Why are most Western Islamic converts women?

[Beet]

Yes, it's a mystery that with atheism so favorable towards women, any women at all convert to misogynistic religion.

[Beet]

Yes, it's a mystery that with atheism so favorable towards women, any women at all convert to misogynistic religion.

The idea that the misogyny of this "New Atheist" movement (whom the vast majority of people have not even heard of) would have any noticeable effect on the amount of men and women converting to Islam, is just insane.

Not as insane as making generalizations about women in the West, or women as a whole, based on a few thousand converts. It's just funny how some atheists act superior because they think being atheist automatically makes them more progressive on gender (this obviously doesn't apply to BRTD because he's Christian), but when a girl posts a photo of herself with a Carl Sagan book in an atheist space, this happens.

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Sure, but nothing is unbiased...

[Beet]

The debate over Islam has been had too many times in other threads- but suffice it to say, any sort of essentialism of Islam as anti-feminist is incorrect ( There are Islamic girls who play sports, and there is nothing intrinsically anti-feminist about covering. )- or at the very least, antithetical to the opinions of Islamic women feminists. And hence the problem for those who want to indict Islam as intrinsically anti-feminist: it requires defeating the voice of Islamic women feminists who actually embody a feminist version of Islam. You have old white men like Richard Dawkins tweeting patronizingly against Malala Yousafzai, because "he's atheist, so he knows better durr". Anyone who thinks that's feminist has no clue.

[Beet]

The debate over Islam has been had too many times in other threads- but suffice it to say, any sort of essentialism of Islam as anti-feminist is incorrect ( There are Islamic girls who play sports, and there is nothing intrinsically anti-feminist about covering. )- or at the very least, antithetical to the opinions of Islamic women feminists. And hence the problem for those who want to indict Islam as intrinsically anti-feminist: it requires defeating the voice of Islamic women feminists who actually embody a feminist version of Islam. You have old white men like Richard Dawkins tweeting patronizingly against Malala Yousafzai, because "he's atheist, so he knows better durr". Anyone who thinks that's feminist has no clue.

I agree there are Muslim feminists, but they, like Christian feminists, almost always take their holy book less seriously and/or literally.

Says who? Also, taking less literally does not always mean taking less seriously.

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Again, taking literally =/= taking more seriously. And "hard line" usually refers to emphasizing certain aspects of religion which are culturally conservative, sure. But that does not make one more true in their religion than someone who does not take a "hard line".

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So what? The rarity does mean their beliefs are invalid. Once, abolitionists were exceedingly rare.

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Covering is not anti-feminist, though. Requiring something of women we do not require for men is anti-feminist, but those who require such things are hardly alone in this. In corporate America, many women are forced to wear makeup, skirts and high heels to "look professional", even though these things can be time-consuming, costly, uncomfortable and unhealthy. But more to the point, not all Muslims agree that the head covering should be required (just as not all Christians do, even though the requirement is in the New Testament that women be covered in church).

[Beet]

Further, the position that Islam is intrinsically anti-feminist, is itself anti-feminist, for some obvious reasons.

First of all, there are some wonderful things about Islam. It is the religion of a billion people, and it would not be so, if it offered them no meaning, joy, sustenance, pride or beauty. If you say that Islam is anti-feminist, then you say that women who partake in Islam are partaking in something anti-feminist, forcing them to choose between either Islam or equality. Men, on the other hand, do not face this choice. A man can choose to convert to Islam, without giving up his rights. A woman cannot. This is a profound sexism, even more profound once one considers the privileged place Islam holds in many cultures. Her only hope of living a life as full and complete as a man's is if it can be established that Islam and gender equality can coexist. This does not mean that Islam as currently practiced cannot be criticized, only that the assumption that Islam is anti-feminist by nature must be discarded.

Second of all, countries that have deeply hostile practices when it comes to women, such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, and many others, are not simply going to give up Islam. In order to get men in those countries to respect women's rights, it is much easier to argue that women's rights are compatible with Islam. It is easier to change one element of the culture, to favor equality for women, than to try and discard the entire culture.

And thirdly, as I have said, there are women who are genuine feminists and also genuinely Muslim. If Islam was inherently anti-feminist, this would be rather impossible. The very existence of women like Malala, and Nahida, proves that Islam and feminism can coexist. Who is Richard Dawkins, or who are we, as a forum full of (mostly) white men, to tell Islamic women feminists that their faith is false, or that they are wrong? It isn't feminist for men to define feminism for women, or for men to tell women that they aren't true or "hard line" enough in their religion. That's anti-feminism. What's feminist is to support the positions of actual feminists who talk about their religion. What's feminist to respect women who choose religion.

The implication in this thread is that women who convert to Islam are somehow messed up in the head, because Islam doesn't respect women. But the irony is, that this implication is itself what is disrespecting these women, because we assume that by converting to Islam, they also chose to sign up for inequality and abuse, when that is not necessarily the case.