Author: rlh95

Identify: An Olympic Spotlight on Transgender Athletes

The Olympic rings modified with male and female gender symbols
Sex LGBT Olympics. Source: Nevit Dilmen, Creative Commons

The Olympics are often heralded as a celebration of international cooperation, but they also reflect the current political and cultural moment in which the games take place. Explained in the book The Games: A Global History of the Olympics, the first modern Olympics in 1896 were only composed of white males, mirroring those who had sole power in society. As the decades passed and the world changed, other races, women, and those with disabilities were added to the Olympic competition roster. This path of progress wasn’t free of setbacks, but the addition of these athletes put out a signal to the world that these groups were to be seen as Olympians; on equal footing as those who had come before. This process of inclusion is still ongoing, and within the past few years a new set of competitors have been given approval to go for gold.

In July 2017, the Olympic Channel launched a new original series, Identify, following the stories of five athletes in the US who identify as transgender, defined as “a person whose gender identity differs from the sex the person had or was identified as having at birth.” Those interviewed ranged in level from a Division III college volleyball player to a professional hockey player, but each of their stories share common threads in terms of their deep passion for their sport and the difficulties of navigating the regulations around being a trans competitor.

The choice to produce the show did not come out of a vacuum. As addressed at the beginning of each video, text appears reading, “In 2016, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) advised that transgender athletes can compete without undergoing surgery, making history in the sports world.” This sentence is referring to a meeting that took place in late 2015 aimed at revising the previous rules on transgender athlete eligibility. Dr. Richard Budgett, Medical Director of the IOC, describes that prior to the new ruling, the IOC policy recommended that in order to compete as a trans man or woman in their desired category the athlete must undergo full lower surgery with internal and external modifications.

Chris Mosier is the first transgender athlete to compete for Team USA. The old policy did not permit him to race at the Sprint Duathlon World Championship so he decided to challenge the ruling. “My whole thing was that I qualified for Team USA just like the rest of the guys on the team, and I knew that I belonged at the starting line representing our country. What it did was position me as a name and a face to say ‘I’m a real athlete who is not able to compete because you’re asking me to modify my body in a way that I don’t want to.’” Pushed by his advocacy, the International Olympic Committee reconvened with their medical advisors to review the current scientific literature, and from the session drafted the “IOC Consensus Meeting on Sex Reassignment and Hyperandrogenism”.

In the document, there are three categories of athletes covered under the new recommendations. The first category addresses transgender men and states that “Those who transition from female to male are eligible to compete in the male category without restriction.” This allowed Chris to be able to join his team at the world competition, but also opened the door to other athletes profiled in the series, such as Schuyler Bailar.

Schuyler Bailar speaking at 2017 Pride and Prejudice Conference
Schuyler Bailar. Source: Wymzee, Creative Commons

For his piece in the Identify series, Schuyler begins by recounting how ever since he was little he has been in the pool. “I’ve just always loved being underwater… and it’s always that kind of moment of ‘This is the only thing I’m supposed to be doing right now, this is the only place I need to be.’ That brings me a lot of peace I think that I don’t have in my daily life.”

An injury in high school afforded him the space he needed to process his identity outside of swimming, and soon after he began identifying as transgender. However, he says that “It took me another year until I told most of my friends and asked them to call me male pronouns and refer to me as a boy and solidify the idea of ‘Oh, this has actually always been me, and I’m not actually changing myself, I’m just presenting the truest part of myself.’”

When he’s not at practice for the Men’s Swimming and Diving Team at Harvard, Schuyler can be found speaking in front of audiences about the experiences he has gone through as his public sport’s career and personal identity have intersected. “I love motivational speaking because I’m really invested in sharing my story, and sharing the possibility for this kind of happiness and this kind of peace with yourself, especially with something so complicated as being transgender, but also so simple as just wanting to be happy.” Introduced as the “first openly transgender athlete to compete in any sport on an NCAA Division I team,” Schulyer takes the stage and begins speaking to a crowd of administrators, sharing with them how important a role his teachers and coaches have played in supporting him throughout his life.

As trans men, Chris and Schulyer are both now free to compete for a spot on Team USA just like any other male athlete, without restriction. For trans women however, the rules become more complex. The IOC consensus states that a trans women is allowed to compete in the female category as long as she 1) agrees to make permanent her female gender identity for a minimum of four years, 2) shows that her testosterone level is not above 10 nmol/L at least 12 months prior to her first competition, and 3) submits to testing of these levels.

The focus on testosterone is one which has been hotly debated around the discourse surrounding the inclusion of trans athletes, and it stems from the fear that trans women will have an advantage over other women in competition. The only episode in the Identify series to follow a trans woman featured Chloe Anderson, a Division III volleyball player for the University of California, Santa Cruz. Out of the five episodes posted on Youtube, she has the largest dislike ratio, coming in at just under 50%. One comment sums up the negativity towards her by stating incredulously, “So, basically they allow cheating in the form of men competing versus women but steroids are an ‘unfair advantage’?”

When closely examined however, the general assumptions on what makes a man “better” than a woman in sports, or even how to properly define those categories, becomes much more nuanced and mired in legal battles. Aside from the discussions on whether nationally funded training programs, genetic variations, and economic privileges give some athletes a competitive advantage over others, a recent dispute over testosterone levels in women’s sports shows how difficult it is to pinpoint a single variable for developing a winning athlete.

Dutee Chand bites her medal on the left while standing with her three teammates.
Dutee Chand, Srabani Nanda, Himashree Roy And Merlin Joseph Of India (Bronze Winners). Source: Athletics Federation of India, Creative Commons

Dutee Chand is an Indian sprinter with hyperandrogenism, defined by the Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine as an “Excessive secretion of androgens (male sex hormones).” The New York Times reports that Chand was “barred from competing against women in 2014 because her natural levels of testosterone exceeded guidelines for female athletes” by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). This decision to draw a line in the sand as for what constitutes a female athlete caused anger in the sports community, and after the court ruled in Chand’s favor by allowing her to race in the qualifiers for the 2016 Olympics in Rio, the decision-making panel released a statement remarking that “Although athletics events are divided into discrete male and female categories, sex in humans is not simply binary… As it was put during the hearing: ‘Nature is not neat.’ There is no single determinant of sex.”

The IOC specifically addressed this ruling during the consensus meeting, and the discussion around the ruling also sheds light on the reasons the IOC amended its policy on transgender athletes. Trans women are now beholden to the limit of 10 nmol/L of testosterone, within the range of the average female competitor, even though there may be other women who may match or exceed that level. Chloe gives a personal description of what it was like transitioning, disclosing that “Transitioning is like going through puberty backwards, the other direction, twice as far. There’s a noticeable difference in my athleticism… It was pretty challenging at first, just having all my muscle basically melt off my body.” With the legal decision and the current body of evidence, the IOC and the IAAF have both come to the conclusion that opening the female division to trans women who have not undergone surgery still meets the requirements of an equal and level playing field.

While the door has opened wider for transgender athletes to join Team USA, there will be no openly trans athletes competing in PyeongChang this month. However, should you still like to support the LGBTQ+ community at the Winter Olympics, the Human Rights Campaign has made a detailed list of several athletes to cheer for on their website, including skier Gus Kenworthy and figure skater Adam Rippon. Good luck you two!

Bacha Posh: The Resilient Girls of Afghanistan

Three curly haired Afghan kids look up to the camera
Afghanistan Kids. Source: Army Amber, Creative Commons

Afghanistan has been embroiled in numerous civil wars and regime changes as global powers like Britain, Russia, and the United States have attempted to each bring their own version of peace and governance to the country for the past 150 years. The international community’s involvement has made little progress in quelling the violence during this time span, despite attempts at installing kings, providing assistance, backing rebels, and imposing sanctions. In some ways, the international community has instead reaped the consequence of empowering extremist groups like the Taliban, who have used the money and weapons funneled to the country for the original purpose of fighting the Soviets to stage a takeover of their own once the Soviets withdrew. With this climate as a backdrop, many of the stories from the region told in the West are often focused on soldiers and battles taking place in Afghanistan’s arid desert, with men from the Afghan government, extremist groups, and foreign armies fighting vigilantly for their homeland, whichever land that may be. When the focus shifts, Afghan women take center stage as the West’s fascination with their sheet-like garment–the burka–brings out calls for liberation of the oppressed group; however, on rare occasions, a story of the resilience and resistance of Afghan women pierces through our media landscape and introduces us to a new facet of the human experience.

Inspired by her visit to Pakistani refugee camps and encounters with many Afghan women in 1996, Deborah Ellis wrote a book about an Afghan girl who dons the persona of a boy to provide for her family. An adaption of Deborah Ellis’s The Breadwinner was released in select theaters in November. Based on the book published in 2000, the narrative follows an 11-year-old girl named Parvana who lives with her family in Kabul, Afghanistan under the rule of the Taliban. After her father’s imprisonment because of Taliban’s disdain for his western education, her mother and school teacher disguise her as a boy so she can work and become the sole breadwinner in the family, bringing in an income for the household of six. Audiences worldwide are now able to watch Parvana’s journey on the silver screen, but with the revelation that a portion of girls do dress as boys in Afghanistan, many questions arise. What happens if they are caught? How is cross dressing allowed by the families? Do the girls transition to being boys forever? If this is a more common occurrence than previously thought, why doesn’t the international community recognize this subversion being undertaken?

Jenny Nordberg steps in to dive deeper into the subject. Author of the 2014 book The Underground Girls of Kabul: in Search of a Hidden Resistance in Afghanistan, she spent months tracking down and interviewing families across the country who had a bacha posh, or a girl “dressed up as a boy” in the Dari language. Through her research, she creates the “only original non-fiction work on the practice of bacha posh”, bringing to light the ways in which women in a hostile environment have innovated and found ways to survive under incredible circumstances. Both the fictional tale in The Breadwinner and the real-life stories of bacha posh in The Underground Girls of Kabul bear striking similarities in themes, but combined they also highlight how the experience of each girl is unique to her own personal circumstances.

War

One constant held across both accounts is the presence of war and the Taliban. For the bacha posh, physical and environmental factors force their adaptation. In both the story and in the in-person interviews, Afghan parents reminisce about the brief period of peace in their youth when they freely roamed the streets in their garment of choice without fear during the Soviet rule. It was only when the Taliban took control that the practice of girls dressing as boys became necessary, as the schooling of girls became illegal and all women who had reached puberty were ordered to wear a burka, be accompanied by a male escort, and stay inside. If a woman is caught outside without an escort and a burka, she risks assault and death. This threat drove the decision of Parvana’s family in The Breadwinner, for without the father figure her family was left without a male, and this lead to her mother and siblings being trapped in the house with no way to earn money or buy food at the market. By making Parvana a boy, even at 11, she was able to escort her family members and secure a job reading and writing letters for illiterate men that passed her by on the street.

 

A line of Taliban soldiers stand beside a table handing in their weapons
Former Taliban fighters return arms. Source: Resolute Support Media, Creative Commons

Society

Yet if girls were unable to navigate the street on their own, doesn’t dressing a girl as a boy increase the risk to her safety if she is found out? Many experts Nordberg consulted when she first began her project dismissed the possibility of the bacha posh’s existence as it seemed to run contrary to the Western view of conservative Islamic societies. In a community in which the roles of males and females are so well defined, it is hard to believe that someone crossing from one role to another would not be in the greatest of violations. Shukria Siddiqui, a bacha posh until she was 20, interviewed 15 years later, clarifies this contradiction by giving an example from when she was challenged by three Mujahideen soldiers at her home when she was 17. The soldiers called out for the rumored girl who dressed like a boy, and when she went to her door to answer one of the men stated “Okay, you look like a boy, and you are completely like a boy, so we will call you a boy.”

The soldier’s statement is the stance that most Afghans, male and female, religious and nonreligious, take when confronted with a bacha posh. In The Breadwinner, Parvana lived in constant fear of being found out by those around her, but Nordberg observes that as long as the status quo of the roles remain, meaning boys complete tasks outside the home and women complete the tasks inside the home, there is nothing provoking about a bacha posh’s actions. In their eyes, the child is still conforming to societal norms, unlike if they were to stay a girl and complete traditionally male tasks. As long as the child switches back at an appropriate age to be married, around their late teens, in order to continue fulfilling their role, all is well. This sentiment is also echoed by the majority of families interviewed who raised a bacha posh. They transform their daughter to become a boy anywhere between birth and 10 years old, but as the bacha posh begins to show signs of puberty, they switch them back to assume their female identity with little problem. Only in two rare types of cases did Nordberg find that the transition back caused lasting difficulties for the girl and her family: when the girl exhibits signs of gender dysphoria, and when the transition back to being a girl occurs later in life.

Psychology

Defined by the American Psychiatric Association,

“Gender dysphoria involves a conflict between a person’s physical or assigned gender and the gender with which he/she/they identify. People with gender dysphoria may be very uncomfortable with the gender they were assigned, sometimes described as being uncomfortable with their body (particularly developments during puberty) or being uncomfortable with the expected roles of their assigned gender.”

The common term associated with someone who experiences gender dysphoria and identifies with another gender is transgender, however,

“Gender dysphoria is not the same as gender nonconformity, which refers to behaviors not matching the gender norms or stereotypes of the gender assigned at birth. Examples of gender nonconformity (also referred to as gender expansiveness or gender creativity) include girls behaving and dressing in ways more socially expected of boys or occasional cross-dressing in adult men.”

The majority of girls Nordberg spoke with fell into the category of being gender nonconforming; comfortable with being a girl even if they took on traditionally male roles. Yet Zahra, a 17-year-old bacha posh, felt the opposite. Transformed into a bacha posh at birth, she fully embraced the idea of being a boy, reveling in her male friendships and shunning interactions with girls as it was not considered manly to interact with the other sex. After working for several years, Zahra’s mother suggested that she transition back, but this caused Zahra great psychological distress. Zahra refused to change back, and feeling appalled by her now changing body she confessed to Nordberg that should she get the chance she would undergo an operation to permanently transition herself into a boy. This was outside of the norm even for a bacha posh, but it does fit into what would be diagnosed in the West as gender dysphoria. While Nordberg was unable to draw a conclusion as to whether the original bacha posh transition influenced Zahra or if the two happened in tandem, it was an important case to demonstrate that while the majority of bacha posh are not gender dysphoric, there may be gender dysphoric bacha posh.

The other case when the transition out of being a bacha posh is rendered more difficult is when the girl transitions back later in life. In Shukria’s case, she was transitioned back at 20 just before her wedding, set up by her family. She accepted this arrangement and went through with it, but she quickly found that she lacked many of the skills that women her same age were already competent in; cooking, cleaning, and recognizing non-verbal cues from other women were all difficult to pick up. It was as if her brain had settled into the male pattern of behavior and found it difficult to let go. Her steps were too long, her voice was too loud, and she found it hard to relate to idle gossip and conversations around childrearing. Yet, it is important to emphasis that all the problems she encountered stem from social, not biological, norms. When Nordberg asked Shukria if she could teach her, the Swedish born New York based reporter, how to become a man, Shukria look her over and said she was already a man due to her Western mannerisms. To Shukria, the basis of being male or female in Afghanistan was not in biology, and as Shaheed, another woman interviewed who remains a bacha posh at 30, describes, the difference is in freedom, and that “between gender and freedom, freedom is the bigger and more important idea.” 

Malala sits and speaks with David Cameron at a conference about Syria
David Cameron meets with Malala Yousafzai at the Syria Conference. Source: UK Department for International Development, Creative Commons

Heroines

The women in The Underground Girls of Kabul and The Breadwinner all demonstrate this spirit of defiance and freedom, and historically they are no exception. Much like the stories of Joan of Arc and Mulan, Afghanistan also holds a woman folk hero in high regard. During a fight against British troops in 1880 when the Afghan army was close to defeat, a woman rushed out, rallied the troops, and used her veil as flag to lead them to victory. While killed in battle, the memory of the warrior Malalai lives on to inspire both Afghan girls and boys to be strong in the face of adversity. Both Parvana and the bacha posh Nordberg spoke with bring to mind Malalai to give them strength when their own resolve begins to waiver, and even the Afghan Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai is named after Malalai. In 2009 at the age of 12, Malala began blogging for the BBC about her life under Taliban leadership as she was forced out of school. She continued writing for three years until, after rising to prominence for her activism for girls’ education, she was shot in the head by a member of the Taliban in an attempt to silence her. Malala survived, and after her miraculous recovery and continued activism she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014, making her the youngest person to ever become a Nobel Laureate. Even if their life is dominated by religious leaders, threatened by the Taliban, and restrained due to cultural norms, these women cling to the stories of their collective past in the hopes that one day, they too may be recognized as courageous and valuable in the eyes of their society.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the United States

A mural of diverse faces on the gateway into Chamizal National Memorial
National Park Gateway: Chamizal National Memorial. Source: National Park Service, Creative Commons

Every four years, the US Department of the Interior releases a strategic plan highlighting their mission and future goals to best serve the American people. As the current plan spanning the 2014-2018 cycle is now drawing to a close, the updated 2018-2022 strategic plan has been created, but was leaked early online. Outside Magazine drilled deep into its content, and on November 2nd published an article addressing the fact that while there were significant changes in terms of National Park fees and regulations, “few took notice that the new administration has deleted the entire diversity, equity, and inclusion mandate from its plan.”

Political discussions about the outdoors usually focuses on the health of the environment or land usage rights, but a movement has been growing to confront what has been described as “The Adventure Gap“, or the underrepresentation of people of color in outdoor spaces. Grassroots efforts have been established to try and address this, such as the organization GirlTrek to get black women outside and walking to increase the health of their communities, but with many state and national parks being located outside of a city’s public transportation network and the entrance prices for popular parks being on the rise, the government for the last several years has been developing ways to extend access to those who would not have had the opportunity to participate in the park system through programs like Every Kid in A Park, an initiative that offers free admission to all fourth grade students across the country. Yet by excluding the mandate on diversity, “the inclusion of individuals representing more than one national origin, color, religion, socioeconomic stratum, sexual orientation”, equity, “freedom from bias or favoritism”, and inclusion, “the action or state of including or of being included within a group or structure”, it is unlikely that initiatives to promote participation by minority groups within America’s public lands will be supported.

This is the latest in a string of decisions in which previous protections, mandates, and initiatives concerning diversity have been deconstructed or removed under the current administration. For example, in January following the inauguration of President Trump the new whitehouse.gov website was found to not only have dropped the page on climate change but to have also discarded the Obama-era page affirming the executive branch’s commitment to supporting the LGBTQ community. This was followed in October by an announcement from the Justice Department that protections from discrimination in the workplace under Title VII (“prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin”) would no longer apply to transgender workers. An easy argument to latch onto is that it is not the government’s place to be forced to affirm the identify of various groups, but after the January ban on refugees, the July ban on transgender military service personnel, and the September announcement of the repeal of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, it is no longer assumed that the government will issue protections for those who have been historically marginalized. However, the United States has wrestled with similar moral and legal debates over the last 200 years, and as preached by 19th century minister Theodore Parker and echoed later by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,

“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

Since the establishment of the United States, there has a been constant tension concerning who is allowed to claim certain rights. In 1868, a first step of progress was made by introducing the 14th Amendment into the constitution, granting US citizenship to former slaves and declaring that all people are to be seen as equal under the law. At the time this amendment was a revolutionary statement, and throughout the country’s history this amendment has been the foundation for many of the most well-known civil rights cases the United States’ court system has ever seen.

Ninety years after the 14th Amendment had been ratified, challenges on the nature of equality were still being debated and put to the test as measures such as Jim Crow laws were enacted. Separation between blacks and whites was enforced in many public spaces, and education, marriage, and healthcare for the black community were all impacted negatively as a result. Yet in 1954, these policies were brought to court under the title of Brown vs Board of Education. Through the success of the plaintiff’s argument, schools across the country would soon be desegregated over the following years.

A display board from the Rosa Parks Collection Library of Congress about Equal Employment Opportunity
Equal Employment Opportunity – Title VII. Source: Ted Eytan, Creative Commons

Moving into the Civil Rights period of the 1960’s, the next phase of striving towards diversity, equity, and inclusion was the implementation of Affirmative Action in 1961. The history of the action is summarized on the National Conference of State Legislators website, recounting that

“In 1961, President Kennedy was the first to use the term ‘affirmative action’ in an Executive Order that directed government contractors to take ‘affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin.’ The Executive Order also established the President’s Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, now known as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).”

Affirmative Action still stands today and has been joined by the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, but much like the decisions preceding them, these acts are still hotly contested. Critics argue that the actions lower standards and may force an employer to hire candidates unfit for the job, while supporters counter that the actions succeed at allowing underrepresented applicants such as ethnic minorities, women, those over age 40, racial minorities, and those who are disabled an equal chance to compete for white collar positions instead of being weeded out at the beginning of the process due to negative biases. Regardless of the controversy, Affirmative Action was another step in laying the groundwork for future actions, codes such Title IX (“prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any federally funded education program or activity.”), and eventually the incorporation of diversity policies and statements into modern organizations.

After the implementation of Affirmative Action and Title IX, some organizations decided to go beyond the minimum and make diversity a core aspect of their operations.  Through diversity statements, organizations and businesses make it clear that they stand for the promotion of a diverse workforce and that diversity in background, skills, and life experience breeds a healthy work environment. Universities have taken the lead on this front, and UAB has incorporated these ideals in two ways. First, any group who wants to become an official club on campus must make sure to include the UAB Nondiscrimination Clause within their constitution before being approved. Secondly, the university has created the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion to specifically promote this cause. On the office’s website, a Statement on Diversity is included that reads

“Diversity is a defining feature of Birmingham’s past, present and future. At UAB, we are committed to capitalize on what makes Birmingham and the University trailblazers in moving inclusion forward. We are invigorating conversations, fostering civic engagement, widening perspectives, stimulating innovation and connecting people. Every day, we seek ways to actively promote and recognize principles of fairness and equity, in relation to, and across, intersections of race, age, color, disability, faith, religion, ancestry, national origin, citizenship, sex, sexual orientation, social class, economic class, ethnicity, gender identity, gender expression, and all other identities represented among our diverse communities.”

These type of statements work as a positive sentiment, but it is important to note that by making an organization-wide commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion also serves as a protection for people underrepresented in certain industies. In August, Google faced an incident that sent waves through Silicon Valley as one of their employees, James Damore, sent out an “Anti-Diversity Manifesto” to other employees across the company. In it he stated that “Differences in distributions of traits between men and women may in part explain why we don’t have 50% representation of women in tech and leadership” followed by “discrimination to reach equal representation is unfair, divisive, and bad for business.”

The google team marches in a gay pride parade
Google Gay Pride. Source: Wikimedia Commons, Creative Commons

The response from those both inside and outside of Google was one of outrage and condemnation, although it should be noted that Damore did have supporters behind him and that these beliefs were not new development to the field. In the April 2017 Issue of The Atlantic, it was reported that within the tech industry most women have had to combat issues ranging from demeaning remarks to fending off repeated instances of inappropriate sexual advances. The article also referenced a number of studies reporting that women “are evaluated on their personality in a way that men are not. They are less likely to get funding from venture capitalists, who, studies also show, find pitches delivered by men—especially handsome men—more persuasive. And in a particularly cruel irony, women’s contributions to open-source software are accepted more often than men’s are, but only if their gender is unknown.”

This put Google in a difficult situation, for if they kept Damore as an employee others would see that as condoning his points and continuing the cycle of discrimination against women, but if they fired him as a gut reaction Google would be confirming his “echo chamber” criticism of the company. However, because of Google’s proactive steps to address this type of issue should it arise, a statement rejecting the manifesto was issued by their Vice President of Diversity, Integrity & Governance, Danielle Brown.

“We are unequivocal in our belief that diversity and inclusion are critical to our success as a company, and we’ll continue to stand for that and be committed to it for the long haul… Part of building an open, inclusive environment means fostering a culture in which those with alternative views, including different political views, feel safe sharing their opinions. But that discourse needs to work alongside the principles of equal employment found in our Code of Conduct, policies, and anti-discrimination laws.”

Through the embedding of diversity into their values, Google was able to swiftly respond by referencing their company policies and showing that those who disagree do so against the whole of the company’s standards and practices.

The Google incident is one of many demonstrating the importance of developing and including diversity statements and mandates within institutions and organizations. While used mainly to voice solidarity and commitment, the statements have the power to protect those who are underrepresented should a situation arise. The recent dismantling of these mandates and protections by the Department of the Interior and the Justice Department have left minority groups far more vulnerable to exclusion up through the highest levels of government; yet when viewing these decisions through the historical lens of diversity advocacy in the United States, the current blockages may only be temporary stumbling blocks on the road to further and deeper acceptance of inclusion across the nation.

Protecting the Dishonored: The Jailing of Honor Crime Victims in Jordan

The silhouettes of a man and a hijabi woman face each other with a sunset behind them
We will stay forever. Source: Kamal Zharif Kamaludin, Creative Commons

“And the Oscar goes to, Mad Max! No.” The audience laughs as they await the announcement from host Louis C.K. for the winner of the 2016 Best Documentary Short. He pauses, then reads “A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy!” Applause erupts as Obaid-Chinoy makes her way to the stage, and during her brief acceptance speech she reveals that “Last week, the Pakistani Prime Minister has said that he will change the law on honor killing after watching this film. That is the power of film.” Another round of applause sweeps across the theater as the crowd cheers the progress made to end this extreme case of violence against women.

Obaid-Chinoy’s film focuses on eighteen-year-old Saba, a Pakistani girl who was the victim of an attempted honor killing, defined by the BBC as “the murder of a person accused of ‘bringing shame’ upon their family. Victims have been killed for refusing to enter a marriage, committing adultery or being in a relationship that displeased their relatives. In many instances, the crimes are committed by family members against a female relative.” Saba survived the encounter, and the resulting documentary chronicling her experience caught the attention of human rights activists around the world. Pressure from these groups was put on the Pakistani government to change the law allowing the perpetrators of honor crimes to avoid charges should the victim or relatives of the victim forgive them, and as of October 2016 the law was changed so that there are now mandatory prison sentences for those who commit an honor killing. However, this is not the case for every country, as other loopholes exist to protect the perpetrator while simultaneously punishing the victim.

Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy smiles and poses with her newly won oscar.
Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy. Source: Disney, Creative Commons

During my stay in Jordan, a second film on honor crimes caught my attention. Shown to the local community at the Abdul Hameed Shoman Foundation in downtown Amman, I sat with 50 other people as we watched If You Meant to Kill Me, a 2014 feature length documentary by Jordanian filmmaker Widad Shafakoj. Her film spotlights Jordanian women who are survivors of honor crimes but were detained in prison by the state “for their own protection” due to the lack of shelters serving victims in the community. These women would spend years inside their cell, released only after a family member signs a paper stating they would not harm her or until the guards arbitrarily decide to let her go. Once released, the women often have no money, no community connections, and no support to help them start again.

Jordanians who commit honor crimes face the threat of arrest in theory, but traditions and stigmas going back generations have created informal barriers to prevent the perpetrators from conviction. An honor crime is not committed by a single individual but instead multiple individuals, ranging from immediate family members to a group within the community. This poses a difficulty for police to convict participants because they must identify an entire social network. To counter this difficulty, they have adopted a second approach that only involves a single person: the female target/survivor. By putting the target/survivor in jail, it relieves the justice system of the stress of convicting an entire family or worrying about another crime being committed. The system also faces little backlash for this decision as the families of the women imprisoned accomplishes two tasks. Without advocates to help their case, the female target/survivor resorts to her families for a signature for release; thus, exposing herself to a future risk of violence.

Jordan is publicizing its work on improving other women’s issues inside of its borders, with some measured success. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1979, and ratified by Jordan in 1992 with the intention of allowing women to have equal rights under the law. However, Jordan still maintains two reservations to the document:

The first reservation is against Article 9, which states that women and men should be granted equal rights in transferring their nationality to their children. Currently, a child of a Jordanian man and a foreign woman can take Jordanian citizenship, but a child of a Jordanian woman and a foreign man cannot take Jordanian citizenship without a special identification card. The second reservation is against Article 16, which states “Parties shall take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in all matters relating to marriage and family relations.” Here is where the difficulty lies, for within a marriage the woman has far less legal power and is therefore tied to the relationship formally and informally, even when violence is introduced.

Freedom House, in 2010, reported that while “domestic abuse is a valid reason for initiating such a divorce, it is often very difficult for a woman to prove her case, because Shari‘a courts require the testimony of two male witnesses.” This poses a significant deterrent for victims to come forward as their own testimony will not be adequate in a court of law. They also risk forced imprisonment for their safety should they come forward, making the risk even less of an option. Besides acting to protect their own safety, the women also shoulder the burden of staying to protect their children. Freedom House reports that the father is the de facto guardian of his children, and while the mother may be able to leave with the children initially, should she remarry she would lose custody. This forces the mother into a position of staying in an abusive situation, where there is a threat of death, or leaving without the security of a second income source to support herself and her children.

A group of hijabi women cut a ribbon to open the new shelter.
Women for Afghan Women open a shelter in Badakhshan province. Source: State Dept, Creative Commons

With the outcry growing louder to find a better solution for these women instead of placing them in protective imprisonment, a small number of departments and shelters developments give an attempt at a solution. The Jordanian government created the Family Protection Department within the Public Security Directorate in 1997 to work specifically on cases of domestic violence and sexual assault; however, their focus is children in the family, instead of the women. In 1999, the Jordanian Women’s Union opened a shelter capable of housing 20 women. The Family Reconciliation Centre opened its first house for 50 women in 2007 and a second in 2009 for 80 women. A

Between the three current shelters, a maximum of 150 women can be protected in a non-prison environment, but with a population of 9.5 million as of 2016, the number of shelters are incredibly too small to adequately serve the women of Jordan. Even if women are gaining more rights to interact equally in the public sphere, the lack of safety for some women in the private sphere blocks them from participating in this progress.

The dedication of more resources is necessary to ensure the women in danger are properly cared for in a safe environment. Additionally, attention to convicting perpetrators is imperative; allowing the women to reenter society knowing they are not at risk for future harm. Freedom House does note that Jordan is taking steps to enact more punishments that are forceful: “stricter sentences are now issued for honour killings and a new specialized tribunal was set up by the Ministry of Justice in 2009 to hear such cases.” The arrests of those committing the acts must occur immediately to hasten the release of the victimized women presently held indefinitely within the Jordanian prison system.

 

Dress Codes

a picture of Arab men and women at the local bazaar
Israel-06737 – Arab Bazaar. Source: Dennis Jarvis, Creative Commons

Many who know me from UAB see me as a traveler, who continually explores the Middle East; yet my first experience aboard was in a completely separate region. In 2012, I traveled across the globe for the first time with my school’s Japan Club for a two-week cultural exchange. I was keen on seeing the world. Our school group enjoyed the usual tourist activities but the interactions with my Japanese host family made the largest impact on my perception of other cultures, eventually setting me on my current course. I assumed before embarking on my trip that my host family would be ridged and slightly cold, an imposed stereotype of Asian families. They met me, instead, with overwhelming warmth and kindness as soon as I arrived. This changed my view of Japanese culture, and subsequently challenged the way in which I viewed other cultures. Upon this revelation, I turned my attention to the culture I saw most demonized in the US: the Arab world. Much of the information I received about the Middle East came through a post-9/11 lens. Therefore, I pursued an academic study of the region in college, educating myself about its culture, religion, and language in order to dispel my own personal biases along with the biases held by others who may not have had the opportunity to travel outside of their local sphere.

On multiple occasions, I have studied abroad in the Middle East during my academic career at UAB: Oman, The United Arab Emirates, Jordan, and worked for a summer in Turkey (discussion of its placement, as Middle Eastern or European is further down). There are so many elements of diversity in and between these regions, that it is difficult to compare them all. The most common question I receive when I return is whether I had to cover my hair. It is an understandable question as there are countless news stories about required or banned headscarves or religious swimwear in certain areas of the world. A headscarf covering is also a very visible sign that a woman belongs to the Islamic faith, and   generally used as the image representing Islam itself. However, there are nuances to this custom that varies by country, city, and even neighborhood, and I have found that starting the discussion about this complex region with dress gives those unfamiliar with the topic a clear reference point on something they have heard about while reframing their views away from stereotypical beliefs.

My first introduction to the normal dress wear of the Middle East was in Oman, located at the southeastern tip of the Saudi Arabian Peninsula. Out of the countries I have lived in, Oman has been the most conservative when it came to dress. Nearly all the women that our school group interacted with wore abayas, black long sleeve dresses paired with a headscarf, called a hijab. We were not required to wear either of these pieces because we are not Muslim; some of my classmates did don the outfit to blend in more on the street. My daily outfit was a pair of long pants, usually jeans, with a long sleeved blouse and a scarf around my neck. I employed this style for all my subsequent trips to the Middle East, even when it was not required.

a picture of Arab girls
Photo by Rebecca Hyde

The dress code rules were much laxer for foreigners compared to the locals in the United Arab Emirates, home of the cosmopolitan city of Dubai. With an international business presence in the country, most westerners wore anything ranging from business attire to short shorts, and some Arabs adopted this code. For the Emiratis who kept the traditional wear of abayas and headscarves for women, and long white dishdasha robes paired with a keffiyeh, a draping headdress for men, there were still differences from the Omani style. An easy spot was the difference in headwear for the men, as instead of a white draping headdress Omani men preferred to wear either a mussar turban or a kuma multicolored hat. For women, the difference is subtler. Women from both countries may choose to wear an abaya; you can gauge their wealth depending on the abaya’s material and the accessories paired with it. Rose gold watches are commonplace on the wrists of those shopping at Dubai mall, along with patterned silk abayas covering fashionable gowns underneath for at-home wear. Even if tradition dictates a certain dress code for outside the home, the women I saw found ways to make their style pop.

Shifting from the Gulf Peninsula, the Levant region (Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, etc.) have both cultural and international forces shaping their dress. During my stay in Amman, the capital of Jordan, there was a different stratum of dress code. In the more Western areas of the city, usually stocked with expensive coffee shops and foreigners, I found young male and female Arab students who have adopted the American style and were busy studying away in cafes. The women in this category wore their hair-uncovered majority of the time and frequently interacted with their male peers. I lived in a neighborhood outside of downtown where the dress wear was more of a blend. The men wore t-shirts and jeans, or semi-formal attire in businesses; the women would cover their hair but in such a way that they presented a coordinated look, down to their hairpins.

Hijabi fashion is making its mark in the Western world currently; you can see the roots of it on the streets of Amman. On the outskirts of Amman, the dress code becomes more traditional. Here many of the Palestinian and Syrian refugees reside, and these areas are often the poorer parts of Amman. In these neighborhoods, the men also wear t-shirts and jeans but occasionally add a red and white or black and white keffiyeh scarf. The red and white version is popular in Jordan, whereas the black and white version has deeper symbolic ties to Palestine. The women in these areas usually wear abayas, occasionally paired with a niqab, a veil that covers the face but not the eyes. When I travel to these areas, I dress more conservatively, and it is one of the rare occasions where I may cover my hair when I am out on the street.

As a note, in all the countries I have travelled to I have never seen a burqa, a covering where you can see no part of the women. The wearing of Burqas happens  in the most conservative areas of the world; yet they are  the most  recognized covering styles among Americans due to the news coverage on Afghanistan and territories held by ISIS. I have included the names of the different styles as to give replacement terms when discussing Islamic head coverings, and in most cases, the garment worn by those in the US is a hijab.

a photo of Arab men
Photo by Rebecca Hyde

I have yet to make it to North Africa and compare the average dress code in countries like Egypt and Morocco. The farthest west I have made it in the region is to Turkey. Turkey is an interesting and complex region. Most of Europe considers it an Asian or Middle Eastern country, while Turkey is pushing back to be considered European. It is a bridge between the east and the west and with that comes a substantial blending of traditions and customs. I worked in Izmir, the third largest city in the country and leans more politically liberal. Throughout Turkey, there is a large Muslim population; however, in Izmir, very few people cover their hair, and the city did not enact fasting laws during Ramadan, the holy month of fasting during daylight hours. Living in Izmir was the first time I was able to go to a restaurant and eat outside during Ramadan because there was not a strong adherence to certain strict Islamic principles in the general population. This differs greatly from cities on the eastern border near Syria, certain areas of Istanbul, and even certain neighborhoods within Izmir.

When volunteering with Syrian refugees in Izmir, the dress was much like the refugee areas in Jordan: more conservative with a larger division between the roles of men and women. Some Turks at my work warned me against travel to these refugee neighborhoods as they were known for crime and drugs; the more I went with the volunteer group, the more I found those fears were largely based in a fear of the “other” who spoke Arabic instead of Turkish, and dressed differently. Within the same faith, dress and culture is still a divisive topic. Before my travels, I viewed the Middle East as a single monolithic entity; however, through observing and speaking with those I met from the region, I now see that there is so much more to these countries than I had first assumed.

Dress is one of the many small aspects of a culture. Recognizing the diversity of dress in a region allows us an entry point into the culture as a whole. Actively learning why a group dresses, talks, or acts a certain way, while considering  this information from the group’s perspective instead of looking through our own lens, we can come closer to understanding each other as complex human beings instead of 2D stereotypes that lack any kind of depth or nuance.

Through a conversation about something as simple as dress, the complexity of a region can be revealed and open the door for richer discussions about the Middle East. However, I wouldn’t have been able to experience any of these countries without the help of study abroad scholarships offered to students interested in the world outside of the US and Europe. If you would like to study a critical language or do research abroad, UAB has great resources through the Office of National and International Fellowships and Scholarships. They have helped students win awards such as the Critical Language Scholarship, the William Jefferson Clinton Scholarship, the Boren Scholarship, the Rhodes Scholarship, the Fulbright Fellowship, and more. You can contact them with questions and set up an appointment at fellowships@uab.edu.