Well, here’s as abbreviated a version as I could manage of what I have to say to “Confused” with the Muslim boyfriend:

Dear Confused,

Your letter set off all kinds of warning bells for me. I’m married to a Muslim, but I’m not Muslim myself. I’ve been studying Islam for more than six years now, and I think I know enough to give you some further advice here. It sounds to me that although you mention having lots of arguments over religious issues, you probably haven’t done much research into Islam yourself. Even if your boyfriend is quite knowledgeable about Islam, you should still take it upon yourself to do your own investigation and reading to help sort through his own biases, and to separate cultural practices from religious practices (the former are all too frequently presented as having the source or authority of the latter). For the purposes of my response, I’m going to assume that your boyfriend is moderately religious. If he didn’t care about religion at all, you wouldn’t have this problem; and if he were rather devout, he wouldn’t be dating anybody, which is completely prohibited in Islam. If his family is much more religious than he is, brace yourself. They are unlikely to easily accept his marrying a non-Muslim who does not hold their religion in high regard.

You should know, for instance, that Islam requires that children be raised in the father’s faith (Islam), which is why Muslim men are allowed to marry women “of the Book” (i.e., Christians or Jews, as they are the recipients of a revealed Scripture in a monotheistic tradition), while Muslim women can only marry Muslim men. A non-Muslim wife, however, is expected to manifest a belief in the monotheistic God and to make efforts toward conversion. Male babies have to be circumcised; are you fine with that? You should know that Islam has very specific laws regarding inheritance that may affect you adversely as a non-Muslim wife. You should know that Islam forbids cremation — how do you feel about that? Your husband is unlikely to support your choice if you believe strongly in being cremated. If you were to attend services in a mosque with your prospective husband (and you may think now that you’re never going to do that, but there may be occasions, such as weddings, that require it) you will most likely be required to wear hijab (traditional headcovering) and observe rules about segregation of men and women, which means you may be sitting alone with women you don’t know, or, if you’re luckier, with female relatives of his, while he’s off somewhere with the men. One of the five pillars of Islam is zakat, or charitable contributions in the amount of 2.5 percent of your assets annually. Do you have any problems with that?

Does his family know he’s dating you? Have they met you? Do they know you’re considering getting married? Are they fine with that? I’ve only scratched the surface of the mountain of questions you should be asking yourself. I could go on and on and on.

Interfaith marriages can not only work, they can be highly rewarding, but I strongly believe this can only be the case when each partner has a deep and abiding respect for the other’s faith/spiritual attitudes/values. You say you don’t agree with any of the values Islam teaches and that you don’t “agree with” his faith. You also say he doesn’t care that you don’t have a faith (and I don’t know if you mean that you’re agnostic or atheist), but his feelings about that may change as he ages. For many people of various faiths, the experience of getting married and/or having children tends to deepen their faith.

I’m sorry, but I foresee a fair bit of trouble based on the information you provided. I am much more disposed to and informed about Islam than you seem to be, and it’s been a rocky enough road for me. To be honest, my gut instinct is to tell you to break things off now, before you become any more deeply involved. However, perhaps if you learn more about Islam, you and your boyfriend will be able to have more productive discussions and come to a better understanding. I can’t stress strongly enough that you should be doing a lot of research into the religion yourself, and I also highly recommend the following book: Mixed Matches: How to Create Successful Interracial, Interethnic, and Interfaith Relationships by Joel Crohn. Best of luck.

Sign me
Walking The Walk

I’m hoping you can help me with my parents. I’m 15, a high school sophomore, never ever smoked/drank/doped or even wanted to, and have had a total of one boyfriend, a nice Jewish boy whom the ‘rents deemed “cute.” My social group could be described as “offbeat,” but nobody worships Satan or pierces vital organs or anything. But. School. School is a problem, in many fun and exiting ways.

See, in seventh grade, also known as Hell Year, I was diagnosed with ADD. It’s not bad enough that I need medication or twitch constantly, but it does seriously fuck with my grades. I’ve never had problems with tests — in fact, I got a 1300 on the PSAT — but homework is a major issue. If I even remember to write it down, I forget to do it, or don’t bring it in, or not put my name on it, and one way or another it drags my grades kicking and screaming to C level. This, understandably, causes problems.

Also, my parents are kinda control-freaky, and are strong believers in “do as I say, not as I do.” Here’s a typical conversation twixt me and Mom:

Mom: You can’t wear a tank top. Go upstairs and change.
Me: I checked the weather, and it’s going up to 75 today.
Mom: You can’t wear a tank top. Go upstairs and change.
Me: Also, I’m wearing a jacket.
Mom: No TV for a week, now up upstairs and change.
Me: But —
Mom: (shrill) Do you want to make that two weeks, and lose all your tank tops?
Me: Argh!

I end a lot of my conversations with “argh.” My parents tend towards the “Because I said so!” school of parenting, and can’t seem to accept that I’d like an actual REASON. Even more than that, I’d like to not have huge battles over totally insignificant crap. Unfortunately, I’m at least as stubborn as they are, so either of us letting anything slide is unlikely at best. Also, they tend to be pretty immature, to the point of giving me the slient treatment and refusing to let me say anything because I dared to challenge their authority.

To make matters worse, since I live in the depths of suburbia and the freaking LIBRARY is beyond walking distance, I have to rely on them to go anywhere. It’s a funny story, actually — see, my parents wanted me to join BBG (a Jewish youth group) a few years ago. I said, “But won’t you have to drive me all over the place?” They said, “Oh, we won’t mind!” I joined, and now the girls in my chapter are among my closest friends, and a huge part of my life. But my parents want me to switch chapters because the girls in mine live too far away, and they don’t like having to drive me all over the place every weekend.

So it’s all a big, steaming pile of crap that I have to deal with entirely too much, and the root of the problem is our mutual stubborn-ness. Any ideas?

Argh!