ABSTRACT
This chapter considers recent examples of gendered violence in Australian society in the context of reading religion as a vestigial state. That is, religions are conceived as political entities that once were states, or might be in the future, and that enjoy special privileges in neo-liberal societies as distinctive institutions. These institutions are patriarchal in that many incorporate claims to a male divinity, male headship and a male lineage to religious leadership. Like formal states, they also promote gendered forms of violence where women are continually positioned as boundary markers of contested power relations between secular and religious men. Muslim women are consistently denied agency and construed as voiceless, choice-less, passive and dominated by Muslim men. Such a discourse enjoys popular circulation, despite counter voices and contestations. Shifting the discourse of violence against women into a framework that treats religion as a vestigial state creates a productive space for feminism to re-think the politics of state power, religious authority and male hegemony.
