Dilemma of French Muslims

[Storebought]

These are just a few stray thoughts about the ongoing issue with the Charlie Hebdo crisis that have been nagging me over the past few days.

I have a simple question to ask people who are (1) familiar with Islam, and who aren't MINOs, and (2) familiar with the intricacy of French law, which as a civil code system has little resemblance to anything effective in the US or the UK:

How can French Muslims participate -- assimilate -- in a Republican system that is by constitution secular without themselves falling into apostasy, which is unacceptable to them?

Republican France is constructed by law and mores to prevent the free, or even muted expression (I experienced this first hand in Paris -- and I am not in any sense religious) of any religious impulse, as religion itself (as I have read it in French-language blogs) is thought the enemy of reason and consequently the enemy of the state. Mind you, this was because the old Bourbon monarchy in France was bound up within Catholicism -- the King himself was 'most-Christian' and his coronation was a priestly ordination as well. It didn't help matters that Roman Catholicism itself for two centuries afterwards willingly used itself as a cat's paw for all and sundry secular philosophies whose goal was to destroy the state.

The tools/weapons/laws that French secularists have developed to prevent the return of state Catholicism is now deployed against Islam, which no one can mistake for a state religion in France (or Algeria).

It is too much to ask France to modify laicite. But at the same time I refuse to accept simple answers that six million people, give or take, be compelled to abandon their beliefs as a precondition for citizenship. Not even Stalin made such a gross demand on Muslims in Soviet times.

The fact that France doesn't have a Muslim equivalent of a Bernard-Henri Levy, or even a Fareed Zakaria, to argue on every talk show that Islam is (somehow??) compatible with republican values and that French Muslims have no intention of bringing Sharia into the country does not help matters. One can go on why that is the case, but that is for later discussion.

You can dismiss this as concern trolling for my part -- but I am writing this at 4 AM on a Sunday morning, so take that for what you will.

[Antonio the Sixth]

France has no doubt made many mistakes in attempting to enforce secularism in recent years. The niqab ban was pretty stupid and contributed to alienating a good number of Muslims. I'm more conflicted on the 2004 law on religious signs at school (because come on, public school is not the place to express your religious beliefs) but in practice its enforcement had to be problematic.

The core of the issue, of course, is the fact that many politicians use secularism as a pretense to stigmatize Muslims and stir up hatred against them. And of course these politicians are the same who criticize secularism when it goes against their ultra-Catholic buddies... So the problem isn't really with secularism as much as it is with xenophobia.

[politicus]

In principle: When the Catholic church is able to exist in France without becoming CINOs, so should Muslims. I know its not that simple, but part of the answer lays in a transition to a form of Euro-Islam. Unreformed Islam will inevitably collide with French secularism.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Islam

[ingemann]

I really don't see the difference for Muslim between living under a aggressive secular state like France or living in other European states, with their official or semi-official religion. For a Muslim for who the issue means a lot, it's just as bad to live in either states.

I don't really think Islamic terror in  Europe can be explained with the country, they live in, instead I would look at the original nationality of the terrorists families. You find relative few Turk, Kurds, Bosniak, Albanians and Iranians among them, instead Arabs, Somalians and Pakistanians are overrepresented.

So I think putting the blame on France versus other European countries for the terror attack, I think is the wrong conclusion.   

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

I really don't see the difference for Muslim between living under a aggressive secular state like France or living in other European states, with their official or semi-official religion. For a Muslim for who the issue means a lot, it's just as bad to live in either states.

That really doesn't follow. All those other countries don't have the same policies or cultures that France does. An officially Protestant country with tepid treatment of public expression of other religions is most certainly not just as bad as an officially secular country with hostile treatment of public expression of almost any religion, especially if said hostility is selectively deployed against religious minorities.

[anvi]

How can French Muslims participate -- assimilate -- in a Republican system that is by constitution secular without themselves falling into apostasy, which is unacceptable to them?

I'm quite unable to address all the complexities of this problem, or maybe even some of its basics.  But one possible answer from a jurisprudential perspective for Muslims might partly depend on how one understands the contours of dar al' amm.  If Muslims can be allowed to peaceably live in a country where they are not prevented from practicing Islam, then those schools of jurisprudence that recognized this category of the "house of safety" would expect Muslims who lived in such a place to in turn be law-abiding citizens of the country that gave them such protections.  But then the tricky issue would be identifying what constitutes the practice of Islam.  Certainly the freedom of religious association and expression would be required to meet the standards of dar al' amm, but if those requirements included the wearing of certain kinds of apparel, ect., then the problem becomes thornier, and presents a challenge to non-Mulsim countries to accommodate the needs of believers.  Obviously, the relevant issues go far beyond the confines of mere jurisprudence and involve ethnicity, historical factors, social tensions and so on.  But there are at least recognizable and precedented religious grounds for Muslims not to be pressed into choosing between fidelity to Sharia and religious struggle.  

[politicus]

I really don't see the difference for Muslim between living under a aggressive secular state like France or living in other European states, with their official or semi-official religion. For a Muslim for who the issue means a lot, it's just as bad to live in either states.

That really doesn't follow. All those other countries don't have the same policies or cultures that France does. An officially Protestant country with tepid treatment of public expression of other religions is most certainly not just as bad as an officially secular country with hostile treatment of public expression of almost any religion, especially if it's selectively deployed against religious minorities.

A country with an established church is not necessarily so bad for religious minorities. In Denmark Muslim private schools can get 75% of their expenses covered by the state under the free school legislation (provided they meet a certain standard and teach general subjects). That would be unthinkable in France (or the US for that matter). The fact that one denomination gets supported by the state tends to create pressure for other denominations to be supported as well (although on a much lower level). So it creates discrimination, but not suppression.

[swl]

How can French Muslims participate -- assimilate -- in a Republican system that is by constitution secular without themselves falling into apostasy, which is unacceptable to them?

I think you exaggerate the problem, the large majority of Muslims does not ask itself these existential questions. In my opinion if you solve the social issue (many say that in the ghettos you have two options: drug trafficking or religion) you have solved 90% of the problem.

[DemPGH]

I don't know that there's a dilemma. France is a first world secular democracy, so criticism or lampooning of religion is perfectly acceptable as a means of expression. I think at some level you have to adjust to that! You're in a country that permits that! I would never go to a third world religious dictatorship, on the other hand. Because I would assume that it would not take long for me to end up in jail or, more likely, dead. So, I think you have you to be responsible and take that into consideration. Banning something like the burqa, for instance, or lampooning religion, is not something anyone in a first world democracy should be worried about.  

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

Banning something like the burqa....is not something anyone in a first world democracy should be worried about.  

Why not?

[Storebought]

I really don't see the difference for Muslim between living under a aggressive secular state like France or living in other European states, with their official or semi-official religion. For a Muslim for who the issue means a lot, it's just as bad to live in either states.

That really doesn't follow. All those other countries don't have the same policies or cultures that France does. An officially Protestant country with tepid treatment of public expression of other religions is most certainly not just as bad as an officially secular country with hostile treatment of public expression of almost any religion, especially if it's selectively deployed against religious minorities.

A country with an established church is not necessarily so bad for religious minorities. In Denmark Muslim private schools can get 75% of their expenses covered by the state under the free school legislation (provided they meet a certain standard and teach general subjects). That would be unthinkable in France (or the US for that matter). The fact that one denomination gets supported by the state tends to create pressure for other denominations to be supported as well (although on a much lower level). So it creates discrimination, but not suppression.

I often thought that, at least in Europe, this was the better option as far as assimilating Muslim citizens. State support of mosques would as least entail state officials forming a relationship, if not full state oversight, of their imams and their messages/sermons.

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That may have been the case a generation ago, but the Muslims adopting Islamism as an ideology however one defines it are moving up, or rather past, their original cohorts of felons and reform schoolers.

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Most French Muslims are French citizens, and recent Muslim immigrants to France tend to be from Francophone nations, so this isn't a matter of lack of familiarity with western liberalism or secularism as may be the case with Muslim asylum seekers in Scandinavia or Germany.

The expression of anticlericalism that is tolerated -- state-sanctioned, really -- in France goes much farther than in every other European country. This is significant because France, compared to the US,  in most respects places greater practical limits on freedom of expression than us, especially when related to publishable works:

(in French)

From Charlie to Dieudonne: How far can freedom of expression go?

According to that article, religion itself may be criticized, but the members of a religion cannot be. I honestly don't see how this can be done except by identifying and distorting a composite (less politely, a stereotype) of the most visible members of the religion as religion itself, in a way that is intended to defame them all. This is especially comical since the images used to caricature Islam (...but not Muslims...), such as black-shrouded women and Kalashnikov-wielding men with unwashed beards, are, as you point out, already illegal in France. Yet, mocking the salient personalities behind the growth of militant Islam in France or in north Africa and Arabia, is illegal in France, too.

You end up with the curious situation that the beliefs of 2-6 million people (we only have estimates for the number of Muslims in France) are lampooned but the people responsible for creating their bad image aren't.

Furthermore, Islamophobia, as such, is not a crime under French law:

(in French)

Is Islamophobia punishable by law?

This is logical since, of course, there is no law against blasphemy or apostasy or "giving offense" by airing criticism of religious attitudes in a country with no state religion. But no one is naive enough to accept that airing criticism of Islam does not entail venting prejudice against Muslims in general, since the former is legally protected and the latter isn't. CH may have made pains to distinguish between their hatred (the correct word) for Islam with respect for Muslims themselves, but most commenters on Islam in France aren't so equitable.

I understand how French Muslims, who have been taught the values of the Republic near from infancy, can take exception to this.

[Antonio the Sixth]

The expression of anticlericalism that is tolerated -- state-sanctioned

lolno. Wake up dude, we're not in 1905 anymore. Actually, the French State is waaay nicer toward the Catholic Church than it should be, and the discourse of right-wing politicians has increasingly religious undertones (see Sarkozy's Lateran speech in 2007).

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No, that's not how it works. You have it completely backwards. While it is true that you can construct a stereotype out of the religion (isn't all caricature based on stereotyping anyway?) you cannot use stereotypes to stigmatize all the followers of a religion without risking a trial for hate crime. On the contrary, you absolutely can satirize Islamist leaders or generic Islamists (ie, proponents of a certain political ideology). In fact, probably about two thirds of Charlie Hebdo's supposed "caricatures on Islam" were actually caricatures of radical islamist figures or ideas. You have to get better information if you really wish to formulate some grand theory on French policy.

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Yeah, but what do you want to do? Ban legitimate criticism of religion on the pretext that it might be used as a code-word for racism?

[swl]

According to that article, religion itself may be criticized, but the members of a religion cannot be. I honestly don't see how this can be done except by identifying and distorting a composite (less politely, a stereotype) of the most visible members of the religion as religion itself, in a way that is intended to defame them all.

I guess you can do for example that by taking the Coran and criticizing what's in it, like you would do for the Bible, the Capital, the Republic or any other book or religious/philosophical/political nature.

[DemPGH]

Banning something like the burqa....is not something anyone in a first world democracy should be worried about.  

Why not?

A number of reasons, but chiefly two:

It's easily among the greatest and most sinister symbols of oppression in the modern world. It could be used to conceal contraband and so forth as well. I would happily support a burqa ban.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

Banning something like the burqa....is not something anyone in a first world democracy should be worried about. 

Why not?

A number of reasons, but chiefly two:

It's easily among the greatest and most sinister symbols of oppression in the modern world.

I'm not sure I'm willing to concede that that's a legitimate reason, mainly because I'm not sure whether or not I'm willing to concede that it's semiotically accurate.

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That is definitely a legitimate reason, and can be argued for.

It should however be remembered that a lot of the people clamoring for these bans want them to extend not only to burqas but to niqabs and in some cases even hijabs as well, banning which would be not only clearly anti-Muslim but also arguably anti-feminist.

In any case, what was being argued wasn't that this would be potentially good and reasonable policy--which, again, can be argued for--but that nobody should have any reason to be skeptical of it, which I think is ridiculous.

[afleitch]

It should however be remembered that a lot of the people clamoring for these bans want them to extend not only to burqas but to niqabs and in some cases even hijabs as well, banning which would be not only clearly anti-Muslim but also arguably anti-feminist.

The problem is that the hijab and the niqab are essentially 'cultural' dress, not religious. There is no requirement in Islam to wear them. They are essentially Arabian garb and are in many ways (as most intrusions into Islam are generally Saudi these days anyway) now usurp traditional forms of more fluid and more practical dress such as the salwar kameez. Everything is 'immodest' in comparison to the hijab and niqab and so it essentially becomes a race to the bottom. Given that the pursuit of 'modesty' is patriarchal, I don't see how opposing every facet of a woman's identity as a human being being covered up is anti-feminist. I think that the facial obliteration as a result of extreme facial coverings is actually a very anti-human thing to do on the basis that we communicate through our faces and pick up cues that way. It also impedes conversation for those who have to rely on these cues, from children to those with hearing impairments more than others to actually communicate at all.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

The first thing to note about the hijab and niqab is that it often (not always, perhaps not even most of the time) genuinely is a personal choice to wear one, as opposed to the burqa, of which to the best of my knowledge that's (outside already extraordinarily conservative Muslim countries) very seldom the case. The second thing to note is that the reason why many women choose to do so--this is something that Muslim women I know have told me personally--is feminist, or at least proto-feminist since this rationale wasn't originally developed in cultures in which feminism was conceptually present, in that it's concerned with averting or deflecting the male gaze (whether this is the effect that it has is a separate question). This isn't a form of feminism for which I expect the sex-positive liberal feminists of Atlas Forum to have much sympathy, but it is a feminist idea nonetheless.

This isn't to say that wearing it is generally 'a feminist choice' (and yes, I do think that there are such things as feminist choices and non-feminist choices, which is why I didn't just end this post after the first sentence), but it is to say that prohibiting it would be removing what is a feminist choice for many people. Again, what's being discussed here isn't just discouraging certain types of dress, or opposing or lamenting their intrusion into cultural spheres in which they weren't previously present, it's banning them. Prohibiting them from being worn under penalty of law. In general I think that passing laws about how women can and cannot dress should be presumed anti-feminist. Which obviously means that requiring hijab or niqab is also anti-feminist, indeed much more obviously so.

Impeding communication especially for children and the hard-of-hearing is a genuinely good reason to consider wearing facial coverings a bad idea, but the idea that they're, in other ways, 'anti-human' would seem to rely on assumptions about what is and isn't characteristic of 'humanity' that it does not strike me as rational to expect everybody in a pluralistic society to share. Especially since there are also issues of post-colonial identity involved.

[politicus]

When grouping traditional Muslim female dress it should be burqa/niqab and hijab. The hijab is not destroying the individuality of the person in any way, whereas the two other clothings do. A woman wearing a hijab is still fully recognizable as an individual with facial expressions and mimic.

In general I think that passing laws about how women can and cannot dress should be presumed anti-feminist. Which obviously means that requiring hijab or niqab is also anti-feminist, indeed much more obviously so.

I would generally agree with that, but the niqab crosses a line - having the entire woman covered (and hidden) in cloth apart from her eyes is an unacceptable symbol of female submission, no matter how the women wearing it interpret it themselves.

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In a European context there are clear limits to how pluralistic society can realistically get. Any functioning compromise between immigrant cultures and the aboriginal European population must be mainly on the terms of the latter. Expecting full equality between different cultures is never gong to work in Europe with its well established ethnically based national cultures. Some things are "over the line" and the niqab is one of them.  

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Being from a former colony and an oppressed people shouldn't give you special rights in other parts of the world.

Even if you think it should, large parts of Europe played no role in colonialism. Other parts played a diminutive role. Should we then have different standards in Finland and France because the latter was a major colonial power and the former a colonized people themselves?

[Storebought]

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lolno. Wake up dude, we're not in 1905 anymore. Actually, the French State is waaay nicer toward the Catholic Church than it should be, and the discourse of right-wing politicians has increasingly religious undertones (see Sarkozy's Lateran speech in 2007).[/quote]

That only reflects the cozy, and likely corrupt, relationship between traditionalist and right-wing politicians and bureaucrats to the Catholic Church, not towards religion in general. That might be more an expression of growing reactionary sentiment in France, seen amongst Muslims themselves, but I don't see how Muslims necessarily "benefit" from that.

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No, that's not how it works. You have it completely backwards. While it is true that you can construct a stereotype out of the religion (isn't all caricature based on stereotyping anyway?) you cannot use stereotypes to stigmatize all the followers of a religion without risking a trial for hate crime. On the contrary, you absolutely can satirize Islamist leaders or generic Islamists (ie, proponents of a certain political ideology). In fact, probably about two thirds of Charlie Hebdo's supposed "caricatures on Islam" were actually caricatures of radical islamist figures or ideas. You have to get better information if you really wish to formulate some grand theory on French policy.[/quote]

My contention is that the images used to illustrate the absurdities of Islam as religion or a belief system come from the stereotypes and cliches themselves, and using figures clearly meant to depict Muhammad himself as the stand-in for this sort of "Islam" (1.5 billion people) contradicts the statement of yours that I highlighted. This is a satire that paints with a very broad brush.

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Yeah, but what do you want to do? Ban legitimate criticism of religion on the pretext that it might be used as a code-word for racism?
[/quote]

The popular discourse used to criticize Islam isn't a patient, or even impassioned, refutation of the interpretations of the Koran or hadiths that radical clerics use to foment violence (a poster mentioned that earlier in this thread -- if only that were the case). Instead, it uses "sociological" arguments suggesting that Islamic (mal)education, or anti-westernism, or something like it, hinders Muslim assimilation into society (an argument that I don't accept in the slightest), which then escalates into "Why are you all so foreign?" -- why do you people keep your women in shrouds?, why do your kids leave school so early and just smoke hashish all day?, and then turn to Islam when they stop? .. etc. Discussions about Islam in the abstract degenerate into thinly veiled screeds on why those types are even in the country at all. Crude caricatures and sweeping generalities from people like Levy will not be the spark that leads to fruitful debate.

I read what anvi wrote about the different schools of Islamic thought hold different views of the degree of assimilation into a non-Muslim nation, but

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In both France and north Africa generation ago, Muslim women were seen walking bare-headed through the streets, and only the older women kept themselves mostly covered -- and even then, not to the extent seen in modern Saudi Arabia or the Gulf states. Something has changed between then and now, but I really refuse to accept the argument that Muslims are now adopting a strain of Islam so fundamental and fanatic (even when not outwardly violent) that it makes assimilation into their host nations impossible. That's the argument that every neocon has made since 2000.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

NOTE TO POSTERS WHO ACCUSE ME OF 'WALKING BACK' THINGS I SAY: I AM GOING TO BE MODIFYING MY POSITION ON A POLITICAL ISSUE IN THIS POST BECAUSE OTHER POSTERS HAVE CONVINCED ME THAT AN ASPECT OR ASPECTS OF MY PREVIOUS POSITION WAS OR WERE BASED ON INCOMPLETE INFORMATION AND/OR FAULTY MORALS.

When grouping traditional Muslim female dress it should be burqa/niqab and hijab. The hijab is not destroying the individuality of the person in any way, whereas the two other clothings do. A woman wearing a hijab is still fully recognizable as an individual with facial expressions and mimc.

You're right, this is a much better distinction to draw. Although I should point out that the mental image of the garment that I had in mind when I was using the word 'niqab' in the above post was what's apparently called the 'half-niqab', which looks sort of like a one-hole ski mask, as opposed to the full niqab which covers just as much of the face as a burqa does.

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I agree with you--I find hijab more or less completely unobjectionable but full niqab uncanny and difficult to interpret as potentially 'feminist' no matter how hard I try--I'm just not willing to trust that aversion to the point of making public policy based on it. (Strong social and cultural discouragement, however, absolutely!) '[N]o matter how the women wearing it interpret it themselves' is...I guess in principle it shouldn't be hard for me to accept that, because I've made the same argument about other issues, but in this particular case I just have trouble being comfortable with it. Assuming that the source of that discomfort could be identified and alleviated, I guess I could be convinced to accept the bona fides of the laws about this sort of thing that have been passed in France and Belgium and the Netherlands (although they'd be blatantly unconstitutional in the United States, and although fining the women wearing the clothing strikes me as a weird enforcement mechanism if the rationale for the ban is liberal and feminist rather than discriminatory. Totally support fining people who force others to wear face coverings and throwing them in the slammer to cool their heels for a year, though), but I'd still find the laws that obtain in Turkey and apparently also used to obtain in Tunisia under Ben Ali, and those that were proposed in Quebec a couple of years ago, completely unacceptable and morally wrong.

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There were two things that I came up with in response to this and I can't decide which I'd rather say, so I'll just present them both.

1: I understand why you'd say this, and I don't think it's an ipso facto racist argument, but it still makes me uncomfortable--call it American chauvinism, I guess.
2: That doesn't sound morally right, but I don't know enough about Europe to dispute it.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Madeleine, I'm generally in agreement with your position, but you lost me with this:

The second thing to note is that the reason why many women choose to do so--this is something that Muslim women I know have told me personally--is feminist, or at least proto-feminist since this rationale wasn't originally developed in cultures in which feminism was conceptually present, in that it's concerned with averting or deflecting the male gaze (whether this is the effect that it has is a separate question). This isn't a form of feminism for which I expect the sex-positive liberal feminists of Atlas Forum to have much sympathy, but it is a feminist idea nonetheless.

As a non-"sex-positive" feminist, I have just say that I honestly can't believe you're actually making that argument. Your knowledge of feminist theory probably surpasses mine, so please enlighten me if there's something I'm missing, but right now I'm really confused.

Women adopting a certain clothing code in order to avoid the male gaze is the exact opposite of a feminist behavior - it is a way of ratifying patriarchal oppression as the "normal" order of things. Rather than actively combating it, it implies that women should adapt to it and limit the range of their possible choices in order to try and avoid its nastiest consequences. It's the exact same logic that operates when a woman fears that if she dresses too provocatively, she will get raped. Feminism is about eradicating the beliefs and behaviors that sustain patriarchy, not about changing women's behavior to adapt to it.

Note that I'm not arguing that this necessarily a bad thing (you do have to acknowledge reality even if it's unpleasant and you wish to change it). But calling it a form of feminism honestly strikes me as an insult to feminist thought.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

Madeleine, I'm generally in agreement with your position, but you lost me with this:

The second thing to note is that the reason why many women choose to do so--this is something that Muslim women I know have told me personally--is feminist, or at least proto-feminist since this rationale wasn't originally developed in cultures in which feminism was conceptually present, in that it's concerned with averting or deflecting the male gaze (whether this is the effect that it has is a separate question). This isn't a form of feminism for which I expect the sex-positive liberal feminists of Atlas Forum to have much sympathy, but it is a feminist idea nonetheless.

As a non-"sex-positive" feminist, I have just say that I honestly can't believe you're actually making that argument. Your knowledge of feminist theory probably surpasses mine, so please enlighten me if there's something I'm missing, but right now I'm really confused.

This isn't my own argument; I made a deliberate choice to uncritically parrot it from the Muslim feminist acquaintances I initially heard it from.

I'll try to defend it from my own feminist perspective, but since I'm actually pretty skeptical of it personally (the deciding factor in my own opinions on this is the religious liberty side of things, not the ostensibly-feminist side of things), I might not do the best job of it.

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The idea, as I understand it, is that consciously adopting it as an aversive or diversionary mechanism is a feminist choice relative to the most obvious or easiest perceived alternatives, not that it's a feminist choice in that it represents a positive movement towards a feminist society (essentially, that it prevents losses rather than making or solidifying gains). It's, yes, difficult to the point of absurdity to argue that much of anything that focuses on, essentially, employing smoke and mirrors to make the male gaze go somewhere else (see below for my take on the very unfortunate likely accidental outcome of this; it's the second of a list of three objections to the argument that I'm about to make next) could possibly constitute an actual amelioration of the real problem.

There's also--and I personally think this is a more convincing argument than what I outlined in the first sentence of the preceding paragraph, although it still has by my count three noteworthy flaws, the second of which in particular is really hard to get past--a certain aggressiveness inherent in consciously doing something to circumscribe one's being from public availability or availability to men. This could be understood as a form of separatist feminism, even. There's an entire genre of Japanese Buddhist anecdotes about women who become nuns (and thus shave their heads) or dress in offputting and outrageous manners or, in extreme cases, scar themselves in order to make themselves as unappealing to men as humanly possible.

The flaws in this argument are:

1. It might not actually succeed in making one less appealing to men.
2. If it does succeed, that male gaze is just going to go elsewhere, so this essentially becomes a form of the 'if he's going to rape somebody, make sure it's somebody else' sensibility, which is an unbelievably terrible outcome.
3. Most feminists who are also devout Muslims would probably not classify themselves as separatist feminists anyway.

It's not hard to imagine a way of applying this theory that avoids these problems, but since that way involves enormous numbers of people simultaneously deciding to adopt the dress code of a minority religion as an act of organized political defiance, it's probably best not to hold our breaths.

[Antonio the Sixth]

I understand the point you're trying to make, and I do agree that in some situations adopting a non-revealing clothing might indeed objectively improve the position of women and constitute a deliberate assault on male entitlement. I think that the issue is that my definition of feminism might be slightly more theoretically specific. In my view, a "feminist act" refers to an act that either constitutes a symbolic challenge to patriarchy (which implies active rejection of the patriarchal system rather than merely coping with it) or actively contributes to undermine patriarchy's material or ideological foundations. The act of wearing a hijab to avoid the male gaze strikes me, if not actively pro-patriarchal (for the reasons that you have yourself outlined), at best neutral. Which, again, doesn't mean that it cannot represent an improvement on women's conditions in some circumstances. Sometimes reconciling theory and practice is a really complex exercise.

But regardless, I do agree with your general point on religious expression. While I would welcome a world where burqas and niqabs didn't exist and hijabs were nothing more than a piece of clothing, I highly doubt that we can advance toward such a world by banning the former, and obviously not by banning the latter.

[politicus]

Personality on display


Personality disguised

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

In my view, a "feminist act" refers to an act that either constitutes a symbolic challenge to patriarchy (which implies active rejection of the patriarchal system rather than merely coping with it) or actively contributes to undermine patriarchy's material or ideological foundations.

I do have a lot of sympathy for the notion that the general principle of using sartorial choices to offend male sensibilities or male entitlement and to deflect or confuse the male gaze can, in fact, constitute just such a symbolic challenge. I'm just not sure that this is in fact a case of that for most people. (I know anecdotally that for at least a few women it is but the plural of anecdote is not et cetera.)