What does she discuss around the water cooler with John Yoo? ...

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	• Infidel Ayaan Hirsi Ali Free Press, 2007 - 353 pages average customer review:based on 267 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

What does she discuss around the water cooler with John Yoo? ...

This remarkable woman has traveled the world, in time, space, and cultural dimensions in an epic journey worthy of Odysseus. Her memoir sheds much light on some of the central issues of today. Her journey commenced in one of the world's poorest non-states, Somalia, where allegiance to the tribe is paramount. The cruel rule of Siad Barre, an adherent of the communist ideology, eventually disintegrated into tribal civil war, the worst kind of war, and she wisely fled the country with her family, seeking refuge first in Saudi Arabia, to avoid the war with Ethiopia, later in Kenya to avoid the civil war. Her father was very active politically, in opposition to Barre, and as so many in that role, clearly neglected his familial obligations. She honestly discusses her tumultuous relationship with her mother. Her culture affected her profoundly, both with the anti-female dogma that imprisons a woman in her mind, and physically -- she was subjected to female sexual mutilation.

I found Chapter 6, "Doubt and Defiance" powerful as she first begins to question some the dogma that she has been fed since birth. She is drawn to the fundamentalist message espoused by Boqol Sawm, and a milder version espoused by Sister Aziza. She identifies one of the basic causes for the appeal of fundamentalism - the social network, and their honest behavior that serves as a stark counterpoint to the corrupt Westernized elite. She was able to personally experience the hypocrisy of so many preachers (be they religious or secular) when her friend Abshir would preach his sermons of sin, and then proceed to kiss her afterwards. The section on rescuing some refugees from the Somalia-Kenya border was heartbreaking.

Almost certainly the most critical decision she made in her life was to flee a forced marriage, and seek refuge in the Netherlands. She undertook this courageous decision, and implemented it essentially without any support. She is stunned by the orderliness and functionality of this "infidel" country, and broadens her outlook first as an interpreter, latter, she graduates from the prestigious Univ. of Leiden. In the end she rejects the faith of her birth, and makes a short movie, entitled Submission I, with the anti-female verses in the Koran painted on the bodies of semi-clad women. This lead to the brutal murder of Theo van Gogh by a Muslim fanatic. She is the target of numerous death threats herself, receives heavy security from the Dutch police, and in a sad ironic twist to her life, is stripped of her Dutch citizenship, and must seek refuge in America.

Whew! An incredible journey, with enough transitions to exhaust several lifetimes of "future shock." It is only natural that alter boys who have been sexually abused by Catholic priests, or Mormons who have fled the strictures of their religion, and are labeled "apostates," to reserve their primary animus for the religion that has abused them. So too in Ms. Ali's case. She reserves much anger for those who say: "but on the other hand.....", for example, p270, "Infuriatingly stupid analysts--especially people who called themselves Arabists, yet who seemed to know next to nothing about the reality of the Islamic world--wrote reams of commentary. Their articles were all about Islam saving Aristotle and the zero..... These were fairy tales, nothing to do with the real world I knew."

As she finds herself in yet another world, with her critical intellect, might it be possible that she do a "Submission II"? Imagine the verses of the Bible that are both despicably cruel and anti-female painted on female bodies. There is no shortage of them: Leviticus 21:9, on the requirement to burn prostitutes; Deuteronomy 22:23, on stoning a virgin who was "in town" and had sex; Leviticus 20:18 on the exiling of a married couple for having sex during her period. That is a very short list, all believed to be the absolute word of God, by fundamentalist Christians and Jews. She might also realize that religion is only one mechanism for keeping "women in their place." She might read Susan Faludi's seminal book, "Backlash--The Undeclared War Against American Women." "Islam" is not in the index to this book. Most of what Ms. Faludi painfully documents has nothing to do with any religion--mainly it is secular actions that have been taken to keep the women down--in America, certainly including removing the Equal Rights Amendment from American political discourse.

In terms of those "Infuriatingly stupid analysts," who raise inconvenient questions like: Why have Muslim countries such as Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Indonesia all had women in the number one political leadership position, yet the United States and France never have?; she might articulate an answer other than we are stupid.

She concludes her book with: "But to me, there is far worse moral corruption in Islamic countries. In those societies, cruelty is implacable and inequality is the law of the land. Dissidents are tortured (!)... (Exclamation point added) p350. She might want to read Robert Sheer's "Cri de Coeur" on America's open adoption of torture, and endless imprisonment without charge as published on TruthDig. She now works for the American Enterprise Institute, the very heartland of the neocon ideology of the promotion of endless war (see the excellent BBC documentary, "The Power of Nightmares.") The AEI has some of the most prominent neocons on their staff: Irving Kristol, Richard Pearle, Paul Wolfowitz and perhaps most infamously, John Yoo, who is the principal architect of providing the legal basis, and absolution from prosecution, for torture.

I'm rooting for her. The journey is not complete. She can revisit her Chapter 6, "Doubt and Defiance," with the neocon tribe, and realize their own "black and white" ideology of cruel, endless war against the other to be, in large measure, the flip side of those Islamic fanatics that she so rightly detests. I might even suggest a title for her next book: "What I discussed around the water cooler with John Yoo?"

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A Must Read

The book gives excellent detail into the living conditions and cultures of the Moslem counries 1n some mid east countries. It shows what terrible attitudes and behaviors women in those countries live under. They are little more than property to be used and abused and the book gives details that really illustrate what happens there. Everyone should read this book

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A Must Read For Infidel's Everywhere!

This book was very enlightening, and showed the struggled and bravery of one woman against the extreme conditions found in the Muslim world.

A Powerful Tale

A lot of reviewers seem to be reviewing the author or her politics, rather than this book.

With minimal attention to the validity of Hirsi Ali's politics, or her character, Infidel is an excellent autobiography for a number of reasons:

Infidel is extremely readable. The pace is balanced between dramatic page-turning moments and slower more pensive sections. The scale is very human throughout, as well as very personal, even when discussing issues of Dutch national politics. From the first page, it's about Hirsi Ali's sense of identity, and her lifelong struggle with that sense. This is why it remains a good autobio, and a bad 'manifesto' or political treatise.

Hirsi Ali's tone throughout is fairly humble. It's easy to tell that she is extremely stubborn, outspoken, and arrogant... and most of her stories do reflect well on her, or highlight her victimization. But at the same time, she owns up to actions of which she now disapproves, and does include stories that reflect poorly on her. The result is that I 'liked' her the whole time, which is a good quality in an autobiography.

In a way that's unusual for an autobio, Infidel builds up on itself. Stories that seem tangential are shown to have pertinence later, without a disruption to the narrative or an explicit connect-the-dots. The result is that I feel that I understand the decades-long experience that have made Hirsi Ali who she is, and what she stands for. Regardless of whether or not I like her politics or agree with her, having read Infidel, I can understand *why* she is where she is.

Finally, it's a compelling read because the story is bigger than one woman. Although she keeps the focus on her own experience, a large part of her personal motivation came from seeing that her own level of physical and mental abuse was not unique in her community. This expands the autobio to be reflective of a larger group - not all muslim women, but a sizable number of them. As is clearly Hirsi Ali's intent, this provokes a lot of thought and discussion amongst readers. Whether this makes for a 'better' autobio or a 'worse' one is debatable, but it is certainly a more powerful/impactful/weighty book as a result.

An excellent read!

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A Soul Yearning To Be Free

Ayaan Hirsi Ali's 'Infidel' evokes comparison with 'The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man', each an eloquent and painful story of a soul yearning to be free, striving to overcome the crushing oppression of totalitarian religion. Hirsi Ali was born into the clan-based culture of 1969 Somalia, a culture that values family and clan honor above all else, in which a daughter is esteemed for her submission to her father, as is a wife to her husband. The theme of submission runs deep in this book. (The word 'Islam' means 'submission'). The ideal woman is one who negates herself for the benefit of others, who passively accepts life inside the 'mental cage' as Hirsi Ali calls it. The brutal and traumatic violence that enforces this culture is described graphically: battered wives, young girls 'sewn shut', rape, 'honor' killings of unmarried women who become pregnant. And, as Hirsi Ali, points out, the tragedy is not limited to the female half of the population: women living in fear of violence in this life as well as of Islam's Hell in the next raise stunted children. But Hirsi Ali was able to survive and eventually flourish in the Netherlands. She gained Dutch citizenship and took up the cause of the rights of Muslim women as a member of parliament. But speaking the truth has cost her dearly: estrangement from her family, and the murder of her friend and collaborator Theo van Gogh, the Dutch filmmaker with whom she made a film about women and Islam. Her book, though, isn't angry. She simply wants others in the Muslim world to search for the truth, recognize it when they find it, and then speak it without fear.

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, page 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19

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