So long, Daily Reveille; It’s Story Time!
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Farewell haters, bigots (and that one crazy woman who stalked me.) It’s been entertaining, enlightening and stressful.
What can I say, It’s been a good 1.5 years of writing about Islam (with a semester break in between somewhere), Alhamdulillah. I’ve gotten people asking me how I managed to get my job as an opinion columnist. I guess it’s kind of funny; I never really mentioned this to people, until now. Gather around chickadees while I tell you the story of my wonderful journey into journalism. Sure, I could say something like “It’s because I’m a good writer,” and stop there. But truthfully that’s not really how I got my job. *This post might get a little long, but inshaAllah it’ll be worth it*
In high school, I had an English teacher whom I really didn’t care much for — Mrs. Wimberly. (I called her Wimbo for short.) Just as she thought my writing was mediocre, I thought her outfits with dinosaurs on them were pretty mediocre too. I would say they were really tacky, but I couldn’t help staring and smiling at them all throughout class time. Wimbo 
would hand back my papers disappointed that I didn’t see the biblical illusions she saw in the books we would read. But that wasn’t my fault. The woman was a little crazy. It really wouldn’t be a stretch to say that if I gave her the book, “Elmo’s Big Adventure” Mr. Elmo would be the biblical illusion because he was “red and represented the blood of Christ.” Anyway, I didn’t really listen to her criticisms and decided to take journalism classes in high school, thus sparking my first interest in media.
Ahh, that really has nothing to do with how I got my job… but do I miss those dinosaurs.
Anyway, fast-forwarding to the end of my freshman year at LSU. Everyone read and still reads The Daily Reveille on campus everyday. One day, I picked up the paper and saw a cartoon drawn on the op-ed page that not only caught my attention, it infuriated me. This wasn’t the first time The Daily Reveille printed something bigoted and completely offensive to Muslims. I decided to head over to the newsroom to have a little talk with the cartoonist but to my dismay he wasn’t there. Surely, I wasn’t going to leave without complaining. After all, I had to defend Islam. And I’m a girl, complaining is in our nature.
So, I requested to speak to the editor-in-chief at the time. It turned out I wasn’t the only one offended by a cartoon which depicted the Iranian President sitting at a laundry mat waiting for his brain to be finished being “washed” with “Quran Detergent;” other people had apparently been complaining all day.
After complaining about how unacceptable it was for him to print the cartoon, he sincerely apologized and told me he “wants to make sure that it doesn’t happen again in the future,” even though he was graduating only week later. He told me that at that very moment they were holding a forum for people who wanted to apply for being on the opinon staff for the next semester. He highly recommended I apply for a position after knowing I was a mass communication major. Subhanallah, it
really was the Qadr of Allah that I went to complain at that very moment, because next thing I knew he led me into the room in which I was to apply. And I did. And so did about 100 other people who wanted one of 12 spots.
Anyway, I applied, got called for an interview and then alhamdulillah I got the job. And that started my work in mass dawah. Which wallahi has been such a blessing from the very beginning. However, you have to have a strong heart when speaking the truth about Islam. Don’t sugar coat things, don’t fall under the pressure of those around you.
Wallahi I can’t tell you all how many times I got people saying “Write about something else!” and subhanallah for a brief moment you think about it… then you realize that you are doing this purely for the sake of Allah and I figured if they fire me for not wanting to write about anything other than Islam, then so be it. But they actually loved the readers I would bring and the hits I would bring to the website too, alhamdulillah.
Anyway, so it’s been a good time. I’ve seen a lot of results coming from my columns. People seeing the truth about Islam, new members to our community, changing people’s perceptions; all by the tawfeeq of Allah.
So without further adieu, my last column for the Daily Reveille (I don’t want to re-apply). This column sums up my final message to all the non-Muslims out there- Pick up the Quran and be enlightened, literally:
“‘Hijab Challenge’ successful, enlightening” — (I don’t get to chose my own headlines, that’s why they are always boring!)
It’s nothing great because it came in the middle of my finals, but alhamdulillah ,no complaints. Wallahul musta’an.
“The End” to that chapter in my life…
DEEN SCOPE COMING SOON! -Watch out Islamonline.net muahaha..
shirien Says: 02.05.08 at 2:33 pm
haha pay attention to the comments under my last column. it’s great.
Abû Mûsâ Al-?abashî Says: 02.05.08 at 4:14 pm
May Allaah reward you for your work and patience sister. Aameen!
HK Says: 02.05.08 at 4:17 pm
hahhaha English teachers always try to squeeze biblical themes out of literature – even when it’s not there!
as for the comments, haters will always be haters – their ignorance is so appalling, i pity them!
Ahmed Eid Says: 02.05.08 at 5:22 pm
The comments are funny…lol
I loved this line
“I’m sure that just as the hijab was enlightening to these girls, the Quran will also enlighten you to a more accurate perception of what Islam really teaches.”
mmmmm….
Haters will never change…their attitude shouldn’t phase any of us…alhamdulillah, you seem to have the correct attitude towards them…lol
Allahs pleasure is all we seek
May Allah reward you
AlSallamualaykum
shirien Says: 02.05.08 at 7:37 pm
Jazak Allah khair Br. Abu Musa for your dua. wallahi i went back just now to see the comments, I really takes a toll on you sometimes. You try to dismiss it but sometimes these things just ruin your day. Perhaps the biggest blessing of writing columns was having a better understanding of verses in the Quran and seerah. WAllahi hearing is not like knowing. and although it’s uncomparable to the ridicule the Prophet Salallahu alayhi wa sallam used to get, the verses still have a more profound meaning to me because these are things that really effect you emotionally sometimes. everytime I see those comments I think of the hadith of the Prophet salallahu alayhi in which he said, “My example and your example is that of a person who lit the fire and insects and moths began to fall in it and he would be making efforts to take them out, and I am going to hold you back from fire, but you are slipping from my hand.”
anyway, there’s no comparison of course but it really opens your eyes. wallahu alem.
HK, lol yeah I remember she was obessed with biblical illusions. She one time said the “A” in the book “The Scarlet Letter” was a a biblical illusion because it was red also and represented the blood of Christ.. im like Adultery= blood of christ?! haha I remember I had started wearing hijab in the middle semester of taking her class… She then asked me when she saw me “did you get that for christmas?”
Br. Ahmed, yeah haters will be haters and alhamdulillah I dont have to deal with that for a while again, wallahu alem if I’ll pick up doing something similar in the future. I really got to see the the vastly different reactions to my columns. Either really negative hateful stuff or people saying I helped them change their perception completely about Islam. Alhamdulillah, again it’s bound to happen when you speak the truth, you just have to not fall under pressure.. they’d love nothing more than for you to stop writing about the Truth. wallahu alem.
Alima Says: 02.05.08 at 8:32 pm
Shirien i just decided that i would be write for my university and off you go once again…I have to say your articles were great and those haters, don’t worry about them…
You’ve got the whole ummah behind you…
theManOfFewWords Says: 02.05.08 at 9:15 pm
that’s silly … you should reapply. If anything you are probably the ONLY Muslim voice in the paper. Don’t be silly … (and dont refer to yourself as a ‘girl’ what’s up with that?
Alima Says: 02.05.08 at 10:18 pm
Shirien…theManOfFewWords..,I think the br makes a really good point!
shirien Says: 03.05.08 at 3:55 am
Alima, by all means go for it. If you want me to help you out, you know to reach me. But be prepared, you are going to get a lot of attacks from every direction possible. WAllahul musta’an.
Manoffewwords, the hate mail isn’t why I’m not re-applying. It’s a blessing and an opportunity Allah ‘az wa jal gave me and I can’t thank Allah enough for it. However, there are a couple of reasons for me not applying again such as it being time consuming. It was extremely difficult this semester to go to meetings once a week and then turn in my paper for editing which took about an hour at least every time. Also I feel like i’ve covered the basics pretty well, and at the same time i’ve educated those around me in the newsroom about islam so that they are more careful to write something bigoted or hateful. For instance the cartoonist wont ever draw another islamic cartoon. Another girl completely changed her mind about hijab, my editor refuses to print the word islam-o-facism. ya3ni, it’s a start.
actually here is a column one of my co-workers wrote about me (and women in Islam):
Tolerence of Islam A valuable Lesson (check it out)
anyway, khalas it’s just a something that I did, and i’m moving on to other things inshaAllah. would I do it again for another paper if I had the time? absolutely. I’m not intimidated by these people. I mostly feel sorry for them.
But I’m not going to lie, I’ll be really relieved to stop getting mail from these people. It takes a toll on you emotionally. Most of the time i really ignore it and I could care less, but other times it really just makes you upset and you think to yourself “I dont need this!”
wallahul musta’an. I have to say though having a stalker made for some interesting stories in the classes I would go talk to about Islam. I mostly always introduced myself as “Hi my name is Shirien Elamawy, as some of you may know I’m a columnist here for the Daily Reveille.. you’ve probably sent me hate mail once or twice, but nice to meet you”
Breaks the ice every time
(and actually subhanallah its funny because people always send me email after I talk to their classes saying stuff like “Thanks so much for talkign to our class I learned so much,etc.” lol I think they felt bad I would get so much hate mail lol. good times, good times.
theManOfFewWords Says: 03.05.08 at 10:25 am
I still think that’s a cop out … reapply and groom a successor.
Shirien Says: 03.05.08 at 4:05 pm
i got this nice email today, but weird blog post lol:
Dear Ms. Elmasraya,
I’m a Reveille alumnus (reporter, copy editor and columnist) from a quarter-century ago, and I just wanted to congratulate you on a fine column in the May 2 edition. Frankly, as a believing Catholic, I think the “hijab challenge” is a brilliant way of challenging contemporary Western culture to reexamine its deformed conception of feminine beauty.
Before the great divorce of faith and reason — and faith and practice — it was accepted that we all shared the responsibility of helping one another get to Heaven. Or, as U2 put it, “Sometimes you can’t make it on your own.”
Now, not so much so. And so it goes.
At any rate, I thought you might appreciate this blog post of mine based on your Reveille column.
Take care, and God bless,
James Freeman
(BA-Journalism ‘84)
Here’s his blog post:
“Beauty is not skank deep” lol
shirien Says: 04.05.08 at 6:53 pm
manoffewwords, if you got attacks like this every week, you’d be sick of it too:
http://www.tigerdroppings.com/rant/messagetopic.asp?p=8059563
Just look up my Pen name (shirien elmasraya) on google and see all the trash you’ll get
The Mighty Favog Says: 06.05.08 at 1:45 am
lol you’ve been edited. no anti-Islamic sediment on my blog. I had enough of that on the daily reveille. I can actually CONTROL comments here. you said somethign about wahhabis, etc. yeah not here
go find someone else to spam
- Shirien
p.s. i also edited your URL, no music here either
K? Thaaanks
The Mighty Favog Says: 06.05.08 at 6:02 am
Excuse me, but what was anti-Islamic about asking questions? Or are you incapable of defending your assertions . . . and your faith?
An honest question deserves an honest answer. Responding to an honest question — and an attempt at some form of dialogue — with disingenuous statements and rank hostility is both dishonorable and doesn’t exactly cover Islam in glory.
In other words, child, it would appear that you can dish it out, but you can’t take it. It likewise would appear that would be the modus operandi of your faith as well — if you are a truly representative witness to it.
Furthermore, if you are not Wahhabi (the no-music thing, I seem to remember, is a Wahhabi thing), what are you? I know not all stripes of Islam are anti-music, what others besides the Wahhabi movement among Sunnis are?
Or is asking that inherently anti-Muslim?
In the peace of Issa the Christ.
shirien Says: 06.05.08 at 2:50 pm
Go ahead and ask your questions. If I feel that they are not sincere they will be deleted. however, I saw your blog and know where you’re coming from. So although you may think I’m a “child” I’m really not that dumb. Thaaaanks.
The Mighty Favog Says: 06.05.08 at 7:53 pm
If you’ve seen my blog, you then realize that I write from a Catholic perspective.
Likewise, you also must have noted that my original post on the “Hijab Challenge” applauded your challenging of the skewed modern Western notion of “beauty,” while reflecting on that subject from *my* Catholic Christian perspective.
This, you apparently found “weird.”
When I asked what was so “weird” about a pretty straightforward presentation of Catholic cultural criticism, I discovered — to my surprise — that I had left “anti-Islamic sediment” in your combox.
Given all of the above — and given that you’ve not seen fit to answer ANY of the questions I’ve already submitted — I think I’ve learned plenty about someone who either is incapable of defending her faith or just unwilling to engage in anything other than shrill, thin-skinned Islamist mau-mauing.
Either way, it doesn’t paint a flattering portrait of Islam . . . not a good thing for someone who’s all about “dawah.” In fact, it kind of makes your faith look like what Gertrude Stein once said of Oakland — “There is no there there.”
OK, I do have one further question: How is your whole spiel anything but a bunch of “anti-Christian sediment”?
The Mighty Favog Says: 06.05.08 at 8:51 pm
Thanks for your E-mail. My questions are pretty clear, but I’ll restate them (and expand upon them) here:
– What was “weird” about my original “Hijab Challenge” post, which was written from the perspective of an observant Catholic?
– The Islamic and Catholic agreement on the principle of modesty seems to be arrived at from different directions. Your take seems to be that Allah wills it; here is the dress that is prescribed.
Catholics, on the other hand, recall the teaching of Jesus that whoever looks upon a woman (or man) lustfully already has committed adultery or fornication — as well as other tenets both in scripture and tradition — and arrive at the conclusion that modest dress is the means of encouraging virtue.
But there is no specifically prescribed means of dress.
Is this “weird,” or is it just coming at the same problem from different directions?
– And what is the deal with the “no music” thing? I know that is a Wahhabi tenet, but what other movements among Sunnis and Shiites also frown upon music? Obviously, not all of the Muslim world does.
Furthermore, how do you square the “no music” admonition with the fact that your call to prayer is, itself, song?
shirien Says: 06.05.08 at 9:27 pm
“The Mighty Favog,”
Before I proceed to answer your questions, I have to address a couple of points. First you decided to name your post “Dhimmitube on the Bayou” which really already seems like anti-Islamic sediment to me. As well as other comments you’ve made really led me to believe that you were not asking with sincere intentions. However, I’ll proceed to answer your questions in hope that it will be somewhat helpful for you.
First, it’s good to find common ground between Muslims and Christians, as if you trace back the origins of the 3 monotheistic religions- they all came from the same source; Allah. So there is bound to be similarities that even exist until today, despite the altering of the Gospels and the Torah.
To address the hijab issue. It is true that the hijab was a commandment special to the followers of the final messenger,Muhammad (peace be upon him). For the revelation of the verse which perscribes women to wear hijab (found in the 4th surah of the Quran) was revealed only some time after Muhammad (PBUH) became a prophet.
Which just is to say that different nations had different shariah(laws, prohibitions). So the nation of Moses had a different Shariah than Jesus, why? Because Allah, chose to make some things permissible for one nation while he chose to forbid it in another due to wisdom only He knows.
However, Since the Quran remains in tact today since the time it was revealed (over 1400 years ago) and there has been no alteration of the Text and that Allah has promised to protect the Quran from that, then we have to follow the final message.
What does that mean? well since the obligation of women wearing hijab was revealed in the Quran, we as Muslim women still follow that order today and until the day of judgment.
So yes, it may be that the hijab not something jesus ordered the women to do, but that is because each nation had their own shariah until the final shariah (which we still have to follow today) revealed/inspired to Muhammad (PBUH).
I know that was long-winded but I wanted to make it clear.
Second, the term “wahhabi” is a term used in the media and by neo-conservatives. If by wahhabi you mean extreme, then no, sir. I am not an extremeist.
However, the term is derived from a righteous scholar named Muhammad Ibn Wahhab, who’s teachings were not extreme, but managed to bring millions of people back to true Islamic teachings, the teachings that trace back to the first 3 generations of Muslims, who were the most righteous. (I’m just clarifying this term).
Third, with regard to music, this is not an “extremist” view. this is an Islamic view. All musical instruments are forbidden except for the duff (a specific type of drum). You may be wondering why:
first, it is forbidden by the Quran and sunnah(found in hadith–you can look up what hadith are). second, anyone who has listened to music in the past (including myself) knows that music kind of intoxicates you. It takes you into this state of mind and takes you away from the remembrance of Allah. And a heart cannot have both the love of music and the love of Quran at the same time.
The call to prayer and Quran recitation is just that; recited. there is no music accompanying it, and we should try to beautify the way it is recited because it itself is beautiful in it’s words and meanings.
anyway I hope that answered your questions. I’ll be more than happy to answer any legitimate questions or concerns.
-Shirien
Guy Says: 06.05.08 at 10:43 pm
according to him you’re a fundamentalist
The Mighty Favog Says: 07.05.08 at 2:17 am
You write:
“Before I proceed to answer your questions, I have to address a couple of points. First you decided to name your post “Dhimmitube on the Bayou” which really already seems like anti-Islamic sediment to me. As well as other comments you’ve made really led me to believe that you were not asking with sincere intentions. However, I’ll proceed to answer your questions in hope that it will be somewhat helpful for you.”
Not my post, not my blog, not my headline. Get your facts straight.
My post is here:
http://revolution-21.blogspot.com/2008/05/no-roomah-in-ummah-alhamdulillah.html
shirien Says: 07.05.08 at 2:35 am
regardless of the mistake in the URL, you’re last post was not the most “Islam Friendly.”
I posted my reply, and now that I realize who you actually are, I appreciate your original email and I hope that i’ve answered your questions.
(are you by any chance related to the opinion columnist Eric Freeman?)
The Mighty Favog Says: 07.05.08 at 5:54 am
Not related to my knowledge, but I got a comment informing me that we’re fellow alumni of Baton Rouge High.
I started there as a sophomore the first year of the magnet school and graduated in ‘79.
Was on the Campus Currents staff for a couple of years, the Fricassee my senior year, and my junior and senior years worked at WBRH, where, alas, I played music.
ooshi Says: 22.05.08 at 6:18 pm
great job sherien
and dont worry abt those haters,but i have an advice for u in order to shut these haters up u might need to know somethig about the bible and its teachings… believe me u will find anything they criticize abt islam in the bible itself…but some christians are real hypocrites…talking about women rights in christianity? well i posted a comment abt that in your column but it hasnt been sent yet(i hope they allow it)
but this women in christianity thing compared to islam makes me laugh
and by the way christianity is not a monotheistic religion .You r and egyptian and probably heard abt horus..go back and read the story of horus the “sun god” and u will find the copy cat in the bible but here the name is “jesus”"the son god” looool Its just another pagan religion…
and note that horus is 3000 years before jesus.Can any of out hater friends explain this “coincidence”
and its not only horus but other sixteen pagan gods as well(Oooops) how many coincidences we have here
shirien Says: 23.05.08 at 2:34 am
ooshi,
but yeah i completely agree. we should use this in dawah.