Islamophobia Awareness Month Blog #3
Islamophobia Awareness Month Blog #1
So what can we do to challenge Islamophobia which impacts such a broad range of survivors?
Firstly, we must accept that Islamophobia, like other forms of racism, is political and systemic, rather than just prejudiced individual attitudes and behaviours. To tackle Islamophobia, the VAWG sector must carefully rethink our narrative about safety and how patriarchy and racism are different sides of the same coin. Here are some ways we can do that:
Rethink ‘harmful practices’. The term ‘harmful practice’ is linked to perceived cultural and religious practices of Black and brown communities that are done to Black and brown women. Intersectional feminists recognise that harmful practices aren't limited to any culture and in fact, behaviours like date rape and upskirting can are considered harmful cultural practices. To truly uproot racism and create a safer world, we have to think about the words we use and stories we tell about which ‘communities’ are inherently dangerous, and which are not, because if we don’t we end up victimising the women we are claiming to centre and in so doing the work of patriarchy and reinforcing white supremacy’s racist ideas of dangerous Black and brown men harming women.
End surveillance and the hostile environment which are important strategies for upholding racism and misogyny. Many people who need the VAWG sector don’t have the right to live and work in the UK yet. They have what’s known as ‘insecure immigration status’. Knowing this, abusers often use insecure immigration status as a tool of control and threaten their victims with deportation. This situation forces migrant survivors into a dangerous position: they are not safe with their abuser and not safe to ask for help. The places where survivors should be able to safely tell someone about their abuse, such as a GPs office, a hospital and other healthcare settings are all frightening places for survivors with insecure immigration status. The Home Office has intentionally brought healthcare settings into the Hostile Environment to make them places of surveillance instead of places of safety. Now, in England, healthcare staff check patients’ IDs and non-UK citizens are charged for non-urgent medical care including during childbirth. This impacts anyone who is seen as a migrant, which includes many Muslims no matter how long we have been in the UK. In fact racist narratives use immigrant, illegal migrant, refugees, asylum seekers and Muslims interchangeably and on purpose.
Campaigners like MedAct are working hard to challenge the normalisation of surveillance in healthcare so that all people including migrants can confidently and safely access healthcare.
As people and organisations who want to support survivors, the VAWG sector must think about ways of achieving safety that don’t rely on surveillance of Muslim communities as though we are inherently or especially violent or weak. This is something that the sector knows about and some have campaigned for when supporting homeless survivors, migrant women and those with no access to public funds.