I Wish

Every campaign that calls for social change is hoping to be noticed, particularly by media and celebrities. That’s how to start a chain reaction: the campaign gets noticed, attracts attention and new followers, grows, attracts more attention, grows even more, and so on. Every successful crusade that has started from the ground up, including womens suffrage and GetUp’s portfolio of campaigns, has operated in basically the same way.

#WISH is getting noticed. 

#WISH is a small Australian movement in which non-Muslim women, including some celebrities, take photos of themselves wearing a headscarf as a makeshift hijab, and post the photos on social media. The campaign takes its name from the acronym “Women In Solidarity (with) Hijabis”, and was started by Australian-Muslim lawyer and activist Mariam Veiszadeh. Some men have joined the campaign, posting photos of themselves holding signs expressing their support for the crusade.

#WISH is just one of several actions taking by Muslims and non-Muslims together, to distinguish “everyday” Muslims in our communities from the Islamic extremism ripping apart the Middle East. Another high profile campaign being played out on social media is “Not in my name”, a campaign that started in the UK as an opportunity to give young Muslims a chance to denounce the actions of Islamic State. 

Dr Lauren Rosewarne is a senior lecturer in the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne. Dr Rosewarne has dismissed the #WISH campaign as being more about fashion than religious freedom, and on a par with tabloid television fat-suit stunts. 

There's a reason why involvement in social media campaigns such as #WISH are so frequently downplayed as slacktivism. Invariably they are examples of the laziest form of political… <cough>… participation imaginable. Incorporating a headscarf into our daily social media lifestyles isn't consciousness raising; rather, it is attention seeking and it is about a privileged delusion that non-Muslims can dress-up, partake of and then somehow protest discrimination. All using the mystical power of the selfie.

This is not how social change happens.

Social change would be nice, of course, but perhaps one of the objectives of #WISH is more modest than that, and perhaps it has met that objective by bringing a feeling of comfort and community to others. Isn't that successful social activism?

Dr Rosewarne seems to believe that social activism requires more than a selfie on social media, and perhaps she’s right – or perhaps she’s simply an activist snob who believes that her personal choice in style and mode of political action, if she has one, is somehow superior. She also assumes that #WISH participants are all white Non-Muslims who are involved in no political activity beyond posting selfies supporting the cause of the day.

Sadly, Dr Rosewarne has missed the larger point of #WISH. It is not about illuminating discrimination at all; we all know that there is a heartbreaking anti-Muslim sentiment throughout the Western world, and particularly now. Senior figures in our own government are squabbling over a burqa ban, proposed by two of the most conservative figures ever elected in this country, assisted by one shiny new Senator who wears her ignorance as a badge of honour.

As Muslim-Australians become targets for abuse on our suburban streets, #WISH lets Muslim women know that not all of us are filled with fear and hatred, that we are proud to take this small act, to give them hope. The hijab is a religious symbol for the Muslim women who choose to wear it. Similarly, it is a symbol of solidarity for the non-Muslim women who have chosen to join this campaign.

Last week, a white male friend mentioned that he had been out during the day with a colleague who was not white. The darker man attracted anti-Muslim insults launched from the other side of the street by passing bogans. The only reason for the verbal filth directed at him was the colour of his skin.

I’m not white either, and as I read my friend’s tweet, I felt sick. We were heading out shopping at the time and I was, for the first time in decades, uncomfortable in my skin. Nervous. As a young child, I attracted more attention for my colour than I care to remember. My father is Muslim and dark; my mother is white and was raised Presbyterian. These days she is not religious and nor am I, but here is our #WISH photo.

Today I wear my version of the hijab to express my mixed race, and to add my voice to those who have already joined the #WISH campaign. Islam is part of my community; it’s part of my existence. Showing support for women who are Muslim is not fashion, Dr Rosewarne, nor is it even remotely the same as wearing a fat suit for television ratings.

Meanwhile, if Dr Rosewarne wants to examine something based on fashion, I recommend she take a look at the current tendency of some cynical commentators to undermine the ability of social media to drive positive change …or perhaps she could stop criticising from the cheap seats and get on board.