Veiled threat
There has been a heated debate in Britain after a senior Cabinet minister suggested that Muslim women covering their faces causes division in the community.
Jack Straw, who is a former foreign minister and now the leader of the House of Commons, has called on Muslim women to remove their veils.
"Communication in face-to-face meetings require that both sides are seeing each other's face [to] not only hear what people say but see what they mean," he said.
Mr Straw says the veil is causing division in communities but he is not demanding rules that ban women from wearing it.
"I'm not talking about being prescriptive," he said.
"But with all the caveats, yes I would rather (women did not wear full veils)."
Mr Straw says he has received a positive response when he asked women to take off the garments when they came to see him about issues in Blackburn.
His remarks have sparked an angry backlash amongst Muslim people, particularly those in his electorate of Blackburn, where Muslims make up one-third of his constituents.
But Ruquyyah, a 23-year-old British Muslim who wears the full veil, says it should be seen as a sign of religious devotion rather than female oppression.
"I wear the veil because for my understanding of the religion of Islam, the teachings of Islam, for a Muslim woman and how she should cover, this is the conclusion that I have come to, that this is the best way for me to cover," she said.
"I'd say to Jack Straw that by asking me to take off my veil is like asking me to take off a piece of my clothing."
The British Prime Minister's has tried to distance himself from Mr Straw's comments.
His office says Mr Straw is expressing a personal opinion that does not reflect Government policy.
While we're at it, if you run into a person on the street and they're wearing sunglasses, which hides their eyes, should they take them off? What if they prescription sun glasses, or those transitional lens. If the person takes them off then they might not see your facial expressions. Beards can hide many facial expressions. Should all men shave?
Come to think of it, since I consider Mr Straw's comments to be concerned only with musilms then I suspects he thinks all men should shave, since most muslim men have some form of facial hair.
posted by Renegade79 at 8:49 am
7 Comments:
"While we're at it, if you run into a person on the street and they're wearing sunglasses, which hides their eyes, should they take them off? What if they prescription sun glasses, or those transitional lens. If the person takes them off then they might not see your facial expressions. Beards can hide many facial expressions. Should all men shave?"
Arn't we extrapolating alot to link sunnies and beards to a full cloth encloure hiding everything and only a cloth grid to look out of?
This sign of 'religious devotion' is blatently sexist, oppressive and does not belong in the modern world.
That said, the government SHOULD NOT legislate or regulate this. But maybe gently encouraging them to free their shackles is a good thing, if there is no carrot or stick associated with the encouragement.
I like it when politians SAY something, whatever it is, even if it is devicive - you cannot please everybody all of the time.
Mr. Straw said his comments, and 1/3rd of his electorate will get to say if they like that or not at the next election.
Freedom of choice is an interesting thing. What one thing is to one person might be something totally different to another.
Who is to say that what we consider free is simply a choice of limits. You can do this but then not that, or that but not this. It's you're choice.
Perhaps freedom nowadays is simply having less limits than others. Or maybe it is simply a state of being where your mind has evolved to ignore the limits that has been placed upon your person.
I think I agree with Mr Straw actually.
Not that we should force Muslim women to remove their veils, but surely it's worth having some dialog about it.
As far as I can understand it, Muslim women cover themselves so thoroughly because Muslim men wrote the book and wanted to protect themselves from their own lack of self-control.
Hence, I suspect, the Sheikh's comments about uncovered women being too tempting for men to handle.
I say that all men should be self-controlled regardless of what women wear ... forcing them to cover up to remove temptation is like, I don't know, forcing McDonald's to shut down during the day throughout Ramadan so they're not tempted to eat.
Some Muslim women may be genuinely convinced that their devotion to Allah is best served by covering themselves completely, which is why no rules should be made. But even then, I suspect these women have been brainwashed by Muslim men and that many Muslim women wouldn't dare say otherwise for their own safety.
And making comments about it should not be divisive. I've had about enough of not being allowed to say anything about Islam because it's divisive. It's only divisive if Muslims are insecure about themselves. Otherwise they should be perfectly happy to explain their position openly without feeling threatened. As it stands now, non-Muslims feel too repressed to express an opinion about Islam!!
I think I should clear up my position on this.
Women should be allowed to wear what they want. If they want to dress sexy then they should be able to do so without fear of being mauled by some drunken dick head. On the other hand if they dress from head to toe and wear a face veil then they also have a right to do so.
Now if muslim women are being forced to wear a veil by a male authority figure, such as their fathers/uncles/brothers or an Imam then it is a sign of sexist oppression, but what about the women who choose to do so as a sign of their faith?
Women who grow up in a western civilisation, such as the 23 year old british woman quoted in the article would of been taught society's rules and values. They would know that they have a choice in what they can wear and if they choose to wear the veil then how can it be oppressive?
The reason I found Straw's comment's divisive is because westeren soceity, primarily Christians and Jews, also teach women to dress modestly (slut, tramp, jail bait and "whore of babylon") Our soceity, the so called modern world, for all it's talk, does not really approve of immodestly dressed women. Muslim's simply have a more extreme concept of modestly dressed.
But why do muslim women have the veil? Lets take a look at the geography of the evolution of the muslim faith. Muslim's are primarly an Asian minor, now known as the middle east, culture. The middle east is mostly desert. A harsh, unwielding environment. The veil did not start as a means of opressing women, but of protecting women's faces from sand, dust and sun. I'm not saying Islam is not opressive towards women, because it is. But the veil did not begiun as a tool of said opression.
So why do muslim women contiune to wear the veil in the western (modern) world? First of all it has been part of their culutral and religious tradition for the past few thousand years. Traditions are not over turned lightly and in times of culutral crisis (such as being surrounded by people who hate you and want to destroy your way of life) people tend to cling to traditions more. Second, Islam is relevently new to the western world. Up until the last sixty years or so muslims were not even grudgingly accepted in Western society. There was been almost no time for Islam to intergrate with the rest of soceity.
And what inroads were being made towards this intergration have been stalled at the very least, destroyed at the most, by the recent wars bwteen the west and Islamic countries, and hate crimes by main stream elements of western soceity aganist the Islamic community. These actions have caused the Islamic community to become more isolated from the rest of soceity. One of the signs of this is the increase in women wearing the veils. Another sign is the increase in violence over any western indiscretion of their faith (riots after those danish pictures)
Another reason why Straw's comments are divisive is because it creates the image of a us and them soceity. It makes westerners appear to be unaccepting of muslim traditions and muslims feel threaten, that their culture will be merely reduced to a joke, or destroyed completely.
Now Luke I agree that polictal correctess has gone a little too fair in the favour of the muslims. This does not help either because like you said, non-muslims are feeling repressed. This is a free country with freedom of speech and people should be able to say what they want. (Just curious, do you support the right of neonazis to hold rallies in civic park? Not support what they say or believe but merely their right to say it?) But I think people, particulary those in a position of authority should be a little more informed before making such comments.
The one things I will give Straw is that he asks women to removed the veil when they visit him. That I do not see as divisive, as they can always say no. I disgree with his belief they should be removed permantly.
Interesting points there Nat.
I think I agree with most of what you've said. The only point at which I differ is re: the mandate for public figures to be so guarded in what they say. Public figures should set an example of respect for all people, but within that constraint they should be allowed to offer their thoughts on an issue. Otherwise they're simply modelling political correctness, which subtlely suppresses dialog on complex issues.
In this case Mr Straw has quite rightly observed that talking to someone in a shroud is bad for communicating with that person, religious issues aside.
And as for neonazis holding rallies on government-owned property, I guess that comes down to getting approval from the local council ;-) I don't have a problem with it as long as said neonazis know that if they make plans to terrorise others they'll be thrown into jail. Quite happy for white supremacists to believe what they want and express their opinions... but if they want to kill people they'll have to face the music. (Obviously!)
Some would argue that neonazis inherently incite violence. I don't know enough about what their goals are these days to comment.
I'm not saying that they need to be guarded, well, not completely. Just that they should be learned of the situtation between they shoot off at the mouth in order to garner some cheap publicity.
In this case it wasn't that he was asking them to take off the veils to communicate (okay, a little bit I'll admit) but the inference for them to removed the veil period, for them to look like one of us. Basically muslims don't feel like they are one of us and such comments such as this could be interpreted as a "You MUST look like us"
In order to be completely fair this is a press article. I have to admit that I have not read or heard Straw's full statement and it would be merely the media twisting statements to sell papers. In that case then the paper is being divisive.
Oh the neonazi question I just had to ask as many people claim to support free speech until they don't like what they hear. I admit I don't know much about the neo's goals and motives these days either.
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