Popular Cleric From Pakistan Blamed COVID-19 On Women Who Wear Short Clothes. RIP Logic, Misogyny Is Here.

Popular Cleric From Pakistan Blamed COVID-19 On Women Who Wear Short Clothes. RIP Logic, Misogyny Is Here.

It’s such an irony that when it comes to a successful project, the credit is often snatched away from women and handed over to the men in her team. But when it comes to an unfortunate incident or failure, women are blamed. Whether we have any connection whatsoever is an aspect of logical reasoning that our sexist society has long forgotten to use. Who would have thought someone would find a way to blame COVID-19, a pandemic on women? Yup, that’s right – a virus that has brought the world to its knees is apparently because women have been wearing hemlines that are way higher than approved by the Pakistani clerk Maulana Tariq Jameel.

He made some really cringe-worthy, wrath-evoking statements that will make your blood boil and your fist clench. Maulana Jameel said that COVID-19 is a result of the “wrongdoing of women”. He put the blame on “women who dress scantily” for the pandemic. “Who has torn honour to pieces in my country? Who makes my country’s daughters dance? Who is asking them to wear skimpier clothes? Whom should I hold accountable for this sin?” he said. He further added, “I seek forgiveness from Allah that I could not make my community understand. When a Muslim’s daughter choose the path of indecency and the youth choose vulgarity… The biggest curse of God was on the people of Lut as they crossed all boundaries of indecency and were cursed five times.”

All of these berserk statements were made on Live television during the Ehsaas Telethon fundraising and in the presence of Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan, who has made equally sexist comments in the past. If logic, science, and humanity met and decided to commit suicide, we all know where they’d go. I don’t understand how such people even have the authority to give any public statements. In fact, they shouldn’t be allowed to talk at all, but democracy. I mean, it’s really tedious to keep saying that there’s literally nothing wrong with a shorter hemline. It doesn’t make women loose. But seriously, how can someone blame a deadly disease on our clothes? Earthquakes, Amazon fire, Australia’s bush fires, etc – everything can be our fault, going by the logic of Mr. Jameel here.

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) took to Twitter to call Maulana Jameel out for his shameful words. It wrote: “HRCP is appalled at Maulana Tariq Jamil’s recent statement inexplicably correlating women’s ‘modesty’ to the Covid19 pandemic. Such blatant objectification is unacceptable and, when aired on public television, only compounds the misogyny entrenched in society.” Even Dawn, Pakistan’s newspaper called him out for propagating such disgusting notions.

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First, Maulana blamed the media for making mountains of his misogynistic molehill and then apologized saying some of it was a slip of tongue. How far did you let it slip, mister? Like your brains, it seems like your tongue isn’t in your control too.

What is even more shameful is that you can see several followers of his school of thought on Twitter supporting him and cursing the media. A lot of these are young, educated people apparently don’t find his statements misogynistic.

https://twitter.com/Shahid_Hasan_M/status/1254679061353435137

https://twitter.com/EmranBaloch7/status/1254678406895153152

ALSO READ: In Pakistan, The Aurat March On Women’s Day Was Successful. But A Man Abused A Woman On Live TV, So Equality Is Still A Dream

Akanksha Narang

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