The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) by Robert Spencer see larger photo List Price: $19.95 Our Price: $13.57 Released 01 August, 2005 Paperback Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours

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Customer Review
Oppression? It's just a tale
1/5 Stars
I am a muslim women and I live in Indonesia, the largest muslim country, and I want to tell you that I don't suffer any oppression suggested in a chapter in this book. In my country, women have as much opportunity as men to climb corporate ladder. In fact, there's no such thing as glass ceiling like often happens in corporate America. We even have ever had a female president, one thing America has yet to have. Where's the oppression then?

Many American see that hijab I wear is some sort of oppression in Islam. Although there have been many books and articles about the hijab, they always tend to be written from an outsider's point of view; I hope this will allow me to explain what I can observe from the inside, so to speak. Before wearing hijab, sometimes I felt uneasy about being stared at by men. In my hijab I went unnoticed, protected from impolite stares. Islam commands women to cover their bodies so as not to trouble men who are weak and unable to resist temptation.

Wearing hijab is a voluntary act. No one could coerce me to wear it. If they had, perhaps I would have rebelled and rejected it. In Paris, one of my sisters from Japan was in the same Metro carriage with a nun and they smiled at their similarity of dress. The nun's dress was the symbol of her devotion to God, as is that of a Muslimah. We often wonder why people say nothing about the veil of the Catholic nun but criticize vehemently the veil of a Muslimah, regarding it as a symbol of` "terrorism" and "oppression."

Muslims are accused of being over-sensitive about the human body but the degree of sexual harassment which occurs these days justifies modest dress. Just as a short skirt can send the signal that the wearer is available to men, so the hijab signals, loud and clear: "I am forbidden for you." So I rejected the author's claim in this book that women in Islam are oppressed. After all, it is I who wear hijab and I don't feel restricted at all. Instead, I feel free.

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