be achieved by the elite (the nobility, higher social classes), because only these upper classes are considered intellectually capable to grasp the concepts of philosophy and to achieve realization as persons of noble character.

 

Methodologically, what Ayubi has done is to “interrogate” the text. To be able to analyze how gender is understood in the texts, she first examined the masculinity and the class bias contained in the texts, particularly how men – and specifically, men from the elite class, in terms of wealth, education, and power – are conditioned from birth to become patriarchs/ leaders in society. It is important to recognize here that the issue is not simply that women are not included in a given text, but rather how, overall, the texts on ethical behavior require a certain form of relationship that is based on the subordination of others (for example, wives or slaves) to men in the effort to become more ethical.

 

According to Ayubi, in the understanding of mysticism, the studies of akhlak and fiqh occupy different “strata”. Fiqh is seen as discourse on ethics for the common people, who do not need heavy ideas but just require practical guidelines on what is and is not permitted; in contrast, akhlak is seen as discourse on ethics that is formulated by philosophical thinking, and therefore is intended only for the upper classes/ nobles. In her research, Ayubi concluded that the discourse on ethics in tasawuf suffers not only from male gender bias but also from class bias, because it is oriented toward the male elite. Obviously, the discussion of akhlak does include some discussion of women, and also of slaves. But the main thrust of these studies is on how a man should act ethically when facing (the temptations of) women or slaves. Hence, women are discussed in their role as the touchstone to test the quality of a man’s ethics, as a direct object to test the purity of men’s souls.

 

The concept of akhlak in mysticism is “refinement of nafs” (purification of the heart). Kyai Ulil added that the process of purification of the heart in tasawuf consists of three concepts: takholi (cleansing the heart of negative characteristics), takhali (filling it with good characteristics), and tajali (the peak of human endeavor, becoming a person who always acts ethically). amina wadud explained how this relates to the concept of Insaan Kamil, the ideal person, which revolves around purification of the hearts of men. According to Zahra, this “refinement of nafs” is in fact a concept that is solely for cleansing the hearts of men. In this way, no different from the epistemology in the fields of fiqh and tafsir, the texts on akhlak in tasawuf are full of misogyny and gender bias.

 

According to Dr. Ayubi, essentially the discipline of ethics (akhlak) offers a basic perspective on the meaning of being human, especially in the concept of dien according to Islam, which offers a way and a path of life for all humans. But apart from this rich discourse on ethics, there are still many other assumptions that need to be unpacked so that the humanity of every person can be fully recognized, so that this discourse can contribute to answering how to achieve the superiority and nobility of humankind in the perspective of Islam, i.e. as insaan kamil as mentioned by amina wadud.

 

Dr. Ayubi notes that in these texts, the question of gender can be raised not only in those matters that often discuss women, such as marriage, but in fact in all aspects discussed in the texts. Everything includes the issue of gender. She sees that, first, although the texts she studied were written in Persian, in which the pronouns do not literally distinguish between masculine and feminine, when we read them in context it is evident that these texts specifically refer only to males. For example, when discussing how to be a better person and Muslim, or when discussing the concept of nafs (the psyche) and how to control it, what is actually meant by the text is how to become a better Muslim male and be able to control one’s nafs. As another example, in the discussion on society, such as how to be a good leader and how to deal with opponents, the entire context is men’s leadership in society.

 

Second, the construction of akhlak in Islamic tradition as a way of life has to date been an exclusive effort. The ethical discourse aimed at purifying and upgrading oneself continues to exclude other groups based on gender, ability, rationality, social class, and race.

 

Rationality is one aspect that causes women to be treated unequally in the epistemological constructs of tasawuf, as in the other epistemologies (Fiqh, Aqidah, Philosophy, Politics). In fact, all these epistemological constructs focus on rationality. Perhaps this is why women are excluded in the texts. In fact, rationality should have no gender and need not always follow the same path.

 

But women’s reproductive capabilities, such as menstruation, pregnancy, giving birth, postnatal confinement, which are recognized in the text of the Qur’an as extremely burdensome events, “wahnan ‘ala wahnin”, have been used as a unilateral argument that women’s rationality is lower. This also relates to the ways in which women are obstructed in performing worship. The reproductive events that women experience have been used as a judgement on their inequality with men. Their essential ability has become a stigma implying that women are less rational than men, as well as further implications departing from the same prejudice – doubting their rationality.

 

For Dr. Nur Rofiah, one of the initiators of KUPI (Congress of Indonesian Women Ulama), Zahra’s book further reinforces her view that there are problems within Islam’s system of knowledge, including in mysticism, which has until now been considered neutral. It turns out that tasawuf is also characterized by a masculine awareness (using males as the standard). For many centuries, the experience of women with their bodies and their reproductive capability has not been taken into account in the system of teachings/ knowledge of Islam. The long history of human civilization, including Islamic civilization, is characterized by a tradition that “does not treat women as human”. This gives rise to a collective view (including in women’s own thinking) that men are considered the standard for women’s humanity.

 

Yet women’s biological and social experiences, such as giving birth and nursing their children, as well as their social implications, are never experienced by men. Women’s experience with reproduction seldom even enters into men’s awareness. Meanwhile, men hold strategic positions, including in constructing the concepts of knowledge. It is this situation that creates the gaps and differences in determining the standards of benefit in gender relations. The concept of “maslahat” (benefit, advantage) relies entirely on the standard of males. The most obvious example is that when determining permission for polygamy, in terms of both ethics/ fiqih and akhlak, polygamy is justified because women have certain time restrictions for engaging in sexual relations. Rather than having some empathy for women who are menstruating, pregnant, or in post-partum seclusion, men perceive that these obstacles interfere with their own benefit, and they therefore formulate their rights themselves so that they can continue to enjoy having sex whenever they feel they need it. On this basis, they formulate polygamy as a right that is permitted for men. Another example is marriages between young girls and adult men. This practice, which creates suffering and trauma for the girls, is considered beneficial because such marriages bring benefit to men, who feel they have the right to repeatedly deflower virgins by marrying young girls!

The importance of reproduction for the survival of living creatures, which brings with it many biological experiences for women, will never be compatible with the concepts of akhlak according to masculine bodies and experience. For amina wadud, a rereading of this issue requires us to radically integrate the bodily experiences of all humankind (not just women) in constructing an understanding of humankind, insaan kamil, and then enhancing it so that spiritual refinement is not allocated only to formal rituals of worship.

 

Returning to the question I raised earlier, if women are treated so badly in the epistemology of Islam, why are women (still) comfortable being in Islam?

Dr. Zahra Ayubi stated that texts such as the ones she explored should not automatically be ignored. An effort is needed to reexamine them critically and in depth, and to raise critical questions at a more philosophical and cosmic level. We can ask what the ethical basis is in interpreting the meaning of being a Muslim, what is the purpose of human existence, and what it means to surrender oneself to Allah. She recommends that Muslim intellectuals should collectively and sincerely think about a more inclusive philosophy of ethics that does not merely construct happiness based on the concept of use of reason (such that rationality holds the most important position and neglects other kinds of experience). The current definition of akhlak is problematic, because it excludes the experience of women.

 

Ideally, the texts on akhlak should be able to acknowledge the diversity of humankind – not just in terms of gender, but also race, ability, and class. The recognition of this diversity could give rise to a diversity of standards – not just a single standard for achieving “refinement”. And this would be more appropriate, because the various differences, social constructs, and structural challenges will lead to differences in defining the obstacles each individual faces in achieving the potential of their nafs.

 

I held a virtual discussion with several of my feminist colleagues. They provided some answers that seem quite reasonable to me. The most common answer was that women lack the courage or willingness to leave Islam, because the ties that bind them are so tight and strong. Imagine: from the day she is born, the first stones are laid in the walls that guard her; she is the daughter (binti) of a particular father, and the entire family line of the patriarchal hierarchy feels they have rights over her. Starting even as a baby, she is told of her obligation to maintain the dignity of the family, and then of ever-widening circles, until she must protect the reputation of the entire “Muslim community”. If she chooses to become an apostate, for example, how many people will feel they have the right to punish her? In this sense, the question of “comfortable or not” becomes irrelevant.

Second was an answer which asserts that within religion there are in fact aspects of affection, warmth, a feeling of peace, a devout relationship between individual women and their God. This experience is not codified as a discipline of knowledge, nor is it institutionalized. This is because women’s experience is not known by the men who have for so long constructed the epistemology of Islam. These aspects of warmth in religion live and are passed on as a secret among women from generation to generation. The experience of reproduction is something only they experience, which they do not share with those who will never be able to understand it (men) and who consider it a taboo subject. They choose to maintain an internal love, with their Creator, whom they treat as their beloved.

Another option is to leave Islam and take up some other religion or ideology that defends women, such as secular philosophy and thinking that is based on the legal system. But such an option does not necessarily provide space for women. And finally, and I think this is the path that is now being pursued by feminist Muslims, including Dr. Zahra Ayubi: seize the tafsir (interpretation)! The epistemology of Islam already offers a wealth of methodologies that can be criticized and reused to provide a critique that presents the experiences of women as valid truth. In this way, the epistemology of Islam can be reexamined and reconstructed! []

 

What Do Countries With The Best Coronavirus Responses Have In Common? Women Leaders

Looking for examples of true leadership in a crisis? From Iceland to Taiwan and from Germany to New Zealand, women are stepping up to show the world how to manage a messy patch for our human family. Add in Finland, Iceland and Denmark, and this pandemic is revealing that women have what it takes when the heat rises in our Houses of State. Many will say these are small countries, or islands, or other exceptions. But Germany is large and leading, and the UK is an island with very different outcomes. These leaders are gifting us an attractive alternative way of wielding power. What are they teaching us?

 

Truth

Angela Merkel, the Chancellor of Germany, stood up early and calmly told her countrymen that this was a serious bug that would infect up to 70% of the population. “It’s serious,” she said, “take it seriously.” She did, so they did too. Testing began right from the get go. Germany jumped right over the phases of denial, anger and disingenuousness we’ve seen elsewhere. The country’s numbers are far below its European neighbours, and there are signs they may be able to start loosening restrictions relatively soon.

Decisiveness

List of Countries with Female Leaders and Coronavirus death rates

Data from the European Centre for Disease Control as of April 12, 2020

 20-FIRST

 

Among the first and the fastest moves was Tsai Ing-wen’s in Taiwan. Back in January, at the first sign of a new illness, she introduced 124 measures to block the spread, without having to resort to the lockdowns that have become common elsewhere. She is now sending 10 million face masks to the US and Europe. Tsai managed what CNN has called “among the world’s best” responses, keeping the epidemic under control, still reporting only six deaths.

Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand was early to lockdown and crystal clear on the maximum level of alert she was putting the country under – and why. She imposed self-isolation on people entering New Zealand astonishingly early, when there were just 6 cases in the whole country, and banned foreigners entirely from entering soon after. Clarity and decisiveness are saving New Zealand from the storm. As of mid-April they have suffered only four deaths, and where other countries talk of lifting restrictions, Ardern is adding to them, making all returning New Zealanders quarantine in designated locations for 14 days.

Tech

Iceland, under the leadership of Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir, is offering free coronavirus testing to all its citizens, and will become a key case study in the true spread and fatality rates of Covid-19. Most countries have limited testing to people with active symptoms. Iceland is going whole hog. In proportion to its population the country has already screened five times as many people as South Korea has, and instituted a thorough tracking system that means they haven’t had to lockdown… or shut schools.

Sanna Marin became the world’s youngest head of state when she was elected last December in Finland. It took a millennial leader to spearhead using social media influencers as key agents in battling the coronavirus crisis. Recognising that not everyone reads the press, they are inviting influencers of any age to spread fact-based information on managing the pandemic.

 

Love

Norway’s Prime Minister, Erna Solberg, had the innovative idea of using television to talk directly to her country’s children. She was building on the short, 3-minute press conference that Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen had held a couple of days earlier. Solberg held a dedicated press conference where no adults were allowed. She responded to kids’ questions from across the country, taking time to explain why it was OK to feel scared. The originality and obviousness of the idea takes one’s breath away. How many other simple, humane innovations would more female leadership unleash?

Generally, the empathy and care which all of these female leaders have communicated seems to come from an alternate universe than the one we have gotten used to. It’s like their arms are coming out of their videos to hold you close in a heart-felt and loving embrace. Who knew leaders could sound like this? Now we do.

Now, compare these leaders and stories with the strongmen using the crisis to accelerate a terrifying trifecta of authoritarianism: blame-“others”, capture-the-judiciary, demonize-the-journalists, and blanket their country in I-will-never-retire darkness (Trump, Bolsonaro, Obrador, Modi, Duterte, Orban, Putin, Netanyahu…).

There have been years of research timidly suggesting that women’s leadership styles might be different and beneficial. Instead, too many political organisations and companies are still working to get women to behave more like men if they want to lead or succeed. Yet these national leaders are case study sightings of the seven leadership traits men may want to learn from women.

It’s time we recognised it – and elected more of it.

 

Source:https://www.forbes.com/sites/avivahwittenbergcox/2020/04/13/what-do-countries-with-the-best-coronavirus-reponses-have-in-common-women-leaders/?fbclid=IwAR36nQtLPGG827vxLnIWjFtsGLBaDMV02oMKY5W48IDKD48DlGhcZRuz11E#48e867943dec

A woman’s greatest enemy? A lack of time to herself

If what it takes to create are long stretches of time alone, that’s something women have never had the luxury to expect

 

A few months ago, as I struggled to carve out time in my crowded days for writing, a colleague suggested I read a book about the daily rituals of great artists. But instead of offering me the inspiration I’d hoped for, what struck me most about these creative geniuses – mostly men – was not their schedules and daily routines, but those of the women in their lives.

Their wives protected them from interruptions; their housekeepers and maids brought them breakfast and coffee at odd hours; their nannies kept their children out of their hair. Martha Freud not only laid out Sigmund’s clothes every morning, she even put the toothpaste on his toothbrush. Marcel Proust’s housekeeper, Celeste, not only brought him his daily coffee, croissants, newspapers and mail on a silver tray, but was always on hand whenever he wanted to chat, sometimes for hours. Some women are mentioned only for what they put up with, like Karl Marx’s wife – unnamed in the book – who lived in squalor with the surviving three of their six children while he spent his days writing at the British Museum.

Gustav Mahler married a promising young composer named Alma, then forbade her from composing, saying there could be only one in the family. Instead, she was expected to keep the house utterly silent for him. After his midday swim, he’d whistle for Alma to join him on long, silent walks while he composed in his head. She’d sit for hours on a branch or in the grass, not daring to disturb him. “There’s such a struggle going on in me!” Alma wrote in her diary. “And a miserable longing for someone who thinks OF ME, who helps me to find MYSELF! I’ve sunk to the level of a housekeeper!”

Unlike the male artists, who moved through life as if unfettered time to themselves were a birthright, the days and life trajectories of the handful of female artists featured in the book were often limited by the expectations and duties of home and care. George Sand always worked late at night, a practice that started when she was a teenager and needed to take care of her grandmother. Starting out, Francine Prose’s writing day was defined by the departure and return of her children on the school bus. Alice Munro wrote in the “slivers” of time she could find between housekeeping and childrearing. And Maya Angelou got away from the pull of home by leaving it altogether, checking herself into an unadorned hotel room to think, read and write.

Even Anthony Trollope, who famously wrote 2,000 words before 8am every morning, most likely learned the habit from his mother, who began writing at age 53 to support her sick husband and their six children. She rose at 4am and finished work in time to serve the family breakfast.

I think of all the books, paintings, music, scientific discoveries, philosophy I learned about in school – almost all by men. The conductor Zubin Mehta once said, “I just don’t think women should be in an orchestra,” as if they didn’t have the temperament, or the talent. (Blind auditions put an end to that notion.) I think of an interview Patti Scialfa gave on how difficult it was for her to write the music for her solo album because her kids kept interrupting her and demanding her time in a way that they never would of their father, Bruce Springsteen. And it strikes me: it’s not that women haven’t had the talent to make their mark in the world of ideas and art. They’ve never had the time.

Women’s time has been interrupted and fragmented throughout history, the rhythms of their days circumscribed by the sisyphean tasks of housework, childcare and kin work – keeping family and community ties strong. If what it takes to create are long stretches of uninterrupted, concentrated time, time you can choose to do with as you will, time that you can control, that’s something women have never had the luxury to expect, at least not without getting slammed for unseemly selfishness.

Even today, around the globe, with so many women in the paid labor force, women still spend at least twice as much time as men doing housework and childcare, sometimes much more. One study of 32 families in Los Angeles found that the uninterrupted leisure time of most mothers lasted, on average, no more than 10 minutes at a stretch. And in mapping the daily lives of academics, the sociologist Joya Misra and her colleagues found that the work days of the female professors were much longer than their male colleagues, once you factored in all their unpaid labor at home. Even so, she found that the men and women she studied spent about the same amount of time at their paid work. But the women’s time at work, too, was interrupted and fragmented, chopped up with more service work, mentoring and teaching. The men spent more of their work days in long stretches of uninterrupted time to think, research, write, create and publish to make their names, advance their careers and get their ideas out into the world.

In his Theory of the Leisure Class, Thorstein Veblen wrote that throughout history the people who had the ability to choose and control their time were high-status men. He dismissed women on page two, writing that they, along with the servants and the slaves, have always been responsible for the drudge work that enables those high-status men to think their great thoughts. Feminist researchers have argued that women have often had, at most, “invisible leisure” – enjoyable, but productive and socially sanctioned, activities like quilting bees, canning parties or book groups. Yet pure leisure, making time just for oneself, is nothing short of a courageous act of radical and subversive resistance. Easier to do, one researcher joked, if, like the writer, composer, philosopher and mystic Hildegard of Bingen, you became a nun.

Feminist researchers have also found that many women don’t feel that they deserve long stretches of time to themselves, the way men do. They feel they have to earn it. And the only way to do that is to get to the end of a To Do list that never ends: the chores of the day, as Melinda Gates writes in her new book, killing the dreams of a lifetime. Indeed, I’ve been trying to carve out time to think and write this essay for more than four months. Every single time I’ve sat down to start, I’ve gotten a panicked call or email from my husband, son or daughter; my mother, dealing with the strange frontier and endless paperwork of the newly widowed; a credit card company; or a mechanic about some emergency or other that requires my immediate attention to stave off certain disaster.

I remember interviewing psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, famed for identifying the state of flow, the peak human experience when one is so absorbed in a meaningful task that time effectively disappears. It’s the state that artists and thinkers say is a requirement for creating anything of value. I asked him if his research explored whether women had as much opportunity to get into flow as men. He thought for a moment, then told me a story of a woman who lost track of time as she ironed her husband’s shirts.

The poet Eleanor Ross Taylor lived her life in the shadow of her husband, the Pulitzer prize-winning novelist, short story writer and professor Peter Taylor. “Over the years, many times I would say to poems, ‘Go away, I don’t have time now,’” she told an interviewer in 1997. “But that was part laziness. If you really want to write, you can. I did keep the house scrubbed and waxed and that sort of thing.”

I feel such a sense of loss when I think of the great, unwritten poems that took a backseat to polished floors. And for a long time, I thought the expectation that others be tended to first and the floors be polished and that she was the one who was supposed to keep them that way was what kept those untold stories coiled inside her, compressed, as Maya Angelou writes, to the point of pain. But I wonder if it isn’t also that women feel they don’t deserve time to themselves, or enough of it that comes in unbroken stretches. I wonder if we also feel we don’t deserve to tell our untold stories, that they may not be as worth listening to.

The writer VS Naipaul claimed that no woman writer was his match, that women’s writing is too “sentimental”, their worldview too “narrow” – because, you know, men’s lives are the default for the human experience. And I’ve often wondered: would a woman who’d written a carefully observed six-volume novel based on her own life have received the same attention and international acclaim as the Norwegian writer Karl Ove Knausgaard, author of My Struggle?

Virginia Woolf once imagined what would have become of Shakespeare were he born a woman, or if he’d had an equally gifted sister. (Think of the musical prodigy Nannerl Mozart, whose early compositions her brother Wolfgang praised as “beautiful” but have been lost, or remained coiled inside, unwritten, as she disappeared into an expected but loveless marriage.)

The female Shakespeare, Woolf wrote, would never have had the time or the ability to develop her genius – barred from school, told to mind the stew, expected to marry young, and beaten if she didn’t. In Woolf’s telling, Shakespeare’s sister, despite her great gifts, wound up crazy, dead, or shut up in a cottage in the woods and mocked as a witch.

But that wasn’t the end of the story. Woolf imagined that, in the future, a woman with genius would be born. Her ability to blossom – and the expectation that her voice, her vision, was worthy – would depend entirely on the world we decided to create. “She would come if we worked for her,” Woolf wrote.

I do not claim to have any particular genius. But sometimes, I dream that I’m sitting in a dusky room at a kitchen table across from another version of me, who sits, unbound by time, quietly drinking a cup of tea. “I wish you’d visit more often,” she tells me. And I wonder if that searing middle-of-the-night pain that, at times, settles like dread around my solar plexus may not only be because there’s so little unbroken time to tell my own untold stories, but because I’m afraid that what may be coiled inside may not be worth paying attention to anyway. Perhaps that’s what I don’t want to face in that dusky room I dream of.

I also wonder: what if we really did do the work to create a world where the sisters of Shakespeare and Mozart, or any woman, really, could thrive? What would happen if we decided women deserved the time to go to their dusky rooms and stay awhile at the kitchen table? What if we all decided to visit more often, drinking a quiet cup of tea with ourselves, listening to the coil of stories as they unspool, knowing they have value simply because they’re true? I’d love to see what happens next.

  • Brigid Schulte is a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist for The Washington Post and The Washington Post Magazine. She is also fellow at the New America Foundation. Overwhelmed by Brigid Schulte is published by Bloomsbury in March 2014

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jul/21/woman-greatest-enemy-lack-of-time-themselves?CMP=fb_gu&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR1_oJwEuYfMwsRHX01NNuhvEJQJpiPJvKG2N7Z3f9J5Suic987ZfwP0vpw#Echobox=1580910568

Summary of Books on Fikih on Guardianship: Rereading the Right of Guardianship for Protection of Women from Forced Marriage and Child Marriage

Exposers of the Dark Current:

Exploring the Works of Muslim Intellectuals in Realizing Justice for Women

by Nur Hayati Aida

 

The world we live in now is one in which society still considers one sex as superior to the other. Nearly all arrangements in society are constructed from a male perspective, so it is not surprising that what is produced is a set of rules that tend to be detrimental to women and put them in second place. One factor that reinforces the imbalance in the relations between males and females is (the interpretation of) religion. Whether we realize it or not, interpretation of religion (and its texts) contributes to the perpetuation of practices of injustice toward females.

Yet in the midst of this patriarchal mainstream, certain persons have emerged who chose to fight the tide by building a methodology that reinterprets the misogynistic religious texts that have long been deliberately used to legitimize gender-based discrimination.

In the early 19th century, an intellectual who was also a scholar at al-Azhar named Rifa’at al-Thahthawi published a book that analyzed the gender relations between males and females in Islam. This book, entitled al-Mursyid al-Amin li al-Banât wa al-Banîn, addressed the unequal relations between men and women in Egypt at that time. With his deep understanding of religion, Rifa’at al-Thahthawi traced the elements in the classical treasury of Islam that were more friendly toward women. He also actively campaigned for the importance of education. Education and social interaction are the doors for the advancement of women. Without education, the ideal of progress for women would be a dream that is never realized.

With his intellectual capability, Rifa’at al-Thahthawi also built a methodology for interpreting religious texts using a feminist perspective through three basic principles: al-hurriyah (freedom), al-musâwah (equality), and al-hub (love). If these three foundations are used properly in the reading of every text, the interpretation can never lead to oppression of one sex by the other.

A few years later, Muhammad Abduh became prominent. One of Abduh’s intellectual works that can still be enjoyed today is Tafsir al-Manâr. Although ultimately this commentary was completed by his student, Rasyid Ridha, the basis and direction of al-Manar were constructed by Abduh. al-Manâr is a work that addressed the social problems existing at the time the book was written. According to Abduh, the interpretations prevailing at that time were unable to accommodate the problems experienced in the context of modern society. What Abduh did was an effort to engage the Qur’an in continuous dialogue with the current age.

Abduh fervently opposed polygamy because of its great potential to destroy the family, and also because it violates the sharia which function as the protector of positive benefits. This argument was based on the Qur’an, specifically al-Rum:21.

In the middle of the 19th century, there emerged in Egypt a thinker and activist named Qasim Amin. Qasim Amin wrote a book entitled Tahrîr al-Mar’ah. This book created a great controversy, leading to various responses, both positive and negative. In the book, Qasim Amin wrote about women and their private rights in connection with the family in Egypt. The topics that received the most public attention were polygamy and divorce.

At the same time, Qasim Amin also harshly criticized the fikih scholars who took the position that talak could be imposed without witnesses and even if done as a joke. Qasim Amin placed divorce on the same level as marriage. Like marriage, divorce is an action of sharia that leads to the loss of certain rights and the emergence of other rights, such as sustenance and inheritance. Therefore, divorce also requires witnesses.

As well as in Egypt, an intellectual also emerged in Tunisia who was greatly concerned with humanitarian issues, and especially women, at the end of the 19th century. This was Thahir al-Haddad, who constructed a concept of Islamic ethics using three instruments: al hurriyah (freedom), al-‘adâlah (justice), and al-musâwah (equality). These three instruments were used as the spirit in reading texts in the creation of sharia. Sharia grants freedom to individuals and the public based on a basic human right – the right to live free from domination by any type of person. According to Thahir al-Haddad, Islamic sharia must be a pioneer for change in society to emerge from backwardness toward progress. The greatest challenge faced by the community in the world of Islam is the excessive power of religious institutions in controlling family life.

Through his book Imra’atunâ fî al-Syarî’ah wa al-Mujtama’, Thahir al-Haddad voiced his social critique because Tunisian society placed women behind religious symbols created by the ulama based on religious knowledge as the center of truth.

Although his life ended in exile, Thahir al-Haddad’s concepts and ideas live on. Many years later, his name is used for schools in Tunisia and his photograph is displayed in government offices.

 

Indonesian Scholar/Thinkers who Spoke out for Justice for Women

 

Islam arose in a feudal social structure centered on the power of clans (bani), relying on patriarchy and physical force to conquer a harsh physical environment. Islam actively combined with the local culture through the Prophet Muhammad, and responded to the characteristic events and social traditions of the Middle East. The products of law, particularly the fikih, were constructed by the ulama of the early mazhabs based on the context of the region where they lived and studied, mainly in the Middle East. One context worthy of mention relates to the position of those who are weak or are made weak, such as women, children, widows and the poor.

Indonesia is obviously not the same as the Middle East. The two regions are different in terms of culture, geography, land, and social structure. If a nomadic society relies on trade, communities in Indonesia tend to settle in one place and be based on the traditions of an agrarian society. These differences have implications for changes in various religious practices. In the classical works of fikih, for example, istinja’ or cleansing one’s body after defecating is done using a stone. This practice of using stones for personal cleansing may make sense in a sandy desert region, but certainly does not apply to the context of Indonesia with its water-based culture.

These differences, as well as certain social issues specific to Indonesia, have forced Indonesian scholars and thinkers to reconstruct and reanalyze the interpretations of religion and the law of fikih. They have tried to provide a context to the rules of fikih which were taken from the locale where Islam first emerged, and particularly the more sensitive issues that are rarely addressed such as women, children, and minorities.

We can now mention the name of Husein Muhammad, a male ulama who has been most vocal in speaking out for the rights of women. His works and writings record how the (interpretations of) religion that have long been used as justifications to perpetuate discrimination can in fact be used as a means of resistance and a counter narrative to the negative views of women. Kiai Husein, with his mastery of the literature and the academic realm, has traced the classical texts of Islam, and proclaimed the news of ideas about the equality of humans, whatever their sex. Islam, according to Kiai Husein, is a religion that upholds the principle of equality. This is clearly illustrated in the confession of tauhid, belief in the oneness of God, as a confirmation that there is nothing and no one that deserves to be worshipped and elevated in rank by humans other than Allah. And humans, both males and females, have the same position and opportunity to engage in pious works. Men and women also have the same worth in the eyes of God. Those who are more favored before God are those who are pious and devoted, whoever they are, male or female.

As well as Kiai Husein, there are several other figures from the world of the pesantren who, while not specifically known as feminist, speak out on issues of benefit in society which are based on development of the law of fikih. No doubt fresh in our minds are the ideas of social fikih as conveyed by KH. Dr. (HC) Sahal Mahfudz. Social fikih is a form of religious accountability to respond to the needs and problems of society. More than that, social fikih is also a form of concern from Kiai Sahal, as he is known, regarding the assumption that fikih is a kind of transcendent truth. The general public has a mistaken perception that all truth is contained in (the books of) fikih. To produce social fikih, Kiai Sahal uses two methods: qawlîy, using an approach of qawâid fiqhiyah, and manhajîy, the approach of maqâshid al syari’ah, whereby the text and the context are brought together.

Kiai Sahal places great attention on the many cases of child marriage. He is of the opinion that by marrying off a daughter who is still a child, the parents have violated their obligation as parents to provide a decent livelihood and education for their child.

In the realm of the Religious Courts, Dr. Andi Syamsu Alam can be considered a pioneer in institutional management. He is very active in building effective working methods and a modern judicial system, and also encourages judges to pursue further judicial education.

Dr. Andi’s concepts in verdicts on family law, which should serve as a reference for religious court judges, include rejecting dispensations for a lower age of marriage, and granting inheritance rights to adopted children. Unfortunately, the first of these concepts is often not used as material in the consideration of verdicts. According to Dr. Andi, this is because judges’ thinking is stagnated, in that judges still interpret the Marriage Law as accommodating child marriage. In fact, the Marriage Law, despite its many loopholes that need to be criticized, was in fact an initiative by certain progressive figures and ulama to raise the age of marriage and to protect women and children from discriminatory practices. The minimum age for marriage for females, which was set at 16 years when the Marriage Law was enacted in 1974, was the result of fierce negotiation with conservative groups.

Two figures who were involved in the preparation and formulation of the Marriage Law are Prof. Dr. Hazairin Harahap and Teungku HM. Hasbi Ash-Shiddiqiy. Teungku Hasbi is one of several persons who have offered the idea of Indonesian fikih. According to Teungku Hasbi, the ‘urf (local wisdom) of Indonesia should be used as the basis for creating a special fikih characteristic of Indonesia, considering the differences in culture, habits and social structure between Indonesia and Middle East, the region where Islam was first sent down and which was used as the basis for creating the laws of fikih. This idea has received many responses from various groups and individuals, some of whom say there is no need for an Indonesia fikih.

Teungku Hasbi’s interpretations include a prohibition on polygamy, because the requirements for allowing polygamy cannot possibly be fulfilled. Furthermore, the narrative constructed by verse 3 of al-Nisa’ is a prohibition, not a recommendation. Polygamy, according to Teungku Hasbi, is only allowed in emergency circumstances, and emergency doors must normally be kept shut.

Meanwhile, Prof. Dr. Hazairin Harahap was Indonesia’s first doctor in traditional law following independence. He served as Minister of the Interior in the cabinets of Ali Sastroamidjojo and Wongsonegoro. After retiring from the world of politics, he entered the world of education as a professor at the University of Indonesia.

Like Teungku Hasbi, Hazairin also strove for the concept of an Indonesian fikih by reconstructing ‘urf and istihsân in ushul fikih. He severely criticized the practice of marriage in childhood which bases its permissibility on the concept of biological maturity (baligh). Biological maturity cannot be used as a justification for marriage in childhood. A person must have achieved the level of baligh rusyd (maturity in thought and action) as a requirement for permissibility of marriage. In addition, his ideas relating to receptio a contrario also contributed to the creation of the Marriage Law.

The figures mentioned above are just a few of those who have chosen the lonely path toward realizing justice. They have chosen the path less taken: intellectual work, a kind of work that requires great discipline in exploring both text and context, as these two aspects are interrelated and constantly pulling on one another. A text does not appear in a vacuum; context cannot stand firm without the support of text. And it is these lonely works that can expose the dark current of patriarchalism that has for so long prevented thinking and acting to achieve justice for women. []