My Hat Goes Off to the Burqa Avenger!

I know this has little to do with Ghana specifically (though there is a huge population of covering Muslims in Ghana!), but a friend brought this to my attention today and I think it has to be one of the most awesome initiatives I’ve read about in a long time: 

Click Here: Superhero 'Burka Avenger' divides Pakistan 

 See also: 'Burka Avenger' fights for Pakistani schools

Oh man! I love that she's a teacher! And that she's fighting crime with books :) And I also love that clearly sometimes she chooses to wear a burka and sometimes she chooses not to. 

My proverbial hat goes off to the producers of this show. What an awesome role model idea for young women and men who are a part of Muslim culture everywhere! Whether they are covering Muslims or non-covering, it is awesome for young girls who choose or are forced to wear Muslim coverings to be able to look up to a role model superhero who chooses to cover herself and still has purpose, goals, a career, strengths, uniqueness!

I get why some people feel there is unacceptable irony in the idea of promoting a woman who kicks butt in a burka. As the friend who shared this with me pointed out, many people see the burka as inherently a symbol of oppression. But I really feel its important to acknowledge that there there are so many women who wear Muslim coverings/Christian coverings/Jewish coverings/cultural coverings/personal coverings/etc. by choice  -- many Muslims out of a sense of modesty and not necessarily linked to male oppression. 

In my mind, the voluntary wearing of Muslim coverings specifically is often compared, by analogy, with bathing suits in the west. What I’ve learned from some Muslim women is that in many traditionally Muslim cultures a woman’s hair is looked at as an arousing part of the female anatomy. So those who voluntarily choose to wear hijab may be covering up for religious reason and/or may cover it up simply as part of their own personal sense of modesty. For some women, having their face or other parts of the body exposed for men to leer at violates her sense of personal modesty and privacy, thus the niqab, burqa, etc. Yes, its true that men aren't subjected to the same standard, but to me, that doesn’t make it inherently sexist logically speaking. What is sexist about the tradition is when it is used as a tool of oppression. And don’t get me wrong, it often IS used as such a tool. Almost anything can be used as a tool, and almost any tool can be creatively used as a weapon. But that doesn’t mean that those women who aren’t truly experiencing that oppression need to be liberated from what other people feel is oppressing them. To me, what they should have a right to is the choice. I have a choice to burn my bras and I value that choice, but that doesn’t mean I actually want to do it :)

In North America a woman’s breasts are commonly viewed as an arousing part of the female anatomy. In some cultures, they aren't! But in North America, they are. So those who choose to, cover them up as part of their own personal sense of modesty/social convention. People choose their own degree of modesty, some not being comfortable showing any cleavage, some showing everything possible without going nude. But nobody looks at me wearing my turtleneck sweater and full-coverage bra and tells me I’m being oppressed by some man. People may scoff at my choice of swimsuit as being overly modest, but no one, to my knowledge, feels that its oppressive that I don't feel comfortable publicly revealing the amount of my flesh that others might be comfortable with. That choice is a part of our culture. In our culture its largely acceptable for men and boys to walk around bare chested and its not largely accepted for women. Its legal (in Ontario!), but not acceptable in our culture. In Canada most little boys go to the beach in trunks, most little girls wear a full bathing suit or a two-piece. The closer girls get to puberty, the less you see their parents allowing them to run around topless at splash pads (as some toddlers often do without a problem) To me, this isn’t inherently some double standard. 

I’ll get off my soapboax now, I just really really enjoyed reading about this new superhero and I hope that she inspires girls in Pakistan and elsewhere to fight for their right to education and their right to equality, as long as that does not mean the elimination of their right to CHOOSE who they want to be in society and what aspects of their culture or religion they choose to accept.