Infidel

Infidel (literally, 'one without faith') is what Ayaan Hirsi Ali has professed herself as and has plastered in large all-cap letters on her recent autobiography. A brave woman as association with such a name puts her in direct threat of Islamic radicals.

I have just finished reading her fabulous autobiography where Ayaan details her life as she moved throughout Eastern Africa and the Middle East specifically Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia and Kenya. She places emphasis on how Islam shaped and changed her life, then to a greater extent how it affects it's followers and finally, Islam as a worldview that influences the world. Her story is all horrific, fascinating and thought-provoking. I winced through it as I read about her experience with female genital mutilation and the treatment of women in most Islamic countries. How can you leisurely read about a girl of 14 begging her husband who is holding a knife to her scar (the result of circumcision) not to cut her open so he can penetrate her? He so kindly got her cut open at a hospital instead of doing it himself. Such experiences fill her life's story. It is horrifying.

Ayaan also describes the political and social environments of the many countries she lived in. The reign of Siad Barre, the battle and ultimate destruction of Mogadishu (think Black Hawk Down). The rise of the Brotherhood of Islam and their influence in the world. Finally, she relays how she escaped an arranged marriage and fled to Holland. There she stayed independently where she worked factory jobs, learned Dutch and worked herself through school, gaining a masters degree in political science. Her observations and description of western culture from architecture to sex to philosophies is direct and eye-opening. We hardly comprehend our own culture until the other appears. Ayaan made her way into Dutch parliament and fought for women's rights, various immigrant policies, etc. all the while publically rising up as a fierce critic of Islam.

Together with Theo van Gogh, (a filmmaker in Amsterdam) Ayaan made a short film called Submission (you can watch it on youtube). The movie simply and artfully communicated the oppression of women in Islam. In November, 2004 Theo van Gogh was chased down on the streets of Amsterdam, shot, had his throat slit and was stabbed numerous times by an Islamic radical. With the last stab his killer attached a note onto Theo's chest addressed to Ayaan threatening that she would be next. She has since gone into hiding and is residing now in the U.S.
I arrived in Amsterdam 6 months later and I remember walking with some friends in Dam Square and being told of the huge demonstration that had happened there for Theo van Gogh in reaction to this terrible incident months before. This was undoubtedly a big deal.

Today Ayaan is known as one of Europe's most controversial political figures, speaking directly against the detriments of Islam. My natural overly tolerant Canadian tendencies winced at reading her harsh accusations and criticisms of Islam in her book. She has not been one to withhold her controversial opinion and in turn has rose in popularity as one of the most loved and hated feminist voices of today. I admire her strength and courage.

I love autobiographies generally. I love hearing people's stories, learning their lives, sharing and relating to their thoughts and experiences. What I love about Ayaan is her honesty and directness. I felt as though I have had the honour of being taken into her confidence and share a deeply personal journey. She wrote so candidly, not withholding details that one might easily hide as embarrassing if not unimportant to the story. But Ayaan has simply lived and told her story. She is a product of and now a fighter against religious abuse.
I recommend this book as one that has deeply touched and taught me. One can learn much from it's personal journey, history and perhaps challenging (or other) point of view from a fellow fighter for social justice.

In Ayaan's sharp criticisms towards Islam fundamentalism I couldn't help but find parallels with fundamentalist Christianity. Yes, evil is done in almost any name. I felt an uneasiness thinking back on the Christian education I so often received growing up with a (too often solely) strict emphasis to 'save the lost!' (as thought that were my job in the first place. Didn't Jesus come to do just that?) and all the detriments attached to an over simplistic, non-relational, partially understood 'mandate of love.'
Ravi Zacharias declares that one cannot judge a religion based on it's abuses but rather on what it professes. Now we're getting onto a whole other topic. :) I believe religions are flawed and often harmful. They are human made. And though it may be harder for me to separate a religion from it's abuses I am most interested in what religions profess. Ayaan makes it clear that it is a critical question to ask, for in reality it affects us all.