notes about the Caged Virgin.

I read a book for school two months ago. I really value that experience of reading this book, because it awaked many reactions, memories and opinions in me.. and still does. These are some of them.

I have not integrated to the western perspective. I do not believe that Integration has to be our major goal as immigrants. For many immigrants the mail goal is to survive. Integration will occur only if this process is reversed. Integration will occur if the host country is able to adapt to new immigrants way of life through tolerance.

Are immigrants so uncivilized that they need to be conquered and imprisoned by the host country ideas and lifestyle? My inquiry stems from a hope for change, for a collaborative effort of immigrant integration without segregation. An integration of diverse needs, and voices, and ways of doing and being would greatly benefit new immigrants as well as members of the local host community. If the host country looks to integrate, it must dismiss some of its own values and customs. It must be a shared effort. I want to believe that this is the future of integration.


Hirsi Ali criticizes the victimization discourses that have surrounded her own vision of the world. She perceives that the liberal western people are advocating for human rights but are fearful to damage their experiences. The idea that not being critical implies having ‘pity’ for somebody is what she refutes. I disagree with this. I can see how liberals and well intentioned people may not do much by not criticizing others; however, they are already doing something, they are being vulnerable, they are practicing tolerance, and they are not being extreme critical people, as the author is implying as her optimum desire. She is looking for the westerners to not only be critical towards the Islamic minorities, but also to impose one and only Truth.

When Ali expressed, “Withholding criticism and ignoring differences are racism in its purest form”, I immediately opposed this statement. Ali’s tone is condescending and judgmental toward liberals. I do not see the purest form of racism as not saying what one’s thinking or choosing to avoid confrontations with others. I have experienced racism in different ways; therefore, I do not believe in one pure form. My first experience with racism in United States consisted of people violently throwing a can of soda at me while I was in a very white neighborhood in Lakeside. I thought that day, “So this is the racism that people talked about”. That day changed my life. It opened my own memories of discrimination in my own country; it opened my perspective of others; and, it helped me to understand that people that have not experienced racism of any kind are not likely to recognize acts of racism to others.

I strongly disagree with Ali’s idea of having one truth. She views the secular liberals as victims of guilt feelings and ignorance towards minorities. Her perception calls for everybody to stand up for one truth. I think that advocating only one truth is a form of racism. If we do this, we are ignoring people that are surviving and advocating for themselves in their own ways already.

I, for some reason, have the need, still, to apologize of my words sometimes. That is itself a barrier that Im fighting against, myself. I want to critizes myself, to  love me.
 
I hate the tittle 'the Caged virgin'. Its sexist. commercial. unfair. its creative too. and makes me mad having so many reactions due to one book. but that same thing makes me grateful.
 
I am glad that I can disagree.