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Faiza S. Tanha shodam tanha I'm left Alone, Alone Asooda az ghawgha shodam I'm left relieved of any chaos Az bas ke khordam khoon-e dil So much I took from this pain that Chun ghoncha az ham shodam I started to develop like a flower bud. - Ahmad Zahir Words by an incredible Afghan musician that echoes throughout our history. This particular piece speaks to me, as it reflects on my mother’s pain of leaving her homeland to be able to grant her children a chance to grow. And just like the flower bud develops, we grew, as she was left with only the thought of her homeland. To this day, what I admire most is my mother’s endless courage and her love for where she came from. My mother always made an effort to remind us of our homeland; she spoke a beautiful language which is now held close to my heart, and she would often tell stories, reminiscing about her time in Afghanistan with her family. Hearing these stories became a sense of comfort for us all. In wonderment of my culture and heritage, I was intrigued to find out more. After all, I was born and raised in the U.K and understood the privilege I had, so I didn't want to allow myself to forget where I came from and the struggles that the people of Afghanistan faced, and are still facing. Reflecting on the hardships, this is where my mother's journey and mine unfolds. My Mother My mother lived a humble life, as many Afghans did and still do. She grew up in the stunning valleys of Panjshir, by the waterfalls and mountains, with the crisp air that was often a reminder of the peace that was present in the moment, until it no longer was. In Afghanistan, with a blink of an eye, your whole life could take a turn into a state of chaos, and all that you knew could soon become a shattered memory. That is exactly what happened to many when the Soviets invaded in 1979 and many Afghans were displaced from their homes. During the nine-year long conflict, it is estimated that one million civilians were killed, as well as thousands of Afghan troops. It was the starting point of a never-ending war within the country. My mother came to the U.K in 1995, after travelling to Pakistan and Libya, in hopes of finding a better life for her children. I would often find my mother with marbled eyes, glazed by her tears, trying to find a sense of belonging in lands that were foreign to her. “Coming to the U.K. was completely foreign to me. I didn’t know the language and learning it at the time seemed impossible, with so many children running around- all I could really do was take care of you and your siblings. I wouldn’t change that for the world.” Wrapped up in guilt, I would often seek the comfort of Afghanistan through my mother's eyes. Beautiful memories of our homeland, later turned into an ocean of tears, due to the suffering of its people. Faiza I visited Afghanistan for the first time when I was just a child, aged seven and trying to understand where I was, while meeting aunties and uncles I had never seen before, only heard of. Greeting each person I met with my broken Farsi and feeling oddly small with the lack of knowledge I held about my own country. A memory I still hold of my visit to Afghanistan, is the love that one of my Uncles- Merakbar Mama showed to me. He would often take my sister and I out for burgers, while smiling from cheek to cheek, making sure we were happy wherever we went. Passing the busy streets of Kabul, I found myself feeling like a foreigner in my own country, it’s a feeling I will never forget. Strangers and faces I had never seen before, would welcome me in with open arms, as if I had always been there. It was a beautiful yet bittersweet moment, as I felt like I couldn't give as much love back as I wanted, due to my broken Farsi. This was my barrier and my strength. I didn’t know it then, but as I grew up, I came to realise that the footprints of colonialism were heavily embedded in me, and had become a state of mind. Almost as if growing up in a completely different country from my mother had made me forget about my Afghan roots. Colonialism is acquiring political control over another country while occupying the people of that country, to further exploit them and their economic development. I found myself in a constant limbo of knowing too little and losing too much of myself. Learning about Afghanistan’s history and meeting others within the Afghan community here in the U.K, gave me the resources I needed to learn more about my Afghan heritage. This was the baseline of me growing into the woman I am today. Through every story and every picture, I found myself and my love for my country. Almost feeling alien to the scent of my own homeland, I often found myself clinging onto something that reminded me of Afghanistan. For me it was the clothing, its unique embroidery and the precious jewellery that I would often get gifted from family members. Family members that held onto the memories of me as a little girl, hoping that we would all reunite one day- given that peace and prosperity finally comes to our homeland. These small reminders and pieces were special to me, as every detail held a history beyond space and time. To think that every thread of the clothing was handmade, allowed me to understand the depth and love the people of Afghanistan held for their textiles. It’s being proud of who you are and where you come from. That's what these pieces were and still are to me. The colours in the jewellery and clothing, remind me of a happiness that still thrives in our country. We find peace in these colours and they are a symbol of hope and goodness. A tradition that can never be forgotten. Unique and beautiful in its own way, Afghanistan holds many traditions that should be celebrated beyond the country. From it’s people, to its food, attire and music- Afghanistan is a country filled with magnificent history that should never be forgotten. A Colonised State of Mind As I search for a sense of belonging, fitting neither here nor there- I remember the beautiful words of Mahmoud Darwish (an extract from ‘Antithesis to Edward Said) that goes: “He says, I am from there, I am from here. And I am not there, nor here. I have got two names that meet and depart. I have got two languages, I’ve forgotten in which I used to dream…So, carry your country wherever you go. And be a narcissist if necessary. Exile is the outside world, exile is the inner world. So, who are you between them? I do not define myself, lest I lose it. And I am who I am.” I hold these words close to my heart as they remain a reminder of how I felt and still sometimes feel as a child of diaspora. A broken mother tongue that is twisted into a bitter sweet language. This is my colonised state of mind. As if you are trying to unlearn or tear off the layers that once had you hiding away from your own culture. I remember even as a little girl, I felt almost embarrassed by who I was in this land and even in my own home country. There was no in-between, because here, I wasn’t British enough and in Afghanistan, I wasn’t Afghan enough. The internal conflict I faced only pushed me to learn more about my heritage and motivated me to be unapologetically Afghan. Embracing my country, while writing stories and poetry that would connect me to my roots, I found myself in the social realm, connecting to those in the Afghan Diaspora and those that experience Afghanistan first hand. It’s a blessing in disguise to know that social media as well as my mother's endless love of home, granted me the confidence to embrace my Afghan roots. I feel as though through the years, I've lived through my mother's story, while being in my own story-almost as if I am going through my own character development in my own storybook. The more I grow, the more I fall in love with my roots. You see, unlearning and peeling back these layers takes time and dedication, meaning it is our duty to learn about who we are and where we came from. Why is this important? Because we need to remind the generations to come, what it took for us to be in the positions we are in now and the sacrifices our parents made. This isn’t just my story but it’s the story of you and I. Through the strength of my mother’s wounds, I found a thousand hidden stories that allowed me to create my own. My mother would always say, “Never forget where you came from and the war we are still going through, for it is a history that should never be forgotten.” And this history is one that many Afghans are still facing. War and death still seeps into Afghanistan, with many losing homes and losing their lives. Forgetting our roots would be a crime to our own country. So I ask of you, to learn your history and never forget about your people- for their stories and their pain is what brought us here. We are the children of diaspora, decolonising our state of minds and returning to the roots that we had once forgotten. This is a generational story. So learn about your story and speak of it to the world. Edited by Palwasha A.

Palwasha A. and Lamisa. H Did you know that Chadwick Boseman fought for Black Panther to have the African accent of Wakanda? The producers pushed for him to have a British or American accent, and when Chadwick argued that that wouldn’t make sense because Wakanada had never been colonised, they said it would be hard for audiences to understand, and that if they made that decision, they’d have to “stick with it”. The producers told Chadwick that they could say that the character had “studied in a foreign country”. Boseman stuck to his guns and won, and T’Challa was allowed to have his African accent, but the anecdote is shocking in that it is so un-shocking. Why would a character from Wakanda, an African country that was portrayed as having never been invaded by the British have its prince speaking in a British or American accent, and furthermore, why was this point something that Boseman had to fight for? Imagine if Marvel’s producers had won, and were successful in giving T’Challa a British or American accent. Every other Wakandan in the movie would have retained the accent of their dialect and we would have had, in the first movie featuring a black superhero lead, some superior subtle colonial messaging, just like in almost every other Hollywood production we can think of. So let’s break this down. What is ‘Colonial Messaging’? Colonial mentality is the ethnic or cultural inferiority we internalise as a result of colonisation. Our film, media and entertainment perpetuates these messages in everything they produce, and often leave us with the subconscious belief that the cultural values of the coloniser are inherently superior to our own. Growing up, we are met with white washing, Eurocentric depictions of the 'other', and this representation or lack thereof has serious implications in our society, as well as the constant pushing of the ideal that white is superior. We all know what colonial messaging looks like in the media, especially in the news we consume- we constantly have to undo the damaging stereotypes put forth about our communities by the media, for example, the global Muslim community having to constantly denounce violence, but what about more subtle messaging? Especially that found in the media we consume as children. Why Does it Matter? “Why do you think this doll is the nice one?” “Because she’s white.” “Why do you think this doll is the bad one?” “Because she’s Black.” In the famous and alarming “doll study” of 1939 we were shown that Black children’s self esteem and identity had been severely compromised as a result of racial segregation. The test was originally designed in 1939 by pioneering Black American psychologist Dr. Kenneth Clark and his wife and partner Dr. Mamie Clark. The Clarks would show a young child two dolls, one Black and one white, and then ask them which doll was pretty, which was nice, and which was bad. They were not surprised to find that the white children they interviewed overwhelmingly preferred the white dolls, but dismayingly, so did the Black children. Two-thirds of the Black children expressed that the white dolls were better, prettier than the ones that looked like them. This experiment was recreated 50 years later, and the results showed that out of 21 Black four- and five-year-olds at a Harlem child care center, 15 children preferred the White doll—the same ratio the Clarks found during segregation. You can watch the experiment at the link below. One of the children who has just said she thinks the Black doll is bad, is shown answering a follow-up question: “which doll looks like you?” The little girl hesitates, touches both, and then slowly pushes the Black doll forward. The original test was measuring these responses in a time of racial segregation, when we know without a doubt that Black people were being portrayed by media as inferior to white people. The fact that this experiment would have disarmingly similar results now may be due to the colonial messaging we are exposed to all our lives, as so often it targets our subconscious. Capitalism and Colonialism To bring awareness to our world’s current state of rapid environmental degradation, we have the recent Netflix series hosted by David Attenborough, our favourite British gentleman eagerly telling us about the natural world in his wavering voice. In fact, when you think of reporting on conservation and the natural world, many of us in the West think exclusively of Attenborough. You may even have read the words “natural world” in his British accent in your head. But there’s an important discussion happening at the moment about what Attenborough is pinpointing as the problem. In his series, Attenborough correlates overpopulation with the climate crisis, saying the former is one of our planet’s biggest concerns. Basic research tells us that capitalism is the culprit of the climate crisis, not everyday people. We need to be deeply critical of how Attenborough is choosing to use the immense authority given to him with his platform, to support overpopulation theory. Overpopulation theory is rooted in colonial ideology and, while overpopulated areas do create pollution, it does not amount to even a fraction of the carbon emissions emitted by only the top 10% of the world’s richest. What all this reinforces is that white supremacist and colonial ideals are safeguarded and reinforced by the gatekeepers of our media. Netflix, you’re disappointing us. How is a movie like ‘Holidate’ even allowed anymore? To fit the diversity quota, every supporting role was given to a Black or POC actor while the main characters remained white. Again, the POC best friend trope is shoved down our throats. Though this trope can be seen in so many Hollywood productions, it's especially present in some of our most beloved romcoms. Netflix’s newest dance movie ‘Work It’ unfortunately screams white saviour and fills the POC best friend slot by none other than Miss Liza Koshy. In the movie, the predominantly POC dance troupe, filled with actual dancers stops dancing because the white protagonist pulls out. The protagonist whose whole thing is that she can’t dance. And then when she has her change of heart and comes back, they start dancing again. Did she steal their legs and brains? Ah, the POC best friend. In Clueless it’s the sassy Dionne, in Emily in Paris (Netflix, please) it’s the sassy Mindy Chen. In Devil Wears Prada it’s the sassy Lily, who catches Anne Hathaway getting a little too cosy with Simon Baker. In Ten Things I Hate About You, in A Cinderella Story, in Another Cinderella Story, the POC best friend is ever-present, and ever-sassy. What’s the point of this trope? It subtly makes us understand, again and again, that we are not main character material, in an industry notoriously lacking POC lead roles. It asserts that people of colour lack the agency necessary to enact positive change in their own lives, and that any of our achievements stem from interaction with the white saviour. Within this overarching trope, are further tropes of sassy Black bff (A Cinderella story) nerdy Indian bff (Deadpool, although he’s a taxi driver), flamboyant gay male bff (bonus points if he’s Black) whose only purpose is to help you find love (My Best Friend’s Wedding, every romcom past 1995). It’s not just the butchering of Michael Oher’s story in the Oscar-winning ‘The Blind Side’, his depiction as a mentally challenged Black man whose life is changed by his adoptive white family, when in reality he can’t recognise this portrayal of himself (and neither can his real-life adoptive white family). It’s not just about the Oscar-winning movie ‘The Help’ having a fictional white woman’s efforts be the catalyst for the liberation of a whole community of Black women, while the real Abileen’s identity was stolen to create this white saviour narrative- it’s the reasons behind why, what these narratives do to us, and our understanding of ourselves. Starting The Process of Decolonisation In addressing and dismantling this constant, subtle colonial messaging, we need to be aware of what it looks like. We need to mentally point it out when consuming media, and equip ourselves with knowledge and educational resources that help us turn the tide. The movement towards inclusivity and fairness in our media is not stagnant- there are countless change makers, activists, creators and others already doing the work, and it’s up to us to learn how to join them. Though the road to dismantling systemic racism is long, we are becoming the leaders, the creators and policy makers of the future. Let’s talk about a specific, seemingly small act. When Hasan Minhaj appeared on Ellen, he corrected her when she pronounced his name. This act communicated a very clear message, not just to white people but also to the brown community and every person of colour, that subtle colonial messaging would not stand in that instance, and that it should be publicly addressed and defied. The news and entertainment media teach us about minorities, ethnic and marginalised groups. This industry has one of the greatest educational impacts for people who have little to no contact with the members of certain groups being represented. A simple act of pronouncing a name correctly on international television, starts a conversation about unlearning and unpacking the subtle messages of colonialism we have been fed all our lives. It places us back into the centre of our own narratives, and on the path to a more nuanced and truly representative multicultural outlook in our film, entertainment and media.

Irisa R. and Palwasha A. Ramy, the first of its kind, is a show about Muslims written by an actual Muslim. It’s goal was ambitious - to explore the experiences of a young man trying to move closer to his faith when his worldly desires won’t let him. Ramy Youssef, the writer and star of the show, addressed some of it’s more common critiques-that it was deeply disrespectful to speak about Islamic practices with such little acknowledgement of their purpose and spirituality. However, we already know, like most of you, that this show was not meant to inspire or move the audience, it was meant to explore the difficulty of being a Muslim man in a Western country. Just like anything, the first step can be a stumble. It won’t always be perfect, and we respect the fact that a show like this could even be green-lit. However, as young Muslims we are so starved for relatable content that sometimes we are willing to consume media that, to put it nicely, is really, really disappointing. We All Just Want Them White Let’s discuss the never-ending respect for and chase of white women that is explored in almost every big-budget movie or show (Namesake, Master of None and The Big Sick). Ramy is the same. He is constantly, constantly trying to win the approval of white women and repeatedly shuns women of his own faith and culture to do this. Through the first season Ramy has many, many one-night-stands with different women, and while in most scenes he treats them as people with their own agency and can engage with them respectfully, there is a deeply problematic subtext to his interactions with the Muslim female characters in the show. These women are shown to be struggling with their faith, battling with the stigma that comes with pre-marital sex and stifled by a lack of agency that shadows every decision they seem to make. Yet at every step along the way they are sexualised, objectified and undermined. This is so apparent when Ramy tells his parents that he wants a Muslim woman his mother eagerly replies, “we’ll find you any type of girl you want.” Let’s unpack this. Firstly, for a self - proclaimed progressive show, this falls into one of the most gendered, misogynistic ideals. A tale as old as time. It rests on the assumption that essentially, a man can do whatever he wants, live how he wants and take part in whatever he desires, and then one day (when he’s ready to settle down) he will still attract any woman he wants, without a second thought. As if there are hundreds of women, sitting around waiting for men that do not share the same values or experiences as them. This scene mirrors closely a scene in Kumail Nanjiani’s “The Big Sick”, where he was secretly dating a white non-Muslim woman named Emily, while his parents were still looking into an arranged marriage for him, inviting Muslim women to the house to meet him. Though arranged marriage is a legitimate way to meet a life partner, Kumail wrote the scenes in an unrealistic and disappointing manner, where a strew of unmarried Muslim women, one after the other, would show up to his house (completely unwanted by him) and sit with him and his parents to prove how dedicated and interested they were in marrying him. This is not an insight into our culture, because shockingly, we don’t just knock on unmarried men’s doors, invite ourselves in and try to prove for an awkward hour how we could be a good wife. It’s really more an insight into how the men writing these shows, and the men that support these shows, view the women in their own community. It was interesting because Nanjiani wrote about Emily with respect. She was multifaceted, she was intelligent, interesting and flirtatious. By contrast every brown woman was just shown as desperate, lonely and boring. It painted a very clear picture, where white women were seen as this unattainable dream and brown women were seen as the unfortunate but must-be-endured obstacles to achieving this dream. Yet this movie was nominated for an Oscar, and heralded as a big step towards diversity and showcasing young Muslims stories. Whose story? In episode six of Ramy, he is set up with a Muslim woman from his community, and they show that she’s quite observant from the fact that she wears the hijab and that she wants to meet him for the purpose of marriage. However, what’s really strange is that during this scene Ramy is scared, and then disinterested while she is again painted as desperate to attract him. He then delivers the most absurd monologue about how he is “just trying to be a better Muslim”, and somehow, somehow, she is seen to react to this with adoration and respect, despite the fact that he fits none of the qualities she has listed on a sheet of paper before her that she said she is looking for. Again, they don’t mind; they’ll settle because they just want to be married, because no matter how they have chosen to live their lives, the guy who falls short is still somehow worth it. What About The Women? The women. My god. Ramy’s mother is portrayed as nothing but a caricature, a lonely house-wife with a borderline love-less marriage. Ramy’s sister, Dena, is denigrated to the role of the bitchy, frustrated woman who just wants to stay out late with her friends or have sex without the stigma. Nothing else. No nuance. No grey area. Both episodes that were dedicated to the women in the show, tried but failed to explore female sexuality, or create opportunities for character development beyond their sexuality. When Ramy’s sister Dena is about to have sex for the first time, the man she is with asks her what position and she just says ‘anything.’ This in itself shows such a deep fracture between what Ramy, and his writers, understand about female sexuality and abstinence. While Ramy is characterised as having been watching porn so intensely from the age of thirteen that his friends said that he had a problem, for some reason his sister, who grew up in the same household, hasn’t had sex and therefore must have absolutely no sexual literacy. Interestingly, this entire plot line aligns with the very palatable, consumable sexual liberation argument, which is that if you are not having sex, you must be sexually repressed and also ready and willing to be sexualised by any man. The Moderate Muslim Myth In one of the first big turning points for the show, Ramy goes up to his parents, and, trying to finally be a ‘good Muslim boy,’ asks them to help him find a wife. His mother’s immediate, joyous question is “covered or uncovered?” Ramy replies “uncovered”. This may seem like a funny, relatable interaction (“oh of course he wants a more relaxed wife”) but this scene is indicative of a very serious issue with the representation of hijabi women on the show. In an appearance on Seth Myers, Ramy Youssef condemned the use of the term “moderate Muslim”, explaining to Myers that it’s notion of a Muslim having not to practice to be seen as palatable or acceptable is offensive and incorrect. Yet his show, at every turn, promotes the idea of the moderate Muslim, as the desirable one, as the palatable one, as the one you can still have fun with. Ramy’s desire for an “uncovered” woman (which, oh my God, the objectification of it all, like picking a melon at the market) is a desire to keep himself happily seperate from what he perceives as the Muslims who are too “hardcore,” which apparently includes anyone who wears hijab. The undercurrent that this show really plays into is the most secular, obvious, whitewashed nonsense that having a religion is a constant, constant struggle. It’s only about sticking to arbitrary rules that get you nowhere but feeling sexually frustrated. What we do appreciate about the show is that it’s honest. It's a truthful and vulnerable semi-autobiographical account of Ramy’s life that has allowed us to have discussions like these. Also, we can’t say we didn’t laugh. Some scenes were hilarious. Like, ‘‘throw a prayer down for my mother right now.” But one or two laughs can’t counteract the catastrophe that was nearly every episode. What’s really unfortunate about all of this, is that we really, really wanted to enjoy this. But we left feeling more alienated from the experiences explored than most other shows we watch that aren’t even slightly targeted to us. The only good thing to come from something like this, is that it will be the first of many. Hopefully, this will inspire and encourage more young Muslims and BIPOC to pick up a pen, write some witty dialogue and maybe a female character (or two) with just a bit of respect. Editor: Tahmina R. *This is based on our review of the first season.

Jessica L., Palwasha A. & Mariam H. Pop culture and social consciousness at large is flooded with messages of sexual liberation and empowerment. Since the sexual revolution of the 1960s, morality surrounding sex in the West has shifted to become far more flexible and fluid in mainstream culture. Sexual empowerment has become something to be loudly celebrated in everything from television shows, movies, popular music, and literature, to the fashion industry. Empowerment itself, specifically sexual empowerment, has become synonymous with hyper-sexualisation. A TIME article published in 1964, highlighted the growing phenomena of an alternate sexual guilt, this time based on “not being sexual enough”. Interestingly, and rather ironically, this hyper-sexualisation of mainstream culture has not resulted in a transformation to a sex-affirmative society, where the concept of sex is unencumbered by shameful associations and subtext. Instead, as highlighted by TIME writer Rachel Hills, perceptions of sex as a “sinful and corrupting force” just continue to flourish alongside these new ideas. Thus, we have sexual excess coexisting with ideas of repression and extreme regulation. Essentially, one must be 'a savage', as well as classy, bougie and ratchet. The contradictions and ideological divide created is clearly evident in the debate surrounding abortion and access to birth control, the continued stigma and lack of support faced by survivors of sexual assault, the dichotomy of consumption of the adult entertainment industry and the treatment of sex workers, along with the discourse regarding abstinence education. Icons of sexual empowerment in pop culture When we think of sexually empowered icons in our popular culture, we often think of the white middle-class women from Sex in the City, in particular Samantha Jones. She is a successful career woman who is in charge of all facets of her life, having autonomy over who she has sex with and actively enjoys sex without shame. She is meant to be the driving force that pushes out the dusty and archaic ideas of sex being shameful and disgusting and instead promotes the idea that it is fun and fabulous. The character is a glamorous depiction of what we think sexual empowerment should be, but the decision to adopt the Samantha Jones persona doesn’t necessarily work for all women, especially for BIPOC and LGBTQ+ communities. Now, let’s zero in on the phenomena of ‘WAP’. In a green-screen illusion of a decadent mansion, Cardi B alongside Megan Thee Stallion is clad in multiple lingerie styles, from leopard prints to black leather as they both playfully spit about how much each woman enjoys physical pleasure. But many (men especially, looking at you Benny boy) have voiced immense disgust. They comment on the crudeness of the lyrics and the visuals, actively shaming the artists but also fail to really hide their own hypocritical enjoyment of the overtly sexual content. When Black women unabashedly speak about sexual empowerment they are often met with slut-shaming and insults targeting the value of their character. However, at the same time the entertainment industry demands the bodies of Black Women to be presented in a sexual way regardless of whether the creators themselves choose to be sexual or not. When black women’s bodies are demanded by an industry to be sexualised but then are publicly shamed as a result of fulfilling the demand, the hypocrisy cannot be ignored. Specifically in the case of WAP, none of the imagery used or created is new. In fact, it has been produced over and over again for years, to the point where hearing these kinds of lyrics is neither unique nor shocking (think the majority of Grammy-award winning music by men). The difference is that this song was written and produced by a woman, about her own sexual pleasure as opposed to that of a man’s. Sexual empowerment is presented as an aesthetic more than an actual internal belief. It’s fed to us that the opportunity to have sex is considered the hard-won freedom of sexual liberation, forgetting that the element of choice is still something that evades most women. Confidently dancing in tight-skinned clothing or having control over who you want to sleep with are only parading the aesthetics of sexual empowerment without going into the reform of thought needed to achieve true liberation. Loving Sex and Hating Sex Workers Let’s talk about an example many of us are familiar with. Mia Khalifa is a name that has been associated with the fetishisation of the hijab. She is an extremely hated figure throughout much of the Middle East, despite the majority of the views on her videos coming from that region. The recent light Mia has cast on her time within the adult entertainment industry caused shock waves around the world. Though she was the most searched porn star last year, her actual time within the industry spanned only 3 months and a dozen videos when she was only 21. Mia Khalifa has said that these videos were made during a time in her life where she was most vulnerable and insecure. It is just one of many terrifying example of the extremes of how women can be exploited in a society where so much of our self-esteem and understanding of our value is sexualised by the male gaze. A few weeks ago, Mia Khalifa announced that she was starting an OnlyFans, mostly because she needs the money for her legal bills in battling the conglomerate Bang Bros for the rights to her imagery. This sparked significant outrage and a reversal of much of the support she’d garnered from telling her story. After all, how could she claim to have been exploited and regretful about the availability of her videos when she is only going to be putting content out that again falls under sex work? Its interesting how much more accepted sex work is when it’s something that is done to someone as opposed to them doing it themselves. This shows a clear lack of understanding regarding consent and agency. Mia Khalifa’s lack of ownership and right to her own videos reflects the recent controversies around artists Taylor Swift, and the group Fifth Harmony’s lack of ownership over most of their own music. Though not comparable, the common thread in all is the exploitation of a young person uneducated about their rights, being taken advantage of by two of the biggest, most money-churning capitalist industries in the world, the entertainment industry and the adult film industry, in the name of furthering their billions. Education Around Sexual Empowerment The themes of insecurity in Mia’s story that led to her trauma are all too familiar to so many women. Her choice wasn’t an informed one. It wasn’t agency. It was grooming, lack of understanding, insecurity and young person turmoil all rolled into one. This is why education around sexual empowerment is so important. The question of alleviating one’s insecurities and building self-esteem cannot be answered with pursuing sexual empowerment and believing in the glamour of sexual freedom without fully understanding the consequences and the realities of our society today. We can remember all throughout our lives and schooling, instances of friends and classmates garnering long-term deep-seated trauma from seemingly liberated decisions. Being in Year 7 and overhearing a classmate crying to her friends about being pressured into sex by her boyfriend, and how she knew she would have to do it to keep him. Or in year 11 when a close friend’s boyfriend took advantage of her when they were alone, with everyone called her a liar when she spoke up, leading to her tolerating more and more abuse from every boyfriend after, because the public response to her pain had taught her how much she was worth. Sexual empowerment is not and should not be about excess and hyper- sexuality. It is informed consent, education, agency and understanding. Ultimately, a new sexual revolution is needed. One that acknowledges and protects the rights and realities of those most vulnerable in our society. Sexual empowerment is informed choice. The choice that covers the spectrum of everything from WAP to abstinence. We need to understand ourselves, our bodies, and our boundaries before we can truly be empowered.

Composed by Lamisa. H & Photographed by Mariam. H Recently, I've found that whenever I haven't reflected, I feel scattered. It shows in my actions, I misplace things, I misinterpret what people say, I’m riddled with more anxious thoughts and I feel exhausted after doing only a little. When people ask me to do simple tasks, I suddenly feel like I can’t juggle everything on my plate. Journaling has always been inconsistent for me throughout my life, but I always gravitate back to it as a source of comfort and security. I’ve always been certain of the positive impacts journaling can have on our lives. More than anything, I look to others for inspiration and guidance and I am lucky enough to be surrounded by women who strive to be grounded in the field of their work and their life. I wanted to pursue this piece not only to champion some of the women I admire, but showcase the intentional choices they are making everyday, pushing through adversity in their own unique ways. We know that journaling helps us label our emotions or acknowledge traumatic events. Yet, we never really look at traditional journaling as an organisational system. It is as important to organise the thoughts in our mind, as the events in our week. Keeping track of ourselves. The women I speak to use journaling as their superpower, both as a way to creatively channel their thoughts, and meticulously plan out their schedules and keep themselves on track for the completion of their dreams. Enjoy the journey: Mariam: The Art in Journaling I have a whole shelf of journals. I have been doing it for my whole life. I’m not really consistent with it. It is very much an intuitive process. I have had mental health issues for much of my life. When I was younger, I wasn’t really aware of a diagnosis, I thought it was just who I was and I never spoke to anyone about it because I thought this was how it was for everyone; they just knew the secrets to handling it. I just adopted journaling as a coping mechanism, almost incidentally. Whatever I couldn’t handle, whatever became too overwhelming for me to deal with I would journal. Sometimes that was words, or poems, other times it was pictures, and drawings. Whatever became stuck in my head and I just couldn’t shake. Later, when I sought professional assistance, my journaling practise was a great resource to tap into and became more specifically therapeutic. I would incorporate aspects like cognitive behaviour therapy into my journaling. This was where I would take huge things and break them down, deconstruct them. Or if I could feel my mood dipping, I’d incorporate this gratefulness technique. You write down 3 things that you’re grateful for that day, and they have to be very specific things, not just the general ‘oh I have good health’. It's to be very specific, very detailed. You would be amazed how much it will make an impact. I don’t articulate when I’m angry. I get so angry, that I can have outbursts, so instead I write it all down. I don’t go back and read my writing (let’s be real, I couldn’t even if I tried). I journal more now for mindfulness and art therapy and I know the evidence behind it. It's not about being good about it. Am I naturally gifted? By no means, but I love playing with breath and movement. Textures are more important to me than colours. I set out to finish the whole book and I put everything into that book to push myself creatively, because when I write things down I experience them fully. Hebah: The Mind of a Storyteller I do a whole bunch. Dream journal in high school with my whacky dreams. End of high school, writing in a personal journal, analysing how I felt and what I wanted to do in the future. A lot of it was a stream of consciousness because I didn't know what I wanted. And now I don't really write in it. I felt pressure to keep up in the journal to the point where I realised that in 2019, I didn't write anything. When I was writing, I was writing about really sad stuff. So, I found better ways to analyse what I was feeling. Now I feel like I have a better process. In that sense, I don't need to write out my thoughts. That was me deconstructing my thoughts at the time. It helped me form the communication skills I have today. It helps you understand you better. I think a lot now. We don't give our brains enough credit, sometimes we just need some silence and in that time we’ll come to conclusions. We’re consuming so much and it's so important for me to switch off from it. It's so easy to numb yourself with these ‘infinity pools’ [apps with non-stop content]. It's unprecedented how much our brains are consuming every single day. It leaves you almost paralysed, in a debilitated state and there's nothing you can do about it. What am I going to do with this information? Now I have 2 or 3 journals in rotation. Usually to write ideas down. Writing little notes in my notes that I have to fix out, all work related. I jot down things whenever I need to. Unlined ones that are even more free. When I’m on the train, I’ll dedicate some time to writing, instead of listening to music. My brain works sporadically. I write little key words and phrases, if it's a script idea. If I say something, I'll write it down. My degree is in Media, Arts and Production but… I really like the title of Storyteller. Because I am so passionate about diversity. I feel like growing up, you’re really not shown other ways of living. I want more of our stories, and life experiences heard. It's a good time to be a minority… well, it's never a good time to be a minority, but I feel like now is a good time to have our voices heard. Raisa: Organisation is the Key to Survival I started off with bullet journalling, when I hit year 11- it was more ‘creative’ journaling. I started journaling around year 10 and I was feeling a lot of complex emotions with events in my life and I didn't have people to talk to about it. I wasn’t much of a person to open up. It felt a lot easier to translate them into writing, channelling all that complex emotion into something creative. It helps with processing, and you can almost mould them into something you can control rather than them controlling you. It was the time that I found the power of art. There are glass balls and rubber balls. A lot of things in my life are glass balls, in the sense that if I drop them they will shatter. I have to make sure that I am accountable. I'm writing a few articles for my science journals, I have a lot of responsibilities with caring for my sister. My life also revolves around my PhD: I'm looking into early intervention for Autism and ways to improve the healthcare system to ensure it is more CALD and low SES-friendly. There are a lot of gaps, it doesn’t cater as well as it should, to who doesn't fit the stock standard. My work fights the stigma of health care and mental wellness within these communities. It's an independent form of work, you set your own work and your own goals and you have to be vigilant with organisation. You cannot survive in a PhD if you are not aware of the bigger picture. Especially with COVID, the structure disappears when you are working from home and running from clinic to clinic. The night before is when I sit down, usually Sunday night. That is my time, where I sit down with my bullet journal and fill out my journal as much as I can and I go into the week with a running start. That's my 9-5 Raisa journal. It brings a lot of light into my life, like "here is my massive life and hey! its all colour coded", I doodle on the side of my planner because it brings a lot of joy in that responsible side, but also my creative side that loves to experiment with what is traditionally a planner. [My goal with journaling is] trying to organise my life in a practical perspective, and incorporate creative aspects into my work life. There is definitely an art in science, it's not just about data. There's a massive push for interdisciplinary research, and that kind of work needs a lot of creativity. Channeling my creativity into my work, transforming my hurt, stress and trauma into art. I'm in a stage production, acting and dancing. I'm playing the role of the brown mother stuck between her son and husband and struggling with her own progressive liberal values. I have a dance piece in it. In dance, journaling helps if I draw similarities between me and my character, trying to navigate the mould of the gender roles we’re given as brown women and overinflated senses of duty. What I struggle with a lot, is not quite feeling that self care is a thing that you can do. That is the message that we get, because it is selfish and that our duty is to serve others runs deep within my character and within me, and with writing from her perspective, juggling the deep and complex trauma that brown women walk with. [As a graduate in psychology] Journaling is proven to be successful in the literature, for both PTSD patients and stock standard people or at risk youth. It's a constructive way to manage emotions. Art therapy is more constructive than nulling. It should be used in conjunction with Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT). It's called ‘adding a third space’- instead of going from ‘A’ to ‘B’, you have somewhere in between. It allows you to be a little less reactive. Self-reflection is highly highly underrated, and boundary-setting is also very important. I think journaling centres you a lot and it helps you communicate to others more effectively, and it’s helped my friends in their relationships. I would definitely advocate for it, especially now since communication is so instant, we don’t have that space anymore and we’re always on and open and things unfold in real time. We tend to get caught in those instant emotions rather than seeing the bigger picture. Amara: Being Conscious of the Self I have always been passionate about writing. My family has taught us (my brother, my sister and myself) that when you feel something, you write it down. When you see the word, Taqwa, it translates to ‘God-conscious’. But you have to be conscious of yourself before you can be conscious of God. A journal should be organic and unfiltered. I need to unlearn correcting myself in my own journal. Sometimes when I write, I tend to filter myself and write what I think I want to hear later on. In saying that, when you write, your heart is raw, writing is your safe space, and as you write, your thoughts will slowly unravel. I don't think in a linear sort of way, so I read all these different perspectives and internalise the information and what part needs critical analysis- when I post or speak on a topic, I don’t ever want to present any information that is incorrect. I never want to come across as pretending. It’s like Imposter Syndrome- you feel you don’t know enough, but it's the expectations I hold of myself. I put a lot of pressure on myself to present reflections in a very structured way. But only God knows everything, it's impossible for us to. I try to be as vulnerable as I can in front of myself, because I really value vulnerability and imperfection. For me, it's about recognising that you can't be perfect. It's almost like you’re undergoing training, self-development, being confident in the whole self, even the flaws. I am whole, even with the flaws. You don't fix them because the holes are where the light comes in. You can just be sometimes. I don't write for the sake of writing. I ask, ‘What is your soul saying?’ And then write. That's a strategy that I do every night, or nights I make the intention to. I struggle with that a lot, where I'll get distracted even though I told myself I would dedicate that time just to writing. I feel like we all struggle with that distraction: There's a thread that ties us together and it's so beautiful finding that thread. [My journaling process is that] I read a lot of poetry, I write excerpts of that and then write reflections on that. I let the poem be the steering wheel- sometimes it’s a quote from people that I admire. Political, philosophical, Islamic, I think it's all interconnected, so the way that I write is not really separated. It really speaks to the idea that you can't really separate anything. My journals are a portal into my own self. If I've done or said something that I don't agree with, I use these journals to reflect and confront it. This is why I chose the path that I did, justice and political science. I can't sit by and talk about a problem. I need to do something to fix it. It is the collective movement that creates the chain of change-makers. That’s why I'm hell-bent on fixing things, whether that’s a smaller thing or a bigger thing. What I Learned From These Wonderful Women These women offered me a smidgen of their wisdom. At such young ages, they are all carving paths of change in the world around them. Here is what I took away by listening to them: Journalling doesn’t have to be something intimidating. You don't have to do it everyday, or have any particular routine. Have a goal or intention before you write. Your goal can be that you don’t have one. You don’t have to be a poet to have a journal. You don’t have to be creative to keep a journal You don’t have to be a woman to keep a journal. Keeping a journal isn’t entirely an emotional act- The act of writing accesses your left brain, which is analytical and rational. Journaling extends beyond the self-care movement No one is judging your writing- so you can unlearn the act of judging yourself. Journal comes in many different forms and serves different purposes. Fit it into your life in the way that works for you the best. Our minds are our greatest assets-- let’s use them to our advantage. Edited by Palwasha A.

Tahmina R., Palwasha A. & Irisa R. "If there is a book that you want to read but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it" - Toni Morrison Fatima Farheen Mirza did exactly that. Let us introduce you to the book that is everything you ever wished you could read as a child, the representation we craved. It’s our own families on its pages, the scenes are from our own lives and the choices each character makes, we understand. This book felt like home, everything about it - the dawats, the colours of the jai namaz, the sound of her Ammu calling out badtameez (lol), the intense love for parents that did everything in their power to build a life far from home, but with every bit of the ugly that we know very well comes with many of those moments. The story started with a single image. Fatima recalled, “The first image came to me when I was 18. It was of a family gathered at the wedding of their eldest daughter and, as they’re about to take the family photograph, their son, Amar, cannot be found. The entire novel was written as a way for me to understand this moment.” But in creating these characters she brought to life experiences that gave us a reason to pause, and recognise them in our own lives and families. We’re introduced to the “rebellious” brown boy we all hate, the “strict” father who can’t show love, the “simple” mother who never seems to stand up for her kids and the “studious” daughter who does everything in her power to keep her family together. The way that these characters are all of these things but none of them made us question how we could ever have thought that any of the people in our own lives could have anything but the same level of nuance. MISCOMMUNICATION ‘A Place For Us’ is about the breakdown of a family, not from anything that is said, but from everything that is left unsaid. So much of the book is narrated from characters' thoughts, and this storytelling choice was a true reflection of so much of the way that our families communicate in the spaces created by words left unspoken. After we finished the book we read a review that said, with so many exclamation marks, “this book was ridiculous, they never actually said anything! They never told each other what they meant or felt.” And we laughed, because we understood, from our own lives, that this was the whole point. “What was it about an apology that was so difficult? It always felt like it cost something personal and precious.” Our Desi cultures are among the most difficult to decipher because so much of what is communicated lies in non-verbal cues like body language, tone and etiquette. And we’re all too familiar with what happens when these cultures are transplanted into societies that don’t share the same values. Where one says to acquiesce, the other says to be assertive, where one is driven by duty, the other privileges the individual at every turn. Let’s talk about the character of Hadia, the eldest daughter of the family who did everything she could to do right by her parents, her sister and her brother. This character was unbelievably confronting because of much we could see parts of ourselves and women we love in her. In the ways that she rarely chose anything for herself, and in the future she ended up with. Her passivity represents such a real fear for so many of us, the daughters born to immigrant families that are doing what will be best right now, choosing the things that make our families happiest under the assumption that once we’ve done enough we'll be beyond reproach. “Afsoos was the word in Urdu. There was no equivalent in English. It was a specific kind of regret - not wishing he had acted differently, but a helpless sadness at the situation as it was, a sense that it could not have been another way.” Almost every one of our experiences as diaspora kids are interwoven by the fact that our parents, or our grandparents, uprooted their lives to start a new one across the world. But the portrayals of sacrifice and unconditional love that we’re used to associating with these journeys, Fatima does not give us in this story. She chooses not to portray the parents as heroes and martyrs, or strict pillars from whom their children dream of escaping. She doesn’t give us that comfort-the comfort of not having to be truly confronted by the experience because it is told incorrectly, or foreign enough to allow us to disassociate from it comfortably. Like the way we did with so many of the stories we read growing up. Our experience was not romanticised beyond recognition. Instead, she gave us something we couldn’t shy away from - the truth of our lives, and how we are also complicit in the choices being made. FAITH & FAMILY When we recommend this book we often say that there is no other book we’ve read (or show we’ve seen) that deals with faith in such an aspirational way, without taking away from how hard it can be to live by it. “The first sound we want our children to hear is the voice of their father, telling the child where it has come from, who its creator is, and whose care it will be in now. Telling the child, there is no God but God, and God is Great.” This is one of the only lines in a fiction novel that explains the connection between faith and family, not by what is said, but by what is done. The act of whispering the adhan (call to prayer) into a child’s ears when they are born fulfills a parent’s first responsibility to their child. In the book, Fatima plays with this idea beautifully. In her story, years later when the father, Rafiq, and son, Amar, are estranged, Rafiq laments that while he was able to recite the adhan for his two daughters, a complication during Amar’s birth meant that he never could. This he later described as his first failure to his son. As the children grow older in the book, we see in Amar and Hadia’s characters emerge a pattern that is all too familiar in our own lives. While Amar’s desire to forge his own path leads him to act out, Hadia’s desire for the same thing is stifled. Through their individual choices, Fatima plays with the differences between what it is to be religious, what it is to be conservative and how the dangers of teaching religion with the same rigidity we are taught culture can push people away from their faith than toward it. At one point, their mother Laya dwells on how Amar would truly listen to the religious teachings he heard growing up, pull out the teachable moment and spend hours reflecting on whether he could ever measure up. But the more he started seeing his relationship with his faith in black and white, success and failure, the harder it was to hold onto it at all. When he prayed he wanted it to mean something or he didn’t want to pray at all. So, as his life took the course that it did, when he could not live up to who he thought he should be, he struggled to keep the principles too - like being honest, staying true to his word and taking responsibility for his actions. But these were not the first to go, the first to go was the belief that he could, and would, be forgiven. “The Prophet was the leader of the entire ummah, his every action an example, but when his grandson climbed his back, he had bent the rules, and what if it had been because it was more important to protect a child from pain than to be unwavering in principle?” Now, this challenged the essence of Rafiq’s entire character. He was so hellbent on principle that he refused to bend with life, and to bend with his children. Until the very end of the novel, we had grown so comfortable with judging Rafiq and blaming him for all that had happened. At the end, when we are finally given the opportunity to see the story unfold from Rafiq’s perspective, this feeling is what Fatima addresses so powerfully. Throughout these final chapters it became so clear that each and every moment he recounted was filled with more tenderness and hope for his family than anyone else. We couldn't help but look at our own fathers, our grandfathers and all the men that had a hand in raising us, and ask ourselves: did we judge them before we even tried to understand them? IF I WAS A PARENT I WOULD BE BETTER In her book, Fatima plays with almost every cliche of endless drama, miscommunication, and at times plain dysfunction that has come to plague stories told about immigrant parents and the whole while we couldn’t help but think of everything we would have done differently. Through the eyes of these seemingly predictable characters, we witnessed the unfolding of one of the most gentle portrayals of a first love that we’d ever read. A love story that is not quite a love story because it ends before it ever really started. As fleeting as it is, it becomes the flashpoint for a series of events that have us questioning the parents more than the children and the communities that they had spent their lives trying to live by. For us, Layla was a particularly grating character. It was difficult to see someone try so hard to understand, and be understood by her children, but when push came to shove, she was the one to undermine them. It was interesting because her character spoke to the most commonly heard phrase, ‘what will people think?’ Speaking to the passivity and inaction that comes with living a life dictated by the assumption that you can control how others perceive you. “Back then, Layla remembered thinking that humiliation was a deeper wound than heartache. She had wanted to protect them all from it. Now, as they stood beneath the spotlight on the stage, before the remaining guests who surely must be whispering to one another.” After reading this book, we shared it with our family. Our parents took turns reading it and we spent hours and hours sitting around our dining table just talking about it, trying to understand the motivations of the characters and in doing so, trying to better understand each other. This is what happens when we’re given a real, true representation of our faiths and cultures, written without any of the implicit bias or othering that we had come to expect in all representations of us. More than anything, Fatima gave weight to the moments where we act in a way that falls short of ourselves. She shows the ripple effects of the choices that seem insignificant at the time but that change us as people and the people around us. It showed the importance of niyat (intention) in everything we do, showing how when this is even just the slightest bit skewed, the tiniest moments can drastically change lives. A FINAL WORD. Fatima Farheen Mirza spent ten years writing a book that is what we needed as teenagers, and just as much today. She tells our stories with genuine respect and understanding that only someone who’s lived through them can. This is the first book we’ve all read, as adults, that has fundamentally changed the way we see some of the most important relationships in our lives and it did this by requiring us to question people who we have never had cause to give nuance to or expect nuance from. The reason we couldn’t put this book down is because with most books we read, there are huge parts of the story that we can disconnect from, because the characters live such different lives to us and empathy isn’t the same as truly understanding an experience. But in ‘A Place For Us’ no matter how hard we tried, we couldn’t disconnect from the way they spoke, the conversations they had, and the judgements that were so often unfairly made because we ourselves have either thought them or seen others live by them.

The One where Mariam and Irisa talk about rice. Have you ever been enjoying a plate of steaming Biryani or a bowl of Nasi Goreng, and been looking at the graceful grain of rice on your plate and asked yourself: how did this get here? Where did it come from? What is its story? Well, we certainly have. Rice is the backbone of countless cuisines, and the tried and tested way to our hearts. This captivating carbohydrate has been traversing its way through human history, making a cameo in civilisations across the millennia. This giving grain has participated in some of the earliest migration routes, dabbled in cultural exchange and is now facing its biggest foe; the gluten-free movement. During these unprecedented times, we thought what could be more inspiring than taking a stroll down the memory lane of human history and to dedicate some time to ruminate on this humble grain. And then there was ... R I C E The first grain of rice can be traced back to the Yangtze River Basin in China. This actually predates the invention of the wheel, which really goes to show that you really do need a snack before you can get to work. By the 3rd millennium BC, it had become the grain of choice in India, Sri Lanka, the Malay Archipelago and the Indonesian Islands. With the migration of this graceful grain, an exchange of knowledge and technology allowed its cultivation to flourish. This can be considered the first taste of globalisation, where different communities began to share cuisines and cultural practices, across vast distances. When migrants arrived in Japan, after passing through the Korean peninsula, they came with a unique way of fermenting fish, this process evolved to become the basis for Sushi. By this time, rice had consolidated itself as a staple food in East Asia. In Vietnam, when a fast-ripening strand of rice made its way back to China in 1000 CE, the communities along the Yangtze River population grew from 60 million to 115 million within two centuries. This cultural exchange allowed for a merging of languages, where many of our root words for dishes are actually the same across most of the world. For example, the word rice comes from the Greek oryza, which itself is derived from the Indo - Iranian term brizi and the Sanskrit term vrihi-s. From the middle ages to the European age of exploration, this gallivanting grain really got around. The Islamic expansion spread rice throughout the Middle east, then to West Africa and North Africa. Later the Moors would introduce it to the Iberian Peninsula, after which it spread to Italy and France. Soon after, the Spanish and Portugese Colonialists would take it to Latin America. The West Africans that endured the Transatlanic Slave trade, played a significant role in establishing rice as a crop in the New World. The West African cuisine, composed of various rice and bean dishes became a part of the culture of the colonies that they were in and even today these dishes are still a staple food among their descendants. Further, during the Gold Rush in California, the newly arrived Chinese immigrants started growing rice for themselves and now it's the second largest crop in America. The humble little grain had slowly and steadily conquered our stomachs, and with it the world. “GIMME YOUR RICE!!!” In the preparation of food, and the passing down of recipes, we build customs and traditions. However with colonisation, so much of the ‘discovering’ and the ‘expeditions’ allow for the appropriation of other communities' produce, without paying respect to the people who nurtured, harvested and prepared the food. An interesting example of this is the rijsttafel, which is a Dutch dish, composed of a rice platter with a variety of side dishes. It is served in the Netherlands by over a thousand restaurants and it is now considered to be a “non-partisan national dish”. However, in reality this dish is a colonial fantasy, where it is a cultural hybrid and entirely constructed. The dish was commonly eaten among Dutch East Indies officials, who saw it as 'authentic Indonesian food.' While it was sold as “native food”, it was actually a mixing pot of many different dishes that came from all over the Indonesian Archipelago, with the exact origins of each dish rarely specified. The dish that is most similar to it is the Tumpeng, a Javanese ceremonial dish served at their Selamatan ritual. It is a cone shaped rice tower surrounded by a variety of side dishes. The Dutch colonialists took something that was extraordinary and lavish, and reduced it to a dish that could be consumed in an everyday setting. The other, particularly unsavoury part of this was that for the 'authentic' experience. the dish would need to be served by a long line of Indonesian waiters. THE RICE THAT GOT AWAY So far we have talked about all the ways rice has been a part of cultural exchange throughout the world, yet in Australia the story was very different. Native Australian rice (O. meridionalis) was a key part of the pre-colonial Australian diet, and society. Yet as Bruce Pascoe explores in his widely renowned text, Dark Emu, it was convenient for European settlers to disregard any evidence of an Aboriginal agricultural economy. Even now we are taught to assume that First Nation communities were nomadic, hunter gatherers. However, Aboriginals had one of the most sophisticated ways of propagating grains, where the farms were so perfectly tilled and well looked after that early settlers' reports describe it as a mirage in the desert. Had those irrigation processes and tilling practices been nurtured, Australia would now be producing the highest quality strain of rice in the world. Native Australian rice is gluten - free and more nutrient - dense then the rice we import. Anthropologists have now concluded that First Nation peoples had a diet that was more nutritional than any other civilisation in the world. Furthermore, climate activists are now pushing for this native rice to become our new normal, because it requires less fertiliser, it allows for less water run - off, and overall, it would reduce our national CO2 emissions. In the last ten years, with the rise in eating low GI and gluten free food, some of the largest corporations are investing in commercialising this native Australian grain, with very little success because they are failing to cooperate with local Aboriginal communities. This history is important because it can be really easy to value one story over another, one practice of developing over another. Right now, Australia has some of the highest rates of obesity in the world, and it’s quite ironic to know that for over sixty thousand years First Nation communities were living off a diet that now anthropologists describe as the 'cleanest diet.' Here we are at the end of the grain, we have travelled through all of human history and now, you must be hungry. So go and make yourself a delicious meal, and maybe it’ll taste even richer with the knowledge of the centuries of cultural exchange, struggle and triumphs that allowed it to arrive at your dinner table.

By Lamisa H. and Tahmina R. The current global refugee regime was never fit for purpose, with over half the world’s refugee population living in temporary camps while they await visas. The greatest risk of this system is that the refugees become completely dependent on short-term aid. The refugee crisis has turned from a humanitarian crisis to a development crisis. Ultimately, providing aid in a vacuum is never sustainable and we need innovative, integrated solutions that work in the long term. Keeping this in mind, an organisation that we have worked closely with in the past, Refugee Support Europe (RSE) recently moved out of the camps in Greece and relocated their operations to Cyprus. Although heartbreaking, the reason they did this was because they felt the residents of the camps they were working in for over two years were becoming dependent on their aid and felt that their presence was stunting the relationship between the Greek government and the residents that were under their care. In fulfilling immediate needs they had inadvertently created a situation where the residents of the camp were becoming very reliant on their aid alone. What is dependency theory? Dependency theory suggests that there needs to be a reassessment of the relationship between the aid provider and receiver, to empower the latter. Barbara Harrell-Bond wrote as early as the 1980s that long term humanitarian assistance can undermine agency and fail to recognise or nurture the capabilities of refugees. It is like a double edged sword, helping in the short term, but often harming in the long term. With RSE, it was as simple as knowing when to leave. When they became aware that the residents were becoming dependent on their aid. So, after over two years of service in a camp that was never meant to be used for that long nor expand to the size that it eventually did, they decided to leave. While the role of aid cannot be understated in the short term, without long term strategies for moving residents out of there is a risk that decades will pass before they can leave. The average stay in a refugee camp is 17 years. The greatest risk here is that these camps will turn into ghettos and that an entire generation will be raised in conditions deprived of the entitlements enjoyed by citizens. There are situations where refugees have been in this limbo stage for decades, such as with the camps in Bosnia that have over the past two decades turned from short-term camps to long-term camps to what are now effectively ghettos. They have very minimal rights and protections and in this vacuum, agencies like the UNHCR and NGOs of all sizes try to fill the gap in resources and protection. What was most impressive to us, was that the co-founders, John and Paul, were able to look two or three years ahead and realised that nothing would change unless they removed themselves from the equation. It was their ability to look outside their emotions and consider their situation as objectively as possible. Had they stayed and stretched their resources as long as they could, all they ever could have achieved beyond what they had already done is to sustain the delivery of food and clothing. But the circumstances of the camp, how far it was from the city, its distance from other camps and location in the mountains meant that beyond making the residents comfortable they were now contributing in such a way as to make it easier for the Greek government to keep the residents there for years, or even indefinitely. For more, have a read of the interview we did with Paul last year. What on Earth is a Refugee Economy? RSE in the last two years has dedicated their projects in Cyprus to funding small business ventures and entrepreneurship by the refugees they are working with. This change in their operations is reflecting a shift in focus from ‘helping’ in the short term to better understanding how they assist residents of the camps in using their economic potential. With a growing number of displaced people and a declining global willingness to provide protection, we need more solutions that integrate refugees as a part of the solution to providing effective aid and to keep in mind that refugees are a key part of the private sector. ‘Refugee Economies’ by Betts, Bloom, Kaplan and Omata ‘Refugee Economies’ use the concept of ‘refugee economies’ to describe the economic potential of refugees living in exile. They argue that if given sufficient support and opportunity, they themselves can play an active role in securing a sustainable future for themselves. As it stands, their labour is often absorbed with little recognition into the informal economies of the states that they are hosted in, making them especially vulnerable to exploitation - or as Ranabir Samaddar writes, “capitalism feeds on the informal economy and refugees.” It is a combination of structure and agency that limits or creates opportunities for refugees. Structurally, it is the institutional context of being a refugee that shapes outcomes. On the agency side, the capacity of refugees to transcend that institutional context both as individuals and as communities also shapes outcomes. What is clear from Betts et al’s research is that there is a spectrum of income and dependency levels, refugees have the highest incomes and lowest dependency levels in the cities, away from the camps. This means that “the greater the opportunities for the refugees to integrate into the mainstream economy” the greater the potential to collectively move away from “a logic of dependency toward greater sustainability within our responses to refugees.” Refugees need to be part of the solution Earlier this week the Australian government announced it would cost $55 million to reopen the detention centre on Christmas Island over the next 6 months. The offshore camps in Australia deprive the detainees of the very institutional/ legal safeguards that they would otherwise benefit from if they were on Australian soil. This is their entire purpose. With climate change, the refugee crisis will only worsen. While our system is among the most inhumane in the world, currently, research like that conducted by Betts in their book ‘Refugee Economies’ presents a promising future where it is possible for aid to work alongside those they are hoping to serve. References Betts, A., Bloom, L., Kaplan, J. and Omata, N. 2017, Refugee Economies: Forced Displacement and Development, Oxford University Press, UK.

By Palwasha A. “Is it us? Or is it you?” A few days ago, the survivors of the Christchurch massacre went to make their statements in court, as the person responsible for murdering their loved ones in their place of worship was given the heaviest sentence ever handed down in the history of New Zealand. The strength of their message as they looked directly into the face of the person who a year prior had stolen so much from them rings so strongly that it needs to be remembered. One image in particular stood out. The son of Haji Daoud Nabi, the 71-year-old man who was murdered saying the words “Hello brother” to his killer, was wearing a pakol in court. Non-Afghans may have thought it a style choice, but the pakol is a hat originating in Chitral, traditionally worn by Afghan men, particularly Pashtuns. His father Daoud was also wearing a pakol in the image of him that was shared across the world after his death. This choice of headgear, combined with his long full beard and gigantic frame, I realised, seemed a conscious choice to make him look every inch the image of the word that has been used to demonise people who look like him in the Western conscience for so many years, as he looked upon the terrorist in the room. “I urge you to take a look around this courtroom, and ask yourself who exactly is the other here right now. Is it us… or is it you?” - Sara Qasem, daughter of Abdelfattah Qasem. It’s said that everyone remembers where they were when they first heard the news of a horrific tragedy. When I read about the massacre as the updates were still rolling in, I was at work. I kept refreshing the page in horror, trying to keep my expression neutral, already understanding on a deeply-ingrained level that the outrage at this attack would fall short. I connected with the only other Muslim in the room, even though we barely knew each other, and we sat in silence over the news. When I went down to where everyone else was working, seeing them, I knew I had to leave, or risk someone making light of the attack. “God says in the Qur’an, whoever kills one innocent soul, it is as if he has killed the entire mankind... And you have killed fifty-one. They left behind 34 spouses, 92 children and more than a hundred siblings who now have to endure the life sentence of being without their loved ones” - Hamimah Tuyan, wife of Zekeriya Tuyan. I don’t know if any of us remember ever hearing any shame, any acknowledgement from the Australian community that this terrorist was homegrown. When an Arab kills innocent people, all Arabs must be made to account for it for the rest of their lives, constantly defending themselves against such abhorrent, vile ideology. An Australian man wrote a manifesto condemning all non-white people before going into another country where he was allowed to travel freely, and killed people in their safest and most sacred place of worship. We never took blame or looked deeply into the fabric of our country for what it was that had allowed anti-Muslim hatred to grow so steadily unchecked that it resulted in this. “You thought you can break us… You failed miserably. Ata is gone but never forgotten. He will always be the light of our eyes. And we will live in his legacy” - Maysoon Salama, mother of Ata Elayan. A week after the attack, I heard a conversation in my workplace. Some of the higher ups were talking about an ad they wanted to run on our platforms, that a woman in charge of PR was worried was “subtly racist”. The head honcho complained for twenty minutes about how inconvenient it was to have to cater to these things all the time. Then the head of digital marketing said to the woman, “listen, if you’re worried about how it’ll come off, we’ll just cut it down a bit. I think people are very sensitive right now because of what happened at Christchurch, so let’s wait a week before we post it”. The solution was to wait a week before being racist again. It didn’t end. I got up, my legs shaking and ears blaring, and walked up to my bosses and squeaked, “excuse me.” It came out as a genuine squeak. When they turned around I told them the ad was definitely racist, and saying something wasn’t okay “because Christchurch just happened” should tell you that it's not okay, ever. They protested, but in the end they had to listen, I think because they smelled, as all big people do, a potential lawsuit from a minority coming. The head of digital marketing apologised. Not truly genuinely, but the seed had at least been planted. The person who killed so many people at Masjid al-Noor was someone who walked among us not too long ago, from a town that’s not actually that far from where we live, who swallowed and perpetuated, revelled in and promoted white supremacist ideologies and realised them in the choices he made throughout his life, resulting in the ultimate act of hatred. But would we have gotten to this place, I wonder, if we hadn’t had a government that normalised the lock up and torture of non-white people seeking refuge on our shores? If when John Howard was losing in the polls 20 years ago, he hadn’t gotten his marketing team to make Muslim refugees the enemy of that year, and then when it worked, every year after that, resulting in his re-election? And if our neighbours, our community members and in some instances, we ourselves, hadn’t voted for it? I wonder what would have happened if our country’s most esteemed university didn’t choose to honour such a man, awarding him an honorary doctorate as protests took place outside it’s walls, and all the other events that we take part in every day that normalise intolerance in the narrative of our country. Sara Qasem, the daughter of Abdulfatteh Qasem, said to her father’s killer in court that he had made a choice. “A conscious, stupid, irresponsible, cold-blooded, selfish, disgusting, heinous, foul, uninformed and evil choice," she said. It was a choice. “Because of you my faith is stronger, and I want to learn more about Islam. So thank you” - Nathan Smith, Christchurch survivor. One of the biggest barriers to addressing anti-Muslim racism is that we ourselves are unaware of how deeply rooted it is in our own psyches. While we send our prayers up for every single life lost that day, we need to start understanding and fighting against the white supremacy and widely accepted anti-Muslim racism that led to so many people losing their lives that day. For us, the best way we could think of remembering the tragedy and honouring those who lost their lives is to commit to fighting what allowed that and so many other tragedies to happen, and committing to seeing these changes through in the community. We’d like to invite all of you, our readers, to the “One Act” initiative, where you will be able to hop on and tell us about one thing you did in your week, however large or small that sparked an important conversation, or changed an uneducated opinion or protected a more vulnerable person. There should never be another Christchurch. Our words of “never forget” mean never forget what it cost us to stay silent. Never forget what happened when white supremacy and anti-Muslim racism was allowed to thrive in Australia. “We respect New Zealand and the Muslim community and the non-Muslim community. We stood together against hate” - Gamal Fouda, Imam of Masjid al-Noor. Thank you to Al Jazeera, who provided bios and short stories for each person killed in the Christchurch attack. Too often the numbers of such attacks overwhelm the real human stories behind the names and this article honours each of them: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/03/zealand-mosque-attacks-victims-190316183339297.html. Edited by Tahmina R.

Jessica L. and Mariam H. When we consume and enjoy our favourite music, media, and books does that mean we are complicit or even condoning the unsavoury actions of the artist? How much does context matter? If the artist is no longer able to profit economically, does it matter if we continue to consume their art? Whether or not we continue to stream ‘Thriller’ during the entire Halloween season, and regardless of any profit his estate makes, Micheal Jackson will still be dead. But how much is the cultural legacy and impact of an artist worth?And what happens when we have to reconcile our idols with the horrors of their actions? Xxtenations had a huge significance for so many that listened to his music. His songs were raw with a vulnerability and fragility uncommon in the hip hop genre, covering themes such as depression, loneliness, and loss. Yet, while his music actively challenged the constraints of toxic masculinity, his real life actions seemed to be moulded entirely from a hyper-violent strain of it. We are in a brave new world. More than at any point in art history, the everyday person has the power to assign value. The institutions that once upheld the authority of the critic are something that we scoff at now. What defines value, directs attention, rouses praise or sows scorn is no longer decided by an unknown pretentious elite. I mean look at Rotten Tomatoes, do we even care what the critic score is if the audience score is ‘certified fresh’? We have become the critics, the audience, the consumer and the fan all at once. What this all means is that there is greater moral obligation in deciding that those we venerate and value are ‘worthy’ of it. The simplistic manifestation of this dilemma is ‘cancel culture’. The alternative stance is to create distinction between the Artist and their Art. But do either of these really fit? And does it provide enough nuance to understand the complexities and contradictions? “Death of the Author”: Art belongs to everyone Media and art criticism is largely influenced by Roland Barthes infamous theory called “death of the author”. Barthes suggests that the Artist's intentions behind the work does not matter as much as the audiences own interaction and interpretation of the work itself. Meaning, value and understanding is derived from the individual more so than the author/artists’ rendering them obsolete. In an age where perceived authenticity is a key selling point, “death of the author” as criticism seems to be dying in relevance. It is most often used to divest audiences of the responsibility to challenge the artist and their intentions. It provides an easy freedom to enjoy the art, and engage with it in an emotionally safe and pleasurable manner. It allows us to dismiss the unsavoury parts of the artist and comfortably consume their work in a manner that is formative to our being. The theory does not recognise the symbiosis between the artist and their art. It is becoming harder to truly separate the art from the artist for the sake of the individual. Especially when the art is constructed to be inseparable from the artist to begin with. Take Taylor Swift for example, her music is near autobiographical and intertwined with her artistic persona. Swift's album ‘1989’, was heavily coded with references to her public life, and the audience’s understanding of the work was guided almost entirely by the artist. Another notable example is the Harry Potter universe and its creator J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter is among the modern works of art that have shaped culture and our collective consciousness. The work has been a safe haven for many. Its’ themes of belonging, personal identity and friendship spoke to millions worldwide. The emergence of the internet allowed fandoms to flourish, and fans worldwide used Rowling’s work as a means to connect with each other and create a global community. Rowling herself was lauded and placed on a pedestal, increasingly becoming a moral authority. This image began to fracture as Rowling became more and more vocal about her views. Most recently, Rowling decided to drop her unsolicited transphobic views. So while for so many of us Harry Potter is a formative aspect of our lives, it is becoming difficult to separate Rowling from her creation. We cannot immerse ourselves and enjoy the Harry Potter universe in the way that we previously had. The question that haunts us is, if engagement with the Harry Potter universe equates with validation of Rowling’s unsavoury, hurtful statements and sentiments. For those like us, not part of the communities she hurt, does our silence mean they were not worthy of our outrage, active protest or solidarity? What would active protest even look like? How would we ‘cancel’ Rowling and Harry Potter? How would we go about simply erasing such a monolith from the cultural narrative? Can we really use art to decide who is good and bad? Art is a strange lens to view morality, as it is in a constant state of flux. We constantly see artists that we put on such a high pedestal be knocked down to ruins in an instant. The call-outs and cancelling of the artist’s actions, is used as a measuring stick for our own collective and individual morality. What we have developed is a tool to measure our moral compass. More than anything we need to draw lines in the sand, react accordingly, appropriately and ‘woke-ly’ in response to the art we consume. Time and time again we have seen bad people produce good art, from authors such as Hemingway, to directors such as Woody Allen, designers like Coco Chanel. Beautiful, insightful, moving work can come from horrible people. Celebrated work can come at the expense of so much tragedy, oppression and the direct result of exploitation. To say that we do not justify the value of art without those parameters is untrue. Does it seem good for visual artist Damien Hirst to slice a cow in half and put it’s carcass in formaldehyde for the sake of art (YES this is true, google it) or is it justifiable to watch another movie produced by Harvey Weinstein’s company (the devil works hard but damn Miramax in the 1990-2000s worked harder). There is a strange comfort in relying on Cancel Culture rhetoric to inform us when a “problematic” artist should be condemned. Socially we become aware of who NOT to engage with, making it easier for us to know who we should not give our attention, time and money to. Problematic and Unproblematic appear as solid and trustworthy roadmaps to navigate the media yet it is not without its limitations. The art and the artist do not always fit easily into those binaries. The moral high ground when it comes to art seems to be a mountainous terrain with endless peaks and ditches before us. As much as we want it to be easy to navigate, a black and white map is not the best measure to decide whether the greyness of art can be truly good or bad. Overtime looking for absolute morality in art erodes you, leaving you more confused as to where you stand in all this greyness. What becomes more apparent is that art is a display of power. It’s a clear indication of what we think matters in this world, of the people that we choose to venerate and the idols that we aspire to become. So, Can Great Art be Separated From its Problematic Artist? The greater question is, why do we need it to be separated? We demand clear cut positions and boundaries, yet no aspect of human existence is truly clear cut. The cultural legacy that is imprinted into our society is the assumption that good art is synonymously created by good people. Upon reflection it feels as though by giving Artists our time and energy, we want them to be deserving of it. We so often place our Artists on a pedestal, we expect them to be better, to do better, to be infallible. As though being an Artist means they are something greater, but the truth is neither genius, inspiration or talent is synonymous with innate morality. The value of discomfort and confliction cannot be disregarded. As a cultural artefact, the primary function of art is not simply to entertain. Art is an exploration of the human conditions, it is a means to wallow in the discomfort and develop nuance. In Aristotle’s earliest surviving work The Poetics, he stipulates the true purpose of Greek Tragedy, as means of catharsis for the audience. Though Aristotle was specifically discussing dramatic theatre, the concept can be applied to Art generally. Art can allow us to grapple with the nuances and darkness of the human condition in a controlled environment. In being challenged and discomfited we facilitate a deeper understanding of ourselves. The ethical dilemma of how to manage a ‘problematic artist’ can shape and develop our boundaries. So learn to sit and stew in your discomfort. That conflicted feelings that comes from engaging in the morally grey of art is an opportunity to reflect. The truth is 9 ½ times out of 10 you will not get the satisfying answer that will comfortably return you to black and white binaries. Instead it will help you understand the darker and more questionable parts of your being. In summary: Separating the Art from the Artist is HAAAAAAARD Just because you make great Art doesn’t mean you are a good person It’s ok to feel uncomfortable every once in awhile We are all confused, but we try.

Tahmina R. and Irisa R. Recently, on Instagram, we came across an image of a jai namaz (prayer mat) with the Holy Ka’bah printed on it being sold as a ‘frilled Greek carpet’ by the fast fashion brand ‘Shein’. This was just one of many examples we’ve bombarded our group chats with, of disturbing-to-the-point-of-funny, instances of cultural or religious appropriation. Some are plain absurd and others are downright offensive because they take cultural or religious symbols and carelessly market them as an ‘aesthetic’. The term ‘cultural appropriation’ has come to mean something that it was never intended to - white people have slotted themselves in as the centre of the discussion. It’s become about what is and isn’t permissible for white people to wear, rather than what it actually is - the erasure of minority cultures through the commercialisation of garments that are not up for sale. Cultural appropriation allows members of the mainstream to benefit from elements of minority culture without permission of use or acknowledging where an item of clothing comes from. Similarly, religious appropriation strips garments, symbols and objects of their religious meaning, leaving only the aesthetic value. For example, one of Gucci’s recent fashion shows featured models in a dastar while others wore what looked unsettlingly close to a hijab. Imitation is (definitely) not the highest form of flattery There is a myth that the more globalised the world becomes, the traditions and customs of all people can be poured into an ever-churning pot, where no one really holds any particular ‘ownership’ of anything (the great ‘melting pot’ narrative of globalisation). But in stripping a garment of its specific context and the meaning that comes with that, then repackaging it in a way that appeals to a dominant group, it values its aesthetic quality over its actual purpose and meaning. It means that the average white consumer is given the power to determine what is preferable to their tastes and what can be discarded. This leads to ridiculous situations, where a kameez is being sold without the salwar, where a keffiyeh is being repurposed as a mini dress and where a cheongsam is cut into a two piece crop set. Cultural appropriation isn’t just moving a garment from one context to another, it is (if even unintentionally) erasing the agency of the communities that they belong to. By stripping the rich, non-European context of the garment, it becomes something that fulfils a fleeting trend and nothing more. The process of selling these garments for profit without recognising the artistry behind them, the legacy of the garments and the story of why they’re worn is problematic. It means that we can’t distinguish between a hanbok, a kimono and a cheongsam with each being generalised into an ‘oriental print’. When we bought a tunic from Palestine, we soon realised that we had no place wearing it, so we gifted it to a Palestinian friend, who explained to us the significance of the embroidery. So, this conversation isn’t just a competition between white people and everyone else. That said, there is still so much space for us to meet on common ground where we both give or take in a mutual exchange. But as soon as it becomes one culture taking the aspects of another and assuming them as its own, it can be cultural appropriation regardless of whether the person is white or BIPOC. This can happen whenever there is a clear imbalance between the person appropriating and the person losing control of their culture. A common example is South Asian people speaking in blaccent. Appropriation Becomes Harmful It’s easy for us to think that if our own communities honour and acknowledge the significance of the garments or the jewellery that we wear, then why does it matter? For example, our own parents will celebrate some instances of appropriation as people showing interest in our culture, genuinely believing that there is nothing to lose from their involvement. However, historically, cultural appropriation has been mobilised as a way to preserve certain aspects of a minority culture that fit the dominant group’s interests while purposefully discarding others, leading to cultural erasure. Now that these practices can’t be institutionalised, and this sort of racism can no longer be made policy, the same sentiments are emerging in equally problematic ways in fashion and pop culture spaces. We all hold a form of cultural capital. The value of this capital is often determined from the Eurocentric viewpoint that we often (unintentionally) inhabit. So with this in mind, the sharing of cultural knowledge can move away from a mutual exchange into a way for the mainstream audience to take without acknowledgement. What’s more is that when they are taken and commercialised, cultural and religious garments can often be sexualised in order to appeal to a very specific demographic. When the cheongsam is appropriated with high slits, it seeks to sexualise the bodies of women who wear it, when the actual clothes themselves are not at all for that purpose. One of the more dangerous examples of religious appropriation is the sexualisation of the hijab. As a garment its very purpose is to protect the wearer from being objectified and alarmingly, the appropriation of the hijab and niqab in both high fashion and pop culture has had the effect of causing the opposite. Taking the value of an item of clothing, without paying homage to the place, its history and the people who wear it, allows us to take the aesthetic without honouring its story in the process. Everyone's responses to this can vary but we think that for us, the line between appreciation and appropriation is crossed when something is sold without benefitting the communities from which it was taken.

By Palwasha A. “I see a type of spiritual colonialism here: bypassing, erasing and occupying a spiritual landscape that has been lived…by Muslims from Bosnia and Istanbul to Konya and Iran to Central and South Asia” - Omid Safi A few weeks ago, I came across a thread about Rumi by Persian Poetics on Twitter that confirmed something I’d long suspected; that the translation of his works had largely been sanitised in their distribution and consumption in the West. The post was being shared to reveal how much everything we know and admire has been twisted to fit the narrative of the world today, where we operate globally under colonial structures and make do with being the inferior non-white other. When reading the translations of Rumi for the first time, I noticed the omission of mentions of God and Islamic religious terminology, and categorised him in my head as subscribing to the vague notion of a religion of “love”, rather than Islam. But it was confusing, given his context, how a 13th century Persian Muslim poet could write such seemingly vague and untethered sentences. Recently I found out that what we know today as his most popular “translations” here in the West are actually paraphases of other people’s previous English translations, with careful and purposeful ommissions of Muslim terminology. The person mostly responsible for Rumi’s celebrity-status in the West is a guy named Coleman Barks, who has produced over a dozen books of Rumi translations, the ones everyone has on their coffee table today. Here’s the insane catch. This guy doesn’t speak Farsi, has never studied Rumi or Islam and has actively removed Rumi from his very thirteenth century Muslim context on purpose, despite claiming to Rozina Ali, the writer of an excellent New Yorker article about Rumi’s whitewashing (linked here if you’d like to read) that he has no memory of whether or not he did it on purpose, even though he left in references to Jesus and Joseph because he was “raised Presbyterian”. Interestingly, Barks is not solely responsible for this. This kind of separation of mystical poetry from it’s Islamic roots dates back to the Victorian period, writes Rozina, by (white) academics wanting to create the illusion “that these people are mystical not because of Islam but in spite of it” she quotes from esteemed professor of Asian and Middle Eastern studies and Rumi enthusiast, Omid Safi. They refused to acknowledge or promote the fact that the works they so admired were created by devout “Moslems” (I always thought this spelling was to mock the way Americans pronounced Muslim, but in fact it was the predominant spelling of the time). It was from the translations of these folks (already incredibly inaccurate and problematic) that our bumbling, non-Farsi speaking boy Coleman spun his interpretations. His purpose in doing so, was not just to get filthy rich off his clumsy whitewashing of Rumi, but to “make him palatable to an American audience”. Hmm. What is the Point of erasing Rumi's Muslim-ness? Rumi’s wisdom is incredible and many people in the West can and have benefited from it, but a version of it that he would, as a devout Muslim and scholar, have rebelled against. One can easily see how Coleman could reach the conclusion that all the Islam needed to be removed from Rumi’s poetry, because the West’s demonising of the religion, its followers and any association with it has been so thorough and complete. This also pushes the enforced idea, as Omid points out, that non-white people have not contributed to civilisation, either in academia, invention or philosophical thought. There is alarmingly little outcry or criticism of Barks’s interpretations, and even less widespread awareness of what has been done to Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Balkhi. As an Afghan for whom Rumi is one of essentially only two Afghan thinkers given any credit in the West it is genuinely upsetting that he has been removed from us and our history. His acclaim is by having torn his work from the context that would allow him to be in any way associated with us, rather than a figure who transcended the pitiful backwardness of a religion that Afghans (and much of the Muslim world) today are imagined to be held back by. Why does it matter? The misrepresentation of Rumi opens up the wider discussion of; if they did it to him, who else in our history has been whitewashed, sanitised and removed from a rich, non-Euro context. Which others of our heroes have been purposefully twisted to uphold a colonial narrative that takes the benefit of their work without paying homage to the religious and historical context within which they were writing. This whitewashing of non-white historical figures is necessary in upholding a white supremacist and Islamophobic narrative. Even further, by removing Rumi from his context, readers are deprived from learning about the beautiful spirituality of Islam. It also deprives the person thinking they are reading Rumi from feeling the strength any text gets from its context, from being written about what the writer knows, has experienced, and has love for. His evolution from devoted worshipper of the God and religion he believed in and devoted his life to, into vague and wholesome affirmations in English translations, means that the reader is not exposed to his actual work and only experiences Rumi through a game of Chinese Whispers with an agenda. Rozina writes: “Even if Rumi was heterodox, it’s important to recognize that he was heterodox in a Muslim context—and that Islamic culture, centuries ago, had room for such heterodoxy. Rumi’s works are not just layered with religion; they represent the historical dynamism within Islamic scholarship.” Final Thoughts Frustratingly, in researching this piece and Rumi’s whitewashing, I found that even among those who have been most vocal in their writing about this topic have failed to engage with why. When we don’t engage with the why, we’re left “fixing” one problem without addressing the root of the problem - which is the whitewashing and islamophobia that permeates Western academic traditions and the retelling of Muslim history. The sanitisation of Rumi, along with the erasure of countless other revolutionary, non-white scholars and inventors and leaders comes from the need to uphold the Eurocentric narrative that white is supreme which has been systematically spread throughout the Muslim world through the processes of colonisation. For those of you who are seeking a genuine translation, free of all the euro-shapeshifting, check out Jawid Mojaddedi (an Afghan researcher) whose works translating the ‘Masnavi’, are out in several volumes already. Also, check out the powerful ‘Rumi Was Muslim’ platform, created by the people who inspired the writing of this piece with their attempts to give Rumi back his true legacy. Edited by Tahmina R.