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The Top 5 Most Islamophobic Reactions to Huma Abedin

Anthony Weiner's wife has stood by him in a baffling show of support - and the media, both mainstream and right-wing does not know what to make of it.

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3. Elizabeth Wurtzel, Personal Twitter Account

In a tweet on July 28, Wurtzel (who herself came under fire earlier this year in an anti-feminist rampage after a New York Magazine essay on her stunted adulthood had many crying "white privilege") attempted to calm the masses, reminding them that "Huma Abedin grew up in Saudi Arabia. She might be joyous just to not be wearing a burka." After I quickly yelled, "WHO?", and then remembered that Wurtzel was the author of Prosac Nation (the irony of her writing a book essentially about the damage that comes from a society that prescribes questionable methods as a means to control isn't lost on me) I came to the conclusion that Twitter is technology's attempt to eradicate inner-monologue more than anything else.

 

4. Maureen Dowd, New York Times

Pulitzer Prize winning  NYT columnist Maureen Dowd's column for the Sunday Review this past weekend proved her to be a surprisingly simple-minded in her reading of what is, politically speaking, a rather complicated breakdown of the husband-wife dynamic. Dowd writes, after calling Weiner "eel-like" in a bit of undeniable accuracy, "you must remember one thing: Huma was raised in Saudi Arabia, where women are treated worse by men than anywhere else on the planet." Aside from the obvious bit of subjective quantifying (hasn't the inherent debate on female agency regarding the burka proven that middle eastern culture is relatively immune to ethnocentric readings of freedom?), Dowd's piece is most troublesome for the way it assumes Huma's willingness to stand behind her husband as the result of from generations of traditional submission.

 

5.  Rush Limbaugh, Of course.

"Huma is a Muslim," Limbaugh perceptively pointed out on his radio show. "In that regard, Weiner ought to be able to get away with anything. Muslim women don’t have any power, right? Muslim women are beheaded, stoned, whatever if they drive, have affairs. In certain countries, Muslim women, if they’re raped, are killed — it’s their fault."

I can only read Limbaugh's comments the way I do all of his comments: as some strange performance art piece meant to be viewed within the context of the 24-hour news cycle and the culture's sudden economy of opinion over economy of facts. So, I'll just offer my opinion in response, in the form of a rhetorical question: "H ow is this man even real or allowed to use his mouth for anything other than guzzling rancid garbage juice as a palate cleanser" and be on my merry way.

 

 

 

 

 

Rod Bastanmehr is a freelance writer in New York City with a passion for music, film and culture. Follow him on Twitter @rodb.

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