Omg I wrote loads answering this and then Tumblr went weird and said it had been deleted, so now I’m typing it all again haha.
I don’t think Islam oppresses women at all. If you’re wondering about men being able to have four wives, that’s not allowing them to marry more women for no reason. They can’t if they’re just ‘bored’ of their wife. It’s for if there are problems, such as if they can’t have children, but even then the wife must agree to him marrying another woman. If she’s not happy with it, it can’t happen. Also, 4 women is a limitation. It’s not telling men to go out and marry 4 women. In the past before Islam, men used to marry a lot more than 4 women and so the Quran brought this limitation. Also a lot of women were widows, and so men would be allowed to marry up to four women to protect them instead of leaving them in the streets.
Also, people seem to focus more on the ‘negatives’ of how Islam treats women (even though I personally don’t think any of it is negative). Islam protects women’s rights, it allows them to keep their identities. For example, women don’t change their surnames after getting married to show they aren’t the property of a man. Also, women keep all of their earnings and property whereas men have to share. There are many other examples also. Although there are differences between men and women, the Quran makes it clear that they must be treated equally.
I think one problem of people misunderstanding the Quran is the wrong translation of it. For example, the word ‘qawamun’ is used for men, which means ‘protecters’, although it has sometimes been wrongly translated as ‘superior’, which will of course give people the idea that men are superior to women in Islam, when this is definitely not right.
However there are some Muslim women who are oppressed, but this is either a cultural thing (people seem to confuse religion and culture a lot) or the men who are oppressing the women are to blame, not the religion, seeing as Islam does not state this. Islam does not oppress women. I think Muslim women are mainly oppressed by the ignorance of a lot of people who seem to constantly claim that Muslim women are oppressed.
I hope I have made that clear, please ask if you need anything else :)
