Comment is free | Monday 10 December 2012 10.31 GMT Muslim women face an uphill battle against prejudice to find work Many Muslim women feel pressured to change their appearance to get a job. Employers must question their own assumptions Myriam Francois-Cerrah I’m sure it is true. In my naivety as a new Muslim, I …
Do Muslims really exist? I often find myself pondering this question. Do they exist in the workplace? Where are they? Whenever a new member of staff with a Muslim-sounding name joins the team, there is a momentary, fleeting sense of gladness: company at last. But, alas, such glee is always quickly spirited away when they …
What did your sufism do for you? You sneer at me whenever we meet, critiquing my faith as nothing but actions. To you I am like a withered pod on a bean stalk, an empty shell devoid of spirit. You seem to know my heart better than I as you remind me yet again of …
In the past we transgressed many boundaries, wandering into the lives of others, into private homes, into relationships between people. A website: a gateway. We wandered in where we were not invited, entering private realms, unconscious of the realities of virtual worlds. We came to demand and expect; to cherish and hold; to love and admire. …
As the years pass by I grow ever more depressed by our reaction to evil in our midst. We care more about how we are represented than how we represent ourselves. How many more years must we engage in futile public relations exercises, while amongst us are those that promulgate unspeakable evil? For too long …
Sometimes my ego petitions me: “Why does nobody care what you have to say?” Why are gatherings too intolerant, too impatient? Why do forums wander on as if I never uttered a word? Why are my thoughts and concerns between friends so readily dismissed? My ego harangues me with questions like these, prompting all kinds of contemptuous …
Oh how I love my wife. What a shame such sentiments hit with such force when she is so far away, when I am ill like this. In a moment of delirium wrought by the altercation between those biting shivers and the piercing sweaty heat late at night, I dispatched a message: ‘Come home early, if you …
I return once more to the word of our Prophet, peace be upon him, when he told his companions to throw dust in the faces of those who praised people in their presence. I was in Turkey, taking tea with our Muslim neighbours, when conversation turned to my conversion. People always assume that I converted …
Indeed, how hilarious: those Muslamic ray guns. How our sides split when we encountered the slurred petitions of the EDL supporter interviewed by Press TV last year. Or not. No, instead I just think of that video and the vile reaction to it — the sniggers, the mocking words, the superiority complexes — whenever another …
