“Some might argue that precedent for banning the burka exists. We already have laws restricting what people can wear — for example, you have to wear a helmet while riding a bike. This argument is flawed, however. People have to wear helmets for safety reasons.There is no threat to public safety or the safety of the woman who chooses to wear a burka. There are certain circumstances in which wearing a burka should not be allowed, particularly when it is necessary to see a person’s face at a bank, while voting or when having a picture taken for a driver’s license or passport photo. But at other times, it shouldn’t matter whether or not a woman wears a burka.”—
UVictoria The Martlet | Burka ban: oppression in disguise
Nov 4, 2010
(This is going to be long, so feel free to skip over it. In addition, it was written in 15 minutes, so feel free to offer your critiques.)
Two lines in this article that I have serious issues with: ”The French government is oppressing women by limiting their ability to express themselves.” & “Many women choose to wear the burka as a way to express their faith”
It is hardly oppression to ask someone who has immigrated to your country to live by your customs. Canadians like to believe that our version of multiculturalism is the most correct way, but the idea that it’s offensive for a government to ask women not to wear an item that is a tool of oppression is patently false. Let us not forget that women worldwide are raped, stoned and more for having the nerve to show their faces in public. If a government is not able to take symbolic action, what help can should we demand from them in the larger picture?
Secondly, the burka is not an article of the Muslim faith. Women certainly might embrace it as a part of their heritage or in a (misguided) attempt at modesty for religious reasons, but this should not be confused with the idea that the burka itself is part of the Muslim faith. It’s not. Don’t believe me? Listen to what the French Council of the Muslim Faith has to say about it.
What I am willing to concede is that policies like these have to potential to stigmatize entire groups of people, and that they are unenforceable. I’ll even go one further and argue that they’re counter-productive. (And, as NBC shows, they’re not working.)
The issue, then, is not one of oppression, but whether or not the state should have the ability to interfere with a person’s right to wear a particular piece of clothing. Funnily enough, the author ignores the fact that society is already ok with laws that give the state the power to enforce the way we dress, like fines for public indecency. (She mentions safety regulations, which are only tangentially related to this debate; bike helmets are to burkas what seat belt laws are to tinted windows.)
So the question we must ask ourselves is whether or not we’re ok with the state prescribing limits to what we can - or cannot - wear. And that question is one which I suspect we are not ready to answer.
