The art of pushing religious bigotry in name of feminism and liberalism
Today morning, on Holi, we woke up to an article which made bizarre claims that Holika, the sister of asura king Hiranyakashipu, who tried to kill her nephew on her brother’s behest and got burnt herself instead, was a “Bahujan woman”.
There are a few things wrong here. Firstly, the lady who wrote the article conveniently forgets that Holika was trying to set her own nephew on fire, and got burnt herself. Like those numerous terrorists who accidentally blow themselves up while trying to throw grenades elsewhere.
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Secondly, a bit of a research would have revealed to her that Holika was not a Bahujan, but a Brahmin – a community that is ‘liberally’ maligned as oppressors of the Bahujan people (a vague term that will include OBCs when convenient, but the same OBCs will become ‘upper caste’ when they are at odds with Dalits).
As a marginally privileged upper caste Brahmin myself, I may have been shielded from the caste prejudice which is still prevalent in many parts of India, but social media activism has made me realise that more often than not, a lot of these religious and caste issues are raked up to push bigotry under guise of social justice or feminism, as is the case here with this article on the website called ‘Feminism in India’.
As usual, the self-declared left-liberals chose to propagate the blatant untruth, but many exposed the falsehoods:
Hey @FeminismInIndia,Holika was not a Bahujan woman, she was a Kattar Brahman woman. She was the daughter of the great Brahman sage Kashyapa. Burning of Holika has no caste angle. Have some shame before peddling such lies. https://t.co/dvwvqPN2gD— True Indology (@TrueIndology) March 2, 2018
Holika was actually a Brahmin. Would u then see it as an ‘anti-Brahmin’ act? I wouldn’t give a caste angle to this storyThere is nothing wrong with criticising the scriptures of any religion. But if u do want to criticise the scriptures, a good 1st step is to actually read them https://t.co/SJ8CpG8wGV— Amish Tripathi (@authoramish) March 2, 2018
This is not for the first time this website has portrayed Hindu festivals and Hinduism as inherently misogynist:
And when they are not busy painting Hinduism as oppressive, women-hating religion, they spend their spare time painting Islam as the most women-friendly religion, which is paragon of feminism:
There are many issues with this website that is promoted as being authoritative feminist voice in India on many platforms like Reliance owned Firstpost, and that is why it becomes important to call out the bigotry and propaganda of this so-called feminist portal.
Just take for example the last screenshot above. ‘Legal Islamic marriage’ would mean it falls under Shariyat laws. Please note, that ‘Sharia’, which endorses polygamy, unequal inheritance, nikah-halala (practice of a divorced woman having to consummate the marriage with another man and then getting a divorce from him before remarrying her previous husband) and unequal rights for divorce among others, is showcased as championing the cause of female sexuality. Is it Feminism or Islamism?
While Islam is hailed as progressive and champion of female sexuality, not a single article has been written on this website that shows Hindus and Hinduism in harmony with feminists themes. The blatant bias and double standards hint at an agenda, which they have not been pretty smart to hide.
However, what they have been pretty smart at, is to use a term like ‘feminism’ to push their agenda. This attempt to marry Islamic themes with liberal ideas is not limited to India though. Even in the West, there are scores of newly propped feminists who can be seen endorsing hijab as a feminist symbol:
If I was oppressed by my hijab, I wouldn't be wearing it. Trust me. A piece of cloth doesn't oppress, people do. So stop oppressing me.
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Self proclaimed progressive feminists from the west like Linda Sarsour, who is an American political hijab endorsing Muslim activist regularly turn a blind eye to the misogyny in Islam, and the same is being done by this website in India.
American Muslim Reform Movement co-founder Asra Nomani calls such people and outfits the ‘honor brigade’, which are an organised attempt to silence a debate on Islam, where a group of anonymous bloggers and armies of trolls on social media organise campaigns to silence criticism of Islam.
Hijab and Shariah law defenders like Sarsour led a march in Washington after Donald Trump became US President, which expressly portrayed the veil as a symbol of feminist struggle. Linda and other Muslim feminists have never joined feminists movements like the one against compulsory hijab in school in Iran or stepped up for exiled Saudi women’s activist Moudi Aljohani in her push to stop Riyadh’s enslavement of women; it just shows the hypocrisy veiled under the garb of feminism.
A lot of these feminists and activists have hijacked the liberal catchphrases to push their religious bigotry or whitewash Islamic crimes against the same liberal values. For example, wearing a hijab or burqa is showcased as freedom of choice to wear one, completely ignoring the fact that in many Islamic states, this is not a choice, but compulsion and a glaring symbol of oppression. So much that they organised ‘World Hijab Day’. A very subtle, but quite effective, way of appearing liberal while pushing religious bigotry.
The website Feminism in India too endorses burqa as a ‘choice’:
One can only imagine what this website will do to any Hindu woman who says that wearing sindoor or mangalsutra is her choice.
This trend of using liberal themes and pushing Islamic agenda is not limited to feminism only, however the trend is too obvious to miss. In places like United Kingdom, groups demanding Shariyat to be imposed have been allowed freedom to operate and propagate their thoughts under the guise of ‘multiculturalism’, while Shariyat is just opposite to what multiculturalism stands for. UK woke up, a little, only after connections of such groups and people with terrorist group ISIS came up.
Open espousal of Shariyat could be rare, but every occasion to talk about some liberal value has been used to push Islamic agenda:
Back home, we have seen how the Kashmiri separatists, inspired from their ideas of Islam and desirous of creating a caliphate like ‘pure land’ in Kashmir, try to camouflage their bigotry and violence by pushing their agenda under the banner of ‘human rights’.
These are similar sinister attempts, though fortunately sans the guns and grenades.
We have to give it to the propagandists though. You think of almost any liberal catchphrase and there will be at least one example of an Islamic agenda married to it. Feminism, human rights, social justice, tolerance, et al. Perhaps only thing missing is ‘gay rights’ and Islam. Oh wait:
Source: https://www.opindia.com/2018/03/feminism-in-india-website-twitter-handle-spreads-hindupbhobia-islamic-propaganda/
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