I've just read Michael Muhammad Knight's story, "Progressive Islam and the Double-Dong Brothers." There are any number of things which could be said about it, and maybe I'll say them some other time.
For the moment, I'll say that for me, it raises a number of questions about the role of sexuality in the lives and imaginaries of North American Muslims.
In Knight's story, women are essentially objects. Men look at them, lust after them, do things to them. And, of course, write about them. And apparently, women like it---not that it really matters.
How brutally familiar it all is for those of us who are familiar with typical conservative Muslim discourses on gender, marriage and the family---the sort of discourses which do not bother to disguise the male-centredness of their worldview with flowery rhetoric: Women tempt and seduce men. Women who don't cover their heads and faces invite men to lust after them. Women must bow to their husbands' sexual demands, and women who don't do this are cursed by angels. To describe such discourses as phallocentric is almost an understatement.
Progressive Muslims want to critique such conservative discourses and come up with an approach to sexuality which doesn't diminish the humanity of either women or men. They do this in various ways---from suggesting that temporary marriage can provide an "Islamic" way of avoiding casual sex, to looking to scholars able to provide a feminist approach to Muslim sexual ethics.
Conservatives hold that Islam's task is not to change "human nature" (whatever that is), but to channel human (meaning, male) desires, sexual and otherwise, in approved ways. According to them, people are inevitably going to have sex. The only concern is that the sex they have be Sharia-compliant. Interestingly, progressives seem to share this assumption about a largely unexamined "human nature" which is sexual; where they would differ is that they would insist, at least theoretically, on including women as full members of humanity.
But why share this culturally constructed assumption, that humans are inevitably going to have sex? It didn't come out of nowhere; it has a history which can be traced. Historically, Muslim scholars have gone out of their way to discourage celibacy as contrary to the Sunna. Is it really possible to just incorporate women into Muslim assumptions of how "human nature" works, and come up with anything that is just?
Why not celibacy instead, for a change?
Ilan did post on the idea of a sexual strike by Saudi women---originally written about by Religious Policeman---in order to bring about social change. But I'm not suggesting celibacy-as-protest so much as celibacy as a position from which to enter the ongoing debates about gender and Islam from a new direction.
At its worst, celibacy is often linked to social control and sexist double standards, and yes, objectifying women (underwear with slogans such as "Traffic control--wait for marriage" and shirts warning, "No Trespassing on this property my father is watching). And yes, some people are doomed to celibacy by homophobia, or because at the ripe old age of 25 they are "on the shelf" already. So, it's hardly a problem-free thing to endorse.
Yet, it can also be a way to self-knowledge, especially for women who are used to regarding Muslim conservative (or more apologetic) discourses on gender as normative.
What am I, if I am not a sexual object? If the female body is neither for male pleasure nor for reproduction, what is it?
What am I, if I refuse to care one way or another about the male gaze? (Whether this be the male gaze of the scholar specifying how many centimetres of a woman's wrist can be shown in public, or the adolescent gaze of the Muslim boy ogling women at the mall?)
What am I, if I refuse to submit to the jurists' rulings which say that I must provide sexual services or lose my rights to food, clothing and shelter? If I thumb my nose at the threats of angelic curses? Does this tradition even acknowledge my presence, when all the booklets about "how to be an ideal wife and mother" become irrelevant to me?
What am I, if I refuse to be defined by North American consumerist notions of what a woman is and aspires to?
Why not celibacy? Not as something that everyone must adhere to, or even aspire to. I agree that many (most?) people probably wouldn't want to commit permanently to it. I'm not sure that I would.
I see celibacy as a possibility which should be discussed, if only as a way of short-circuiting the usual assumptions we tend to make about what women and men are, and how they "naturally" interact in the world (and for that matter, in the hereafter---but that's another story). I see celibacy as a viable lifestyle choice for some people, which should be acknowledged and honoured, rather than looked upon as a misfortune or a suspicious abherration.
Don't miss the self-disgust. I have read the whole novel. It is extraordinary. The best he has done yet. It is no mistake that his only woman character who was ever fully portrayed and whom he never saw because of her burqa cuts his head off in the end. The story, the novel, is about the writer coming to terms with the very objections you state here. He uncovers some pretty terrible layers of himself, the characters he has created, the character of himself that sometimes does his dirty work. He knows exactly what it is and he is saying it.ÂÂ
Muslim Hedonist
No, I haven't missed MMK's self-disgust. He sees what a hash Muslim visions of sexuality have made of so many Muslim men. He portrays the irony of it, that a community which tends to excel in self-righteousness (especially when it comes to the sexualities of "others") can foster such anti-human gender relations.
But all the same, IMO women still largely remain objects in this discourse.
Yet, a space opens up (I think) if we take his portrayal and ask what if any relation it has to our own aspirations and views of ourselves. Of course, this is what we aren't supposed to do, to put women's views and visions in the centre.
Which novel is this?
Ginan Rauf
Hedonist- sounds like it could be read along with the Scum
manifesto, a place where female celibacy is glorified as an
ideal and the female gaze is turned in disgust on male animality.
It is the lack.
I would venture to say that this discourse of disgust with male
animality exists in a parallel/oral sort of discourse amongst many
women. It's an informal hadith-a body of wisdom that looks with
utter contempt upon the insatiability of male sexuality along with
all the pathetic things that can go wrong in terms of impotence,
premature ejaculation and so forth. As always your comments are
fascinating. Personally, I am weary of such discourse probably because I am absurdly monogomous and in love with my husband to whom I have been married forever. Still, given the divorce rates I
recognize that human sexuality is extremely diverse and mine may
be not be representative at all, why should it be? So I think exploring
the options of celibacy is a fascinating subject- gosh you cheer me up!
ginan
Celibacy doesn't actually solve much in terms of relations between genders. I'm willing to bet that much of the income generated by the porn industry comes from celibate people.
I was celibate for many years, having gotten married at the ripe old age of 33. It's no walk in the park. Wouldn't recommend it to anyone.
hmm, it would be nice to be able to combine two comments
The unpublished novel is entitled _Osama Van Halen_. It is my favorite so far. It reminded me so much of Sherman Alexie's work. I gave him a copy of _The Toughest Indian in the World_. He loved it. I explain him to non-Muslims as the Sherman Alexie of American Islam.
Celibacy as a point from which to examine one's desires, the proper "object" of one's desires--meaning an emotionally, spiritually, and intellectually healthy person with whom you can share a life of mutual respect, care, and desire--seems right and good. At least this is what my therapist keeps telling me! I agree, it is difficult to sort out one's emotional history with respect these matters if you are in the middle of a confusing series of unhealthy sexual and emotional relationships. It is normal on a sufi path to go through an Isawi period, a period like Jesus, withdraw from the world and learn the proper and healthy balance between one's desires and one's intellect and heart-knowledge. But then one should go back into the world, like Muhammad, and live in the world in a sound and healthy way.
Having practiced celibacy now for several years, I think it has the potential of allowing us to relate more holistically with people of the other sex, but I don't think that is something which necessarily comes of it: Only something that can come of it.
Would it help women to practice celibacy, at least for a while? I think it might, based on my experience with it. For when you commit yourself to celibacy, you eventually cease to think of yourself in terms of whether you are sexually attractive to the other sex. It becomes of no importance to you for it has no practical use to think of yourself in those terms. Hence, for a woman trying to escape from or at least balance the cultural conditioning to be a sex object, a period of celibacy might be a means out of that conditioning.
Just my 2 cents.
I'm a sex-positive feminist, but I think I'd give up all sex if my only option was doing it with a self-righteous bastard for whom my body is a prop.
Hellooo masturbation.
P.S. Does pleasuring yourself figure into celibacy at all?
Muslim Hedonist
Depends on how you define celibacy. Is it the absence of all sexual activity whatsoever, is it simply avoiding penetrative sex, or is it about abstaining from connecting sexually with others?
Such differing definitions seem to have a lot to do with the question of motivation: is celibacy a good thing because sexual pleasure is seen as sinful/shameful? Or can it be a positive choice for some people because it is a way of taking charge on their bodily boundaries? Needless to say, I take the second opinion, so I don't see why celibate people--or anyone else--shouldn't pleasure themselves if they want to.
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