News:

On 8^th June, Forbes news site published an article entitled, "You Can't Have it All: 40% of Women Professionals are ‘Hanging on by a Thread'". It discussed a new study by career strategist and author Megan Dalla-Camina whose book, Getting Real About Having it All regarding the feminist dream of women having a successful high flying career as well as a stable and successful home-life, is debuting in the US this week. The study surveyed 1000 American female professionals about their wellbeing and found that most lacked satisfaction with their lives. 70% believed that the concept of success at both home and work is a myth and were struggling with their wellbeing. 40% said they were ‘hanging by a thread', and only 16% were very satisfied with their lives overall. The author said regarding the women surveyed, "They report a feeling of being on a treadmill and running so fast they're scared to look to the left or to the right, so they just keep running."

Comment:

In 2012, Anne-Marie Slaughter, the first female director of policy planning in the US State Department and mother of two, also expressed similar views, when she wrote an opinion-piece in The Atlantic entitled, "Why Women Still Can't Have it All". She described her guilt on the limited time she had with her children and the strain this had caused on her relationship with them. This led to her leaving her high-flying job in order to spend more time with her family. She talked about how the feminist beliefs that she had built her career on were shifting, and that for women to believe they could ‘have it all' was airbrushing reality. She wrote, "It's time to stop fooling ourselves. We have to stop accepting... male choices as a default."

Last week in the UK, high-profile TV personality and self-avowed "passionate feminist" Kirstie Allsop made headlines when she suggested in an interview with the Telegraph that young women should acknowledge the decline in women's fertility with age and therefore prioritise starting a family before embarking on their careers to avoid the heartache of not being able to conceive children in later life. She said, "At the moment, women have 15 years to go to university, to get their career on track, try and buy a home, and have a baby. That's a hell of a lot to ask someone." She said her advice was based on the biological clock of women and that while the time of starting a career or even a university education can be changed, fertility cannot be altered. Her statements elicited scathing remarks and a furious attack from feminists who casted her a misogynist and accused her of rolling back the fight for women's liberation. In response, Allsop tweeted, "Nature is not a feminist".

The problem with feminism is that it has consistently denied biology throughout its history, with drastic consequences. Its serious error was to not simply call for the right of women to enjoy the same worth and rights of citizenship as men but to measure their success based upon adopting all the rights, roles, and duties of men. This simply exchanged one form of oppression with another for it cast as irrelevant her nature as the bearer of children, expecting her to become equal to men in the workplace while ignoring the blatant fact that she will always be biologically unequal to them. She therefore entered an unwinnable battle against nature in the name of playing catch-up with men, often sacrificing in the process her natural urge of motherhood - all to step into the shoes of an artificial, fictitious identity of the ‘have it all woman' constructed by confused feminists past and present. And in embracing this identity, she replaced one form of devaluing of women who were treated within Western societies as intellectually, spiritually and socially inferior to men, with another. This is because by defining her success against the yardstick of adopting the traditional roles of men, especially as wage-earner, she diminished the status of the very thing that makes the woman distinct and privileged over men - the ability to bear and nurse the future generations of societies. This unique attribute of the woman began to be viewed as a handicap to securing a successful career and aiding the economic productivity of businesses and nations rather than a vital quality for humanity that should be cherished, valued, protected and raised in status within societies. Liberation became liberation from womanhood. The consequence of all of this was stress, guilt, heartache, and lack of overall contentment with life. The other defining mark of feminism is ceaseless confusion regarding the roles and choices of men and women. This is reflected in relentless disputes between feminists over the issue, as well as ever-changing views of what constitutes women's liberation. This begs the question as to why Western governments and feminist organisations are so stubbornly adamant in trying to market feminist ideals and this failed Western model of ‘women's liberation' to the Muslim world?

In this debate, one journalist wrote, "There is no template for successfully being female". Islam utterly disputes this. It has for centuries defined a vital primary role of women as home-makers, mothers and nurturers of children - one that the Muslim society is obliged to greatly value and protect. This does not deprive women of the right to education, work, or a political voice as some secularists have claimed. It simply means that she is able to embrace the identity of the true ‘have it all woman' - an identity that confers upon her a role which gives her time with her children, removes confusion and conflicts regarding her priorities, and that complements her nature rather than being contradictory to it. This is alongside enjoying all the rights of citizenship. Isn't this what ‘having it all' really means?

Written for The Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by

Dr. Nazreen Nawaz

Member of the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir