The issue of the Veil (Comments)

Maggie wrote in with the following, regarding the post about Jack Straw urging Muslims not to use the veil as a point of separation with other Brits. My response to her is included and while I agree with what Straw (and Maggie) are saying, I certainly do not agree with why. Both comments are included in the original post, if you'd care to check them out. But it seemed an important point/ counter-point to me, so I thought I'd reproduce them as their own post.


If I may share another perspective as to why someone like Jack Straw might feel called upon to address the subject of the veiling of females in British society: there is another reason why this is a problem. It has nothing to do with Islam or Muslims. It has nothing to do with conforming, fashion, or racism. It has nothing to do with freedom of expression. It has nothing to do with the individual wishing to live separately from the prevailing customs in observation of their religious beliefs - for example, the Amish in America are deeply respected, though they deliberately reject dress norms, electricity, telephones, conveniences. Here's what the problem REALLY is:

It is deeply offensive to the most fundamental feeling of people in free societies to see other people openly oppressed. We know it happens in various ways to many people in many places, including our own, but when it happens it upsets us. To see degradation of another human being worn publicly and held up as a virtue of some sort is simply sickening to us.

It may be a cultural norm elsewhere to mutilate the genitals of little girls, and considered a virtue; that is not the case here. The custom must be observed elsewhere, not in this society. It may be a cultural virtue to sell off daughters in marriage to strangers, but that is not the case here, and it becomes something that people must do in private -not on the street. It may be a cultural norm for men to have four wives - but polygamy is unlawful here, and disgusting to the majority of citizens. People may freely engage in this sort of arrangement elsewhere. It may be perfectly acceptable to beat one's wife (wives) or kill one's daughters ("Honor" killing, I believe the term is) but here these things are crimes - assault and murder. They may not be practised, accepted and excused here.

Imagine if you will some reversal of experience regarding the veiling of females: what if people, for religious reasons, wore men’s clothing designed to expose the testicles, that women's clothing bare the breasts? Would we not all find this appalling? If you were forced to see it on the streets or in public transportation or to know your children were exposed to it in schoolrooms from their teachers, would you not, finally, no matter how much you wish to be sympathetic and tolerant, say something?

The dehumanization of women is an obscenity to us. To deliberately throw it in the faces of one's neighbors does more than separate - it's offensive. If you are in our countries, you are free to act as you wish in your homes - something that is not the case, I believe, in many of the countries that promote the subjugation of women as a virtue. If people are going to emigrate to free societies, they must understand that they are guests and conduct themselves accordingly, at least in shared public life. Or, live elsewhere. I cannot help but wonder what it is that attracts immigrants to places for which they have such contempt. Please, be happy, perhaps somewhere else.

Jack Straw finally said something. It's worth listening to. If it is unacceptable, perhaps it would be better, and people would be happier, occupying some country whose customs towards females are more in keeping with their comfort zone.

My response is as follows:

Hey Maggie, thanks for writing in. I agree, for the most part, with your comment. I did have some problems with your characterization of what may or may not be acceptable to Muslims.

For instance, you say:

"It is deeply offensive to the most fundamental feeling of people in free societies to see other people openly oppressed"

and:

"To see degradation of another human being worn publicly and held up as a virtue of some sort is simply sickening to us."

My own personal beliefs are that veils are unneccessary and Burqa/ Niqabs are unacceptable. That said, a lot of communities (including the Amish and the Hasidum, here in NY) insist on a dress code for women that emphasises modesty. You seem to have inferred that a veil or a niqab is synonymous with subjugation, which is simply not true. I have a couple of cousins who turned to the niqab of their own volition, as adults and believe this is how they're supposed to live. Their husbands are certainly NOT oppressing them. On the contrary, they wield equal power and, in the privacy of their homes, the dynamics of their relationship would be difficult to distinguish from a western one.

This link that you draw between the niqab and female oppression is, I'm afraid, a knee jerk one and while it may be true for burqad women in countries like Afghanistan, it is less likely to be so in a country like the UK or the US. You may not be able to grasp this, due to a cultural bias (which we all have), but the situation is much more nuanced than how you appear to have understood it.

Secondly, your equation of veiling/ niqabs with genital mutilation or honor killings, is really distressing to me. Again, the link simply isn't there. One is a personal choice, the others are a crime against humanity. My own mother was circumcised and my grandmother was neither veiled nor a monster. It is due to ignorance that it happens, not part of a grand scheme to subjugate women. I'm highly critical of arab/ muslim societies but I believe you're judging other cultures based on your own cultural lens.

Thirdly, the subject of polygamy is a touchy one for most Muslims. That said, I don't agree with you that it's disgusting and really caution you against proclaiming people's customs as such, when a) there's a rationale behind them and b) the West doesn't seem to have the same moral judgement on, say, someone who has kids with different women and then shirks his responsibilities towards them. Which is what polygamy was designed to do: make men accountable and ensure that kids from different women received their rights.

Polygamy is not common among the educated, in the Arab world. If my dad tried to pull that shit, my mom would bobbit-ize him before you could say 'I do' four times. But I personally think it's more commendable than fathering children all over the place and then not taking care of them. Which is a very real problem here in the US...among the lower socioeconomic classes. Do you see the link?

Polygamy is like any other system: it has it's flaws and it can certainly be abused. But the reasons it was set up is not as distasteful as you seem to have inferred from the media. It would be like me saying 'Oh, Southern people sleep with their sisters' which may be true of some people in the South but not all. And in that case, everyone seems willing to chalk that down to the correct reason: ignorance.

Despite all that, I do agree that burqas have no place in a Western society...where the women wish to participate in the economy, the market and the legal system. The difference is that it's simply impractical and not 'conducive to the greater good'. But it can't be banned or anything since this would undercut the principles of freedom that western socieities are based on. Rather, the Muslims need to adapt in order to reach an acceptable compromise. But the West needs to do the same.

The last thing I take issue with, Maggie, and I must say, I found this to be quite an egregious statement and almost a betrayal of your personal feelings of nationalism and so forth:

"If you are in our countries..."

I think you'll find that this is their country as well. And while a modicum of integration and assimilation is the burden of any new immigrant group, it's also their right not to abandon their belief system entirely and to work with other immigrant groups, over time, to arrive at social harmony and cooperation.

I hope you're not offended by my response. The truth is all in the nuances and many times, I feel the nuances about Muslims are either not understood or not seen as being there at all.