Nomad

Nomad. Ayaana Hirsi Ali,  2010. 274 pages.

 It seems obvious to me that no one will ever be able to write an honest review of this author’s compelling but controversial exposure of the dangers to western civilization inherent in Islamic belief systems without being accused of either Islamophobia or of misogyny and wilful blindness to reality. Balance is difficult especially when discussing religion. Her background as a Somali Muslim tribal nomad who has lived in numerous Middle Eastern and African countries as well as in Holland and the U.S., gives her a unique perspective on clashes of different cultures and lifestyles. Like very few others raised in devout Muslim families, she has been able to escape from a restrictive belief system (at the cost of needing lifelong bodyguards and enduring many death threats) to espouse western enlightenment ways, atheism, and rational scientific thinking. 

This is not an easy read, and the vivid description of the abuse that she and many others endured at the hands of her very dysfunctional family members and the larger Muslim community are heart-wrenching. But she powerfully documents that such abuse is an inevitable consequence of pious Islamism, particularly for girls.

Her compelling arguments against western espousal of multiculturalism and ‘diversity’ as desirable societal models were big eye-openers for me and forced me to re-evaluate my political beliefs. By her account, western societies accepting and promoting multiculturalism are ‘sleepwalking into disaster.’ She provides an equally strong argument against any form of identity politics whether it is in the form of Black Lives Matter, the American Association of Retired Persons, National Association of Women or the NAACP. She despises the exclusionary politics of Dutch nationalists and the courting of votes from ever-smaller  self-identified groupings

Like the Nobel Peace prize winner Malala Yousafzai, Ayaana Hirsi Ali is now dedicated to promoting education, particularly for girls in Muslim-dominant countries. But unlike Ali, Malala has not abandoned the Islamic faith entirely. It amazes me that someone with Malala’s brilliance and dedication, in her book I Am Malala thanked Allah profusely for saving her life, rather than thanking the skilled British neurosurgeons who did all of the work. It would be educational and entertaining to hear a conversation between Hirsi Ali and Malala.

A major caution. The author now works, speaks and writes for The American Enterprise Institute, a large Washington D.C. think-tank, usually described as conservative or right wing.  The AEI has received millions of dollars from the Koch bothers who also are known as funders of multiple neoconservative causes and some organizations bordering on hate groups. No think-tank researcher, writer, blogger or speaker can ever be totally uninfluenced by those who fund them (the budget of the AEI is greater than $30,000,000 annually). But Hirsi Ali,  like most members of such outfits and those who quote them (The Economist regularly quotes the findings of think-tanks without revealing any biases they may have) never acknowledges any potential restrictions or conflicts of interest. It also seems obvious to me that anyone escaping the clutches of a controlling, dangerous religious belief system will get a powerful, if subconscious, self-affirming ego boost by maximizing the dangers and evils of such systems in their warnings to others. This applies equally to Hirsi Ali on Islam, Leah Remini and numerous others escaping from Scientology or Carolyn Jessop escaping from radical Mormonism. This should not be interpreted as denying the importance of their messages.

I have read one English translation of the Koran (while sipping a single malt scotch) and don’t recall any unequivocal instruction to violence therein not balanced by contradictory injunctions to peaceful coexistence. The Koran is certainly not unique in providing contradictory religious edicts. However, Muslim friends tell me that there are so many different translations of it that one can get almost any message from it to confirm your own biases, just as there probably are of the Christian Bible in various Arabic translations. As others have pointed out, a single word in Arabic can easily be translated into two exactly opposite words in English. How relevant can 1100 year old contradictory injunctions from an Arab nomad be for life in the twenty-first century -or those from three or four centuries earlier from nomadic Jews for that matter?

Still, Hirsi Ali’s dark depiction of Muslims generally is hard to reconcile with my experience of interactions with numerous Muslim colleagues, trainees, patients and friends. One Muslim friend, in discussing 9/11, told me that he had as much in common with the killers as I did with Timothy McVey. Call me reliably clueless, but I only became aware that a dear colleague was a Muslim when I read about his funeral service at the local mosque! I know of one Canadian Muslim woman who has become a Crown prosecutor. The Muslim trainees that I worked with, both men and women, from Turkey, Kuwait, Syria, and Saudi Arabia, were among the most skillful, dedicated, ethical people I have ever met. Granted, they may not be representative of the larger Muslim community as they were all professionals, usually on educational visas, or raised in Canada.  I cannot accept that they regarded me as an infidel that they should kill, and none ever tried to convert me. During a short period of work in a hospital in Doha, Qatar, I found that most of the doctors were women who did not seem to be oppressed in any visible way, although medical careers are not very highly regarded there. I recall one specialist in an abaya under her white lab coat, and a niqab merrily chatting with me and comparing her children with mine. She looked me straight in the eye as we chatted, apparently a deadly sin for a Muslim woman according to Hirsi Ali. In spite of my concerns, none of the Muslim women I examined in a skimpy revealing hospital gown (them, not me) seemed at all nervous or unwilling to let a male infidel examine them. And the delightful Moroccan Muslim lady who took care of my two grandchildren from infancy to school age, along with a diverse group of other toddlers, never seemed concerned about their fate as children of infidels, and continues to show interest and delight in their progress in a secular school. Perhaps this is due to what psychologists call cognitive dissonance, no different than that of fundamentalist Christians who simultaneously believe that their secular friends and relatives are destined for hell, yet do nothing to rescue them from their perceived plight.

The  misogyny, blatant use of guilt trips and family honour concepts to control behaviour and enforce conformity are undoubtedly horrendous in many Muslim centres, but are not restricted to them. The teaching of children from a young age to believe that there is only one true religion, that of their parents, may be considered the universally most prevalent form of child abuse, as Richard Dawkins has pointed out. This leads me to my favourite quote from this book.

 “I understood fully what Sahra and others saw in religion, which is a chance to be like a child again, taken by the arm and told what is right and what is wrong, what to do and what not to do- to take a break from thinking.” 

I have not read her previous book , Infidel nor have I seen the film based on it that cost her co-producer Theo van Gogh his life, at the hands of a pious Dutch Muslim man who stabbed  him.

This is a great cautionary educational book, to be read with a grain of salt, not a book for those needing a boost of morale and optimism for the future. And I accept that I am in no way qualified to either refute or accept her bleak assessment of Islamic belief systems. Perhaps the hardest thing to acknowledge to oneself is “I don’t know.” But my experience tells me that it is sheer folly to consider all members of any mareligious group as a homogeneous lot of ‘bad hombres.’

Next week, something much lighter- The Best Laid Plans.