Category: Shorts
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Preaching, Morality, and Salvation
One of the most common replies that anyone who expresses a call to Islamic morality receives is “you can’t impose your beliefs on others!” This accusation is way off base for a number of reasons.
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Menstruation and Worship
In recent years, this has been another rung of debate in Muslim women’s related issues – and events to talk about women’s spirituality whilst menstruating are plentiful especially in Ramadan. I was a panelist among other wonderful women this Ramadan for an event tackling the topic from multiple angles: fiqh (jurisprudence), a lack of proper…
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Colonialism, Islamic Reformers, and the Late Ottoman Period
The first half of the twentieth century was a dark time for Muslims. The scientific and technical dominance of the Europeans allowed them to strengthen their already tight stranglehold over Muslims lands. This was especially true in North Africa and the Levant, where Britain and France, and to a lesser extent, Italy, competed for influence…There…
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Human Cloning: New Horizons in Biotechnology
The pace at which technology is growing, a sort of Red Queen’s race situation where the rest of us are running to simply stay in place, behooves us to critically think about the future of biotechnology instead of passively observing.
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A Brief on Islamic Bioethics and Intersex Persons
There was a paper published in August 2020 by Dr. Nasir Malim and Dr. Aasim Padela, the Director of the Initiative on Islam and Medicine at University of Chicago, titled Islamic Bioethical Perspectives on Gender Identity for Intersex Patients. The paper introduces how intersex individuals and their medical needs can be approached in contemporary medicine…
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Israel-Palestine: The End of Media Deception?
The last few days have seen the continuation of widespread violence by Israeli occupiers against Palestinians in the West Bank. Numerous videos have been posted of illegal Israeli settlers evicting Palestinian residents in Sheikh Jarrah and of Israeli forces attacking peaceful Muslim worshippers in al-Aqsa Mosque.
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Oscillating Locus of Control
We all differ in our perception of the control we have in life. Some tend to focus on their abilities, attitudes, and actions, thereby seeing themselves as in control of outcomes or at least able to influence them, while others tend to focus on the external factors and how those factors influence the situations that…
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The Schizophrenic Tongue of Liberty
One could go on about the double standards and inconsistencies of liberal ideals of free speech till judgment day. Time and again, the discussion around free speech proves to be fruitless and the romanticized notion of the subject is ever vapid and shallow.
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The Sanitized Legacy of Nawal El-Saadawi
Egyptian feminist Nawal el-Saadawi has been the focus of hundreds of commemoration posts highlighting her combat for women’s rights after her passing on March 21. Her sanitized legacy overshadows the less celebratory aspects of her activism. An Islamophobe and supporter of the Rabaa Massacre, Saadawi is not being put under enough scrutiny.
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A Christmas Conundrum
Last night I sat with my grandmother as she flipped through the TV channels, until a Christmas segment caught her eye. She halted at DMC, a local ‘general entertainment’ and news channel. Although not evidently in cahoots with the State, one needn’t really confirm that in Egypt. (Surviving) independent channels toe the State line regardless.…