Yesterday I wrote a blog post about segregation of the sexes among some conservative Muslims in mosques, educational lectures and conferences.
I got some rather interesting responses to that, mainly on my Facebook page, which I only allow close friends to join.
One discussion was related in a way to the poll I had posted: “For you, is it terribly distracting to sit next to someone of the opposite sex during an educational lecture?”
I asked that question because I wanted honest answers from people: is it really true that we need to segregate the sexes so that the men and women can focus on the subject matter rather than on each other?
One female Facebook friend jokingly sent me this answer on my Facebook profile, “It depends. How good-looking is this person sitting next to me? Is he Lebanese? And most importantly is he wearing Axe for men cause the TV commercials say it makes men irresistible.”
I asked this friend, “What IF he was a Lebanese man wearing Axe? Would that mean you’d jump on him if he was sitting next to you in a lecture?”
She answered, “I cannot answer that truthfully unless u present me with this opportunity but please make sure he ‘s really good-looking so we can accurately test this theory of urs. I will atnazil [humble myself] and be ur guinea pig purely for research purposes.”
My other Facebook girlfriends and I jumped on this as an opportunity for scientific experimentation that I must admit included a lot of giggling.
One girlfriend wrote out a hypothesis for our experiment:
Hypothesis 1: Axe for men, when applied on square Leb. men, acts as a catalyst to socially unacceptable behavior in Egyptian women.
I suggested we needed a control for our experiment and that control should be an average looking Egyptian man (not as attractive as a Lebanese man to our feminine Egyptian eyes).
So friend number 2 came up with a second hypothesis:
Hypothesis 2: Axe-for-men, when applied to Egyptian men, is neutralized, resulting in a pleasant-yet-platonic effect on Egyptian women.
And I posted a wanted ad on Twitter:
A group of female friends & i will be conducting a scientific experiment based on my blog post from yesterday. We r looking for a male specimen of lebanese nationality. Must be very attractive and put Axe cologne during experiment. We will put said specimen in our midst during an educational lecture to test our ability to sit without pouncing on said specimen. Applications are open to all who fit those criteria till 5pm cairo time @NadiaE.
Of course, it doesn’t take much to be able to tell that my friends and I were just having some semi-innocent fun.
BUT, a Palestinian nanotechnologist who follows me (and who is also a good friend) did not recognize that this was a bunch of women joking around and took us quite seriously.
Quite interestingly, he supported our idea of scientifically testing the logic behind some religious edicts, or fatwas.
I spent the rest of my day spinning this around in my head. Why is it that we do not put the logic used by some Islamic scholars to test?
So if a scholar uses the logic that putting men and women together in one room can lead to men being distracted or to unacceptable behaviors, why not actually test this logic by conducting a scientific study?
Why not find out if science supports the logic behind many religious edicts?
Isn’t that a brilliant idea?
So I started looking at fatwas that prohibit the mixing of genders in the workplace. And of course, one of the first fatwas that comes up in searches now is a recent fatwa issued by Saudi scholar, Sheikh Al-Barrak. I will translate the most important part of his fatwa for you:
The mixing of men and women in the workplace and in educational institutions – and this is what modernists call for – is haram [prohibited in Islam]. This is so because it involves looking at haram [prohibited things], the prohibited unveiling of the face, the prohibited dressing oneself up [of women in front of men], prohibited talk between men and women, and all this leads to what happens afterwards.
And what causes modernists to call for such things is a tendency towards the life of the Western non-believers. Their minds [the modernists] have become westernized and they want to westernize the Islamic nation. Nay, they want to force this westernization [on the Islamic nation].
He who legitimizes mixing – and if this leads to prohibited activities – legitimizes the prohibited activities. And he who legitimates them is a non-believer. And this means he has become an apostate, in which case he should be informed [of the truth] and given the evidence and if he still [continues with the same stance] he should be killed.
YIKES!
I must warn you, this is a very extreme fatwa and even most Saudi scholars who support segregation of sexes will not say that those who support non-segregation should be killed.
But the logic Barrak uses in prohibiting mixing of sexes is similar to the logic used by many conservative Muslims all over the world. If you put men and women together in the same room (and here I’m talking about the workplace and educational institutions, for example, and not the bedroom), then bad things will ensue. Basically, they won’t be able to control themselves, or so the conservative scholars believe.
I had started out my search in wont of discovering a scientific process to test these theories. I still think this is a brilliant idea.
But as I read this fatwa a second thought came to mind.
The above logic states that when men and women are placed together in the same room their instincts of lust take over in many cases and thus in order to prevent the prohibited acts of non-marital lust we must prohibit the precursors of such lust (in this case putting men and women together in the same room).
In Saudi Arabia, where segregation of the sexes prevails, homosexual practices sometimes happen.
So using the above logic, wouldn’t that mean that putting women and women together in the same room, for example, can sometimes result in homosexual acts (prohibited in Islam) and thus we must prohibit the precursors of such acts (putting women and women or men and men together in the same room)?
And using the logic of Barrak’s fatwa, wouldn’t that mean that he who encourages women only or men only gatherings is encouraging the possibility of homosexual acts taking place, and since homosexual acts are forbidden in Islam that person is thus encouraging a forbidden act, thus becoming an apostate deserving to be killed? Would that mean that Sheikh Barrak just issued a fatwa allowing himself to be killed?
I’m just saying!
Inner Workings of My Mind 
I think that same sex societies (created in countries that encourage the separation of the sexes) normally result in curiosity towards the forbidden other; that other creature they hardly see or deal with but can only talk about. It wouldn’t be too surprising that we end up with a fatwa like this one, since this extreme obsession with whether or not to mix with the opposite sex is always associated with logic like “It would create fitna and thus arouse sexual desire.” So by their logic, it’s a step towards adultery. As simple and as direct as that.
Never mind, of course, the fact that by the same logic some of such sheikhs forbid women from working in lingerie stores, or any stores for that matter, since it would mean mixing with the opposite sex in the workplace. So we end up with Saudi Arabia being possibly the ONLY country where you walk into lingerie stores and find a male approaching you and offering his help to find you the right bra.
On the assumption that mixed-gender offices will cause people to uncontrollably jump each other’s bones, I think Sheikh What’s-his-face has watched one too many re-runs of Ally McBeal. That’s the only explanation.
On a somewhat tangential note, I remember a study about mixed vs. segregated schools – basically boys perform better academically in mixed school than they do in all-boys environment (since they’ve got someone to impress..)
There was no significant difference for girls (though perhaps a notch better in all-girls schools). I thought that was interesting.
Alright now. Gotta go refill my stock of Axe deodorant.
i agree, this segregation of sexes in the middle east breeds homosexual behavior. i am a transgirl living in the middle east and i tell you that things that happen to me here does not happen in the west. as im still categorized as male, i tend to mingle in an all male environment (wedding, party, etc) and i will tell you that 99% would be willing to perform a homosexual act. most of these men consider themselves straight (married, engaged, etc). but of course, here in the middle east, you are considered not homosexual if you are the active partner (thats another discussion i guess). what im saying is that why does this happen here in the middle east and not in the west i wonder? all i can think of is because of segregation – but hey im not complaining!
Homosexuality has been around before Islam and Christianity, it has nothing to do with gender segregation, otherwise how do you explain Sodom and Gomorrah ? back then there was no gender based segregation.
Islam prohibits nook which makes full sense, if my wife sees me with another woman in private, away from everyone,she won’t give me the benefit of the doubt *most likely*
If you get a chance to travel to Mexico or Japan , you should notice the females only train wagons and buses , this came as a result of sexual harassment despite them not being Muslim countries.