In recent years, the West through the international non-profit organizations and pro-Western media, has actively begun to implement the idea of gender equality in the countries of Central Asia. Moreover, the West is trying to associate gender inequality in our region with the centuries-old Islamic culture and the way of life of our peoples.
As part of the development and achievement of gender equality in the region, a program to prevent domestic violence against women has been launched, as well as seminars and art exhibitions are periodically held. So, for example, in December 2019, the exhibition “Feminale” was held in the capital of Kyrgyzstan.
On July 6, 2020, several girls from Uzbekistan, the members of a community called Exponautz Art Gallery, posted the photos on the Internet with the homemade posters on the topic of gender equality. The initiators of the action called to support the flash mob by posting photos with their plates on the aforementioned topic on social networks, however, users of social networks in the Asian segment generally reacted very negatively to this flash mob. And, although the majority of residents of the region still deliberately reject the idea of gender equality due to contradictions with their culture, there were still those who expressed support for these ideas.
Secularist dictators in Central Asian countries, in turn, also support and promote such initiatives of the West to secularize the peoples of the region, and the very idea of gender equality is presented by them as development and social evolution.
The problem of disrespectful and even sometimes humiliating attitudes towards women in modern society of Islamic countries clearly exists, but it is necessary to understand what is the reason. Is the main reason for this the Islamic culture and way of life of Muslims, as the West claims, or is it something else?
In reality, Islam outlined the rights and obligations of men and women to each other, and also gave women a special place in society. A woman in Islam is considered an honor that must be protected even at the cost of life. A woman is entrusted with the responsibility of raising children, she is the keeper of the home, but at the same time, Islam does not prohibit a woman from working, organizing her own business and engaging in any social activity within the framework established by Islamic law.
This means that today’s attitude towards women and her humiliated position are in fact the fruits of many years of some countries’ efforts to distance our countries from Islam, which led to the separation of the institution of the family from the Islamic way of life and non-observance of Islamic laws. This is the root of all the troubles and hardships that befall the Islamic Ummah today.
Firdaus Salimzoda