Bushra Rehman > Quotes

“انسان کتنا ہی سخت جان کیوں نہ ہو گناہ کو گناہ سمجھ کر نہیں کرنا چاہتا۔”
― Bushra Rehman, Bahisht / بہشت

“This is the real work of woman of color feminism: to resist acquiescence to fatality and guilt, to become warriors of conscience and action who resist death in all its myriad manifestations: poverty, cultural assimilation, child abuse, motherless mothering, gentrification, mental illness, welfare cuts, the prison system, racial profiling, immigrant and queer bashing, invasion and imperialism at home and at war.

To fight any kind of war, Kahente Horn-Miller writes. "The Biggest single requirement is fighting spirit." I thought much of this as I read Colonize This! since this collection appears in print at a time of escalating world-wide war--In Colombia, Afghanistan, Palestine. But is there ever a time of no-war for women of color? Is there ever a time when our home (our body, our land of origin) is not subject to violent occupation, violent invasion? If I retain any image to hold the heart-intention of this book, it is found in what Horn-Miller calls the necessity of the war dance. This book is one rite of passage, one ceremony of preparedness on the road to consciousness, on the "the war path of greater empowerment.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“This has been particularly difficult because many on the "left" uphold the mythology that since we work against "The evils of the world," we are somehow free of racism, sexism, classism, anti-Semitism, ableism and adultism (the institutional power adults have to oppress and silence young people). After years of antioppression training and organizing work, however, I now know that many "progressive" people and organizations are just as invested in either/ or dichotomous thinking and in perpetuating oppression in the world.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“I had a sudden irrational desire to hug her, but there was so much distance between us. My birth had been only the beginning of our separation, the first time I was cut loose. From that moment until now, I'd just been going farther and farther away, my body a lifeboat pushing into the ocean.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“Strive to be kind to each other's whirlwind girl. Strive to remember that each one of us is precious and necessary, that drama and wars put out our light. Strive to remember that this is our one, short life, and the choices we make will determine what comes of it.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“It all began to disappear, what my parents wanted from me, who they wanted me to be, the future they had so carefully planned.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“I consider myself a woman who is working to understand how spoken and unspoken messages have shaped my experiences and political perspectives.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“Who was going to tell these women that they didn't have to live this way? I was.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“I thought that if I gave everything I had inside to the people I loved, I would perhaps be able to prove I wasn't a bad person. The truth was that I really wasn't a bad person. And I didn't need to dedicate my life to defining the kind of person that I was.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“A teacher once described the Haitians in her class as very obedient and polite. I said that's because their families will beat them if they get in trouble. Sensing my disapproval, she said it is good that they discipline their kids. Yes, but it can be taken too far when they instill fear of authority and beat the spirit out of their children.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“I didn't blame my mother for needing an escape. I felt guilty for my existence and the burden we were on her.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“I heard him only encourage my brother to date Mexican girls. They would be so grateful to go out with a gringo.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“Women's studies classes do not have to be a struggle for power between white women and women of color, yet that is often what they are because of white women's racism. White women must understand that the anger of women of color express in and outside of the classroom towards them is not an issue of "hurt feelings" or "misunderstandings". to reduce our experience of that racism to "misunderstandings" is both racist and reductionist. It is akin to men telling women that we are overreacting to their sexism.

The anger of women of color is a rational, response to our invisibility. It is a rational response to a racist, sexist, capitalist structure. It is not constructive for white women to tell us that our anger is making it hard for them to relate to us, that our anger makes them feel uncomfortable, that we are not willing to find common alliances with them. This is a classic example of white women's racism. They fail to realize that in telling us there is no place for our rage, they are becoming a part of what is colonizing us---the denial of our reality. They have to accept the fact that they don't understand our experiences and have an opportunity to learn something, maybe even about themselves as opposed to wanting to shut us up. Only then can any true understanding result among us.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“You have two things against you: you're black and you're a woman. Nothing is going to be easy.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“My mother turned her face up toward the highest branches and got a shiny look in her eyes.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“Americans don't understand the first thing about love, Taslima's mother added. If they understood love, would they do all the terrible things they do in the world, bringing war everywhere?”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“Before reading this book, I did not understand that my power and my commitment to fighting oppression lay in finding those places where my experiences of privilege and oppression seem to be at odds with one another. Lorde's work and life taught me that I must not be afraid to go to those complex and "messy" places to understand myself, the history of my people, and to learn how to use my identities in a clear and subversive way.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“My mother knew Allah accepted late namaazes the way teachers accepted late homework: begrudgingly, but glad we'd put in the effort.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“You'll wear the taweez and drink Zam Zam, but you'll also read.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“When it's called slavery, it's assumed white people are doing the enslaving.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“Money was why my father had to work day and night and was never home. Money was why girls like Shahnaaz got heart-shaped lockets and thought they were better than me. Money was why Saima and I couldn't speak.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“It was always this way with our fathers. They made stories of cruelty seem so funny.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“No one had ever told me I was beautiful before. I leaned into Angela, and she leaned into me. We became two wood nymphs intertwined at Sappho’s feet, freezing into place like marble figurines.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“Would we be able to transform the darkness of our anger into gold, our mistakes into light?”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“We were two dark haired women who moved in overlapping circles of writers, queers, artists, and feminists.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“The "aha" factor is when you have always felt something but couldn't articulate it until someone gives you a naming system that allows you to point at all the pieces. While in Gambia a couple of years after college, I was criticized at a market by a female merchant for being too aggressive when I negotiated the price. She said I acted like a man and I should remember that I am just a girl. I felt horrible and wondered if I had been rude when I realized her criticism that "I wasn't acting like a girl" came from her acceptance of gender roles and male privilege. By analyzing the incident this way, I was also creating a mental world where things can be different.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“Nothing was sacred, everything was sacred, everything changed, everything stayed the same.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

“Years later, in my sophomore year of college, my father and I finally had it out over my overnight stays with a boyfriend. Fueled with the seedlings of early feminist scholarship, I told my father that I was not a virgin and called him a dinosaur for thinking that any one man was worth so much that I would sacrifice myself and wait till I was married. "I'm here to have fun too, Dad," I said. I still cringe that the way he looked at me in disgust.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“I was frustrated with myself because I did not know how to handle the "logistics" of putting complex racial issues out in a group in a way that clearly demonstrated in word and deed that I was taking responsibility for my privilege while simultaneously taking an uncomfortable promising stand against white supremacy. Although I ha Audre Lorde's words floating around my mind, I had not yet learned how to apply her teachings to my own experiences.

Finally the group resolved that I could "choose" where to go. The feeling in the room was that the situation had been resolved. But it was not resolved for me. I felt alone. I felt that regardless of where I chose to go, it would be the wrong choice.”
― Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism

“For them, us first-gen Pakistani girls were a forest of green cards. We were groomed like Christmas trees, thinking we were in the beautiful woods, thinking we were growing, but we were just being readied to be cut down. They were coming for us.”
― Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion