When I see the covered up shadow figures on streets, I feel upset and dare I say it, almost violated, because my spiritual heritage is being used in, what I think, in an inappropriate way. It is being used to further a social and political agenda, that I do NOT subscribe with. I do not and can never believe in racial pride or one-upmanship. My spirituality is too sacred, too private and I feel too vulnerable about it to ever want to use as a political device or support its use as a political tool. I like how the pope is wearing his faith–he doesn’t say, ‘if you are catholic, then you must care about the environment.’ He is saying, ‘since you and I are human, it is high time to care about the environment and stop using the religion of Christianity as a political device. ‘
I wish such advanced thinking could spread into the Muslim diaspora. Instead of harping on their self identification and therefore victimization, if true leaders emerge who stand behind issues of grave importance, e.g., ‘non-violence or peace is important to us and we will chastise all imams who preach racism and bigotry as essential to being Muslim.’
Preachers who are Muslim, often focus on beliefs and quotations, rather than values and common ground. Teaching like this can only work to create a shaky moral ground for those people because they never face a challenge of being in a multi-cultural world–they need to be protected their whole life from the real world. The moment there is real challenge, such type of teaching fails, because it doesn’t create true faith. It is a mask of purity worn on top of inner sickness.
In the last while, there has been a rising phenomena of the black burqa, the tight head covered hijab and the niqab–a facial mask. Some even go as far as gloves on their hands, ostensibly because it is a requirement of the religious faith. That is not true. Hijab, Niqab or Burqa are cultural artifacts. There are so many different shades of muslim culture. In some cultures, gender discrimination is high. However, the idea of the religion was to elevate the status of women, not to downgrade them even further, unfortunately many muslim cultures don’t respect women, so women have to dress in a protective way.
I’ve lived in Vancouver for 15 years. I have taken buses at 2am at night. Stood on street bus stops. I have said whatever I felt like. I have raised a son who is comfortable with being all of who he is and claiming his space in a multi-cultural society-without losing anything of our original identity. I have worn skirts and I have worn big huge kurtas and saris, trousers and suits. I have worn a chadar over my head often–because it is so cold and scarves work. Nothing has ever created negative attention towards me. I have prayed in many different spiritual and religious centres, nobody has questioned my choices or whether I can be in their spiritual centre. I’ve been received as a fellow spiritualist. I love the open society and I find that my core values are mostly reflected in Canadian society.
The only time I’ve ever been made uncomfortable about my personal choices or who I am, has been among people who equate dogmatic belief with faith. Whereas belief and faith are not the same thing at all. Belief is about control, faith is about trust. They come from different areas of the spiritual heart. One is about protection, the other is about vulnerability. One gives guilt, the other expands you into growth.
Advertising a spiritual identity through a dress code in a free and open society is consumerism. It is branding…..here’s an example from a non-muslim context about what I mean.
The other day a dear friend of mine mentioned how a monk in downtown Vancouver called her over as he was gifting bracelets. She believed him and took a bracelet he offered. Immediately he wanted money. When she said, ‘sorry I thought you were gifting it, and I don’t have cash right now’–he grumpily took the bracelet away. That was exploitative of the brand image, ‘buddhist monk’. A con man exploited the teachings of the Buddha to make some money.
I care about my inherited values. They are inviolable. They are not a dress code or a name. My values are faith, gratitude, equality, honesty, justice and kindness. I can choose to call them Islam or not choose to equate them with a religion. I don’t have to make that choice ever. It isn’t important. The values are more important than the way I dress them up.
Some people will say, what option do we have, other than choose, given that Fox news and the mainstream media, keeps lumping ‘Muslims’ as people out to get the rest of the world?
One option is to create anti-racism awareness campaigns. The other option is to do nothing, i.e., become invisible and accept it.
There is a third option. Stop seeing yourself as Muslim, start seeing yourself as human first, Canadian second and embrace the others that you see around you. Articulate your values. When people know your values, they can trust who you are as an individual. I firmly believe that is more important than one’s accidental birth religion or culture in post modern societies that are formed on ideals of equality, justice, honesty and faith.
Each individual is unique in their personal connection to God and it is their choice if they seek a religion or not. If there are foaming in the mouth angry people as Fox News describes, it won’t matter what Fox News says about them, they’d see it as an opportunity to recruit people. Fox News and republican/conservative agendas are plain stupid. I have faith that the large majority of people can see through that anyway and Muslims don’t have to worry about it. Even the pope and vatican supports Muslims!. When the Ahmed incident happened, the whole planet supported Ahmed’s right to make a clock and be treated like a normal child.
That’s so cool-and it proved the point that a free society works. But then, this whole incident was take up by the political islamists to push their hijab wearing rights and anti-racism campaign. I am okay with that also, some girls love their outfits a lot. But, what I am not ok with is aligning myself with right wing Islamists.
I speak for those people who care about values, not about dress codes and religion. We may be a tiny minority, but we are here.
We care for the real questions of concern of our times. We want those courageous leaders who can make a real difference, not this democrat vs. republican or conservative vs. liberal vs democratic, race based political posturing, in which the real issue–the environment and education are shoved under the carpet.
Behind The Veil 