I have supported the anthology project by promoting the call for submissions amongst the membership at Muslimah Writers Alliance, however, in response to the statement, “and, at times, the voices that are heard the loudest are those of brothers”, I beg to differ. In fact, the article, “Abused Muslim Women in U.S. Gain Advocates” was posted at MASNET (http://www.masnet.org/news.asp?id=4690), and I happened to also share it with my fellow members at the National Association of Muslim Lawyers, to which a MALE attorney responded, “Shame. While this is a problem experienced by Muslim women, I hope the men will step up to the plate and advocate, instead of the victims always being the advocates.” I replied back, “Amin!”

If you link under the word “anthology” in this blog post, it takes you to a page offering additional information regarding the call for submissions. In the update the sister has written, “We have received a lot of positive feedback on the idea but not as diverse a set of submissions as we had hoped for.” I can just imagine, based on my experience as a Muslim revert, and 4-years in working with revert sisters through the Sisters4Dawah project, that the majority of responses to the call for submissions, to date, have conveyed NEGATIVE experiences regarding courtship/dating (or whatever term would be used to describe how a pair of Muslims comes to the point of getting married) - especially if the sister is already the victim of divorce, abandonment, and/or abuse. Every time I think I cannot possibly hear of another such story, there it lands in my inbox again…and again, and again. And a huge complaint among men is that women don’t ‘respect’ them; when the crux of the problem is the lack of men that ‘respect’ the true teachings of Islam.

If the only choice a Muslim woman has is to marry a Muslim man…then God help us…and I thank Him for good friends (like Imam Bray) and cats.