i first heard about controversy-courting comedienne shazia mirza a few years ago, but i wasn’t really a fan of her signature “pilot’s license” joke– i just didn’t think it was THAT funny– so i wasn’t sure that i’d dig her comedic stylings. that might be why i waited to read an interview with her until now:

You used to wear a burqa. Why did you stop?

The reason you’re meant to wear it is because men are meant to be sexually attracted by hair. But I’ve tried, it doesn’t work! (laughs) And I thought, men are the weak ones, yeah? They should be wearing the burqas, they should be locked up in the house, and women should be out. Why is it that those guys who can’t control themselves are let out, and we’re the ones that have to wear the burqas? You can be a perfectly good Muslim without wearing it. You know, it’s not what you wear on your head, it’s what you do with your life.

One of the letters you read onstage was from a Muslim man who first berated you for being a bad Muslim, and then asked you out for coffee. Being Indian myself, I’ve seen that type of behavior — an Indian man, a perfect stranger, once yelled at me on the street for wearing a tank top, and then asked for my phone number.

[Muslim men] are attracted to [strong women], because normally they would get subservient women who would do what they wanted them to do. But actually, what they’d really like is somebody who is comfortable in their own skin. They criticize you for being yourself because they can’t cope with it. Usually, the balance of power is on the man’s side. It’s OK for men to sleep around, it’s OK for men to have girlfriends before marriage, it’s OK for a man to go out with white women, but if a woman does it, she’s a slut and nobody wants to marry her. That’s terrible! And yet they’re still interested in [strong women] because it’s something different.

and i thought that “tank top” thing only happened to me…