"It was at the CAIR retreat that Mr. Awad’s unwelcome, inappropriate and offensive behavior toward Ms. Saroya reached a point where she decided that she would in fact resign. Prior to that point, Mr. Awad, Ms. Saroya’s supervisor, had on various occasions asked her out to a personal lunch with him, asked her to put away her notebook and stop talking about work, and insisted on driving her back to her hotel during conferences and retreats. In May 2018, while out of town on a work trip, Mr. Awad asked Ms. Saroya to meet him in the hotel lobby at midnight. When she complied, he said to her with a smile "Do you know that [other CAIR employees] think there is something going on between us?" This latest escalation of Mr. Awad’s shocking and repulsive behavior led Ms. Saroya to realise she needed to leave CAIR for her own safety and well-being."After resigning, it continues, Saroya was "shocked at the sheer number of women, past and present, who revealed their appalling experiences at CAIR National and affiliate chapters in a number of CAIR victim support groups and other channels she joined after her departure from CAIR". Her testimony is undoubtedly unsettling. But it also raises an uncomfortable question: why were concerns about the alleged abuse at CAIR not aired during the height of the #MeToo movement? The answer, I believe, is rooted in a fundamental tension between America’s Muslim community and their country — one that is illustrated by the way that CAIR’s leadership retains control of three spheres of influence. The first is internal: within the Muslim community, there is an honour and shame dynamic that is both compelling and insidious. When the victims in the #MeToo movement came forward, the prevailing culture called for the male predators to be held to account. The women were not blamed or shamed. The Arab-Islamic attitude towards sex and sexuality, however, is rigid in its honour code. Women who have been victimised are often approached with an air of open suspicion. What were you wearing? Why were you in the car alone with a man? Why are you working outside of the home? The woman is assigned the blame and faces the prospect of causing her family real shame and dishonour, even if the woman is a victim. In addition to the honour and shame dynamic, there is a related "in-group" and "out-group" attitude. The very act of a person from the Muslim community seeking legal counsel, police involvement or media attention outside of the Muslim community — or even outside of her own ethnic or extended family community — can be viewed as a betrayal of all Muslims, rather than an individual plea for help. In a community where you have to seek to resolve your grievances internally or shut up, women will frequently gravitate to the latter option by default. Secondly, there is CAIR’s influence over the American-Muslim identity. CAIR shapes the image of what America is for Muslims, projecting a message that Islamophobia is around every corner and just one wrong word could result in a rise of attacks against Muslims nationwide. In the face of this perceived Islamophobic threat, CAIR presents itself as the only barrier standing between Muslims and persecution. And what practising Muslim — especially those who have already fled from persecution in other countries — would dare to question that? Even if you don’t necessarily agree with everything CAIR says, you wouldn’t want to undermine the fight against Islamophobia, would you? This also relates to CAIR’s third sphere of influence: the one that concerns the wider society. The #MeToo movement rose against the backdrop of identity politics and the backlash against the Trump administration. And no organisation has profited more from this than CAIR. In the years since #MeToo reached its peak, CAIR has cynically leveraged identity politics by explicitly styling itself as the defender of minorities. It is, so the thinking goes, the last place that people would expect to find any form of mistreatment of women. And, even if someone did, it would be easy to cry Islamophobia, bigotry, and xenophobia. Any critics would be defamed, dismissed and ignored. But now, thanks to Saroya’s courageous refusal to be silenced, those spheres of influence have never looked so fragile. I have never been a vocal supporter of the #MeToo movement. There were too many unsubstantiated allegations, too many reputations destroyed for lapses of taste rather than crimes, too much attention paid to Hollywood when much worse offences were being committed against less privileged women in more obscure places. Women, it should be noted, like those at CAIR. Of course, CAIR’s lawsuit against Saroya is yet to be concluded; and Saroya’s testimony yet to be countered; so far, the allegations against the organisation and individuals concerned remain exactly that: allegations. But the public fury of women such as Saroya surely marks a turning point for Muslim women in the US. Make no mistake: America’s Muslim #MeToo moment is here. Read more at: UnHerd.com and Deception.news.
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