To Veil or Not To Veil - Err, Wrong Question!

Unarticulated ranting of the day, written by an evil feminist, inhabitant of a Western country:

I worry that the feminist movement of Muslim women (and the odd men) everywhere is slowly dying down. It’s understandable - in these times of clash over religion, Muslims crave unity and don’t wish to rock their own boat any further. Fundamentalism is growing as a backlash to US policy in the Middle East and in many places, for example in Turkey, to the westernization of culture at large. And where fundamentalists rise to power, the life circle of Muslim women narrows down.

I had a Muslim friend in High School. She wore jeans and her hair down, with no veil. She was also a devout Muslim. My friend had modesty and therefore there was no need to add a veil to the mix. In the Quran the word “Hijab” refers to modesty, not to any specific piece of garment.

“And say to the believing women that they should lower their gaze and guard their modesty; that they should not display their beauty and ornaments except what must ordinarily appear there of; that they should draw their veils over their bosoms and not display their beauty except to their husbands, their fathers, their husbands' fathers, their sons, their husbands' sons, their brothers, or their brothers' sons or their sisters' sons, or their women or the servants whom their right hands possess, or male servants free of physical needs, or small children who have no sense of the shame of sex, and that they should not strike their feet in order to draw attention to their hidden ornaments. And O you Believers, turn you all together towards Allah, that you may attain Bliss.” (Quran 24:31).

I lost touch with my girlfriend. She excelled in math and wanted to study pharmaceutics, or go to beauty school, but I have no idea what became of her. Or what she might be thinking nowadays.

But I don’t want to make this into a post about the Hijab. I’m not against the veil. I’ll go as far as to say I’m not completely against the Nibaq or Burqa. If you’re a Muslim woman reading this and thinking the veil (Hijab, Burqa, full Chadri or what ever) is your personal choice, I have no beef with you. Go ahead and make your choices. What I’m against, is the narrowing of your choices as a woman. I don’t believe your government or religious society has the right to control your choice of dress. I believe you should stand up against it and urge also your husband to speak on your behalf. Do it clad in full Afghan Chadri, if you wish. (And blame old naïve me, if you get death threats)

I’ve done it again, changed my target audience in a flick. I started this post talking to other westerners and then switched demographic and addressed Muslim women. And probably not very many Muslim women read my blog…Oh well.

This post was inspired by Youtube propaganda. I hate Youtube, especially the comments posted there, and yet I can’t stop reading. They offer me a window to some of the darkest thinking patterns and intellectual dishonesty of people all over. No one there really bothers to be politically correct and some of the comments simply reek hate. You don’t get that kind emotion in the mass media.