God Who? And Can I Show My Skin?
We had such an interesting class discussion last week. I invited several Muslim women in to speak to the students; each of them chooses to cover her hair and conform in various other ways to the dress codes mandated by Islam. As we so often we openly decry veiling and view such women as helpless objects in need of our (Western White Christian Enlightenment) rescue, I wanted to give them a chance to speak for themselves, articulating what wearing the head covering offers them in terms of personal self identity and life satisfaction.
They both did this beautifully, letting the class see from their perspective how obedience to religious dictates enables them to feel that their lives have meaning above and beyond that of quotidian secular existence. One said that her God asks her to be her best self; in her world view this means playing down the baser aspects of humanity, discouraging emphasis on materialism and competition and unrestrained sexuality.
I completely understand her position. I too want a life rich in meaning. I too want to be seen as something other than an object. I too want to be of service to my family, my community, my world.
So isn't it fascinating that we find such different ways of achieving these ends?
Most obviously, my position as (Western White Enlightenment Radical) Feminist means that I do not, cannot, will not, look to ancient patriarchal texts to legitimize my existence. For example, while my guests explained that in Islam there is no gender to God, there most certainly is in Christianity, my natal religion. God's a man. A big man. A REALLY big man, who looms over us all and passes judgement. In their original languages, the Judeo-Christian texts explicity use male nouns and pronouns. God's a Father; God's a He. This is not opinion, as people often say. It’s right there in black and white.
Why no female manifestation of the divine? How utterly, utterly, sexist. Other cultures do not exclude the possibility of the godhead being a woman. Last night on 60 Minutes they showed an Indian deity who rides a tiger, demonstrating that She has dominion over the most powerful animal on earth. Where's that notion of omnipotent femininity in MY culture? Why am I left with Paris Hilton as the only female fetish? Not good enough.
Secondly, in the religion in which I grew up, I am asked to accept the fact that I am stained with sin, originally and utterly, thanks to the disobedient and impulsive behavior of a female. I don't believe any of this. Never did. Don't see how others can. It's so utterly preposterous, the tale of Eden, so thoroughly fabulous and naïve in its construction, that to accept it as fact would require that I suspend everything I know about the world around me.
And for what? To "get" to accept my sinful nature? Yuck. Yesterday I was listening to a televangelist who was talking about how to live. I was following along as he asked us to consider our choices, be attentive to the meaning of our lives; I nodded as he encouraged the audience to watch out for red flags, eschewing behaviors we know wouldn't be in our own best interests despite cultural desire to do them. Great advice! And then he said: "Is what you're doing worth Jesus dying for?" And there he lost me.
Huh? What? You're actually going to impose some morbid, bizarre, lurid guilt trip on me in order to coerce compliance to your limited way of living? I just about reeled in shock, which is pretty funny given that I was watching a televangelist. What did I expect? But still, there’s something completely revolting to me about this story, that I occasioned the torture murder of someone else. I know we can do better than this in defining who we are as human beings and encouraging ourselves and one another to seek mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health.
Then he asked where I was going to spend eternity. Now I don't know about you, but when someone tells me he knows for sure what happens after we die, I know he's lying. He might not mean to be lying, he might even believe what he's saying, but he's sure as shooting not speaking from any kind of knowledge base that I can endorse. Empirical evidence strongly suggests that when we die, we're dead. Duh. I guess that's the Post-Enlightenment thinker in me, one who trusts what can be proven and discounts what cannot. Forget those ancient texts. There's no proof they're divinely inspired. In fact there's buckets of evidence to the contrary. Forget the promises of an afterlife. There's no evidence of one. In fact there's no reason to believe in this myth at all.
It's important to note the word "reason" in my last sentence. The reason vs faith dichotomy forces us to see only two possibilities, that things either exist only if we can prove them or that there's a whole unknown universe that we must trust in and--in the case of organized religion--obey the mandates of lest we undergo eternal punishment for failing to do so.
I'm not nuts about either one of these. To accept fully the secular rational philosophy, I must claim that I know that everything can be known and I cannot know that. To accept fully the faith-based worldview, I must suspend massive disbelief in the existence of an omniscient deity and swallow the superstitions handed down by ancients, many of which relegate the female to secondary status and require that we see ourselves exclusively as helpmates to men. Plus I have to believe a guy built an ark and put all the animals on it and the whole world flooded ‘cuz God hated everybody but him and and and and, well, just, no.
So where does that leave someone like me? Good question. I'm certainly not going to convert to Islam. I've no more faith in the veracity of that theology than I do in the one in which I was raised. I'm certainly not going to endorse female modesty because a patriarchal deity allegedly ordered us to cover ourselves. In fact one of my students sent me a news release about increasing pressure in Iran to separate males and females into different universities. They are already in separate classes, but apparently that's not separate enough.
What really caught my eye about this article, however, was the passage that said political students are being banned from classes and there's a call for the "purge of liberal and secular lecturers." Uh oh. Believe or get out.
How I fear that adamancy, in Iran, in the United States, anywhere on the planet. Apparently most people don't share my skepticism, feeling secure in their faith in these ancient texts and most willing to impose their dictates on others. I see it in my own country all the time as gays are excluded from equal rights; as abortion becomes less and less available; as teachers are silenced for having beliefs outside the mainstream.
How grateful I was that USC did not fire me following the scandal that erupted over my photos last Spring. Other female teachers have been fired in similar circumstances. And speaking of those photos, I definitely want to continue this piece, contemplating in what ways I agree with my guests from last week--that females can be viewed as objects if we don't take steps to resist this totalizing sexist metanarrative about our essence--and how I also see a problem with the idea that covering ourselves up is the answer. If I believed that, I wouldn't have gone naked at Burning Man and documented that liberating journey on the web. Indeed, I am quite sure that the answer is a rejection of binary thinking altogether: women either cover or we're whores. How else can we imagine the body, female sexuality, nudity, freedom, spirituality, humility, morality, without having to choose between two hugely unappetizing choices?
So like I say, there's more to say, but it's just such a heartbreakingly beautiful day that I also want to go ride my bike. And that’s what I’m going to do.