It's Not About the Burqa QUOTES

1 " I have engaged in enough women’s rights activism to know that the belief “sons are better than daughters'' is a huge problem in some parts of the world. For those who have little knowledge of Islam, there is the impression that women’s oppression stems from islamic teachings. This is simply not the case. In fact, muslim imams preach about the value of daughters often siting that a daughter opens the gates of paradise for their father. Indeed, the person the most beloved to the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him, was his youngest daughter, Fatima. Islamic teachings are clear that a father has to fulfill his duty to raise and care for his daughters, and that the obligations go beyond providing financial support. He must provide a safe, peaceful, and loving home environment that is conducive to his daughter’s overall spiritual and moral development. "

― , It's Not About the Burqa

3 " Too often, ‘community’ is synonymous with men, and too often those self-appointed male leaders are the ones who determine what is ‘too far’. In fact, the word and concept ‘community’ is much like the word and concept ‘culture’: for example, a popular way to rein in people – read ‘women’ – is to tell them that they must not oppose a behaviour or way of being because it is part of the ‘culture’ or what the ‘community’ wants. "

― , It's Not About the Burqa

5 " When a woman is ‘too much’, she is essentially uncontrollable and unashamed. That makes her dangerous. "

― , It's Not About the Burqa

7 " Mine is a single person's lived experiences. An experience full of contradictions, imperfections and incongruities, but my lived experience nonetheless. Part of the journey, for me, is owning the inconsistencies in myself and my stories- we cannot change past perceptions, but we can certainly reflect on them, own them, and commit to growing from them. We must cultivate compassion for our past selves, trusting that we did the best we could at the time, while simultaneously striving to do better "

― , It's Not About the Burqa

9 " Dissecting the rishta sites quickly becomes me and Fiz's favorite pastime. 'Look at this one, Fiz, look at this one. "i am looking for simple, obedient girl." Vom!' 'Why doesn't he just advertise for a chief chapati maker and be done with it.' 'I know, right! This guy says "only virgin!", "no party girls!" He also loves exclamation marks.' 'Translation: I can't be with a woman who has met other men because then she'll know how rubbish I am. "

― , It's Not About the Burqa

11 " Women are supposed to be ‘less than’, not ‘too much’. Women are meant to be quiet, modest, humble, polite, nice, well behaved, aware of the red lines. They are supposed to tread softly and within their limits. "

― , It's Not About the Burqa

13 " Revolutions 'go too far': if your community is ready for you, then you are too late. You must challenge your community. You must throw down the gauntlet of freedom to your community and dare it to accept. Revolutions are by nature uncomfortable. They are meant to discombobulate.

How else would the status quo be overthrown? Revolutions rattle the privileged and discomfort the complacent. They are never about the comfortable majority. Rather, it is always the minority, especially those who are caught by the intersection of multiple oppressions, who instigate and inspire. "

― , It's Not About the Burqa

15 " You think all your memories are yours alone, but often they are given by others: versions of events repeated by family, scenes stolen from a movie watched half-sleeping, dreams willed into existence. I want to say that everything that follows here are my memories but I’m not sure. I’m not sure whose they are, or if they indeed ever belonged to anyone. In the end I’m not sure it matters. Sometimes all we know of families are the myths we are told and the fragile heaviness we carry inside, the sound of snapping in the ear. "

― , It's Not About the Burqa

17 " Writing is dangerous because we are afraid of what the writing reveals: the fears, the angers, the strengths of a woman under a triple or quadruple oppression. Yet in that very act lies our survival because a woman who writes has power. And a woman with power is feared.1 "

― , It's Not About the Burqa