What is the relationship between sexularism and Orientalism?
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In her article, Sirma Bilge mentions that historically, one of the orientalist arguments against Muslims was that they are polygamous and under that frame polygamy is seen as ‘’sexual excess’’ (Bilge,305). Another argument was that Muslim women are oppressed, they wear the hijab and it’s a symbol of oppression, according to the West and the Orientalists (though nobody asked the Muslim woman how she felt about her hijab). All of that was in contrast to the so-called free, liberal and ‘’civilized’’ West where men are not involved in polygamous marriage (it’s illegal in many if not all Western countries) but rather they (some of them) get involved in many relationships and women can wear whatever they want, but what society (through social media for example) actually wants from them, is that they wear the most revealing clothing because she is a ''free western women'' (or maybe it’s so that she can satisfy the eyes of ‘’ Monsieur Madame tout le monde’’). According to the sociologist, nowadays the orientalist rhetoric is less about polygamy and more about Muslim men being oppressive because their women are covered and also that they do not share the position of the West about homosexuality/sexual freedom.
Those two elements: women’s rights and sexual freedom are becoming important
‘’ civilisational values of Western nations’’ (Bilge, 305) and the concept of sexularism is built on that. According to Bilge, sexularism is the idea that secularism will lead to gender equality and sexual emancipation (Bilge, 307). Under the sexularist framework, religion is an obstacle to those goals because religion and more specifically Islam ‘’oppresses women and does not allow ‘’non-heteronormative sexualities’’ (Bilge, 307). Hence, in my opinion, the relationship betweensexularism and Orientalism is that both of those concepts represent Muslims as the complete opposite of the Westerners. Muslims are represented as uncivilized because they live by their religion, and they have more ‘’traditional views’’ on sexuality. Whereas Western nations are secular and that is what makes them civilized. For them it’s about liberty; anyone should do what he wishes (but the Muslim woman should not wear the hijab). In her article Sirma Bilge kind of answers the question of the relationship between Orientalism and sexularism by saying that ‘’… Sexularism is hence a reconfigured Orientalism…’’ (Bilge, 307). I agree with her because fundamentally sexularism is rooted in Orientalism in a way that they both demonized the fact that the ‘’Other’’ has more conservative values which is not a bad thing in itself, but in the Western worldview having conservative values means that you are backwards and that you need to be brought to modernity.I understand why in Quebec the idea of people living by more traditional values can seem backwards because the experience of Quebeckers and the Christian church was negative -- at least it’s often the way it's depicted especially when we talk about the ideas behind la Révolution Tranquille, and even when we look at the ‘’Pensionnats autochtones’’ situation-- , but it’s not because the Christian church was seen as an obstacle to modernity and development and was responsible for atrocities that Muslims have a similar relationship with Islam, but the whole rhetoric is often based on this assumption.