Gender Inequality: A Middle East Social Problem

Gender Inequality: A Middle East Social Problem
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Gender Inequality: A Middle East Social Problem
Ethnography refers to a method of understanding a given society by observing members’ patterns of habits, customs, and differences. The present study focuses on the aspect of mutual differences. In particular, the difference between males and females in the Middle East. Notably, there is significant data to establish that females are more disadvantaged in Arab societies than males. The disadvantages are in the dimensions of political participation, employment, income and compensation, and domestic responsibilities. The plight of women in the Arab world also worsens due to a significant degree of violence and sexual abuse against females. Although there is hope for women in the Middle East to gain as much empowerment as they require to live with dignity rightfully accorded to human beings, a low rate of education and other elementary factors render the process long and challenging.
It will take years or centuries for gender equality to be established in the Middle East when policymakers, scholars, and other stakeholders consider statistics without observable considering observable contributions. Thus, it is necessary to shift the discussion from data and statistics to an ethnography point of view. A qualitative description would help understand the cause, impact, and most effective mitigations of the social problems that females in the Middle East encounter. Withal, an ethnographical review of gender inequality in the Middle East is critical in challenging foundational causes of the social problem criticizing labor force, public space occupancy, religious and educational customs which support female subjugation.
Gender inequality poses a significant challenge to Middle Eastern countries because of customs and attitudes which favor inequality. One of the significant contributing customs is gender roles. Most Middle East countries exhibit strict gender roles, with substantial punishment to women who try to overlap them. In general, the socialization of gender roles assigns the leadership and authoritative position to males, leaving women subjects to the decisions males make.
The social constructions about gender roles affect Middle Eastern from their early years since the customs are reinforced at school and in madrassas. The case also applies in the home settings, where parents reinforce differentiated perceptions about masculinity and femininity based on how they related with their children. One way in which the differentiation manifest is through toys. According to a Gulf News article by Kamaraju (2019), UAE parents are guilty of choosing gender-biased toys for their children. Kamaraju (2019) unveils that Middle East parents trigger social conditioning in which various occupational roles are perceived to belong to either males or females. Middle Eastern parents are more likely to purchase toys such as trucks, airplanes, and construction models for boys. The parents are also likely to select dolls and kitchenware models for their daughters. However, Kamaraju (2019) reports, based on scientific research results, that girls without social conditioning would enjoy the toys most probably purchases for boys as much as their male counterparts.
The observations indicate that children grow up with a mentality that they belong to the workforce market or at home. The trend accounts for the high probability that women in Islam families become housewives, leaving their husbands as to the sole breadwinners. However, the trend is expected in the Middle East and other parts, such as Western countries. Ergo, there is more to the high degree of gender inequality in the Middle East than children-parent relationships and perceptions. For this reason, Joseph (1980) asserts that Middle Eastern children from an early age become aware of the formal, public power that establishes the hegemony of boys over girls. As a result, the children grow up knowing that males are better, more authoritative, more intelligent, and with greater social power than females. The perceptions percolate in all aspects of their lives, including marriage and professionalism. Coherently, culture-specific tenets attribute to the uniqueness of gender equality found in the Middle East.
One of the cultural factors highly associated with the distinct gender-based customs in Islamic nations, which are dominant in the Middle East, is religiosity. According to Al-Ali (2005), Islamic religious customs place more pressure for affirmation on women than men. As such, elements such as modest dressing, beauty in women's silence, and submission paves the way for society to criticize females more than males. Moreover, it opens numerous opportunities for males to justify subjugation and punishment against females. It is for this reason that Al-Ali (2005, p.741) states, "The increased levels of religiosity have contributed to a culture that puts social limitations on women. Girls have become increasingly worried about their reputation, and the number of honor killings has increased since the start of the war."
The sentiments inform that religion is a major limiting factor in advancing equality between males and females in the Middle East. Notably, females would become fearful and reluctant to criticize and counter religious customs that favor their wellbeing. Although Al-Ali (2005) argues that female subjugation increased after the Iraq-Iran War ended, it is appropriate to assert that the war halted the increasing female subjugation in the Middle East, especially Iraq, before the 1980s. Nevertheless, the fact that women would succeed in occupational positions of males, who went to battlefields during the war, informs that the customs do not limit women because they are incapable of participating in the labor force market.
In support of the supposition, Al-Ali (2005) informs that religion helps males discount motions of females to contribute to national reconstructions processes. Thus, when females try to include gender equality as one of the goals for the reconstruction processes, male-dominated societies and institutions counter the efforts by claiming that they depart from the widespread faith since such lifestyles gain inspiration from non-Islam origins such as the Christian-dominated western countries. On the contrary, the limitation is a derivative male securing their privileges and masking the intention by arguing ...