A group of women circulates images of their husbands in burqas, and the prank angers Muslims.
It all began when a woman celebrated having finally found a modest man: a husband in a burka who wouldn't provoke any woman.
One of the images of men wearing burqas.
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The viral prank began on 18 June with a post by French creator Shanna (@shannasparkleof). The X post read, addressing other women: «Sisters, may Allah grant you a devout man like mine, who wears his veil. »without arguing", accompanied by a picture of their partner wearing a veil.
The post went viral within hours. Among the reactions, however, mocking comments appeared criticising Shanna herself for the image. She showed the husband's arms and said that it «could attract the girls». One of the comments said:«Unfortunately, I can see his very muscular forearms and now I feel full of desire. Please make sure he covers himself properly next time.«Their response came in the form of a second post that took the joke even further: «Thank you for the numerous reminders under my last post; my husband is very obedient and fears Allah… He has properly covered his awrah. Baraka Allahu fikoum, al-hamdu lillah.».
The subsequent posts gradually raised the tone. They no longer simply showed the husband wearing the veil, but also doing household chores and caring for her, always in the same devout register. In one she wrote: «I thank Allah every day for giving me such an obedient, helpful and devout man.». In another, playing with the Qur'anic verse that is usually invoked to assert a husband's authority over his wife, it said: «Sura 4, verse 34 works so well with my veiled husband, al-hamdu-li-L·là.», now with the roles completely reversed.
The third tweet took the joke to the beach: the image showed the husband covered in a pink burqa with sunshades, while she applied sun cream. Each new instalment reinforced the same gag: To apply to men, thread by thread, all the rules of modesty and submission that usually apply to women..
In this dynamic, the hashtag #HijabiMan was born, which other users soon began to use by posting images of their own partners wearing the veil. And the level of the jokes also rose. One user took the logic to the absurd by suggesting that, As having a single husband for the whole household was too much work for her, the Sunna permitted her to have up to four.. Shanna picked up the ball and followed the thread with the same idea: She said she felt sorry to see her husband doing all the housework by himself and that she asked Allah to find three veiled co-husbands to share the load.
The format ceased to be the work of a single author and became a collective phenomenon. Many other women began publishing all kinds of photographs and montages featuring men wearing the hijab: couples covered by the veil in everyday situations, retouched photos, digitally generated images and all manner of humorous compositions, always using the same devout language that parodied discourses on female modesty and obedience.
Men also joined in the joke, taking the gesture personally. One wrote that he had decided that from then on he would wear a burqa., because no Muslim woman was to be bothered by her hair or fall into temptation.
Devout Muslims don't laugh at the joke.
The joke did not go down well with everyone. Among the more conservative sectors, The parody was read as a mockery of the veil and religious precepts., and the publications received an avalanche of hostile comments. Shanna, as the public face of the phenomenon, reported that she had received threats, some of extreme violence — including death and rape threats against her and her partner — often phrased in a tone that contrasted with invocations to a religion «of peace and love.».
What began as a joke by a single user ended up becoming a viral phenomenon that, beneath the humour, posed an uncomfortable question: why do the rules of modesty, obedience and submission that are usually imposed on women sound absurd or unfair when applied, to the letter, to men? The virulence of some reactions—even to the point of threats—ended up inadvertently reinforcing that very message. As often happens on social media, the satire functioned less as a closed conclusion than as a mirror: everyone saw reflected in it what they already thought about the veil, religion and equality.
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