It is open season on veils, if you will pardon the oxymoron. The French parliament has voted to ban the Islamic veil in public. So much for liberté, never mind égalité or fraternité. A British Tory MP has said he will not meet constituents who wear veils. So much for being an elected representative of all his constituents.
One has to wonder about the motivations of these lawmakers, who, like the fiddling Nero as Rome burns, want to legislate on minor issues, concerning minuscule slivers of the population, such as the veil, when they should be worrying about bigger problems. Is this classic deflection strategem or just silly season headline-grabbing material? After all, no more than an estimated 2000 women wear the full veil in France. In the said British MP’s constituency, there are around 500 Muslims amongst over 81000 residents. Hardly a destabilising and disruptive influence.
I would, in fact, suggest that more harm is to be done by radio and TV debates, where callers and discussants embarrassingly refer to French- and British- born women as “them” and “their culture”. The “Islamic veil” is a convenient horse to flog, considering Catholic women did wear the veil in living history and Catholic women still are required to cover up or wear a veil or mantilla in certain churches, whereas men are not required to. Why is this worth bringing up? Well, Catholics are a sizeable percentage of Christian population both in the UK and in France. They hold conservative – and not necessarily widely popular – views on many issues too. So it is unsurprising that many Catholic leaders speak against the ban on veils. There is no “us” and “them”, just “them” for the moment, till they come for “us”. If this sounds melodramatic, I would suggest you have never been a minority any time in your life.
It is also hard to swallow that these legislators are concerned with women’s freedoms and the encroachment of their rights. If they really were, they would start somewhere else. For instance, France’s sizeable fashion industry, year on year, promotes an unreal body imagery that influences many young and otherwise impressionable women. If the French legislators are going to tell women what to wear and what not to wear, how about starting at the fashion industry? Few women, who can afford designer clothing, have straight-up, straight-down bodies like pre-teen boys. Few women, who have full-functioning brains, want to look like straight-up, straight-down pre-teen boys. In Britain, we women would probably appreciate it if our legislators occupied themselves with issues like equal pay and encouraging girls in science, technology, engineering and maths, rather than the yardage of cloth we cover our bodies in.
(Late edit, July 20th, 2010). Banning veils seems to be the hot new ticket in town for claiming or pretending to be secular nations. Syria is the latest in line to ban face-covering veils. From its universities. Because veils hurt its secular character, says Syria (official name Syrian Arab Republic).
I am under no misguided impression that all women, who wear veils, choose to do so with their free will, and with zero coercion. For my sins, a friend gave me this weekend a book smuggled out of Saudi Arabia. It is titled “Fatāwā” (Arabic, plural: means, religious opinions) and in it, modern clerics pronounce on “essential rulings for every Muslim woman”. Reading it, I was sinking in an abyss of depression, when said friend reminded me that I should be glad I was born in a democracy and live in a democracy too.
True. But are women in these democracies really free? In the capital of the democracy of my birth, for a woman, “going to the mall” means “going to be mauled”. Why, over in the capital of the nation seen as the keeper of all things civilised, women leaders’ clothes seem to occupy the eponymous broadsheet’s interest too. It seems even as the sisterhood makes strides in all spheres of life, our legislators, our press are all intent on telling us how to live our lives.
Lest you should think this post was a defence of symbols of oppression, let me reiterate my point.
It is a woman’s right to choose what she wears, whether to hide or to expose her body.
It is her right to choose between a flowing dress or a skin-hugging body-con dress.
It is her right to pick comfortable ballerina flats – it has to be said that Michael Gove, a Tory MP, now education minister has put in his tuppence worth on why ballet pumps should be banned (read here, if you don’t believe me) – or sky-high stilettos.
And if she so chooses, *let her wear veil!
Late edit (August 6th, 2010):
Claire Berlinski says “ban the burqa“. Make up your own mind. My stance is clear.
{ 11 comments… read them below or add one }
As someone who always passionately argues in favour of individual freedoms, I am wholeheartedly in agreement. At an abstract/ theoretical level.
However, let’s discuss a practical consideration: there could be several women who are relieved (perhaps secretly) that the veil has been banned. How would we know? We only see the ones who are protesting the ban (of which there could several who did not really want to protest even, but on whom pressure might have been brought by their families/ community elders to join the protests).
Let x be the number of women who *really* want to wear the veil, and who therefore see the ban as an infringement of one of their fundamental rights. Let y be the number of women who don’t want to wear the veil, and who are (secretly) happy that there is now a ban in force that allows them the freedom to not wear one. (They can now pretend that they want to, but are not permitted to.) If y is larger than x, wouldn’t you agree that the ban is a good thing?
Right. Since I am not close enough to this situation I have no idea how the numbers might stack up. Do you?
@Hemant: Thanks for your thoughtful comment. You know why it takes me a while to write posts on topics that have been argued threadbare by other bloggers and commenters? Because I watch which way the water flows, as the debate progresses. In this instance, I am not an affected party except to the extent that as a minority woman living in the UK, I can’t push Niemoeller far from my mind. All the more reason for me not to give my opinions till I know what the real affected parties feel.
This may surprise you, but as it happens, we are not seeing women, who want the veil banned but – at least in Britain – very vocal women, who do not want the veil banned. These women are joined by voices of women, whose own religious beliefs (such as Catholicism) and practices (such as wearing the crucifix while in the workplace) have come under fire lately. In a visual medium such as the television, one can see that the women arguing against the ban are wearing western clothing, such as jeans or long dresses, under their burqa. I should like to surmise that if such a woman were being forced to wear her veil, she would not be wearing “western” clothes (salwar kameez and other “modest” clothing is pretty easy to buy in London, the Midlands and other parts of these isles with even a tiny number of Muslim or ethic minority populations). That she is on TV arguing vociferously with strange men says enough, even if we didn’t mean to inspect her clothes underneath the burqa.
The problem is particularly tricky between the pro-veil and the anti-veil Muslims because although it is haraam for one Muslim to call another mushrik or kaafir without cause, it is quite common practice. Women, who wear the veil but argue with strangers on radio or TV are as vulnerable to such judgments as those who do not wear the veil%. Once such a judgment has been made, the offended party – and please let’s remember, we are talking of practising, believing Muslims here – is required to forgive the offending party, to save him/ her from jahannum. It gets complicated – and fascinating – when we start watching the dynamics of people’s practice of their religion up close. The veil is but an outward manifestation of all this.
% Of course the debate as to why 14th century tribal customs should apply to 21st century women living and working in urban communities is a bigger debate. But since we are not yet bold enough – some of us are – to call out on all religions as a waste of time or as things that must remain private, a bit like personal hygiene practices and toilette – we have to deal in sub-optimals. Such as the woman’s right to choose what she wears. And on hot summer days in London, what she doesn’t care to wear! Thanks for reading.
One has to wonder about the mental capacities of an MP who speaks as if everything poor quality, or potentially capable of causing damage if misused, should actually be made illegal by the government. Absolutely extraordinary! Accuracy matters. Surely he doesn’t mean “should be banned”, he means “are not the best choice of footwear”. As if anyone gives a fig what Mr Gove’s opinions on women’s footwear are.
There are days when I rather like the idea of wearing a veil myself. It’s easy to see how all the various forms of religiously modest clothing, from Evangelical Christian to Orthodox Jewish to Islamic- appeal to very many women, who need no coercion to conceal their bodies from the public view. Banning them is Islamophobia in action, isn’t it- a purely symbolic anti-Islamic act.
It doesn’t help much that the European court of human rights continues to uphold the Turkish ban on headscarves.
I hate burqas more than the next person, but banning it is turning it into a martyr.
Will the French now ban women walking 15 feet behind their husbands out of “respect” ?
-Neo
@Neo: The inevitable “martyrdom” point is a good one. That is also the larger debate, of course. Thanks for reading.
Hi, I don’t usually comment on blog posts on the web, but I couldn’t resist saying *something* after reading this one. I have been a minority many times in my life, but that note about “them” and “us” still sounded melodramatic. In any democracy, the various freedoms need to be “prioritised” (for want of a better word). And for me, the citizens’ right to vote and fair representation and participation in democratic process and government trumps the right to freedom of religious expression every time. If an MP says that meeting face-to-face should be exactly that, then what is the crying sin there ? Send a letter or make a phone call if you want to put words across or make your voice heard. No one is forcing a Muslim woman to lift her veil in Britain (yet, at least). Can’t defend the French position though. Have to live and let live, I think – and banning headscarves is a step too far.
@Ravi: Thanks for your comment.
An MP once elected is required to represent all his constituents, regardless of whether he agrees with them or not. To that extent, he is a public servant and cannot impose conditions on discharge of his duties. That a woman wearing a veil can approach and meet her MP is one of the privileges of living in a vibrant, active democracy as Britain, as well as a reasonable sign that the woman is not oppressed, but free to go about her business and life, without male supervision. The MP’s stance in this instance is layered with ironies he is either unable to see or incapable of parsing. On the role of religion in public life, please see my comment to Hemant above. As long as we don’t have the gumption to make religion an entirely private affair, we are going to have to deal with these issues and in ways we do not like.
Disagree with every word of this post. Can these veiled women choose be unveiled if they wish to? No. They will be ostracized/punished if they wear western clothing. i.e. They are forced to veil themselves.
An ideal government acts only as a policeman that protects man’s rights; it uses physical force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use or threaten to initiate such force.
This is a case where women cannot choose to unveil themselves because a threat of loss of individual rights exist. So it is right for the government to protect their rights by enacting laws to ban islamic veils.
@Edwin Jose: Thanks for your thoughts. Now if only other people who disagree could learn from you, how to do so politely and without resorting to ad hominem… so thank you for that too!
The point in the post however is not about government; it is about legislators who sit in the parliament and enact laws. They are not the ones, who have to enforce it.
Although it is not universally true that all women are coerced to wear a veil (most women I know who wear a veil do so of their own accord; most women I know who do not wear a veil also do so of their own accord but it is safe to assume that my sample is biased in that they are educated, liberal Muslim women), let’s assume for the sake of argument it is. In that case, how does it help to punish the woman who is veiled instead of going after the people who force her to wear a veil? It reminds me of the man who is looking for his keys under a street-light. Asked by a passer-by, if that is where he dropped them, he said that he had dropped them in the next street but he was looking here because there was light here. Solving the solvable problem rather than addressing the tricky real issue that will open a Pandora’s box of lack of integration in society, schisms between religions and races and so on – hardly a smart legislative strategy, or expenditure of resources in a time when neither money nor time is available aplenty.
It’s a much more complex issue than what the European discourse is at the moment. My wife wears a veil and I have been trying to get her out of it for the past year without much success. My mom never even did the hijab till her daughters started wearing the scarf in the 90s in Bombay. Much of it has to do with identity as well, rather than simply religious injunctions, which seems to never feature in the discourse. Not a fan of the veil on a personal level, but what if someone in France decided to wear a hoodie and wrap her face in a scarf?
Arif Attar
I am a Muslim woman and I don’t wear a veil. If I did wear one, it would be in “public” and not in the privacy of my home.It reflects the poor understanding of Islamic traditions among western leaders that they think a woman can be stopped from wearing a veil outside her home but have the freedom to wear it at home.
A microscopic minority of Muslim women wear the veil in the west and it is extremely unhelpful that this has become the major focus of debate in the media and comment by politicians. The problems facing the Muslim community on both sides of the Channel is not a piece of cloth. It is the lack of social progress and economic opportunities faced by our youth. We need policy changes to try and end the deprivation in the ghetto like existence for many Muslim families in these countries. I wish the western leaders talked about these “real” issues.
The veil is not the symbol of Islam. It is not our badge of identity. By France wanting to ban it and for British MP’s such as Phillip Hollobone saying he will not meet constituents who are veiled. They are deepening the “them” and “us” perception that exists on both sides……and missing the opportunity to address the real problems facing the majority of Muslims in France and Britain.
I absolutely agree// It is also hard to swallow that these legislators are concerned with women’s freedoms and the encroachment of their rights. If they really were, they would start somewhere else//
Someone made a comment recently during a discussion on banning burqas in public, your take on this?
Foreign women must wear an abaya and veil in Saudi and they are not allowed to drive or to talk to a man, everybody respects it without protesting. All female journalists reporting from Afghanistan cover their heads. When you go to any country, you must respect the law, customs and the religious dictats. If you want to wear a burqa then better go to a Muslim majority country, rather than going to France.The choice is yours and let it be that way.
@Prerna: Thanks for your note. My view on that quote is simply this: many of the women fighting to keep politicians out of the veil debate were born and brought up in Britain and France. They have jobs, relationships, families and children here. They are contributing socially and economically. For them, there is nowhere to “go back to”. They are in their countries, and feeling unwanted and insulted. Way to go for liberal democracies, I think!
While I am in complete agreement with the right of women to wear the veil or not, as they choose, this again becomes the issue of the individual vs. the community. If I am not mistaken, Islam considers itself an international ‘Quam’ or nation. By that logic, the liberal and vocal sisterhood in the west has a responsibitly to their kin in less fortunate circumstances.
The fact that the veil is a sign of oppression in many cultures does not need debate. The fact that the same cultures where veiled women are repressed, they have lower standards of income and education too cannot be denied. These women are likely not to have a say in the matter. It is these women whose rights are being denied – the veil is just symbolic of all that they cannot choose.
The veil limits one’s mobility and vision. It is hot and bothersome, and the metallic beak (in stricter regimes) has to hurt. The veil impairs communication, identification and human bonding. Admittedly, it had a role to play in times gone by, where duststorms on camelback trips and personal security of commoditified beauty was a major concern. Thankfully, we live in more civilised times now.
@Meeta: Thanks for your comment. The veil is, as liberal Muslims Asma and Arif point out, a layered issue of identity, culture, societal assimilation and religious tradition. Just as this post is. When liberal democracies behave like dictators in matters of what women can and cannot wear, they are no better or worse than the repressive regimes they criticise. It is patronising to say the least, as well as infringing and insulting of a woman’s right to choose.
Seductive as it is to think otherwise from our liberal perches, not all in the sisterhood in the west have voices, not all in the apparently “repressed” societies have a lack of voice. It is amusing to note that a tiny sliver of veiled women are deemed a threat to societal cohesion and stability! Is it possibly because men in power are aware that some of the greatest conspiracies in history were designed, hatched and executed via the zanankhana? Where is the weak, poor woman narrative in history?
The community is debating the issue. The framing however is “us” and “them” which creates an unnecessary chasm of “my culture” and “your culture” making the well-intentioned persons’ intent a little more than white noise.
Whether the veil is bothersome or not is the wearer’s prerogative to decide. I, for instance, find sarees way too “air-conditioned”, needlessly exposing of mostly unflattering midriff bulges, ultimately very sexualising garment and a waste of yards of material. I know I am not alone in this view. But if other women wish to wear sarees, that is their choice too.
Very well argued points indeed. Specially the “Them” notion which is becoming very big in Europe and does not help one bit. Reminds me of the national referendum in Switzerland in 2005 (I think) to ease the citizenship process for second- and third-generation foreigners; its campaign posters depicted brown hands reaching into a basket of Swiss passports. Another poster showed a picture of Osama bin Laden on a Swiss identity card with the caption, “Don’t be fooled.” Well, people were not and did vote against easing life of second-third generation residents. The “Them” argument from there on can only be extended to the veil.
The other well thought out argument is: choice. If it is someone’s choice, why stop it? If we have problems with, say, forced marriages in Asian community should the government step in and ban marriages for Asians? Will Sikhs be asked to shave and not wear turbans just because they are different – or maybe it’s forced by tradition/culture? Here role of culture, tradition, choice and education is ignored by a simple solution which might backfire.
If citizens need to know their place in a democracy so should the elected MPs and the government.
I’m with @Hemant. Sure, it’s not politically correct to tell women what to wear, nor can we be sure how many who veil actually would choose to without pressure direct or indirect, but as @Shefaly comments, “we have to deal in sub-optimals.” I would hope that we start making sub-optimal corrections across the board — like the unreal body image expectations of French fashion, too.
{ 1 trackback }