Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s feigned fear of men in her family and the lie of a forced marriage

Author: Sekhar Chandra

The
exposé is
quite
thorough.
It
gathered
evidence
from
Ayaan’s
family
members,
school
records
in
Kenya,
and
from Ayaan’s hosts
during
her
immigration
to
the
Netherlands. When
Ayaan
is
confronted
with
the
evidence,
she
admits
to
most
of
her
lies.
After
such
an
exposé,
one
would
hope
that
Ayaan’s
lies
would
not
be
repeated
by
her
supporters.
But
as
late
as
04/2014,
even
the
anti-feminist
Barbara
Kay
repeated
the
falsehoods.
She
says

But
to
recap,
Ali
was
raised
in
a
strict
Islamic
society
in
Somalia.
She
is
a
survivor
of
female
genital
mutilation,
civil
war,

physical
abuse
from
a
violent
father
and
a
forced
marriage. Through
good
fortune
and
her
own
determination,
she
exchanged
a
life
of
subjugation
and
misery
under
an
oppressive
religious
yoke
for
secular
freedom
in
the
West

All
of
the
above
are
lies,
except perhaps
female
genital
mutilation.

1. She
   left
   Somalia
   at
   age
   7
   before
   the
   civil
   war
   started.
   Her
   primary
   and
   secondary
   school
   records
   prove
   that
   she
   lived
   in
   Kenya
   from
   age
   10.
2. 
   She
   was
   reared
   mostly
   by
   her
   mother.
   Her
   parents
   divorced
   when
   she
   was
   12,
   her
   father
   worked
   in
   a
   different
   country
   and
   sent
   home
   money, and
   she
   lived
   in
   comfort
   in
   a
   big
   house.
3. She
   studied
   in
   a
   reputed
   Muslim
   school,
   while
   her
   brother
   studied
   at
   a
   Christian
   school,
   thereby
   indicating
   that
   the
   family
   opted
   for
   a
   quality
   education
   and
   were
   not
   religious
   fanatics.
4. She
   had
   an
   
   arranged
   marriage,
   not
   a
   
   forced
   marriage, to
   a
   Somalian
   immigrant
   to
   Canada.

Hirsi
Ali
first
fled
to
the
Netherlands
as
a
refugee
from
Somalia
in
1992
after

declining
to
submit
to
a
forced
marriage
to
a
man
she
did
not
know.
Once
there,
in
hiding
from
her
family,
she
began
working
as
a
cleaning
lady.

A
05/2014
interview
with
Sam
Harris

In
1992,
Ayaan
was
married
off
by
her
father
to
a
distant
cousin
living
in
Canada.
In
order
to
escape
this
forced
marriage,
she
fled
to
the
Netherlands
where
she
was
granted
asylum
and
then
citizenship…

Hirsi
Ali: … I
figured
that
if
I
could
get
this
intake
interview,
then
my
father
or
the
man
he
married
me
off
to
could
come
and
say
that
they
were
looking
for
Ayaan
Hirsi
Magan,
born
November
13,
1969,
and
they
would
find
me
very
easily.
I
wanted
to
prevent
that,
so
I
called
myself
Ayaan
Hirsi
Ali
and
changed
my
birth
year
to
1967.

I
was
trying
to
cover
my
trail
just
enough
that
I
wouldn’t
have
the
fear
of
being
immediately
found.
I
had
never
before
lived
in
a
system
where
there
were
any
protections
put
in
place
for
me.

Harris: So
you
did
this
because
you
were
afraid
that
someone
would
come
to
the
Netherlands
for
the
purpose
of
harming
you?

Hirsi
Ali: Oh,
yes.
Absolutely.
I
was
terrified
that
either
my
father
or
some
of
our
clansmen—or
the
man
whom
I
had
been
married
off
to—would
come
looking
for
me
and
find
me.

And
they
did
come!
My
ex-husband
was
accompanied
by
three
other
men
when
he
showed
up
at
the
asylum
center
where
I
was.
But
by
then
I
had
been
in
the
country
for
something
like
four
to
six
months,
and
even
in
that
very,
very
short
period,
I
came
to
understand
that
I
had
rights.

Ayaan
insists
that
she
escaped
a
forced
marriage,
and
feared
that
her
father
and
family
may
force
her
to
go
back
to
her
husband,
or
honor-kill
her
otherwise.
These
claims
fall
flat
in
the
face
of
the
evidence
presented
in
the
documentary.

1. At
   19:00,
   Ayaan
   is
   seen
   on
   a
   Dutch
   TV
   show
   claiming
   that
   her
   forced
   marriage
   even
   took
   place in
   her
   absence. I
   am
   from
   India,
   the
   land
   of
   arranged
   marriages,
   and
   I
   have
   never
   heard
   of
   a
   marriage
   in
   absentia.
   I
   have
   heard
   of
   something
   as
   odd
   as a
   marriage
   to
   a
   dog,
   and
   even
   that
   was
   not
   in
   absentia.
   They
   brought
   the
   dog
   to
   the
   wedding
   ceremony
   and
   managed
   to
   make
   it
   sit
   still.
   There
   is
   apparently
   such
   a
   thing
   as Proxy
   Marriage,
   but
   it
   is
   rare
   and
   still
   involves
   a substitute,
   real,
   person.
   It
   was
   historically
   engaged
   in
   by
   European
   Monarchs
   under
   extraordinary
   circumstances.
2. Ayaan’s brother
   Mahad,
   aunt
   Faduma
   Osman,
   and
   bridegroom
   Osman
   Muse
   state
   that
   she
   was
   not
   only
   present
   at
   the
   wedding,
   but
   that
   she
   was
   happy
   throughout
   (~20:00).  Ayaan
   claims
   all
   of
   them
   are
   lying.
3. After
   reaching
   the
   Netherlands, Ayaan is
   quite
   happy
   to
   appear
   
   on
   camera
   for
   a
   TV
   programme
   on
   the
   lives
   of
   Muslim
   immigrants.
   This
   is
   certainly
   not
   the
   behavior
   of
   someone
   who
   is
   fearful
   for
   her
   life.
4. Ayaan’s first
   immigration-host
   in
   Netherlands,
   S
   Veerman,
   a
   fellow
   Somali, says
   Ayaan
   appeared
   just
   fine
   and
   never
   complained
   or
   showed
   fear
   of
   her
   family.
   Veerman
   says
   she
   has
   never
   heard
   of
   honor-killings
   in
   Somalia,
   and
   has
   only
   heard
   of
   them
   in
   some
   other
   countries
   like
   Turkey.
5. Ayaan’s second
   immigration-host
   in
   Netherlands,
   a
   white
   Dutch
   woman
   W
   Scwoemaker,
   says
   Ayaan
   was
   in
   contact
   with
   her
   father
   and
   even
   received
   mail
   from
   him.
6. Ayaan’s husband
   visited
   her
   in
   Netherlands
   after
   6
   months,
   and
   she
   admits
   to
   him
   that
   although
   he
   is
   a
   decent
   man
   she
   does
   not
   want
   to
   live
   with
   him.
   The
   husband
   accepts
   that
   and
   they
   part
   ways
   amicably
   enough.
7. Ayaan’s husband
   feels
   that
   she
   used
   him
   as
   a
   passport
   to
   Europe.
   She
   would
   not
   have
   gotten
   to
   Germany
   as
   a
   first
   step
   without
   the
   Canadian
   visa
   and
   the
   ticket
   he
   got
   for
   her
   via
   marriage.
   Ayaan
   admits
   that
   she
   even
   offered
   to
   pay
   him
   back,
   but
   he
   refused
   to
   take
   the
   money.
8. In
   Nairobi,
   it
   is
   quite
   common
   for
   women
   to
   marry
   a
   foreigner
   to
   get
   a
   ticket
   to
   Europe
   and
   then
   get
   a
   divorce.
   Could
   Ayaan
   have
   done
   the
   same?

Original Story on AVFM
These stories are from AVoiceForMen.com.
(Changing the cultural narrative)