It’s Not Hindu v/s Muslim But Whether We See Women as Property
Recently, Muslim bigots viciously trolled Indian cricketer Mohammad Shami for posting a photograph of his family – his wife Hasin Jahan, they said, wore un-Islamic clothes. The trolls – Taliban style – demanded to regulate what ‘their’ women should be allowed to wear, and sought to shame Shami for failing to discipline his wife’s clothing and make her wear a hijab like Irfan Pathan’s wife.
‘Are you a Muslim?’ ‘Aren’t you ashamed at your wife’s exposed neck?’ ‘Your wife is very cute but better not keep her in western clothes’ – were some of the milder comments.
One said “We hate you shami. .. apni aurat ki izzat ki nilami mat karo Bhai…" (Don’t auction off the honour of your woman), another told Shami “This beauty private property of u..dear …not showing 4 others…"
The moral police clearly felt no hesitation in declaring that Hasin Jahan was her husband Shami’s ‘private property’; and that they, as self-proclaimed custodians of Islam, had a right to dictate how Muslim women chose to dress.
The trolls were outnumbered however by saner democratic voices who expressed contempt for the moral police and support for the right of women to dress exactly as they wish without being judged and shamed and controlled by others.
On previous occasions, I have noticed that some Muslim men who would appreciate my social media posts against communalism, would get indignant at posts of mine directed at patriarchal dress codes – even those imposed by Hindutva brigades. They would post comments justifying moral policing and telling me that women’s revealing clothes made them unsafe.
I would ask them: “You are able to recognize that it is fascist to tell Muslims they are asking to be beaten and attacked if they eat beef or wear a skull cap and beard. How come you can’t recognize that it’s just as oppressive to tell women they are asking to be raped if they wear a dress of their choice?”
In the context of the Shami trolling episode, I wrote a piece on the patriarchal codes that are shared across religious, social and political lines. In that piece, I shared an anecdote where Dalit young men were very conscious and aware of the ways in which dominant castes do not “let them dress in modern clothes, use bikes or play loud music or move freely on the main streets and public spaces of the village or town.” But the same young men found it entirely natural on their own part to prevent young Dalit women from dressing in modern clothes, moving freely with head uncovered in public spaces and so on!
In that piece I also shared how even on the Left, there are deep-seated patriarchal prejudices and suspicions about women’s freedom and autonomy. In the last paragraph, I also asked the Hindutva trolls to recognize their own mirror image when they looked into the eyes of the Muslim fanatic trolls.
In the responses to that piece I noticed there were several who demanded to know why mention Hindutva moral police at all in the context of an incident involving the Muslim moral police?
By doing so, they alleged, I as a ‘commie feminist’ was being soft on the Muslim fanatic patriarchs. In reply, I would ask, don’t we ‘commie feminists’ routinely compare the Hindutva moral police (when they impose dress codes etc) to the Taliban?
To take just one instance, here is a statement issued by my organisation AIPWA on the February 2009 Mangalore pub attack, referring to the Sri Ram Sene, Bajrang Dal and similar outfits as the “saffron Taliban.”
By making that comparison with the Muslim fanatic Taliban, were we being ‘soft on the Hindutva moral police’?!
Not at all: rather, our statement sought to underline that the patriarchal assault on women’s freedom and autonomy is what needs to be recognized and resisted – whether it is by the Taliban in relatively remote Afghanistan, the saffron brigades in India, or even the so-called ‘secular’ party leaders who condemned ‘pub culture’ instead of condemning the attacks on women.
The problem with patriarchy is that we can often see and recognize it only in ‘others’ – in our own homes, communities, cultures, it looks ‘normal.’ But the most crucial anti-patriarchal struggles have to be waged in the comfortable spaces – in our own homes, communities, and cultures. One useful test to apply to ourselves when condemning attacks by those of ‘other’ communities on the rights of women, is to ask ourselves if we would condemn identical attacks by those of our own community?
This is not whataboutery. If we have not yet recognized or resisted patriarchy and sexism by ‘our own,’ it does mean we must not condemn the same by ‘others.’ But recognizing it in others can help us recognize and resist it in ourselves. That is why, even in articles condemning the patriarchal remarks or ideologies of Sangh leaders or Muslim fanatic trolls, I as a Leftist often make it a point to reflect also on how similar patriarchal tendencies are seen even on the Left.
The Hindutva trolls, not long ago, viciously trolled Tina Dabi for having become engaged to a Kashmiri Muslim colleague Athar Aamir-ul Shafi Khan. The All India Hindu Mahasabha even thought it was entitled to write a letter to Tina Dabi’s father saying, "This decision of your family will promote love jihad and thus the wedding should not take place at any cost.” In writing that letter, the Hindu Mahasabha displayed the exact same mentality that the Muslim fanatics trolling Shami did.
The Hindu Mahasabha treated Tina Dabi – an independent adult woman – as the property of her father; they declared that her choice (of life partner) shamed her father and her faith; and asked her father to protect Hindu honour by preventing her from exercising her choice.
Likewise, the Muslim fanatics treated Hasin Jahan – an independent adult woman – as the property of her husband; declared that her choice (of dress) shamed her husband and her faith; and asked her husband to protect Muslim honour by preventing her from exercising her choice. Making this comparison and recognizing the family resemblance between Muslim and Hindu patriarchies is important because doing so clarifies the issue.
The comparison makes it clear that the issue is not Hindu vs Muslim but that of women’s freedom vs patriarchy.