the answer to the tile of my post is subjective I know. But it’s related to a conversation I had with a lady here the other day.  This sister wears the niqab (she covers her face) and is pretty disgusted by the way some of the men act here.

There is always this expectation that when you go to a Muslim country that it’s going to be this magical experience and that there will be no war or strife within the society and certainly no random men oogling you.  But guess what?  There ain’t no such thing as a Muslim country!  Just countries full of Muslims.

I can understand this sisters disappointment, It’s disgusting as she pointed out to see a man in the mall sitting next to his wife fully covered while he ogles whatever girl/woman happens to be walking past.  Lowering the gaze does not seem to be part of people’s vocabulary. sigh.  It seems as this sister put it, in her country there is craziness all around and yet Muslims make a concious decision to seek out God and to practice there religion, and yet here, where it’s so easy people don’t.  Why is that?

I think it comes down to choice.  She has the choice of what she wants to do/be back home.  I have the choice, but people here do not.  We could be covered from head to toe or wear barely nothing, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t ramifications of either choice, but you have the freedom to pick either.

I think the issue here is that there seems to at least a significant number of people who don’t want to dress traditionally or practice their religion the way they should, but they do it because if they don’t people will talk about them.  It’s not about being obedient to “God” but rather to culture or tradition. I don’t think I could handle that kind of pressure.

More importantly I think the pressure to “conform” goes to the heart of the question of the point of fulfilling religious obligations/feigning piety.  If you’re intentions aren’t right, then what is the point?  or rather if you intentions aren’t right, then do you get “credit” for doing it? I raise this point because in my personal experience the people that come to the states from Gulf countries to study/work for a bit  that I have met, almost seem to hang their outward signals of their “Muslimness” on the immigration barricade.  I don’t mean just women and abaya/hijab I mean actual acts of worship as well. Sometimes they even go farther than that (hymen replacement surgery much?).

It just seems that if people are doing that, then something somewhere is wrong.  It’s like someone who doesn’t get access to something very often so when they do, they over do it. Of course not everyone is like that. but enough are for me to ponder what this means.

Where are the “best” Muslims at?