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ARTS FEATURE

Working for an inclusive Islam
Muslim lesbian faces death threats for ëradical ideasí in new book

By JOE CREA
Friday, July 09, 2004

IRSHAD MANJI’S MOTHER knew her daughter was a lesbian long before she did.

When the 35-year-old Muslim activist told her mother 13 years ago that she was gay, the elder woman whipped out Manji’s ninth grade student I.D. card. During a recent visit to Washington, D.C., Manji went into detail describing how stereotypically lesbian her photo looked, with her “dykey” haircut and unfortunate fashion choices, heavily influenced by the British musical invasion.

“I looked so bad but my mother pointed to that picture and said, ‘I knew then that you are what you are,’” Manji says. “She was operating on a stereotype that I was living up to: the butchy dyke look that I had in the ninth grade.

“I had no clue then that I was a candidate for lesbianism. As many adolescents do, I would go to bed every night envisioning in my head who would be in my life. But I was always the one bringing home the briefcase and my husband was holding the baby. But it was always a man I pictured,” she says. “However, being a Muslim, we never sexualized men or women for that matter. The fact that sexuality didn’t play a role in my life had a lot to do with it.”

In a religion that, by and large, shows little tolerance for progressive women and downright hostility toward gay people, one might assume Manji is a walking contradiction — marginalized by the Mullahs (Muslim religious scholars), dismissed as a radical, and considered a traitor to Islam.

She welcomes such attacks and labels. Manji has always been radical and progressive in her thinking. As a teenager, she challenged teachers in her madrasa, a school for Muslim learning, to explain questionable texts in the Koran.

Currently a television personality, journalist, writer-in-residence at the University of Toronto and author of the book, “The Trouble With Islam: A Muslim’s Call for Reform in her Faith,” Manji is calling for major reforms in Islam and an ultimate acceptance, or willingness to tolerate, a “diversity of ideas, beliefs and people in our universe.” She says she is determined to end the “mainstream literalism” of Islam.

“Muslims have been bludgeoning the freedoms of other Muslims,” Manji says. “I say to my fellow Muslims and queer Muslims, ‘If we have five fingers and if one can be pointed at America and one is pointed at Israel, can we bear to have one pointed at us? What makes us so perfect? Why are we that unimpeachable?’ God changes not what’s in a people until they change what’s in themselves.”

BUT THE ROAD to such lofty goals can be bumpy. Death threats against Manji have increased since her book was released early this year. Her Toronto apartment, which she shares with her partner, Michelle Douglas, 40, is outfitted with bulletproof glass and she even has special locks on her mailbox to secure her mail.

Manji says the threats are now becoming “up close and personal” because everyone knows what she looks likes from photos and public speaking engagements.

“The Jihadists come only to condemn and denounce,” Manji says. “They happen after the events are finished. It’s always Muslims and always men. They come up to say, ‘I’m not threatening you, but I know others who want to kill you.’ It is never said with affection. I get that kind of favorable response from women and non-Muslims, but the men always say it in these mincing tones.”

In once instance, at a U.S. airport, a woman recognized Manji, walked up to her and began a conversation. A few minutes into the dialogue, a “50-plus heavyset man” approached them and said to the woman, “You are luckier than your friend.” He then, according to Manji, morphed his hand into the shape of a gun, pointed it at Manji and pulled his finger as if to shoot her.

When the woman asked the man, “What are you driving at,” he replied, “She will find out. Not now, but she will find out later.”

But Manji says she is not fearful of her life and doubts that any radical will attempt to hurt or kill her.

“Muslims know that Islam is under the microscope these days,” she says. “People say, ‘Aren’t you courting a fatwa?’ A fatwa would be a bad thing with the assumption that it would be good for my career. Anyone who issues a fatwa or assaults me physically knows that they will just sell more books.

“To those of you who are listening, you will help my cause, not yours,” she says. “I’m not interested in being on the receiving end of martyrdom but I don’t fear that will happen. I believe that what I’m doing is for good reasons, an act of faith rather than repudiation.”

Before writing her book, in a conversation with another unorthodox Muslim writer, Salman Rushdie, Manji asked why she should write about Islamic reform. Rushdie, who had been encouraging her to write about this subject, told her that, “a book is more important than a life.”

“I laughed and said, ‘OK, what is the serious answer and he said that is the serious answer,’” Manji says. “‘When a writer puts a thought out, it can be disagreed with, but it cannot be un-thought. Even if one’s life is expunged because of a book, your ideas never will.’ That moved me profoundly.”

Despite the death threats, Manji said she has received much support for her book.

Her mother, who was initially concerned that the book would “anger God,” has expressed her approval, though she does not agree with everything in it. Manji told her that upsetting Muslim clerics was not the same thing as upsetting God and that she wrote the book “with the right intentions.”

She keeps a congratulations card from her mother, which she received after her book debuted, in her jam-packed briefcase that reads: “Bravo. I’m so proud of your achievements. You go girl. Mama.”

MANJI SAID SHE has received a lukewarm reception from gay and lesbian Muslims. While she is applauded for being a strong voice for diversity in the Muslim world, she says many queer Muslim activists are “disgusted” by her position on Israel.

Manji supports Israel’s right to statehood, in addition to a Palestine state, and has criticized the Palestinian leadership for killing every international arrangement that would have led to a viable Palestinian state in the Middle East. The government did this, she asserts, without seeking the will of the Palestinian people.

“[Gay Muslim activists] say, ‘Don’t confuse me with being anti-Jewish, I’m just anti-Israel,’” Manji says. “I say, ‘Hold on sister. I oppose that premise and so should you.’ I have never said that Israel has a perfect human rights record. Neither does America. I make the case that Israel’s existence does not lie at the heart of what’s wrong with the Muslim world.

“I say, yes, feel free to criticize the IDF [Israeli Defense Force] and their policies. There absolutely is an occupation but there is also a political occupation inflicted by the Palestinian leaders,” she says. “They have rejected every proposal for an independent state. They have always been rejected without the consultation of the Palestinian people. The last one, the Oslo Accords, was not translated into Arabic. This should burn every human rights activist.”

Manji praises Israel as the “only pro-gay society in the Muslim world,” and finds it astounding that gay Muslims would not want to work to bridge that gap. She says that on a subconscious level, she senses a desire on behalf of gay Muslims for mainstream approval and credibility.

“As a result, the queer Muslims will pander to the anti-Jewish prejudices of the leaders,” Manji said.

Muslim societies have shown a great intolerance toward homosexuality. In a recent article by Johann Hari, an award-winning journalist and playwright, titled “Outcast Heroes: The Story of Gay Muslims,” he notes that seven countries that regard homosexuality as a crime, punishable by death, are Muslim. And 36 out of 82 countries where being gay is considered a crime are Muslim.

He also cites the strident condemnation of homosexuality by “mainstream” Muslim leaders.

Dr. Muzammil Siddiqi, director of the Islamic Society of North America, describes homosexuality as “a moral disease, a sin, a corruption” and says, “No person is born homosexual, just as nobody is born a thief, a liar or a murderer. People acquire these evil habits due to a lack of proper guidance and education.”

Sheikh Sharkhawy, a cleric at the London Central Mosque in Regent’s Park, compared homosexuality to a “cancer tumour,” arguing that, “we must burn all gays to prevent paedophilia and the spread of AIDS,” and says gay people “have no hope of a spiritual life.”

Additionally, the Muslim Educational Trust, Hari reports, “hands out educational material to Muslim teachers advocating the death penalty for gay people, and advising Muslim pupils to stay away from gay classmates and teachers.”

Manji agrees that such extreme positions are indefensible and argues that hypocrisy is at the heart of a gay leader’s inability to denounce Christian as well as Muslim evangelicalism.

“The fact that the neo-con right and preachers have called Muslims on their hypocrisy makes it difficult for the political left to condemn it,” Manji says. “To criticize, they say, says you are only feeding into the so-called fear of Islam. It’s the same thing if someone were to say, ‘Oh, I think we need to overthrow Hussein because of his atrocious record on human rights.’

“To criticize the gross human rights violations of Hussein means that you support the Bush administration,” she says. “I long to see the day when gay and lesbian leaders will attend Muslim speak-outs and ask the Muslims in those protests if they in turn will speak out against gay homophobia. I don’t hear too many queer activists hammering that.”

Manji contends that Islam is the only religion that has no sense of moderation. Even Christianity has moderate factions, she says, despite the loud, mouthy rhetoric of apocalyptic social conservatives.

“Whenever I would air anti-gay remarks from Christian leaders on my television show, Christian viewers would flood our lines with tolerant biblical interpretations,” she says. “But when I expose anti-gay feedback from Muslim leaders, not once did other leaders offer other interpretations. It is as if these bigots spoke for Islam. Even those who don’t share mainstream Islam’s prejudices against homosexuality won’t speak up.”

Manji says she hears from many Muslims on her Web site, www.muslim-refusenik.com, and face-to-face that they can’t be public with their support of diversity because they fear persecution. She believes this is because literalism has gone mainstream.

“Every religion has its fair share of literalists but in Islam, literalism is worldwide. Even moderate Muslims believe that the holy Koran is God 3.0,” she says. “Most Muslims still don’t know how to debate because they have never been taught to. The same cannot be said of moderate Christians and Jews.”

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