What I discovered was that it was a much more mature version of her earlier book. She didn’t really want to rehash her life’s story, but showed how Islam and its culture has affected, and does affect, the various members of her family. And instead of simply saying “Islam is bad,” she goes on to describe precisely how she thinks it is bad, and how that can be countered. The end of her book describes very specific things that can be done to better integrate Muslim immigrants into western societies, specifically education about finances (credit, loans, and the like), sexuality, and violence. Certainly I cannot disagree with the idea that education is a powerful tool, and that it would help Muslim immigrants. There is much that can be done to help assimilate people unfamiliar with their culture, as demonstrated in this article from the Wall Street Journal detailing a similar situation, but here in America, and with Russian Christian immigrants.
Hirsi Ali also talked about what she’s seen here in America as she has gone to various lectures—a steady stream of young, well-educated Muslim women wearing hijabs who come up to the microphone and accuse her of misrepresenting Islam. (Deidre came to one of these meetings, one that Hirsi Ali actually speaks of in the book because she was asked "Who gives you the right to talk about Islam?" to which one student in the back yelled out "The first amendment!" Of course, that argument, while true, doesn't address whether Hirsi Ali is right or not.) This is where Hirsi Ali is at her verbal best, even if the tone isn’t going to actually move the conversation forward. Basically her response is, “you know, in Saudi Arabia, you girls in your hijabs accusing me of preaching falsehood against Islam couldn’t even be getting this education, so shut up about what Islam is actually like.”
I myself have encountered this in a class on Islam I took at CUA. One of the Muslim students from the class, with their significant other, and I were riding the metro home together and we got to talking about various issues, like the South Park episode about Muhammad, and the riots in Denmark a few years ago because of the Muhammad cartoons. Needless to say, I was rather disturbed by the tone of the conversation. They weren’t advocating violence, but they really weren’t condemning those who reacted so violently against these events. At all. They seemed to think that the creators of South Park and those cartoons were asking for it.
And what is Hirsi Ali’s overarching theme in this book? Again, it’s the same, that Islam is a force for evil in the world and the western ideas of the enlightenment are near universal truths that just work better. I really read this and started to mentally roll my eyes. After all, Western culture has its failings too. But then I read a passage that changed my entire opinion of the book. After mulling it over, I thought that I would simply go back to Borders and take pictures of the passage so you could all read it for yourself. From pages 212-214:
This part blew my mind. And it spoke so clearly to me and my sensibilities. You can ask Susan, it kind of threw me for a loop that day, to suddenly discover that, despite the best efforts of my professors at Yale, I was still a cultural imperialist. When I read the line “the culture of the Western Enlightenment is better” my heart skipped a beat.
Finishing the book I then discovered that it really was a much more mature version of her earlier work. Having done the US lecture circuit, she’s run into people like my friend Deidre, and has specific responses to their criticisms. And all of these responses ring so very true to me.
First, that we need to get over colonialism. Seriously. Get over it. So Western societies really did some screwy things. Horrible things. Genocidal things. That doesn’t mean you have to throw out the baby with the bathwater. Western society is not 100% bad.
Second, that with the death of colonialism, we will be able to realize that oppression is not always the result of actions by straight white Christian men. Any human being is capable of oppressing another, and we need to stop oppression. Period. The focus on wrongs of the past by Western culture are blinding us to the wrongs of the present from other cultures.
Third, equal respect for all cultures doesn’t actually translate into reality. She has another great line about this. “In the real world, equal respect for all cultures doesn’t translate into a rich mosaic of colorful and proud peoples interacting peacefully while maintaining a delightful diversity of food and craftwork. It translates into closed pockets of oppression, ignorance, and abuse.” Her comment reminded me of this talk by Richard G. Scott of my church's Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.
Fourth, that it is disingenuous to say that parts of the Islamic culture aren’t really “Islamic.” Things like FGM spring to mind. Hirsi Ali’s assertion is that these cultural oddities have been wedded to Islam over the past, oh, millennia, so to assert that Islam doesn’t actually preach these things is to ignore that welding together of Arabian culture and Islamic teaching.
Certainly Hirsi Ali is setting up a false dichotomy in many ways—Islamic culture, or Western culture (and she thinks that Denmark is the pinnacle of Western culture). She herself falls into the exact same trap she accuses others of. The reality of the situation is that all cultures have failings (the suicide rate in Denmark is extraordinarily high, for example), and we should pick up from each culture those things that are good. I particularly like the emphasis on family in Arabian Muslim culture, but again, sometimes this emphasis leads to things it should not. No one culture is so evil it needs to be completely eradicated. But certainly some things do. It was coincidence, of course, but Hirsi Ali’s books are right next to I am Nujood, Age 10 and Divorced by Nujood Ali, another book that is a startling reminder that these things still exist. As if recent news wasn’t enough to make that clear.
So, Hirsi Ali’s book was eye opening to me in some ways. I think given a false dichotomy of Western culture and Muslim culture, Western culture is better. But she makes that (valid) point in such a blunt manner with such flaws that it almost invalidates it. Almost. I like the criticisms in this NY Times book review of it—namely that her family seems dysfunctional for other reasons than Islam (though Hirsi Ali would clearly disagree with him), and that she’s equated all of Islam with the Arabian versions she encountered. To be fair, though, that is the form of Islam that seems to be spreading the fastest. I was also amused at her assertion (one shared by Nonie Darwish) that Christianity, with its God of love, should be playing a bigger role in the "clash of civilizations." Hirsi Ali did apologize to Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, etc. for saying this, which amused me further.
Also, in doing research for this blog post, cracked.com became actually relevant for a moment. Whoa.
In short, Ayaan Hirsi Ali has written a much better book than her first, though with some serious flaws, but on the whole I agree with her premise and conclusions.
And I think that made me become a cultural imperialist. Or at least reawaken the cultural imperialist in me. Western culture is better. Not perfect. Not the best. Just better. It still kind of creeps me out that I can just say that so boldly.
All right all you smart people who read this blog. Bring it on! (And I mean ALL of you. Anybody with any thoughts at all, I want you to share them.)
