The Hijab And I

[feelgud]

THE HIJAB AND I

.....I began this essay when I read about the decision by the French government to ban the use of hijab by Muslim girls in French public schools. Only a day or two were left before the schools opened and the ban went into effect. Meanwhile, I learn, a group of militants in Iraq have kidnapped two French journalists hostage, and threatened to kill them unless the French law, which goes into effect today, is repealed.

The French President summoned a commission to suggest ways to improve the lives of the ghettoized Muslim immigrants in France. The commission presented a dozen or so suggestions, both economic and social in nature, for immediate action. Out of that list, President Chirac chose to put into effect only one: no religious symbols will be allowed in public schools. Not wearing a hijab, Chirac probably thinks, will improve the lot of the Muslim girls living in ghettoes and bring them closer to the ideal of a modern French woman.

In Iraq, some self-declared Warriors of Islam, utterly heedless to the plight of Iraqi women and children around them, decided to defend the right of some French schoolgirls to wear a hijab by taking as hostage two innocent Frenchmen.

Not too long ago the American administration invoked the plight of Afghan women under the Taliban to justify its military actions. The Taliban are now gone and the warlords, back in power, treat Afghan women not much differently. But now one does not hear from Washington about the women’s plight.

Such was the case in the Eighties too when Gen. Ziaul Haq ordained draconian laws against Pakistani women in, calling it Islamisation. But Washington needed the General for its Cold War. It wished to destroy the communists and socialists in Kabul, who by far had done the most for the benefit of Afghan women, and make Afghanistan the Soviet Union’s ‘Vietnam’. And so President Reagan launched his ‘jihad’ with the help Pakistan’s Military Intelligence and Afghan warlords, criminally oblivious to the consequences it would have for the women and children of Afghanistan.

One does not hear about Afghan women now from Washington, nor about the Iraqi women, who had been doing very well in terms of health, education and professionalism, before the earlier sanctions and the recent war. Needless to say, while the lives of Saudi women are of no concern to the mandarins in Washington -- not a peep was heard when 15 Saudi girls died in a fire in 2002 only because the Saudi religious police did not let them come out bare-headed -- they seldom fail to mention Iranian women when expanding upon the ‘evils’ of the next country they just might target.

It seems that championing the cause of Muslim women has become as popular a refuge of a scoundrel as patriotism was once said to be -- of course, it is always he who decides what that cause consists of.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
C. M. Naim is Professor. Emeritus, South Asian Languages & Civilizations, University of Chicago

[Thai]

Passages from the Koran are translated and interpreted in different ways. One interpretation regarding the veil is below----

the article from the internet:-

"Tell the believing men to lower their gaze and guard their chastity; that is purer for them. And tell the believing women to lower their gaze and guard their chastity, and not to make a display of their beauty except what is apparent, and let them cast a cover over their bosoms.... And turn to Allah (God) altogether, O believers, in order that you might succeed (Koran 24: 30-31)."
The Koran suggests that both men and women dress modestly and guard their chastity. Other than this the Koran suggests that women put a covering on their chest (bosom) over the regular clothing they wear and not make a wanton display of their beauty (Koran 24:30-31). This does not fit in any way the picture of a woman wearing a chador or burka [veil] covered from head to toe. It would more closely resemble a picture of a woman wearing a shirt and pants, which do not deliberately reveal her body, with a scarf over her chest (bosom).
Tradition and not the Koran made "tradition based" Muslims bring the veil into Islam. The Koran did not sanction it. The statement in the Koran that talks about dress talks about both men and women dressing modestly, guarding their chastity and lowering their gaze. It does not discriminate between the sexes except in the case of women it asks them to take a extra covering over their bosoms [chest] only.

[feelgud]

A singular understanding of the veil in Europe as a symbol of exclusion is deeply problematic. It should also be seen as a desire for inclusion with a difference.


ARSHAD ALAM


..There is a sense in which it can be argued that the Islamic veil is a symbol of female oppression. If, as the conservative Muslim opinion argues, that the Quran ordains both men and women to dress modestly, why then they never make an issue of Muslim men wearing jeans—or going top-less in films—which women might find attractive? There is certainly a case in which the veil can be seen as a way of controlling Muslim women’s sexuality. But that does not exhaust the myriad uses to which the veil is being put these days. The veil today serves various other functions as well and some of them are beneficial for Muslim women themselves. One of these functions is a relatively minor one and that has to do with the fact that the veil has become a fad. With only a select group of wearers, the veil has become a mark of distinction, a matter of taste and being cool. However, this status function of the veil is limited to a select audience for whom the veil can be replaced by any other fashion article.

..But not all veiling is fad and a result of compromise. For some women, it is also a matter of voluntary choice. Certainly what has astounded the Left liberal opinion is that among the votaries of the veil, influential voices also come from Muslim women. And most of these women defending the veil happen to be products of modern education and are successful women in their own right. What Europe perhaps needs to understand is that Islam’s relationship with body and sexuality has not been the same as in Christianity. There is nothing comparable in Islam (or for that matter in any other religion) to the Christian concept of original sin. Philosophically, life itself became sinful under a Christian dispensation and attitude towards sexuality and human body became repressed which manifested itself in doctrines such as Calvinism which preached that sex should be for the sole purpose of procreation rather than pleasure. It became necessary for the European enlightenment therefore to talk about the body and liberate it from religious fetters. The collective revulsion of the veil in Europe seems to be guided from this historical experience. What they forget is that Islam had a completely different take on the body. As a religion it never repressed carnal pleasures; rather it just tried to regulate them. Sex and sexuality was never a taboo subject and early Islamic texts devote pages after pages to its discussion. Hence in Islam, liberal ideas may not develop a critique of the body similar to the West for the simple reason that the Muslim body was never denied its pleasures. Thus the reason why some Muslim women would not see the veil as a symbol of sexual repression while the Christian West will is precisely because their historical and religious experiences have been very different. By reading the veil only as a symbol of oppression, Europe wants to universalize its own historical biases, anxieties and particularisms.

It is this Eurocentric worldview that the veil calls to question. In the European context, the veil becomes a subversive article, challenging the way in which Europe defines and categorizes the rest of the world and consequently itself. The veil is definitely not only about tradition. It is also about modernity since it speaks a language of rights: that its bearers are citizens who want to chart their own course of modernity. A singular understanding of the veil as a symbol of exclusion is therefore deeply problematic. Rather it should also be seen as a desire for inclusion with a difference. Britain and other European countries need to educate themselves to appreciate and learn to live with differences rather than always wanting Muslims to assimilate themselves.

[Average Bohra]

Originally posted by feelgud:
Britain and other European countries need to educate themselves to appreciate and learn to live with differences rather than always wanting Muslims to assimilate themselves.

Stop this hypocritical BS ! Realistically, no Muslim should expect any more "appreciation" of their differences, than non-Muslim can expect in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam.

The world will be a lot more tolerant if Muslims require the same of Saudi Arabia as they do from their adopted domiciles. If they want a change, then demand those changes in Islamic countries first, once implemented ask the non-Muslim country to reciprocate.

Until that happens, any benefit enjoyed by Muslims not available to them in Saudi Arabia is simply gravy.

[anajmi]

Unfortunately the Saudi royalty will listen only to their American masters. The sooner Bush brings democracy to Saudi the better it will be.

[Average Bohra]

Grow some balls and do it yourself and be careful of what you wish for.

[anajmi]

Actually, what I want done, I am doing it myself. Living in America as a muslim requires balls these days. More so than living as a non-muslim in Saudi.

[Thai]

The Quran gives many freedoms to women and one of them is the freeedom to dress as they choose (with the condition that the dress be modest). This condition is applied to both men and women. However, what is disturbing to me is the misconceptions regarding this issue of the veil. Many imams and sheiks mistake the wearing of the hijab or niqab to safety issues---that is, safety from rape. They claim ---as did the australian sheik---that wearing the hijab will keep them safe. Past research on this issue suggests they are wrong. A rapist is not a normal man. Rapist do not think like normal men because these are men with serious psychological/mental problems. This crime is not inspired by sexual desire but by the desire to dominate---(power). Law enforcement officers often suggest that the best weapons against this kind of assault are common sense rules such as walking in pairs, avoiding isolated/and or dark areas and having basic self defence training as well as practicing to scream very very loudly. It is suggested that a rapists decision to attack is not based on how sexily the woman is dressed but on wether or not she will fight back. Apparantly rapists are aroused by a sense of domination and power over the victim. (other crimes such as domestic voilence, date rape, sexual harrasment, etc were not included in the research at the time I had read it).

I am also against those claims by leaders of the muslim community, both men and women who state that the hijab/niqab is "required" by islam. The freedom to dress as one chooses but within the limits described in the quran is a "god-given choice" and no one, man or woman, can take that away by making false claims that this particular dress code is "required" by Islam. This goes both ways. No one has the right to take away the hijab/niqab except for the wearer. If educated women(and men!)want to wear hijab because it is a fad or because they want to make a political statement or because they want to please god, it is their choice.

Saudi Arabia may claim to be an "Islamic" country, but as long as it denies the freedoms that the Quran has gifted to mankind, It is in fact not following the guidance of the Quran and is therefore not really an "Islamic" country.

One of the fundamental "god-given" rights is the freedom of choice. To be able to make the right choices in a world full of temptations is what ennobles the human soul. If it is dictated by a state then that is no longer a choice.

Ofcourse, God, in his wisdom, did not give us the right of free will in a vacuum. He gave us the Quran as a guidance and our brains as a tool to decifer this guidance.

K

[feelgud]

Originally posted by Average Bohra:
Stop this hypocritical BS ! .

same accent is used while spoken in royal arabic

[feelgud]

Originally posted by Average Bohra:

...
Until that happens, any benefit enjoyed by Muslims not available to them in Saudi Arabia is simply gravy.

what stops you to attck on this country...you ll definetly get military support from the caves of afghanistan and best wishes from saddam..

for us you ll be remain a source of inspiration if returned ,dead or alive