She was loved by everybody in the family » « When she continued to refuse to make a religious vow

They’re drugging her

English PEN has more on Zainub Dala:

English PEN is gravely alarmed to hear that South African novelist Zainub Priya Dala has been admitted to a mental institution in Durban, South Africa. Dala is also a psychologist and a physiotherapist specialising in autism.

In March, at a literary event at a school, she praised the works of Salman Rushdie. A day later, three men accosted her when she was in her car, placed a knife at her throat and hit her face with a brick. She was addressed as ‘Rushdie’s Bitch.’ She believes that if a minibus taxi had not pulled into the vacant lot that she would have been stabbed.

Dala has since been under pressure from members of Durban’s Muslim community to recant and repent. She has now been sent to a mental institution – St Joseph’s. She has no access to laptops, only has use of her mobile and is unable to write.

They then quote her, I guess via her mobile:

I’ve been … drugged till I can barely walk … and basically broken down into a submission where I will follow the straight path (if there is one). I feel that the far-reaching damage to my kids will be severe as they attend schools that are 90% Muslim. And I refuse to educate them with fire and brimstone stories about how they may go to heaven but their beloved grandmother will burn in hellfire. That’s what they are teaching the kids now anyway. I have also been harangued to withdraw, dissect, explain and renounce my admiration of [Rushdie’s] works. I could just as easily burn my Oscar Wilde collection because some homophobes came calling. I can’t turn back now and pretend I never admired his writing. I would look like a fool.

Ellipses in the original.

PEN concludes:

English PEN calls for Dala’s immediate release and for the campaign of intimidation against her to cease. ‘The repercussions of her public statement of support for Salman Rushdie should appal anyone who cares about freedom of expression in South Africa,’ said English PEN director Jo Glanville. ‘That this assault has been followed by pressure from Dala’s own community, leading to her detention in a mental institution, is not treatment that any of us would expect to see in an open society.’

It’s clearly not her “own community.” Just being a Muslim doesn’t make her part of a “community” that bashes women in the face with bricks, tries to force them to disavow their own literary judgments, and imprisons them in mental institutions. Dala’s “community” is writers and thinkers and liberals and freethinkers. That’s our community.

She was loved by everybody in the family » « When she continued to refuse to make a religious vow

Comments

  1. Gen, Uppity Ingrate and Ilk says

    This is just horrifying stuff. From the American PEN site:

    Speaking at a literary event at a school several weeks ago, Dala voiced public appreciation for Rushdie’s work. Shortly thereafter she was the victim of a violent attack in which the assailants referenced her praise for Rushdie. She was hit in the face with a brick and had a knife held to her throat, resulting in a broken cheekbone. Regrettably, rather than rallying around Dala, some members of the local Muslim community in Durban, South Africa, have ostracized Dala, putting her under extreme pressure to renounce her statement about Rushdie’s work, to repent for her “sins,” and to make a public vow of religious loyalty to Islam. When she continued to refuse to make a religious vow or other statements inconsistent with her personal beliefs she was admitted to a mental institution. A psychologist by profession, Dala is the mother of a young child and ultimately consented to go to the hospital to avoid intense and intrusive harassment at her home. She also reports continued questioning about her beliefs by hospital staff.

    This is basically my nightmare come to life. And I’m afraid that in South Africa, the mental health landscape is very dedicated to the idea that one needs some form of religion or spirituality to be “sane”. I don’t know Ms Dala’s religious proclivities, but the religious pressure they enforce in institutionalized settings (at least those I can speak of from experience) is severe indeed, and it is very possible that they may keep her there until she says what they want to hear. That would depend on the recommendation of the doctor who treats her, AFAIK.

  2. Gen, Uppity Ingrate and Ilk says

    Oh yes, and as for what she said about her kids:

    I feel that the far-reaching damage to my kids will be severe as they attend schools that are 90% Muslim. And I refuse to educate them with fire and brimstone stories about how they may go to heaven but their beloved grandmother will burn in hellfire. That’s what they are teaching the kids now anyway.

    This is completely true. Even in state schools, religious indoctrination is the norm and ostracism of people who don’t believe in the same way you do is rife in all of them, be they Christian (more common) or Muslim.

  4. Gen, Uppity Ingrate and Ilk says

    A lot will depend on her doctor. Also, it’s good for her situation that she consented to go in herself, instead of being Section 23ed and involuntarily committed.

  6. says

    I feel woefully ignorant of South Africa now. I had thought that under the reformed government, that it was much more like a secular western democracy. This sounds more theocratic than I had possibly imagined.

  7. Pierce R. Butler says

    She has now been sent to a mental institution – St Joseph’s.

    Strange that a place with such a name would have a staff dedicated to enforcing Muslim orthodoxy.

  9. grumpyoldfart says

    Are the moderate Muslims on the footpath in front of St Joseph’s protesting against her treatment?

  10. johnthedrunkard says

    The ‘moderate Muslims’ rode off on their unicorns when Community Leaders snapped their fingers.

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