France MPs' report backs Muslim face veil ban

[Kuya]

Yes, but you're not just saying it's a tool of oppresion, you're also saying it should be banned. So any muslim woman who wants to use the veil outside her home is going to be denied that ability by people who seem to assume she is being oppressed. I do not think it is hard to look for women such as these. Google around, there must be some forum somewhere.

[Plow]

This is a common argument. If presented with an ideal opprotunity to discuss the matter with a woman who was wearing the veil because she was making a conscious choice without absolutely any outside pressure including family, I would happily take it. Presenting the case of using clothing as a tool of oppression does not also make you an oppressor. The choice to wear such clothing is still there, however, the requirement to wear them at all times should not be.

You do realize that this is about *taking away that choice*, right?

[aduidarnenye]

Yes, but you're not just saying it's a tool of oppresion, you're also saying it should be banned. So any muslim woman who wants to use the veil outside her home is going to be denied that ability by people who seem to assume she is being oppressed. I do not think it is hard to look for women such as these. Google around, there must be some forum somewhere.

You do realize that this is about *taking away that choice*, right?

Hmm, I think my point was more that although we, Westernised people, are also more accepting of a choice and believing that people are making that choice but, in general, women in cultures and communities that use this type of clothing do not have the same type of choice, either through cultural conditioning or community pressure. I am trying to say that I don't believe that there are that many Islamic women full educated on all aspects of their choice to wear full body veils that still choose to do so. Westerners tend to believe that other people think and react in the same way they do.

Of course, there probably are women who do make the choice, but I think they have the same attitude as women such as Phyllis Schlafly and Sarah Palin, who proselytize the stay-at-home nurturing mother ideal that never really existed in history.

In my opinion, religions are generally all crazy and have crazy things they do. I think that people can choose whatever religion they want to choose and celebrate it however they want, but in general I think there needs to be some kind of public-private separation.

I'm fine with Catholic priests wearing their cossacks and collars if they want to and they are required to within their religious celebrations and ceremonies, but they are also allowed to wear regular clothing outside of those. It seems a reasonable separation to me. Why is this different for one gender in Islamic (although generally the more fundamentalist parts)? If the women want to wear these clothing for religious ceremonies, that is fine. I have a problem when they are being simply defined as walking vaginas with no other identity by wearing these things at all times in public. I have a problem with women themselves defining themselves as nothing more than walking vaginas. It is an old truthism that women are their own worst enemies sometimes.

[Kuya]

If your position really is that these women are zombified or not informed enough to realize they are being exploited or controlled, then your agenda should be aiming towards informing these women. Reaching out to them. Your goal is a private one, thus it needs private methods, not public ones.

Using the government in the way you seem to want to use it is completely disproportionate to what you want to do. It uses a roundabout and blanket strategy for something that requires much more finesse. The intent should be to reach out to specific women, not strike all of them. Banning these veils everywhere except the private home is an overreaction, and it only gives off the appearance of antagonizing muslims, which is my main concern.

[aduidarnenye]

If your position really is that these women are zombified or not informed enough to realize they are being exploited or controlled, then your agenda should be aiming towards informing these women. Reaching out to them. Your goal is a private one, thus it needs private methods, not public ones.

Using the government in the way you seem to want to use it is completely disproportionate to what you want to do. It uses a roundabout and blanket strategy for something that requires much more finesse. The intent should be to reach out to specific women, not strike all of them. Banning these veils everywhere except the private home is an overreaction, and it only gives off the appearance of antagonizing muslims, which is my main concern.

Actually, I think I have stated in another thread (or maybe earlier in this thread, I cannot remember) that I actually do not support legal bans of clothing like this. Of course, I cannot also state I support the opposite either.

I think that in general it is a waste of time and resources to go after these things when there are more important issues to be dealt with. People, however, tend to make mountains out of mole hills.

I think that as more Middle Eastern people come to Western countries their children and grand-children and great-grand-children will move into a more Westernised type of thinking naturally, and abandon these traditional practices.

I believe that these types of laws arise because it seems, looking from one side, that Islam is growing massively fast and is going to out-populate Westerners very soon. More of them, less of us sort of thing.

I am unsure of how to combat that type of fear-mongering.

Also, if you really disagree with the morality of another based on your own morality I do not think you should be afraid to offend or antagonise them. It is like being told "Who are you to judge?" (a phrase oft used by my Born Again Christian relatives). Who are you to judge my judging?

[Kuya]

I meant antagonizing in the sense of islamophobia which to me is currently snowballing into quite the issue. Certainly, with the US and allies involved in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, threatening Iran, bombing Pakistan, supporting the dictator at Egypt and the monarchy at Saudi Arabia, while you have european countries banning veils, issues with minarets, well documented european apprehension of muslim immigrants, US paranoia of muslim people; all of this seems to create in the image of muslims the idea that the West is out to get them, and in turn, they react with hostility and the West takes this as proof of their barbarity.

[aduidarnenye]

I meant antagonizing in the sense of islamophobia which to me is currently snowballing into quite the issue. Certainly, with the US and allies involved in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, threatening Iran, bombing Pakistan, supporting the dictator at Egypt and the monarchy at Saudi Arabia, while you have european countries banning veils, issues with minarets, well documented european apprehension of muslim immigrants, US paranoia of muslim people; all of this seems to create in the image of muslims the idea that the West is out to get them, and in turn, they react with hostility and the West takes this as proof of their barbarity.

I guess I also fall victim to believing that people will think and react like myself. I should amend the idea to include people of my own culture and society.

Ah well, we can only hope for a world where these types of divisions, reactions, and violence stops. And one where women won't have to wear full body veils for any reason!