Veils

The recent controversy over Jack Straw’s comments about Muslim women wearing veils and the veil wearing teacher getting sacked have raised the profile of the veil.

I do firmly believe in people being allowed to wear what they want, but they to understand the likely reactions their dress might get from others. The big issue with the Muslim veil is that it covers the face, the most important part of the human body in terms of visual communication and recognition. By wearing a veil you are effectively making yourself anonymous. You may want to remain anonymous in certain situations, and I think you do have certain rights to do so. However, anonymous people should expect to be treated so. If you cover you face, don’t expect your neighbours or friends to say hello, don’t expect passers-by to ask for the time or directions. If you are unrecognisable, particularly if you dress in the same manner as others with you, then don’t expect to be treated as a unique individual. You become an object not a person anymore.

If I go into a shop, or walk along the street, I don’t expect strangers or people in authority to know who I am. I am just another person minding my own business and getting on with things. So a woman who wears a veil should have this right if they so choose. However, there are occasions when my face becomes my identification, such as getting through the door at work, or when I show my passport at an airport. When people or organisations really need to know who I am (that doesn’t mean the likes of supermarkets who don’t need to know who I am) then my face lets them know. In these situations I cannot see any justifications for hiding your face, and therefore you should be prepared to reveal it; regardless of their gender or religion.

This now leads onto my next point, and was highlighted by the sacked teacher. There are mixed news reports over this (as is so sadly true with our press, they can’t tell the truth it seems), and from what I understand is that she removed the veil when standing in front of the children. So the issues of her ability to communicate with the children is not really an issue if this is the case. What she did apparently do was to wear the veil when men were present. Now this becomes a sex discrimination issue, and I suspect this is what she was sacked over. By treating male members of staff differently to women, she was being sexist. So what has priority, religious rights, or sex discrimination rights? Given that religion is a personal choice, but you gender is not a choice then the gender rights should win every time. The reason I often hear from women who wear veils in front of men, is that they do not want to appear as objects of sexual desire. I find this completely demeaning towards men, just accusing us all of being purely sexually driven beasts without the ability to treat women as multi-faceted people. Would she remove her veil in front of a gay man? Would she raise it in front of a gay woman? How many men are seriously driven uncontrollably wild with desire by the slight of just a woman’s face regardless of how beautiful they are? But you could cover your face with a veil and work as phone-sex worker and drive men wild with flirtacious suggestions.

Now I’m on to telephones, the arguement often used is that people are happy to have a conversation over the phone, so why is the different from talking to someone with a covered face? Well, personally I really dislike having conversations on the phone, because I like to see people’s facial expressions to really understand what they are saying. I also like them to see my face, so they know my light-hearted sarcastic quip is exactly that and not some massive insult. Some people are not naturally verbally articulate, so what their face says helps so much to convey information. Try and speak with someone who doesn’t share you language (e.g on your hols to Spain or France). If you are dealing with them face to face you can’t often bumble along and get the message across, and the facial expressions help you along so much. Try doing the same over the phone, and you don’t have a hope in hell. With a face you can see friendship, fear, humour, boredom and all the other emotions that make us human. Take that away and you might as well be talking to a robot.

I’ve even heard some Muslim saying the veil means they don’t have to worry about dealing with their appearance every morning, putting on the make up and deciding what to wear. Why don’t they just go out without make-up on then? Who is going to judge any less of you? Is it the men you so despise for their sexual advances? Do need feel you need to tart yourselves up for them, even though you claim you don’t want their attention? Or is it other women who will get bitchy over that frumpy woman with no make-up? Plenty of women can go out without putting make-up on, so why can’t you?

I’ve never read the Koran, so I can only take on what others have said about what it says over the veil. The general concensus is that only the hair needs to be covered. So where has this trend started amongst a growing minority (most don’t, they are still very rare) of Muslim women to use the veil now? Are the preachers and teachers in the mosques putting new spin on what the Koran says? If it driven by them, why are they doing this?

Feel free to wear a veil, but don’t whinge if you getting treated differently, it is your choice and nobody is making you wear it. I would expect to have the right to wear a pink rubber gimp suit, but I would anticipate to be treated differently as a result and have to live with that. By the way, I don’t!