Muslim Group Says Shell Ad to Blame for ‘Exploiting’ Women
New Age Islam News Bureau
6
Jul 2017
Ms Nurhanizah Abdul Rahman with Bubu in a video entered in a competition. Jakim said intentionally touching dogs was "highly disturbing" and went against Islamic teachings. PHOTO: YOUTUBE
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• Strict New Official Dress Code for Women Sparks Anger in Uganda
• Afghan All-Girl Engineering Team Denied US Visas While Robot Granted Entry
• The Malaysian Islamic Development Department Chides Woman for Her Pet Dog
• Kurdish female sniper laughs off ISIS bullet that missed her
Compiled by New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/muslim-group-says-shell-ad/d/111801
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Muslim group says Shell ad to blame for ‘exploiting’ women
Sheith Khidhir Bin Abu Bakar
July 6, 2017
PETALING JAYA: Muslim group Malaysian Muslim Solidarity (Isma) has urged companies to learn from Shell’s “mistake” of using a woman model to sell its products and services.
This call comes in the wake of outrage expressed by several activists, politicians, and Shell itself over the circulation of pictures showing several individuals engaged in distasteful and suggestive behaviour with Shell’s promotional standee of a woman.
Speaking to FMT, Isma president Abdullah Zaik Abdul Rahman said this was the outcome when some companies chose to “exploit” women.
“Using women to improve sales of goods and services is an exploitation of women which strays far from the value of purity accorded to Muslim women,” he said. “Let this act as a lesson to other companies in the future.”
While many had thrown their support behind 25-year-old Shell employee Nor Shafila Khairusalleh, the face of the standee, Zaik said she was not completely blameless.
He said a Muslim woman should not accept the offer to become a model to help a company in its sales efforts, even if she was allowed to wear a scarf and cover up.
He said it was “natural” for men to be aroused when looking at women, but did not excuse the actions of the men.
“They should lower their gaze and be careful of their actions. What these men did shows moral decadence.
“Where is their sense of faith and loyalty to God? Don’t they know God is watching?”
He said, however, that it would be wrong to put all of the blame on the men.
“It’s not their fault alone. This incident happened because irresponsible companies will not stop exploiting our women.”
PETALING JAYA: Muslim group Malaysian Muslim Solidarity (Isma) has urged companies to learn from Shell’s “mistake” of using a woman model to sell its products and services. This call comes in the wake of outrage expressed by several activists, politicians, and Shell itself over the circulation of pictures showing several individuals engaged in distasteful and suggestive behaviour with Shell’s promotional standee of a woman. Speaking to FMT, Isma president Abdullah Zaik Abdul Rahman said this was the outcome when some companies chose to “exploit” women. “Using women to improve sales of goods and services is an exploitation of women which strays far from the value of purity accorded to Muslim women,” he said. “Let this act as a lesson to other companies in the future.” While many had thrown their support behind 25-year-old Shell employee Nor Shafila Khairusalleh, the face of the standee, Zaik said she was not completely blameless. He said a Muslim woman should not accept the offer to become a model to help a company in its sales efforts, even if she was allowed to wear a scarf and cover up. He said it was “natural” for men to be aroused when looking at women, but did not excuse the actions of the men. “They should lower their gaze and be careful of their actions. What these men did shows moral decadence. “Where is their sense of faith and loyalty to God? Don’t they know God is watching?” He said, however, that it would be wrong to put all of the blame on the men. “It’s not their fault alone. This incident happened because irresponsible companies will not stop exploiting our women.”
http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2017/07/06/shell-standee-molest-stop-exploiting-women-isma-tells-companies/
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Strict New Official Dress Code for Women Sparks Anger in Uganda
5 July 2017
KAMPALA, Uganda: Ugandan public servants on Wednesday hit out at a list of strict new rules forbidding them from showing cleavage, having long nails, dyed hair or wearing skirts above the knee.
But for many in the conservative east African nation, the main concern seemed to be the cost of implementing the rules, rather than the rules themselves, and the fact that workers had not been consulted.
“Women get less pay. This directive will make women fear going to workplaces for fear of losing their jobs because they don’t have money to buy new dresses and change hairstyles,” said Agnes Kunihira, the workers representative in Parliament said.
Winifred Akech, 34, a public officer in one of the government agencies said, she was forced to borrow money to cut her hair as the hairstyle she had was banned under the new directive.
“I didn’t have money to go to a salon and cut my hair because it has a tint (color) and was forced to borrow from a friend. This is embarrassing to me. Secondly, I feel my right to a hairstyle of my choice is being trampled upon,” she said.
A statement from the ministry of public service on Tuesday outlined the list of strict rules, saying that public officers had been dressing indecently.
It said women should not wear tight clothes, skirts or dresses above the knees or reveal their back or cleavage.
Civil servants “are also required to keep their hair neat without color, on top of maintaining polished short nails not more than three centimeters.”
“Exaggerated make-up” is also a no-no.
Men are required to wear trousers — but not too tight — jackets, a neck-tie and closed shoes.
According to the statement those contravening the rules would be given a warning, and repeat offenders would face disciplinary action.
Outspoken Ugandan academic Stella Nyanzi, who is currently on trial for cyber harassment for calling President Yoweri Museveni a “pair of buttocks,” did not hold back on her Facebook page about the new guidelines.
“Who really cares what public servants in Uganda wear, when the emperor walks around naked?” she wrote, again taking aim at Museveni’s buttocks with a series of colorful descriptions.
She said the country should not be distracted amid efforts to scrap a presidential age limit of 75 years, widely seen as a bid by Museveni, now 72, to seek a sixth term in office.
http://www.arabnews.com/node/1124726/world
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Afghan all-girl engineering team denied US visas while robot granted entry
Jalil Ahmad Rezayee
July 06, 2017
Two Afghan girls refused visas to the United States for a robot-building competition said on Tuesday they were mystified by the decision, as the contest's organisers said teams from Iran and Sudan as well as a de facto Syrian team had gained visas.
The unusual story of the Afghan all-girl team of robotics students emerged as the United States grapples with the legality of President Donald Trump's order to temporarily ban travel from six Muslim-majority countries.
Afghanistan itself is not on the list and Team Afghanistan's robot, unlike its creators, has been allowed entry to the United States. Asked by Reuters on Tuesday why the girls were banned, a US State Department spokesperson cited regulations prohibiting the agency from discussing individual visa cases.
So the six team members will watch the ball-sorting machine compete in Washington DC via video link during the July 16-18 event from their hometown of Herat, in western Afghanistan, according to the FIRST Global contest organisers.
“We still don't know the reason why we were not granted visas, because other countries participating in the competition have been given visas,” said 14-year-old Fatemah Qaderyan, part of the team that made two journeys to the US Embassy in the Afghan capital Kabul to apply for their papers.
“No one knows about the future but... we did our best and we hope that our robot could get a position along other robots from other countries,” Qaderyan said.
Most of the female team members were either infants or not yet born at the time of the US-backed military intervention in Afghanistan in 2001 that toppled the Taliban regime – whose ultra-hardline interpretation of Sharia (Islamic law) banned girls from school, women from working outside the home and all females from leaving home without a male relative.
More than 15 years later, around 10,000 US and allied international troops remain in Afghanistan to support an elected government in Kabul that constitutionally guarantees women's rights but is increasingly losing ground to a Taliban insurgency that now controls or contests some 40 percent of territory.
Qaderyan's teammate from Herat, 17-year-old Lida Azizi, was less forgiving of the US visa decision. “All of the countries can participate in the competitions, but we can't. So it's a clear insult for the people of Afghanistan,” Azizi said.
FIRST Global's president, Joe Sestak, said in a post on the organisation's Facebook page that he was “saddened” by the US decision but the Afghan team would be able to connect with the competition via a live Skype video link.
“That is how we must now honour our fellow teammates, those brave girls from Afghanistan,” he said.
He added that the teams of 156 countries – including from Iran and Sudan, which are on Trump’s list of countries whose citizens are banned from entry – had received their visas.
“The support of the US State Department (including its embassies) has been simply nothing short of amazing,” Sestak said in the post, adding that one other team, from Gambia, had been also denied visas.
Also approved for visas was “Team Hope,” a group of Syrian refugees, he said.
Syria is among the Muslim-majority countries named in Trump's executive order prohibiting all citizens from entry for 90 days. The other countries, apart from Iran, Syria and Sudan, are Libya, Somalia and Yemen.
In a 26 June ruling, the US Supreme Court revived parts of Trump's 6 March executive order that had been blocked by lower courts. The highest court let the ban go forward with a limited scope, saying that it cannot apply to anyone with credible “bona fide relationship” with a US person or entity.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/afghanistan-girls-robotics-team-us-visas-donald-trump-muslim-travel-ban-skype-a7824261.html
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The Malaysian Islamic Development Department Chides Woman for Her Pet Dog
July 06, 2017
KUALA LUMPUR • The Malaysian Islamic Development Department (Jakim) has criticised a Malay woman over a video of her and her pet dog Bubu, calling her actions an affront to Islam, reported The Malay Mail Online news site.
In a posting on his Facebook page yesterday, Jakim director- general Othman Mustapha said intentionally touching dogs was "highly disturbing" and went against Islamic teachings.
"We find her actions to be highly disturbing to Muslims here as they contravene our culture and the tenets of our school of jurisprudence," he said.
He said that while the religion provides procedures for Muslims to clean themselves after coming into contact with impurities such as dogs, this does not mean they may adopt the animals as pets.
He posted that "it's as if someone intentionally commits a sin with the excuse that he can repent later...
"Therefore, Jakim hopes the individual will stop her actions and repent to Allah. Her actions suggest she is trying to start a new culture that can be insulting to Islam".
In the video, the head-scarved woman, Ms Nurhanizah Abdul Rahman, talks about how she began feeding Bubu, a stray mongrel, and eventually adopted the dog after rescuing it from a mass culling operation in 2015.
The video was entered in a competition by pet lovers group SmartHeart.
http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/islamic-agency-chides-woman-for-her-pet-dog
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Kurdish female sniper laughs off ISIS bullet that missed her
30 June 2017
A Kurdish female sniper was almost killed on Tuesday when a sniper from the extremist organization in the city of Raqqa in the north of Syria whizzed past her.
The bullet missed her head by a few centimeters but she appeared unfazed. In fact, she did not let the incident bother her and laughed off what just happened.
As many as 7,000 young Kurdish women form the “Protection of Women” unit, which has been engaged in fighting against ISIS.
The sniper was exchanging fire with ISIS members when one shot was aimed at her head. However, the bullet missed the target and hit the wall behind her shoulder.
A video shared on social media shows the 20-year-old sniper talking to her colleagues in the YPJ unit, known as the women military wing, in the Democratic Union Party in Syria.
The news of the female Kurdish sniper was widely circulated worldwide, not only for her luck but also for her bravery. Fighting has intensified in Raqqa between ISIS and Syria’s Democratic Forces as well as between ISIS and Kurdish Syrian fighters.
The United Nations announced on Wednesday that more than 100,000 civilians are trapped in the city. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Raad al-Hussein, has also expressed concern over their fate.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/variety/2017/06/30/Kurdish-female-sniper-laughing-at-an-ISIS-bullet-that-missed-her.html
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URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/muslim-group-says-shell-ad/d/111801
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