reflects on his recent research into the experiences of ex-Muslims and their increasingly precarious position in Britain. His research was partly funded by the National Secular Society.
By the time I spoke to her, Zainab was safe, for the most part. But it had been a close-run thing. And she was still far from 'free'.
Zainab, aged 19, had been in a lesbian relationship. When her parents found out, they beat her. Then they seized her phone and tried to cut off her every connection with the outside world. "I couldn't contact any of my friends and I couldn't talk to my girlfriend," she said. They even took her laptop, depriving her of the material she needed to study for her exams. "I had to pretend that I turned straight," she told me of these long, oppressive months.
But when her sister betrayed her and revealed that she was still in a covert same-sex relationship, the situation escalated rapidly. Zainab managed to alert a friend who contacted the police, but despite numerous police visits and the involvement of the Crown Prosecution Service, she remained in her parents' house.
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Fears of "Islamophobic" labels should never deflect from exposing such cruel and illegal treatment of faith refuseniks.
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