The Story of a Woman Taking a Stand Against Religious Extremists

Considering the world we live in now where we have women in important positions in governments around the world, the rights for Islamic women deserve to be fought for. Otherwise, an entire group of thinkers and inventors who could change the world will be lost.
This post was published on the now-closed HuffPost Contributor platform. Contributors control their own work and posted freely to our site. If you need to flag this entry as abusive, send us an email.

Religion is one of the most complicated phenomenon created by humans so that we feel like we have a larger power to look to answers and hope for. Like many ideas, in some aspects certain religions have been a little exaggerated in today's terms. People who exaggerate aspects of religion to such extremes are called extremists. There is a woman named Amina Tyler, who lived in Tunisia and posted a topless picture of herself on Facebook with the words, "My body belongs to me" written in Arabic across her chest. This is a massive offense in the Muslim religion because women are seen to be only obedient. The extremists obviously thought that a 19-year-old girl who posts a picture of her topless with the words, "My body belongs to me" is enough cause for Amina to be lashed 90 times. Many extremist preachers want her stoned or quarantined for the picture she posted because she is "contagious." Amina was reportedly admitted to a mental hospital by her parents after what she did.

The women activist group FEMEN has been staging naked protests, and stated that April 4 is the day of the "relentless topless jihad against Islamism," which means that they staged a massive protest against the beliefs that women don't deserve rights in the eyes of the extremists in the Islamic religion. Amina is an avid FEMEN activist and she helped jump-start a whole new level of protesting in the Middle East.

The protests that FEMEN is doing are raising important awareness. The real issue is that the men in the Muslim religion interpreted the Quran in such an extreme way that they believe that it's Gods will that women don't have any social standing. These men who follow the religion strictly were taught from a young age the beliefs that they are expressing today. These beliefs are what are holding back these men from accepting women as a functioning part of society. People are entitled to their beliefs, but when it intervenes with someone's freedom and individual thinking, then it becomes a larger issue.

Amina took a stand, and brought visibility to gender inequality in the Muslim religion. She understood what would happen to her if she did what she did. Preachers are demanding her death or at least severe punishment for what she did, because what she did is contagious and could bring epidemic to the Islamic people. It's this kind of extreme behavior that drives a wedge between the more moderate Islamic world and the West. Considering the world we live in now where we have women in important positions in governments around the world, the rights for Islamic women deserve to be fought for. Otherwise, an entire group of thinkers and inventors who could change the world will be lost.

Popular in the Community

Close

What's Hot