Learn English with English, baby!

Join for FREE!

Social_nav_masthead_logged_in
What do you see when you look at me?!

What do you see when you look at me?!

Date: Jun 17 2008

Topic: Vocabulary

Author: alshehri2005

Lesson

What do you see when you look at me
Do you see someone limited,
or someone free
All some people can do is just look and stare
Simply because they can't see my hair
Others think I am controlled and uneducated
They think that I am limited and un-liberated
They are so thankful that they are not me
Because they would like to remain 'free'
Well free isn't exactly the word I would've used
Describing women who are cheated on and abused

They think that I do not have opinions or voice
They think that being hooded isn't my choice
They think that the hood makes me look caged
That my husband or dad are totally outraged
All they can do is look at me in fear
And in my eye there is a tear
Not because I have been stared at or made fun of
But because people are ignoring the one up above
On the day of judgment they will be the fools
Because they were too ashamed to play by their own rules

Maybe the guys won't think I am a cutie
But at least I am filled with more inner beauty
See I have declined from being a guy's toy
Because I won't let myself be controlled by a boy
Real men are able to appreciate my mind
And aren't busy looking at my behind

Hooded girls are the ones really helping the Muslim cause
The role that we play definitely deserves applause
I will be recognized because I am smart and bright
And because some people are inspired by my sight
The smart ones are attracted by my tranquility
In the back of their mind they wish they were me

We have the strength to do what we think is right
Even if it means putting up a life long fight
You see we are not controlled by a mini skirt and tight shirt
We are given only respect, and never treated like dirt
So you see, we are the ones that are free and liberated
We are not the ones that are sexually terrorized and violated
We are the ones that are free and pure
We're free of STD's that have no cure

So when people ask you how you feel about the hood
Just sum it up by saying 'baby its all good'

 

Comments

Log in to Comment

Naghmeh_M

Naghmeh_M

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

I think that they are really powerful.I’m not as powerful as they are , but instead I try to protect my purity and honor.I wish a day womien with hijab could live easily all around the world and go to all universities.

04:26 PM Apr 19 2014 |

1 person likes this

sara1998

sara1998

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

I see freedom in these picture!they don’t need any one to pay attention to them.they just need their GOD!when GOD pay attention to them,they don’t need any thing else!


I always wanna be like them but it needs great resolution that i don’t have!


lucky them!

04:24 PM Apr 10 2014 |

azadkk

azadkk

India

@Ryo- True said…!!!

12:47 PM Mar 10 2014 |

sandraa95

sandraa95

Sweden

covering body is a part of human nature. im agree with being modest but frankly im not fan of hijab bcz i think its a pain in the neck. i cant stand with it and cant keep up with it.esp in hot wether thats the only reason that i dont want it any more. but i dont wanna judge in this case.
i always say: just live the way u want and god wont say go to jail go to hell bcz that ur hair or neck seen by others

10:34 AM Mar 04 2014 |

sandraa95

sandraa95

Sweden

hey there! please stop fighting with each other and biting each other with words!
dont u wanna hear the sound of unity???
why most people dont wanna know the power of togetherness?

09:53 AM Mar 04 2014 |

1 person likes this

Elain_gq

China

in my opinion , it is just bec of culture difference and also religion.

08:24 AM Mar 04 2014 |

Hazelgirl

Hazelgirl

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

Thanks Wobbly Joe for your explanation, I try to read it again and get the meanings ;)


Let me tell you a story, once my friend and I saw a hooded girl in subway, she was sitting next to me, completely covered from top to toe, even her hands were hidden in a pair of gloves!! My friend told me:” she is either very beautiful or too ugly!!” at that time, I just laughed but later, whole the road, I was thinking about the girl’s face, I said to myself,”really why has she been doing it??!! maybe she burnt in a fire and doesn’t like seeing by people!!”, in fact, her act in wearing those kind of special hijab stimulated me to discover her, I really wanted to see her face to satisfy my curiosity!! Plz notice, i had been a girl and had those feelings, only god knows how a boy would have thought then!! ;)


Dear Wobbly, Im not fan of extreme types of hijab, which can be considered as hood or burqa, which is more common among Arabian countries or so on, in Iran its so weird if you see a girl covering her face by something like mask :) its seen just in some southern areas. Moreover, I never talk or defend of any kinds of “Hijab” here, bcoz I need to know more about that, as I told you before, I have nothing to say about this poem but it doesn’t seem bad to defend appearance of a girl in hijab (any kinds of that) and still I don’t see anything bad as you understood in it, maybe about 15-20 years ago it was very strange if a muslim girl attending her courses with hijab in western universities but today in age of information and technology, its become so usual to respect each person’s privacy, appearance is a kind of privacy unless it interferes public moral rules. 


Well, I wanted to say, in regard of clothing or appearance, we have freedom just when we can do it by our all desire and willingness, if a prostitute makes her body naked to earn money, its not freedom at all, or if a nude model does that as an Art, its not freedom bcoz they do that to be appreciated by folks, you know, whenever they think they are not young enough or not popular as before, they quit. Why? Bcoz they are afraid of being blamed or annoyed by others’ words…that’s not real freedom which ends in sorrow, on the other hand, a woman who wears veil by force of her father or brothers is in prison too, a prison made of bricks of both lust and improper bias.


I should admit, I hate those kinds of weak-minded men too, those who oblige their women to wear veil and cover their body and then surf the net to see porno pics, sorry for their poor mind and knowledge, but its not Islam’s fault, its lack of proper culture I guess.


Lord has created women to beautify the world, why some stupid guys treat them as if they were not humankind, I don’t know.

04:15 PM Mar 03 2014 |

WobblyJoe

WobblyJoe

United States

I read the poem as the poet talking about the differences and similarities in the use of the word nude and of the word naked and making word play on them.


Naked is a state of being without clothes. Animals are naked. Victims are naked. Patients in a doctors office are naked. People taking a bath (alone) are naked.


Nude involves the emotions surrounding naked. Nude is naked, but involves the emotions.  You are nude to arouse your spouse, nude to pose as a statue, nude to dance as a stripper, nude to draw a crowd as you suggested,  nude for any purpose that springs from your humanity and not your mere being. A naked animal won’t attract much attention.


Your scale from naked to veil and hood isn’t relevant. Wearing a hood doesn’t make those women more modest or more holy unless the wearing is from their hearts obedience to God.  Otherwise, it kind of means your men are so weakminded they lust over hoodless hair and so the women there must hide from them to be safe.


Notice the poem about the hoods only vaguely mentions God. For the most part, it’s just a poem establishing the phony idea that the wearer has a “moral superiority” over those who do not wear. I submit that the poet is deluded. I can’t imagine God commanding you to wear a hood for those reasons. Yet, she doesn’t mention obedience, which is the only acceptable reason to claim you do as God commanded.


Otherwise, you might as well just wear a sign that says “I think I’m better than you are, I think your wife is a prostitute and your daughter is a tramp because they don’t dress like I do.” This poem isn’t non-Muslims insulting Muslims, it’s Muslims insulting non-Muslims based on Islamic rules.


Which it pretty explicitly says.

02:40 PM Mar 03 2014 |

hoseiny

hoseiny

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

Ms hazelgirl i ask you stop discussing and insulting another members please. maybe you are right but as i said before freedom is not only ‘kind of wearing’. do we really have freedom in media, newspaper, politics and… . and ofcourse i suggest you not defend your wearing so firmly because you did not choose it.

10:31 AM Mar 03 2014 |

1 person likes this

Hazelgirl

Hazelgirl

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

Good morning guys!! i used “nude” or “naked” in order to say” without any clothing” like what a nude model does as a job to attract people around. i stated a situation between 0 or 1, completely being naked (or nude) and completely being covered (in veil or hood), and i should emphasize that i never talked about bare-headed women in western countries, not any insult at all. well, here is a poem, i wanna ask you (Wobbly Joe) to interpret it for me from your point of view, and i have another question about “nude” and “naked” too,


being nude is a situation which someone accepts and chooses by their will (voluntary)?? and being naked can be an obligatory or unconscious condition sometimes, yes?



 The Naked and the Nude


      by Robert Graves


For me, the naked and the nude


(By lexicographers construed


As synonyms that should express


The same deficiency of dress


Or shelter) stand as wide apart


As love from lies, or truth from art.


 


Lovers without reproach will gaze


On bodies naked and ablaze;


The Hippocratic eye will see


In nakedness, anatomy;


And naked shines the Goddess when


She mounts her lion among men.


 


The nude are bold, the nude are sly


To hold each treasonable eye.


While draping by a showman’s trick


Their dishabille in rhetoric,


They grin a mock-religious grin


Of scorn at those of naked skin.


 


The naked, therefore, who compete


Against the nude may know defeat;


Yet when they both together tread


The briary pastures of the dead,


By Gorgons with long whips pursued,


How naked go the sometime nude!

04:42 AM Mar 03 2014 |

WobblyJoe

WobblyJoe

United States

side note I just realized and I apologize in advance for butting in on Hazelgirl and Ryo.


You might be using “naked” in place of “uncovered”. Without defining context to limit it, the word “naked” when applied to humans means without any clothing. It differs from the word “nude” only in context and strangly, intention. (naked with your doctor, nude with your spouse kind of thing)


“Bare headed” is another way to speak of an uncovered head.  Sorry if I guess wrongly but it seems like one of you is talking about not wearing a headcovering and the other is talking about not wearing clothes.

09:13 PM Mar 02 2014 |

WobblyJoe

WobblyJoe

United States

Strange as it sounds, in English, such relative comparisons are meaningless.  They presuppose a starting point of relative “freedom”. Freer to do what? If you don’t know, there is no meaning and the words can be misunderstood even by native speakers. If you don’t define the context, your listener will, and you can’t be sure that what they think is what you meant.


So saying “Islam is freer” sounds good but doesn’t convey real meaning. Christianity is freer. Sola Gratia. Grace alone. Our salvation is a gift from God that we only had to accept for what it is. It isn’t based on any work or any effort or any thing that I can do, it was entirely free and given freely to me. As I said, I defined the context so I could build the meaning of “freer” around my definition. Without that definition, a third person would come along and argue their faith is “freer” than both of ours.


Context always matters. Most particularly with common “invented” words like “freer” that don’t have fixed definitions. Lots of Englishspeakers make up words, it’s very common, but if you don’t define context, you can’t convey the meaning of a word you made up. I added this because I thought it better explained.

09:07 PM Mar 02 2014 |

Hazelgirl

Hazelgirl

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

no its not a good purpose and judgment if we just know muslims as pure and free people, NO!! its rejected in Islam, Hussain (pbuh) told “if you dont have any religion, be tolerant, be free from any bias…” so we should be that, we should be free from any prejudice from bottom of our hearts, freedom is in free will, its not about doing without thinking.

08:03 PM Mar 02 2014 |

WobblyJoe

WobblyJoe

United States

I hope I haven’t given you the idea that I object or even disrespect your decision to wear as you feel God commands, on the contrary I support that.


My objection is this poem clearly defines hood wearing women as “free and pure” and the women in my life as deseased terrorized disrespected objects, which is well beneath their actual status as respected equals.


This poem isn’t the West judging you for wearing it, it’s you judging us for not wearing it.  Our women are no more immoral than yours are, with or without the veil, and my faith doesn’t totter on the sight of a womans hair.

07:49 PM Mar 02 2014 |

Hazelgirl

Hazelgirl

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

those women who are not muslim and who have not gotten used to wear hijab as we do, are respected in my belief. If really they are whatever they want to be, it will be ok, but if they do that just bcoz of the external causes (maybe to tempt guys or to be appreciated by others) it seems terrible as much as a hijab by force does.

07:39 PM Mar 02 2014 |

Hazelgirl

Hazelgirl

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

sorry wobbly joe, your words are not hard that much but im not ok tonight, if i were okay i never asked you to rewrite them for me…by the way, thanks and yes i have nothing to tell about your ideas, but i have mine, i think when a person is in prison its not important s-he is being either naked or covered, jail is jail, whenever you cannot be yourself and live in the way you like, you are in jail..if you want to be free you should be brave enough to accept the outcomes of your freedom.

07:23 PM Mar 02 2014 |

WobblyJoe

WobblyJoe

United States

Okaay, that is the result of reading nothing but platitudes. My words, while numerous, are not hard.


To make this short for you:


This poem insults not only American women, but non-veiled women in general all over the world. I know you don’t care why I think that or you would have read my reasons. “Broad slurs aimed at us” doesn’t mean ‘the US’, it means ‘us’ whose women are not Muslim and who do not wear a veil. You mistake oherwise perhaps because you aren’t used to reading actual sentences.


Ryo- nakedness doesn’t bother me at all. I’m not from there, I can avert my eyes if I begin to lust but generally, it takes a lot more than mere nakedness to cause me to lust.


Peyman- What religion if freer than Christianity? Love God. Love each other. Call on the Christ for your redemption. Not too much to remember but admittedly hard to do.

07:04 PM Mar 02 2014 |

Hazelgirl

Hazelgirl

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

oooooooohhhhhhh my god!!! again tooooo much words written by Wobbly joe, sorry i coudnt understand most of them and i dont know about what you are talking here?!! what do you mean by word of “us” in your comment?? it should be U.S. in your mind but i still cannot realize how your comments might be related to this poem, dont take it as sth to threaten you!! or to insult you!! it is only a poem esp for some kinds of people who are not you for sure…

06:38 PM Mar 02 2014 |

WobblyJoe

WobblyJoe

United States

I don’t see the word American in my answer either, this is just another broad slur against the West. Like so many other broad slurs aimed at us. You yelp like puppies when we stereotype you, but you dump this hate on us like we should not be offended. This stereotype which you persist in spreading is a lie told to slur us by hypocrites.


I have a nephew in the Netherlands, it’s just as true for his mother wife and daughter as it was for mine. This doesn’t slur America alone, this slurs the West falsely, and credits you falsely.  I have relatives in several Western nations, you slur all of them. These are lies about the women in my world, lies told by liars who believed lies. I expect people all  over the West would consider the accusations in the poem as lying propaganda. Probably because that’s all it is, just more hate and slurs.  You expect to be respected because you chose to dress as you do, yet you scorn those who do the same. That’s just plain hypocricy. You don’t seem to want freedom, you seem to want enforced conformity by establishing that any woman who doesn’t make the same decisions you did must be a deseased tramp.


There are indeed all of the weaknesses that humans can invent in your lands and faith as in mine. Except some there pretend that isn’t so and that only others have sin or weakness, for them I can only feel pity. Such hate. It’s all they have, but they think it’s “holy” somehow.


We didn’t invent “honor killings”, we don’t stone people after Church, we don’t behead prostitutes which we claim we don’t have. Sexual terror doesn’t happen in Islamic lands? The victims might disagree with you.


If thats all good baby, keep it. It’s phony self-posturing in the guise of faith.

06:19 PM Mar 02 2014 |

Hazelgirl

Hazelgirl

Iran, Islamic Republic Of

helloooooo Wobbly Joe, i see no “American” word in this poem, why do you think you or your nation is insulted by this poem?? 

05:51 PM Mar 02 2014 |

Likes (42):

See all >

Share this lesson:

  • Share on Facebook
  • Share on Bebo
  • Share on Myspace
  • Share on Twitter
  • Email this to a friend
  • Share on Sina

Post Ebaby! lessons on your blog:

Ebaby! Cast