Who Run The World (Girls)

My title may suggest that girls have it all, success, power and of course love. However, I really just picked the title because I love Beyonce so much!




In our last Sociology class, we have discussed how families are considered as element of socialization and how gender roles can affect the stability of families and relationships. We also looked closely into the breadwinner system and discussed the elements of changes and continuity regarding the system.

Due to the rise of literacy rates amongst women and with more women entering the workforce, more women are becoming the breadwinners in their place, which has shaken up the system. Men are no longer perceived as the main provider for the household; in fact, many women began earning more than men do. Men are doing more housework than they ever had (watching a game and playing X-Box all does not count). Many couples are succumbing to the changes mainly because of the recent economic conditions. On the other hand, there is still cultural resistance and stigma towards men being the secondary earners in the household, which has discouraged many men from dating or marrying successful women.

There are two main reasons why successful women remain single, they are either too busy working and achieving their goals or they are seen as "high maintenance" by men. Men are often intimidated by women who are better than them financially and career wise. This whole "Beauty fades, but personality and brains last forever" just doesn't seem to cut it anymore. Of course, many successful men look for women are equally successful and smart in order for them to support themselves in their social and professional circles. There has been many cases where marriages have been ruined due to the wife having a more successful career, and it usually happens when the in-laws or the public interfere and comment on their situation. Most of the middle-eastern men were brought up in a house where the mom was a stay-at-home mom and the father being the breadwinner. However, many of them are pro-feminism and demand equality for women. 

What happened to "Behind every successful man is a woman"?

One thing about Middle-Eastern men, they will never let you pay the bill just because they're men.

Why are women still single then? Frankly, because some of them choose to be. What bothers in me in our society is how people contradict themselves when it's a stigma for girls to remain unmarried and for men to marry girls who are more successful (or the breadwinner) in the family. Successful, ambitious and more educated girls are then forced to stay single because they haven't found an equivalent companion.
Even though feminism is perceived as a western ideology, many westerners are highly against it simply because they're men.

Shame!

BIGGER SHAME!!

Qatar portrayal in American Media

In the history of movies black people have always been portrayed as poor, stupid, and uneducated. All of those are unfair discrimination that have been attached to the dark skinned people. An example of that is the large collection of movies in the 80's about being a gangster, where the qualities that come with being a gangster are violence, murder and rape. Also, black women are over sexualized in almost all of the movies.

Arabs, also, have always been discriminated at. You have a long beard, you wear a headscarf or if you wear the traditional abaya and thobe. You are immediately discriminated at. It is truly upsetting how much the media have the prejudice against my own country Qatar by portraying it as the country of the poor, bad and uneducated. Two examples to prove that are:

1.     In Transformers which was a blockbuster released in 2007. There was a scene where the aliens are in Qatar. In this scene the movie changes the country from the “modern” America to the “poor” Qatar. The Americans come with their big fancy weapons and modern suits. They start fighting the aliens in what is supposedly called “Qatar.” And the Qatari citizens run for their lives with their sheep while they’re wearing old dirty thobes! This was very problematic due to the massive number of people who watched this movie and formed this FALSE idea about Qatar. 

2.    The Second example comes from another U.S. blockbuster called Taken. It was released in 2008. This movie is about a retired CIA agent traveled to France after his daughter got kidnapped. He discovered she was going to be sold to become sex slave. In one of the final scenes in the film, his daughter was in an auction to be sold. The father purses her buyer in a car chase. Here they showed the shocking part; the car that the father was chasing to get his daughter had the licence plate of Qatar!!! As a citizen of that country I find it very upsetting that my country is being portrayed like that. As a place with low morals where they would buy a human being for sexual pleasure. 

 

Those previous examples can only prove one thing. The media is feeding the public and the audience these prejudices. A personal example to show how this is working is a situation that happened to me back in 2009. I was volunteering for the WSDC schools championship. A British guy approached me saying he was very surprised of how modern Qatar was. He thought that he would debate in a tent! He also thought that he would move from tent to tent on a camel. Personally, I thought that was hilarious because it is far away from the truth. Qatar is a very modern state. If you haven’t lived or seen Qatar before, this picture should give you an idea about the modernity of Qatar.  

I hope one day those stereotypes would disappear, but deep down I know this is not going to happen anytime soon. After all it’s only human nature to put people and judge them into boxes.  

                            

"Modern Abaya"

The culture and traditions of the Middle East are wildly different than they are in the west. Due to the majority of the Middle East being Muslim, the differences of cultural behaviors and social norms are drastic. Women in the Middle East are held under certain expectations that they’re anticipated to follow. The cultural “norm” of how a Middle Eastern woman dresses and acts is considered to be very conservative. We’re expected to be “covering” ourselves from head to toe when we’re out in public or are around men; that however is partly due to religion. Nevertheless in the Gulf, that is considered part of their tradition, and not just for religious purposes. In the Gulf women are expected to wear the Abaya. The Abaya is a loose black robe that covers the women from their neck down to their toes. The original purpose of the Abaya is to cover up the woman, and be loose enough in order to hide the shape of her body, and not attract attention to her.

In the media, Muslim Arab women are often portrayed as very conservative, veiled, and regularly, if they’re from the Gulf, wearing Abaya’s. However, what are also portrayed in the media are ideas of urbanization and modernization. In the recent years, due to the globalization and modernization theories, traditions and cultures in the Middle East are being thrown out the window. For the purposes of being “modern” and transitioning into urbanization, cultures and traditions that we once followed for essential reasons are being forgotten or drastically changed. The Abaya that was once supposed to serve the purpose of covering a woman up and concealing the shape of her body is now turned into a fashion statement. That may be due to the fact that the women here feel alienated from themselves. Marx’s theory of alienation helps us understand that. It basically states that due to the social structure and social class stratification enforced on us by society, we eventually begin to feel detached from our work, from our life activities, from ourselves, and from the people around us. We can use this theory and apply it to the situation here. Because the women are forced to wear the Abaya and look like every other woman around them, they’re beginning to feel invisible. They can’t express their personalities through fashion; they can’t stand out. This makes them feel alienated from themselves and from society, and I believe that this may be one of the reasons for the invention of the “modern Abaya”.

A variety of designers have turned the Abaya into beautifully designed dresses. I cannot deny that the art and thought put into designing those items of clothing is spectacular, but they’re not Abaya’s. Many new designers have come up with “modern Abaya” collections, a few Arab’s and a few westerners. The students of VCU in Qatar have come up with a project called the “Abaya Project” where they all contribute their beautiful designs of modern Abaya’s.

Here are some examples to demonstrate my explanations of today's modern Abaya.

The following video highlights a Modern Abaya Exhibition held in Katara’s Art Center here in Doha, displaying their beautiful designs.



I do agree that these new designs are very inventive, and can allow a woman to highlight her beauty whilst still being conservative. It allows them to express themselves and present their personalities through fashion. But going back to our original values, cultures and traditions, this is defying the purpose of the Abaya and hence defying our cultures and traditions.

Sociology and GoRemy?

It became a norm for this generation of youth to look up topics they are interested on the Internet, more specifically on Google and YouTube. Why you ask? Well because everybody is on the Internet. I say “on” instead of “in” because all the social websites provided to us as Internet users, help people voice their opinions online, a big number of who do it through posting videos on YouTube.

Indeed, there has been a growing phenomenon of people posting their own creative videos on YouTube, Vimeo and many others, which range from music they’ve composed to comments on other videos/movies/songs/campaigns etc …

What’s interesting about those videos is that a big majority of the YouTube users are young. As a fellow Arab social media user, I notice that a lot more young Arabs from all around the world are posting videos and voicing their opinions about various topics.

The YouTube videos that came to my mind when thinking about Youth Cultures in the Middle East are the videos of Young Arab youtubers that live in America, who make silly songs about Middle Eastern food, wealth and cars. GoRemy is a YouTube channel that belongs to Remy Munasifi, he is an Arab-American stand-up comedian that makes music parodies and videos, which made his channel very famous for incorporating Arabic traditions and culture into his videos, which have over 77 millions hits now.

One of his most popular songs is “Saudis in Audis”, where he covers the fact that Saudis are very rich and well ...  drive Audis.

I notice a lot of reference to material and non-material culture in this video, such as the car, the traditional white clothing, the dancing hand gestures, and many more… 

He also brushes on Arab stereotypes, such as “ Saudis just put hose in the ground,” which refers to the abundance of oil and gas Saudi Arabia has. There are so much more stereotypical points he covers in this specific video about the highbrow Saudi culture, which you’ll all have to see for yourself.

He also has songs that talk about famous traditional Arabic dishes, such as, Tabouleh, Falafel and Hummus. His versions of these famous comedy parodies appeal to a lot of youth, especially Arab youth. He gets video responses from Arabs all around the world, but mainly from the U.S and Canada, which showcases the spread of the Arab community all around the world.

What’s also interesting about YouTube and GoRemy, is that it increased channels led and owned by Arab Youth also making funny videos about other Arab cultures, it has increased to a point where I see hegemony of Arab transmitting their cultures through comedic videos.

Watch them all they are hilarious!