Congratulations: we’re about to make history together. MuslimGirl.net is elevating the voices of Muslim women in the media and reclaiming our image the world over. You were generous enough to click on this link to find out what we’re all about, so we’re going to return the love by sharing with you MuslimGirl.net’s best-kept secret: we run on a $0 budget.
With nothing, we’ve already proven ourselves to you by becoming the #1 most visited source of Muslim women’s voices in the United States. Now, imagine what we could do to propel Muslim women’s voices in the media if we had the resources that MuslimGirl.net deserves. Welcome to our collective mission of becoming the first mainstream media network by Muslim women, for Muslim women.
We call on you to make this Ramadan about uplifting the voices of Muslim women. We’ve come a long way, and we still have a long way to go. In this moment, we are all here, together, bonded by our shared struggles and unified hopes for the world our daughters will live in. Let’s join forces and make history for Muslim women everywhere.
#MGFacts: MuslimGirl.net alumna Ainee Fatima became the first headscarf-clad Muslim woman to be featured in Seventeen magazine.
We need your support to continue developing exceptional content to represent Muslim women in the media. We don’t believe in being “a voice for the voiceless.” We believe that everyone has a voice, but that many are conveniently silenced. Your contribution goes directly towards ensuring that our marginalized narrative is out there, front and center.
Here are some MuslimGirl.net initiatives that are totally changing the way we do media representation:
#MUSLIMGIRLPROBS: Our version of media watch. Our weekly link roundup of headlines, stories, events, and situations from across the Internet that are problematic for Muslim women and make us want to rip our headscarves off.
THE GIRLS’ ROOM: Our online series of monthly Google Hangouts where we talk about the issues that young Muslims actually want to talk about, with prominent guests from the Muslim community and beyond.
BADDIE OF THE MONTH: Our profile series on badass Muslim women that are doing incredible things and making waves for the Muslim community. Our inaugural Baddie of the Month was Sana Saeed, producer at AJ+ and who we dubbed “the voice that launched a thousand tweets”!
COLLEGIATE CHAPTERS: MuslimGirl.net has a student organization arm that is the IRL manifestation of our goal mission. MuslimGirl student leaders create a presence for Muslim women’s voices on their campuses and host events to directly benefit their communities. For more information, clique here.
We’re not only representing our voices in the media and raising the profile of Muslim women making amazing contributions to society, but we’re also creating and connecting movers and shakers across all boundaries.
#MGFacts: We’ve become the #1 Muslim women’s blog in the United States, and our articles have been written about, responded to, or cited by every mainstream media outlet imaginable. For example, our counter-campaign to Pamela Geller‘s bigoted “Draw Muhammad Day” was discussed on CNN and profiled in TIME.
Your support goes directly towards empowering Muslim women’s voices — it makes the strong declaration that you believe we deserve representation in the media. More than anything, we need your vote of confidence in Muslim youth. We’re the post-9/11 generation of Muslims that grew up during the height of Islamophobia. Our formative years took place under a complete assault on our identity. MuslimGirl.net is a direct product of that experience and a positive force to address it.
MUSLIMGIRL.NET MISSION STATEMENT:
Create a powerful voice for Muslim women in the media;
Empower a generation of Muslim women leaders around the world;
Reshape the image and eliminate stereotypes of Islam and Muslims;
Impact policies on both Muslim and women’s issues.
We need you to have our back on this one, fam.
#MGFacts: Sara Zayed, president of the Rutgers University chapter of MuslimGirl, represented MuslimGirl.net at the United Nations Youth Assembly. She interviewed UN Youth Envoy Ahmad Alhendawi on the UN’s youth initiatives in the presence of delegations from around the world.
MuslimGirl.net was born in the bedroom of a teenage girl who was fed up with feeling voiceless in the media. She and her girlfriends made it an after-school hobby to write on the daily life and experiences of being an American Muslim teenager, in the hopes of connecting with other girls out there who felt the same way. They hoped to dispel stereotypes and build bridges through the spirit of sisterhood by just being themselves. Little did they know, MuslimGirl.net would grow with them as they came of age and literally chronicle the evolution of their identities as Muslim women. MuslimGirl.net has continued to grow and evolve with our generation. Today, MuslimGirl.net has become the most-read source for American Muslim women’s voices on issues pertinent to their lives — as it should be.
#MGFacts: This is what our typical office looks like. Yes, you can sit with us. The baddie on the right is MuslimGirl.net sex & spirituality columnist, Mira Abouelezz.
To put it simply: we want to take things to the next level.
You know that feeling of always being talked over? Of being invisible? Of your voice being diluted by people speaking on your behalf? We want to make sure that ends by creating a presence that no one will be able to ignore.
You’ve made it clear that you love what we have to offer: MuslimGirl.net has experienced unprecedented growth over the last six months. We are eager to meet our growing audience with the resources it deserves. Here are just a few of things we’ve had to deal with during our expansion the past few months:
IS MUSLIMGIRL DOWN?: Our cheap shared server simply has not been able to handle all the traffic to our website (mashallah!), thus causing periods of time where MuslimGirl.net goes down. This makes the website completely inaccessible at moments of high virality — which is exactly when you want to visit us the most! We want to make sure that MuslimGirl.net is always a reliable and accessible online destination for you. We would like to put funds towards having our own dedicated server.
STAY ON THE LIST: So many of you have subscribed to our email list (mashallah, again!) that we simply don’t qualify for free email newsletter services anymore. MuslimGirl.net now requires a paid service to handle our badass subscribers. We’ve been paying out of pocket for the past few months to make sure our stories and relevant information are delivered straight to your inbox.
LABOR OF LOVE: Not a single one of our beautiful growing family of staff and writers has ever been compensated a dime for their incredible work. Not one has ever reaped a profit off of MuslimGirl.net. #Wallah. Many set aside time from school or work to serve our community with the content you see on MuslimGirl.net. They pour their hearts into this because they believe in it. We think those are the people who deserve to be compensated the most.
MO’ IDEAS, MO’ PROBLEMS: We’ve developed story boards and themes of new media projects to serve our increasing demand. The only problem? They haven’t left the cutting room floor because we haven’t had the resources to make them come to life for you!
MuslimGirl is currently at that pivotal moment where we need to start putting money into it in order for it to continue to grow. Without your help, MuslimGirl.net will stagnate. We don’t want one of the biggest millennial successes of the American Muslim community to flatline because of something as cheap as money.
#MGFacts: Our most visible feature is The Girls’ Room, our monthly Google Hangout series. This unprecedented idea has led to MuslimGirl.net being asked to consult Muslim blogs, events, and even national organizations on implementing our strategy — thus completely revolutionizing the way we have conversations in the Muslim community.