Author: Juliet Rix
Publication: The Times
Date: March 12, 2008
URL: http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article3530256.ece
Maryam Namazie, head of the Council of Ex-Muslims
in Britain, says that rights are for individuals, not religions or beliefs
Picture this, says Maryam Namazie: "A
child is swathed in cloth from head to toe every day. Everything but her face
and hands are covered for fear that a man might find her attractive. At school
she learns that she is worth less than a boy. She is not allowed to dance
or swim or feel the sun on her skin or the wind in her hair. This is clearly
unacceptable, yet it is accepted when it is done in the name of religion."
Namazie is the founder of the Council of Ex-Muslims
in Britain (CEMB) which started life in the middle of last year. On Monday
- in celebration of the centenary of International Women's Day - she spoke
at a conference on Political Islam and Women's Rights, and launched a campaign
against Sharia.
Iranian Muslim by birth, Namazie, 41, is friendly
and softly spoken. But she does not mince her words. It takes nerve to start
an organisation for people who have rejected Islam. In Islamic law, apostasy
is punishable by death. Namazie receives periodic threats, usually on her
mobile phone: "One said, 'You are going to be decapitated'...I went to
the police. They were very attentive at first because they thought it might
be linked to the attempted bombings in Glasgow . But when they realised it
wasn't, they never bothered contacting me again." Doesn't she worry about
her safety? "Yes, I do, frequently. I worry about whether I will live,
especially now I am a mother. If I see someone looking at me strangely, I
wonder." Why doesn't she use a pseudonym? "They can find out who
you are anyway. And the point of the Council of Ex-Muslims is to stand up
and be counted." She doesn't really like the label ex-Muslim and would
prefer not to frame her identity in religious terms but, she says, it is like
gays "coming out" 30 years ago: something has to become public if
you are to break taboos. The CEMB has more than 100 members with inquiries
from people who do not dare to join. "Some have horrendous stories but
do not put them on the website because they are afraid."
Namazie's grandfather was a mullah and her
father was brought up a strict Muslim. Both of her parents (now living in
America) remain Muslim. When Namazie told her father about the launch of the
CEMB, she remembers that he said: "Oh no, Grandpa is going to be turning
in his grave." "So I told him that what I am doing benefits Muslims,
too, because if you live in a secular society, you can be a Muslim, a Sikh,
a Christian or an atheist and be treated equally." Namazie's opposition
to state religion is informed by her own experience. She was 12 when the Iranian
revolution "was hijacked by the Ayatollahs" and her country became
the Islamic Republic of Iran.
"I had never worn the veil and was at
a mixed school. Suddenly a strange man appeared in the playground. He was
bearded and had been sent to separate the sexes - but we ran circles round
him." She can still picture, too, the face of "the Hezbollah"
who stopped her in the street because her head was uncovered. "I was
12 or 13. It was really scary." Worse happened to others: "There
were beatings and acid was thrown in women's faces, and there were executions
on television every day," she says. Then her school was closed "for
Islamicisation".
Namazie and her mother left for India. They
lived in a B&B in Delhi and Namazie attended the British School while
her father and three-year-old sister remained in Tehran. This was meant to
be a temporary measure, but soon her father - a journalist - decided that
they all had to leave. The family spent a year in Bournemouth before travelling
to the US where, when Namazie was 17, they were granted residency.
At university, she joined the United Nations
Development Programme and went to work with Ethiopian refugees in Sudan. "Six
months after I arrived Sudan became an Islamic state. I was, like, this is
following me around!" Along with others, Namazie started an unofficial
human rights organisation, gathering information on the government. The Sudanese
security service called her in for questioning. "I wasn't very respectful
and the UN guy who came with me said, 'No wonder your parents took you out
of Iran'. The Sudanese guy threatened me, saying, 'you don't know what will
happen to you. You might have a motorbike accident or something'." The
UN quietly put her on a plane home.
This was a turning point, shifting her from
non-practising Muslim to atheist. Two decades on, she is devoting her life
to opposing religious power. She is in the midst of organising the first international
conference of Ex-Muslims, to be held in London on October 10. And she is about
to launch a "no Sharia" campaign.
She must have been shocked, I suggest, when
the Archbishop of Canterbury said the introduction of some Sharia in Britain
was unavoidable. No, she says; she wasn't even surprised. "It was quite
apt, although he didn't expect the reaction he got. It was an attack on secularism
really. It is, in a sense, to his benefit if there are Muslim schools and
Sharia. It makes it less likely that anyone will oppose Christian schools
and the privileged place of religion in society."
She is adamant, though, that no form of Sharia
should be allowed here. "It is fundamentally discriminatory and misogynist,"
she says and is dismissive of the idea that people would be able to choose
between Sharia and civil jurisdiction. Women could be railroaded into a Sharia
court, she says. "This would hit people who need the protection of British
law more than anyone else."
She believes that we are confused about the
meaning of human rights. "Rights are for individuals, not for religions
or beliefs. 'Every human is equal' does not mean that every belief is equal."
Islamists portray themselves as victims, she says, and policymakers have bought
into this. Namazie says that the Muslim Council of Britain should not be seen
as representative of British Muslims - but would nonetheless welcome any opportunities
to debate with it. "Ex-Muslims are in a good position to challenge political
Islam," she says. "We must not let little girls or anyone else lose
their human rights. We can't tolerate the intolerable for any reason - including
religion."
Council of Ex-Muslims in Britain www.ex-muslim.org.uk
exmuslimcouncil@googlemail.com; 07719-166731; www.maryamnamazie.com