My Tortuous History with the MSA

When I was at UNC, I was "morally opposed to the MSA (Muslim Student's Association)." For those readers of the non-saracen persuasion, MSA is the club to join if you are a Muslim college student. It's a great place for Muslim kids to network with each other on campus and find their lifelong best friends who can understand their definitively unmainstream lifestyle choices. Anyway, despite the fact that my roommate was a hardcore MSA geek - she was "social chair" - I would refuse to go with her to any events or meetings because of a belief system that I had arbitrarily made up before even setting foot on campus.

Do you ever look back on what you thought was super important and wonder if it like, really mattered? Do you look back and think...okay, my convictions were slightly extreme and well, irrational? Well, this is what happened to me with regards to the MSA (and my previous bitter hatred of cauliflower and cabbage - both are really good!).

My whole rebel without a cause, anti-establishment attitude stemmed from what I thought was a really good reason to hate MSA - that girls got all dressed up in their cutest, modest clothes to find a husband. The year before I got to UNC, the social chair of the MSA had married the vice-president, a trend I noticed at many campuses around the country (i.e. George Washington University - where all East Coast Pakistanis congregated). I thought this was morally reprehensible. Finding a husband in the MSA? Lame, I thought! How anti-feminist! Backwards social thinking, I sputtered, this is what kept saracen girls behind - the neverending quest to find a husband! We were at a top institution like UNC to learn about William Blake, capitalist markets, and population genetics, not search for an appropriate boyfriend from the MSA. And so, thus began my four year boycott of MSA.

Ironically, what I failed to realize was that MSA was where I met my closest friends. I went to the first "social" at Mediterranean Deli and met Sukaina, who seemed quiet but told me she liked my aggressive handbag so I obviously thought to pursue the relationship. At Jummah (Friday prayer), I met Sinthia, and then the three of us nerd-bonded over how hard Chem 11 was.

Despite meeting some lifelong friends at MSA, I still refused to attend any of the events because I thought I was so "above" Muslim people culture - i.e. going to hookah bars and thinking they were all badass (which I still think is lame, but I digress), having ice cream socials in Carmichael, and putting on an annual MSA Sportsfest (this seems dumb to me even now since I hate playing sports). Ironically, I became president of the MSA in medical school - how that came to be was a mixture of fate and bad timing. Anyway, when I told people from my former life that I was MSA president, they would incredulously ask, "You?"

The MSA at UTCOM was not at all about social networking and Muslim bonding but about guy/girl segregation and awkward lunch meetings, but (silver lining) it taught me how to deal with conservative guys who didn't like interacting with people of the female persuasion. And I often wish I was back at the cushion-y safe haven of UNC MSA where there was decidedly less drama and male/female tension.

Anyway, as I reflect upon my college years, I really wish that I had not been so hard on the MSA. In retrospect, it was a meat market (with guys checking out the hijabi girls surreptitiously from across the room), but so what? There was no need for my theatrics and my easy dismissal of it as unprincipled, uncool, and lame. What other forum would allow Muslim guys and girls to hang out in a halal way? At an even lamer ISNA matrimonial event? Because at the end of the day, let's face it, Muslims, even the hardcore haafiz ones, still need a little lurve.

--By Mariam, now an MS3 at UTCOM (mashaAllah).