STOP. JUST. STOP

*sigh* First time posting since forever and it's a rant.



Anyway, here goes.



I have been seeing memes and hipster pictures of admonishments and chastisements against girls wearing 'fashionable' hijabs--they're saying that a hijab is about maintaining modesty and not about attracting attention. 

 

Now, I have questions about this issue, 1st of all, what kind of fashionable hijabs are we talking about? 

 

Something like this?

 

 

 

Or this?

 

 

2nd, are they actually doing their job of covering what they should? 

 

3rd, did this issue come from a hijab-wearing woman/girl or from a man?

If the hijab is covering up what it should, then I don't see a problem with it being fashionable. And by fashionable I mean being pretty or stylize or riddled with frou-frou or whatever. And I don't think that girls are wearing fashionable hijabs to attract attention, that's just the end result.

(As if boys or men need any reason to look at girls)

Clothes, including the hijab, isn't just cloth covering up our body, for me it's a statement, it's a way to express myself or my mood, it's a creative outlet. So, if the girls/women want to wear something fashionable, let them.

Let's just look at this logically. A hijab isn't easy to wear. Sure there are some that's pretty much pullovers but the 'fashionable' hijabs? Those are made of large squares or rectangle shaped cloth that girls swirl, circle, knot, pin, beat to submission in order to achieve the perfect style that compliments their face or their muslim attire. Those hijabs are complicated and intricate pieces of art. People take tutorials and courses to achieve this. 

 

Like this one:

 

 

 

And these girls do this very thing every day. 

 

Why? Because they want to look good. 

 

For who? For themselves. 

 

Because believe it or not, guys, women don't dress for you (unless you are our significant other and unless we intend to ensnare you into our webs),  we dress how we want because we feel good in it. It's already hard enough for girls to feel comfortable with their own body considering the over-sexualized and over- fetishized world we live in (and if you think that girls in hijabs aren't fetishized you are wrong), when we like the way we look, when we feel good about ourselves, we feel confident. And confidence is a very good thing. People, especially girls deserve to feel good about themselves. Deserve to feel confident. And if wearing fashionable hijabs makes them feel better about themselves, so be it. 

 

  (oh look, her hijab doesn't cover the protrusion of her breasts. WHORE. *shakes fist* I want the dress though, pretty.)

 

Besides, do you know how hard it is for girls to wear hijabs? The obstacles alone range from peer pressure, what they see in the media, people's perception, to simply living in our tropical country? They cover their hair, their arms and body and legs, do you know how trying that is, to feel smothered by that much heat? When my sisters come home from school and take off their hijabs they are soaking in sweat.

 

But these girls wear it because they have faith, because they believe in covering their modesty, they believe in following God's words. So now they want to look pretty while they do that and you can't stand it? You think it attracts to much attention? Whose attention? Your attention? Men's attention? Pffft. Please.

I don't think this is a religious issue. I think it is a social one. I think this is the age-old problem where women are blamed for distracting men who can't seem to help themselves, and who can't show a bit of restraint. But of course it is the women who should take the blame and the shame. 

 

 

 

Oh, these hijab wearing hussies, how dare that they want to look pretty while wearing a hijab, look at them covering up their hair and bodies, flaunting their shape like that. And wearing heels under their long skirts that cover up their legs. FOR SHAME!!

 

 

Look pal, if you consider a girl in a hijab (who is covered from head to toe) is distracting you and trying to get your attention, or a girl in a hijab (who is still covered from head to toe) needs to cover up more so she wouldn't attract attention then YOU have a problem.

Go seek help and leave the girls alone.

Haaaa, ladies? You feeling me?

*drops mic*

I once had a guy yelled at me, calling me 'bitch' when I didn't respond to his overture, apparently he wanted to talk to me. He was so persistent that I offered to talk to him at a 24/7 food stall that I was heading to, but he refused. Why the hell was I even giving him the chance to speak to me?

Let me set the scene. It was 2 AM, I was walking home from the cybercafe where I was working on a translation. He saw me and turned around to follow me. Here are my choices, either stop there to talk to him (not likely) or have him follow me home (hell no) so I offered to humor him but in a familiar space where everybody knows me and are friendly. 

He refused. So, I walked on and ignore him. He followed me again until I walked to the food stall where he left me yelling 'bitch' (not really, he called me a really nasty word in Indonesian-Javanese). The owner of the food stall asked me what was that about and I told him that the guy was following me so I'm gonna wait here for a moment just to make sure that he was gone. He shrugged and gave me a free iced milo. 

And of course, since all the people in the stall was male, 'they said that's why I shouldn't be walking in the middle of the night."

I opened my mouth to explain myself, would tell them about I had work, it only took five minutes to walk home, I know everyone that worked in the cybercafe, I know the people that worked in the 24/7 mini market that I always passed by, the road is brightly lit, and in the middle of the cafe to my house, there is this place who is always crowded by people, but then I shut my mouth realizing, I didn't NEED to explain to them, I didn't NEED to feel ashamed or embarrassed because I wasn't the one doing wrong. But that's the case with these kind of situations. The victim is the one to blame for being careless and stupid, not the perpetrator. There are always scumbugs in the world, and if you get screwed, it's your fault for not being vigilant enough. 

But it doesn't really work like that. I once rode a pedicab, in bright day light and this guy in a motorbike followed me, said hi and tried to talk to me. I ignored him, and then when he passed by me he actually stopped to wait for the pedicab to catch up and followed me right to my university. He waited for me when my class was over so I had to hang back for a while until he left. That's in bright day light. Then there are guys who like to act innocent and then brush up against me in public places. How the hell do I protect myself against that?

And I don't get the self-entitlement that goes with harassment, as if it is perfectly all right for them to accost me and feel insulted and offended when I don't feel inclined to speak with them. Even my mother told me to 'be nice and polite' so I wouldn't make things worst by antagonizing them. But being nice and polite as in eye contact is often mistakenly construed as encouragement and that's the opposite of what I want to do. 

Then of course, there's the whole other side of being (what other people consider) too vigilant. When you slow down your steps so the guy walking behind you will walk in front of you. When you refuse to go inside an elevator when a guy is inside it. When you ignore a guy who tries to talk to you on the street. When you refuse a ride from a guy you've only known for a couple of days. When you unconsciously shift away when a guy enters a space. And then they look at you or treat you as if they are offended by how you're 'overly cautious' with them. 

So, being 'overly cautious' means you're insulting perfectly good men who can't possibly harass you, and being 'careless' means you're asking for it. 

It's a damn if you do or damn if you don't do situation and the thought that most women experience this everyday pisses me off.

So,

So, watched Jack the Giant Slayer yesterday with my sisters

…and it was good. Surprisingly good. I didn’t really expect much from it but really, I enjoyed it.

Not to say that I didn’t have something to gripe about it. I can’t say anything about the CGI and etc because I have no knowledge of it, but I can talk about the plot.

Mainly, the plot about the princess. The thing is, it was emphasized that the princess wants an adventure, she wants to do something other than just being a princess, she wants to learn about her people, she wants to be seen as capable and not a delicate princess by her father. 

And that’s cool.

But then, it seems that all she got to do, is being saved. 

After, the writers and other characters (elmond and the other guard) said that she was capable (and she was when she was at the Giant’s territory, I understood why she didn’t go down but go up, and she marked her passage so she wouldn’t get lost, smarts, right there) but then…nothing. 

When the Giants finally destroyed the gates at almost end, I was SERIOUSLY HOPING that the one who wore the crown would be her, that she would finally showed (sure, by way of magic crown) her father, It would have been such a great moment for her.

I understand WHY Jack’s the one who wore the crown, but at the very least, give us a short second where Jack, understanding her, would give her the crown, but she refused and gave it to him, maybe in a sneaky thought that there was no way her father could refuse their hero as her lawfully wedded husband. AT LEAST THERE WOULD BE SOMETHING.

After all the “she is capable, she is strong”, at the end she is a princess who ran away from home, got caught by giants, rescued over and over again and married the GIANT SLAYER.

There, that would be it.

I mean I was kind of psyched with the scene where Jack said she looked beautiful when she was wearing armor. ARMOR and not some smansy dress, but even then the armor is a matching armor of her fathers. It was GOLD, and not a scratch on it, as if it was an accessory. 

I just wanted her to be MORE.