The Moroccan Woman trademark
Twittoma lit on fire after Canadian rapper Drake released Her loss, a collaborative studio album between him and 21 Savage. The trigger was a line from Jumbotron Sh*t Poppin that goes: "Thick Moroccan b*tch, I'mma go and beat it." Drake's song now appears on a seemingly non-exhaustive list of artwork that feeds into the fetishization and hyper-sexualization of Moroccan women. Drake's composing is now part of a larger conversation around The Moroccan Woman™️ — a brand of imperial colonization that started to perpetuate its orientalist fantasies.
Orientalism and the colonizer's SWANA woman fantasy
The term orientalism was coined in 1978 by Palestinian-American academic Edward Said. It refers to a distorted perception of the SWANA region — its history, customs, and people — that emphasizes the contrast between East and West. This perception is based on Western stereotypes that paint SWANA culture as exotic and primitive. In analyzing Flaubert's work, Said encapsulates how Flaubert's obsession with oriental sex reflects the French author's association of "the Orient with the escapism of sexual fantasy" (Said 190). Joseph Massad, one of Edward Said's disciples, asserted in Desiring Arabs: "[S]ex was always an important feature of Orientalist fantasy and scholarship" (Massad 9). With a depraved emphasis on its women, the East represented the unknown that needed to be exploited and deflowered. Orientalist scholarship used the same words to describe the land and the women: virgin, veiled, exciting unknown, and fetish. Imperialist powers did not limit themselves to the self-serving historical narrative of "civilizing the East" to justify their colonialist ventures. In addition, experiencing the mythical, legendary sex drive of the SWANA woman was argued to be a more significant incentive for the European troops. Promises of unprecedented torrid encounters with submissive women whose sole mission is to pleasure and obey the man were enough to kickstart years of sexual enslavement and fetishization of SWANA women.
In her book Scheherazade Goes West, Fatima Mernissi shares her great surprise at experiencing European journalists' obsession with discussing her childhood — one she mentions spending in a harem. Mernissi concludes that a distinction had to be made between what she calls the Western Harem and the one she grew up in. The Western Harem is a direct product of orientalism scholarship that in theory included, b:
dancing girls at the White's man command
liters of wine
sexual partners who were never taught how to operate their intellect
In fact, Mernissi's linguistic use of "women's obsequiousness" as a "distinctive feature of the Western harem fantasy" is very intentional (Mernissi 37). Parisian journalist Jacques Dupont later reveals to Mernissi, paraphrased by herself in Scheherazade Goes West, that he perceives "the absence of intellectual exchange" to be what attracts him in a woman "at the level of fantasy" (Mernissi 37). Dupont's confession is a clear reminder of Mernissi's "second distinctive feature of the Western harem": a white man's sexual pleasure is inhibited by any interaction with the Harem woman's mind (Mernissi 37).
The hoe that can be turned into a housewife
The fetishization of SWANA women will be carried through scrupulously designed structures, including the système réglementariste aimed to orchestrate and regulate colonial prostitution in Morocco and Algeria. Bousbir - the intended-to-be colonial prostitution fantasy park - in Casablanca is witness to the years of viciously-planned oppression against indigenous Moroccan sex workers. From its architecture to its logistical planning, Bousbir was conceived to cater to the colonizer's fetishes, which meant the sex workers' proactive abuse. A few decades later, Moroccan women were not subject to European Orientalism alone. The stereotype of the Moroccan Woman stood out from that of the SWANA woman. The Moroccan Woman is open-minded. She was seen as the accessible version of the Arab Woman, who was perceived as out of reach for the European, and less exciting to the Arab man. In the collective imagination of both East and West, the idea of Moroccan women offers a so-craved bridge between the unreachability of the veiled virgin fantasy and the liberated whore trope. To the Arab man, she epitomized in her stereotype the fantastic combination of the hoe and the housewife. Moroccan sex workers became more and more solicited in Gulf countries. The Moroccan Woman trademarked was born: she had an unimaginable sex drive, she could perform all the sexually forbidden things, and still, she was good at cooking, meticulously attended to the house, and took care of her partner in the most motherly way. The Moroccan Woman trademarked was able to embody both the madonna and the whore. The Moroccan Woman trademarked is the purest distillate of a series of centuries-old fetishes and systemic oppression against Moroccan women.
Endless harm
The Moroccan Woman trademark is extremely harmful to Moroccan women. From daily harassment on social media to actual legislation to hinder their right to travel — the Mahram Gate being a blatant example — the stereotypes around Moroccan women are making our lives harder every day. Our existence is reduced to the chauvinistic fantasies that inform decisions related to our futures. Many of us were denied job placements, education, and a dignified living solely for being Moroccan women. Drake's song is not simply lyrics with a beat. It provided this giant megaphone to amplify our fetishization and justify our hyper-sexualization. The Moroccan Woman trademark is already the center of European rap and trap. Jumbotron Sh*t Poppin signed the start of the stereotype's exportation across the Atlantic. Putting an end to the hyper-sexualization of Moroccan women is now more burdensome than ever. As journalist Nesrine Slaoui shares on her Instagram, "There is not one side of "beur*ttes," and one side of "veiled (women)", stop opposing us according to your masculine desire, whether in working-class neighborhoods, chic neighborhoods, or on TV sets" (Slaoui 5).
References :
Said, Edward W. Orientalism. Penguin Classics, 2003.
Massad Joseph, Desiring Arabs, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2007.
Mernissi, Fatima. Scheherazade Goes West: Different Cultures, Different Harems. Washington Square Press, 2001.
Slaoui, Nesrine [@nesrineslaoui]. “Toujours pas vos Beurettes.” Instagram, 9 Oct. 2021, https://www.instagram.com/p/CU0chxioByH/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link.
About the author :
Rayhana Mouaouia is a Moroccan-Canadian curator and visual artist. She is an intersectional feminist who advocates for the decolonization of gender equality activism. She hopes to contribute to creating safer and more conducive spaces to learn and unlearn within her communities. Mouaouia enjoys sketching flowers, writing poetry, and reading thrillers in her free time. To see more of Mouaouia’s work, you can follow her on Instagram @fonounshorouq.
