Maajid Nawaz LBC- feminists are abandoning ethnic minority women and their causes for first world problems

[crystalgall]

Anyone listening?

He cites a story about a 17tr old black Muslim girl who was forced into an apology by Muslim fundentalist men online for being filmed dancing in the streets (twerking) while wearing a hijab.

He suggests that no feminist outlet commented on the story and that in general feminists are focusing on first world issues (he mentions the transgender issue and then Emma Watsons boobs and the academic who made a joke and was then fired? I don't know that story) and not engaging in supporting ethnic minority women in this country enough.

[IAmAmy]

I can think of countless horrific cases of VAWG on which I've seen no "feminist blogger" comment, rapes and murders included. Does this mean feminists don't care about them? It's ridiculous to criticise "feminists" as if they're one entity for apparently not commenting on one case.

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

It wasn't well reported

It was reported in every UK tabloid, the ones I listed and the Mirror.

[Bundesliga]

This man has had his life threatened numerous times for having the courage to stand up to misogyny in Muslim communities. A badge of honour he should be proud of in my opinion

and you Have no idea what sacrifices have been made by women or threats received even against women here on this thread.

Women face death and rape threats all the time here in the UK for daring to take their rightful place in society.

[Bundesliga]

As to the silence, this has been repeated several times in several ways:

It wasn't well reported.

Any criticism of abusive Muslim men will automatically be 'called out' as

a) racist
b) anti-Islamic

Intersectional Feminism plus unwillingness to offend have combined to silence any dissent.

[DJBaggySmalls]

Lessthanaballpark
It is a common accusation amongst the Alt Right that western feminists spend all their time complaining about trivial western women's problems such as "rape culture" whilst remaining silent on the "real rape culture" of Muslim countries and cultures.

This. Its women shaming.
Meanwhile women in the USA are losing abortion rights, and women in the UK are fighting to keep predators out of women only spaces. 2 women have been thrown out of a homeless shelter for not wanting to share a room with a penis.

These are not fucking trivial 'first world problems'.

If Maajid Nawaz wanted to do something he could have called this to the attention of feminists and asked them to support the girl, but he didnt.

[Bundesliga]

And he's arguing (and he, even as a man, may well be better qualified to comment on this point than non-Muslim women) that it's not even being waged.

Who "should" be waging what war? I don't understand? If it's against slut shaming in the Muslim community then I'd think Muslim women are best places to comment. Has he been slut shamed?

[MaryTheCanary]

completely fucking oblivious to the fact that feminists on MN were participating in possibly the largest thread in MN history on the event and the lack of media coverage whilst also raising a petition for it to be discussed in parliament.

Sure, but MN was quite unusual in that respect, and MN is not a "feminist" site per se, it is a discussion site which happens to have a fairly strong feminist presence. The feminism-related fora here are also pretty usual because they are tilted towards radical feminism, rather than "choice feminism." In any case, I think the thread you mention was in News or AIBU.

Among self-defined feminist sites, pages etc (the great majority of which are tilted towards lib feminism, choice feminism and so on), I really did not see much discussion, sorry.

[Lessthanaballpark]

It is a common accusation amongst the Alt Right that western feminists spend all their time complaining about trivial western women's problems such as "rape culture" whilst remaining silent on the "real rape culture" of Muslim countries and cultures.

During the Munich and Cologne sexual assaults at the beginning of last year Douglas Murray got a lot of support for blaming feminists for not responding adequately to this event, completely fucking oblivious to the fact that feminists on MN were participating in possibly the largest thread in MN history on the event and the lack of media coverage whilst also raising a petition for it to be discussed in parliament.

The Alt Right also never take into account the kind of backlash feminists get for criticising other cultures, accusations of white feminist colonialism, racism etc, and if you remember those threads there was a fair bit of that which consistently derailed the discussion.

Because no one in the Alt Right can miss out on an opportunity to blame feminism for something else can they?

[MaryTheCanary]

"I doubt that he was really outraged by this, otherwise he would be too busy telling Muslim men why they were wrong to have any time to criticise feminism."

He actually spends a lot of his time criticizing Fundie men for their sexist attitudes...including in this case.

I do think he should have said "some feminists" or "some feminist groups" or whatever. Feminism is a broad church, and some feminists like Namazie have been very assertive on this issue for a long time. The silence from other groups has been deafening at times.

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

Further googling shows the story was reported in the period between 4th to 8th March in The Daily Mail, The Daily Record, The Daily Express, The Sun, The Star and The Metro, the Australian Daily Telegraph along with many other online sites.

It was not covered by the Guardian, The Independent or the Huffington Post either as news or an opinion piece by any of the raft of feminist writers who write for them.

[Bundesliga]

Yes I am aware that the battle hasn't been won for these women, nor has it been won for white women. Slut shaming is alive and well in the UK.

I wasn't "boasting"

I'm glad to hear that he calaled out the men who perpetrated this misogyny. That's great and that's where the responsibility lies. With men.

[DickToPhone]

"The clip I posted had him only calling out feminists for failing. It is because of feminism that this woman can dance without condemnation in the streeets of the UK. "

Uh, but she can't though. She danced and she was condemned and slut shamed and her life threatened.

Isn't that really more the point here, rather than hypothetical post-feminist utopia where women, even those from backgrounds that feminism has passed by, are fully liberated. Because clearly that's not the case. Whereas non-Muslim women in Britain are vastly freer than British women 100 years ago, the same cannot be said of Muslim women in Britain at all.

So boasting about feminism's victories is not so much missing the point but actively wrong. The battle has not been won for these women at all! And he's arguing (and he, even as a man, may well be better qualified to comment on this point than non-Muslim women) that it's not even being waged.

[bigolenerdy]

Bundesliga

But he does call them out....

...and even if he hadn't (which he has), trying to dismiss his observations on this basis is plainly a fallacy.

[DickToPhone]

He's a talk-show host. It's his job to bring up talking points. It's silly to think he should or would refuse to criticise feminists.

[redwinewhine]

The comments here are hilarious in the extreme. This man has had his life threatened numerous times for having the courage to stand up to misogyny in Muslim communities. A badge of honour he should be proud of in my opinion. He is right to criticize a certain group of feminists who turn a willing blind eye to certain practices in minority communities. It reminds me of the whole Danish cartoon affair. A pathetic rolling over by those who claim to be 'progressive', due to fear of the repercussions.

[Bundesliga]

He criticised feminists and when women respond to that criticism they are criticised?

He criticised feminists - there is a right if reply that is allowed aside from the issue of what happened to the woman. Is that really so difficult to understand?

[Bundesliga]

The clip I posted had him only calling out feminists for failing. It is because of feminism that this woman can dance without condemnation in the streeets of the UK.

I never said he was the "enemy" and I don't think anyone else here did either.

[DickToPhone]

The actual comments by Maajid on FB

'Hey Ali Dawah, you bullied a 17 year old girl into issuing a petrified public apology, and stoked up threats, all for... dancing.
You a real big man, bro. A real big man. '

'There was more frothing outrage by extremist Muslims at this (now terrified) hijabi twerking than they displayed toward hijabis joining ISIS'

' And here ☝🏽is the misogynist religious policeman himself who, on his roving-fatwa YouTube channel, instead of defending her right to do wtf she likes with her own body, shamed this terrified hijabi even more for dancing and humiliated her by broadcasting her petrified apology.'

This man is not the enemy here damnit.

[DickToPhone]

This is a ridiculous thread.

How the fuck is the issue here him having (apparently) criticised feminists, and not the horrific slut-shaming of this poor girl????? www.facebook.com/GoBrum/posts/387908628232856

I mean what the actual fuck?

He literally calls out the scumbag who slut shamed the girl on air

The focus of his attentions is not feminists, but the fact that this poor girl got slut shamed (and not only by Muslims, one of the comments on Facebook is from a non-Muslim woman saying that she shouldn't do it in a hijab, because "I'm not religious at all but women who have gone into Islam and wear the veil to protect their modesty and then you have girls who do this how modest do you think men will find women in Hijab now?").

I'm seriously wondering how the response of people to this story is to say 'nasty man criticising feminists, how very dare he'.

Maajid Nawaz is a rare secular Muslim and one of the good guys. In contrast it's very clear that slut shaming a woman for DANCING (for fuck's sake) in a hijab is a completely mainstream position in modern British Islamic society. I don't remember any Christians screaming when Madonna appeared on stage with stripping 'nuns'. Nobody gives a shit. And quite rightly so.

Yet apparently the biggest issue here is what Maajid Nawaz said about feminists? Fuck off with that.

[Bundesliga]

It is because of feminism that we can say that this woman can dance without shame in the streets.

It is because of feminism that we can say that she need not apologise for her behaviour

It is because of feminism that he has any ground to stand on in this society that she can act as she wants and not be condemned.

It is because of feminism that she has the right to express herself freely in the streets without fear of reprisal.

Yes, she was failed but these social norms are there because of feminism not in spite of it.

[Bundesliga]

Am in bed but have just listened to the clip.

I'm sorry but it's a fucking outrage his criticism of feminists as opposed to his criticism of Muslim men who oppressed this woman.

No. No, no, no. I'm sorry but he has the microphone, he has the power, the platform and rather than call out his Muslim fellows for their egregious misogyny (who, by his own admission are the ones who popularised the video, made death threats and forced a videoed apology) he chooses to attack feminists?

No fucking thanks.

He has the power. Muslim men (and presumably women as well) did this to this woman. He is a man who has a platform, power and influence. Call them out on their oppression, call them out on their misogyny but he's clearly too cowardly to do that so he attacks feminists for "picking first world fights"

Fucking hell its all sorts of ways wrong and terrifying. It is terrifying that this happened to a British woman.

And an absolute outrage that feminists are somehow to blame!

Feminists have been fighting slut shaming for years! As I said before.

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

I tried earlier and wasn't prepared to subscribe.

Nawaz also spoke out in the last few days about that fairly dreadful retirement speech by Judge Lindsey Kushner , and as, bigolenerdy has said, is not in the least reticent about calling out Muslim men on such issues. All of which are other reasons for not dismissing what he had to say out of hand.

[Bundesliga]

Might see it here. I can't try to play it.

m.facebook.com/groups/1580703442254735?view=permalink&id=1810876179237459&refid=18&ft=qid.6396734140918000366%3Amf_story_key.1810876179237459%3Atop_level_post_id.1810876179237459%3Atl_objid.1810876179237459

[Bundesliga]

Oh, sorry - I just tried to play the podcast and it's behind a paywall. So that's a useless link.

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

why it had not come to more prominence.