8 University Daily Kansan / Wednesday, November 6, 1991 Speakers say Islamic women comfortable with roles, rights By Rochelle Olson Kansan staff writer A male co-worker was guessing the ages of the women in Diana Helwani's office one day. Her co-workers asked the man to guess Helani's age. The man never saw enough of Helwani to predict her age and simply thought of her as "Diana," Helwani said. This is why Helwani and other Muslim women cover themselves in loose clothing — they want to be thought of as people, not objects, Helwani said. "We don't have to flaunt our intimate beauty for everyone," she said. "If somebody says something, he has to prove his point." Helwani was one of four women who spoke about Muslim women at a forum attended by about 50 people last night in Big Eight Room in the Kansas Union. Helwani, who married a Muslim man, said she originally wanted her Sylvia Nemmers Graduate student at Kansas State University husband to convert to Christianity. insulted to convert to Islam instantly. Instead, she converted to Islam three years ago. When she read the Koran, she believed that it could not have come from somewhere. God Hallowenoid Islamic women are not downtrodden, she said. In the Koran, God gave women the right to vote, to be educated, to work outside the home and to own homes and businesses, she said. *This is why we are so comfortable in our role "Helwani said oivia Nemmers, graduate student. at Kansas State University, said she also recently had converted to Islam. She attended Catholic schools during high school but began questioning the dogma of her religion while in college. Nemmers said. She said that she began reading about Islam to show her Muslim friends that their religion also had problems. But she discovered the opposite. One of the problems she had with Christianity was that the Bible said that God created the Earth in six days and rested on the seventh. Why would he need rest if he were all powerful, she asked. Also, in Christianity, people worship Jesus Christ, but in Islam they have a direct relationship with God, Nemmers said. "We are his servants because we must do his will," she said. Nemmers said priests did not exist in Islam. Any man or woman can be a scholar of Islam, she said. No figure such as a pope who can make infallible decisions exists in Islam, Nemmers said. "If somebody says something, he has to prove his point," she said. Nemmers said people interested in Islam should study the religion, not the people who practiced it. As in any religion, some of the people are good and some are bad, she said. Merritt Elashkar, an electrical engineer originally from Egypt, discusses the relationship between parent and child in the Islamic religion. 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