Gah. It’s not like Sarkozy is suggesting that these women prance around in a halter top. You mean to tell me that these women are so modest that showing even their face in public is to them equal to going out “naked”? If so, then that tells me a lot about the indoctrination of females in the Muslim world who consider the Burka perfectly fine.
Shit, sorry, my bad. I’ve confused the burqa with the niqab. Scratch what I said about knowing single women who wear it.
Still, what I said about the abuse stands. Sarkozy is attacking the symbol not the problem. This is stupid and counterproductive. If he wants to combat oppression, why not go after the men with new laws instead of the women? Or is attacking oppressive men a bit too hard for the French parliament?
Thank you for putting the issue in a useful perspective. The government mandating women wear few clothes for religious reasons would be stupid, but mandating they not wear too many clothes is much more reasonable, and may even be a stroke of genius.
And that’s why your opinion should have the weight of law behind it?
No, really, explain why this is something that needs to be outlawed. Per CNN, French lawmakers are debating whether or not women wearing a burka threatens the secularity of the French constitution. Mull over the stupidity if you have a minute. Sarkozy, at least, was more honest in saying it’s just “not welcome.”
Of course it isn’t. But that’s not the OP. The OP is about forbidding women from wearing it. And if you forbid them from wearing it, what will be next?
I have mulled it over Marley. Too bad my opinion differs than yours. Or maybe I have more respect for women than you. Again, let’s take a poll of these women and see what they think about the issue. If they talk to a reporter and end up with a black eye for their trouble then that is perfectly fine, right?
And yes in this case I have no problem with the rule of law coming down on wearing the Burka. Maybe Sarkozy can compromise and have the women wear a little patch that says something like “I wear this Burka of my own free will”
I admit that this isn’t the most rational post ever Marley but this subject really gets my blood boiling.
In light of the persistant political protests in Iran and recent speculation that female protesters actually outnumber men, young and old, I wonder what makes Iran so different from other middle east muslim countries, Turkey excepted.
Could it be the period under the Shah when the veil was banned ? Could that be when Iranian women tasted liberation ?
The burka is a tool of sexual slavery. It has no place in an enlightened society.
You’ve got less.
Who said it’s fine? I criticized the custom. I think it’s one of the more extreme examples in a millennia-long history of patriarchal religions treating women like property at best and unreliable temptresses at worst. The fact remains that people’s stupid religions are their own business. And some people do choose to wear these things [they believe that if they’re wearing the veil, they’re judged by their character rather than their appearance, for example]
Foolproof! Nobody could ever forge a patch, and we all agree the most important thing is that your judgment is satisfied; other people’s lives and religions are a trifle. :rolleyes:
If you don’t mind, maybe you can make a list of stuff that gets your blood boiling and the government can just ban it. That’ll fix everything.
Or how about a small yellow star? :rolleyes:
I find that in the UK the people who are most in favour of the State telling women what to wear are also those most against smoking bans and other attempts at social control. Funny that.
Again though, how would eliminating the burqa stop the abuse? How would it change the problems of abusive men? What makes you think that the burqa causes the problem?
You know what gets my blood boiling, gravity? The belief that if you can’t see something, it doesn’t exist.
It’s the problem with individual iberty - you have to give people the freedom to choose to be oppressed, even if you hate the choices they make.
By the time someone has got to adulthood, banning a particular style of dress isn’t going to do anything regarding an attitude that accepts patriachal societal structures. The solution is to work on those attitudes, and you are probably going to have to do something much more radical. Such as requiring all children to be educated in state run schools.
Not allowing the Burka would make it a little harder to hide said black eye for one. I was joking about the stupid patch. Jesus Christ. See, I can say that without fear of the Catholics coming to my door and chopping my hands off for typing that.
Why all of this tolerance for a barbaric form of Islam anyway? I have no problem with the Muslim religion at all, much of it is admirable, so don’t try to label me as some right wing nut bar.
I also notice that some here have no problem with the government stepping in on the abortion issue but are outraged that the government would have the gall to suggest that maybe some of these women don’t want to wear the Burka. Lets ask them and find out.
Hardly an issue for you, if the burqa is a sign of oppression and abuse. In fact, going by what you’ve written, taking away the burqa will hide the symptoms of abuse, seeing as how not all abused women have bruises on their faces. I’ll say it again: Outlawing the burqa comes down to “If I don’t see it, it doesn’t exist.”
I don’t like it any more than you do. Still, if France is going to be passing laws trying to stop women from being abused, maybe it should concentrate on . . . actual abuse, rather than making articles of clothing illegal? Just a thought.
Pull the other one.
The abortion thread is over there ------------>
This is a thread about burqas (burqae? burqi?).
The government isn’t suggesting that the women don’t want to wear the burqa. It’s trying to outlaw the burqa. What part of this don’t you get?
I’d tend to say this would cause more problems, rather than less. For one thing, you can’t force people to change their minds through banning, it just makes them annoyed, and you certainly can’t do it by changing the outward signs of it. Ban something outright and the demand will go up tenfold even if people didn’t give a shit about it before; ban something people care about already and you’ve got problems on your hands.
And of course there’s the problem that removing one outlet of a particular viewpoint will more than likely simply mean those who wish to oppress will elect to do so in other ways. And, of course, punish following the law anyway. I can understand the reasoning behind it, but it’s really the wrong way to go about it. Oh, and I can say “Muhammad” without fear of Muslims coming to my door and chopping my hands off, too. Yay me, I guess.
It’s usually difficult to find imaginary black eyes.
So far, your arguments have been so poor that I couldn’t tell.
I think that’s been explained pretty well already.
I am sure some of them don’t want to wear it. I wish that didn’t happen, but they do have the right to leave their husbands. But why should those women who do want to wear it be barred by law from doing so? That doesn’t solve the problem.
I’m afraid to ask what this has to do with abortion, so I won’t.
The burqa is heavily used in Afganistan, where it is a tool of female oppression (not sexual slavery). But Afgani women had a lot of freedom 30 or 40 years ago.
The thing is we aren’t talking about banning the burqa in Afganistan. We are talking about banning it in France, where I believe women have pretty much equal rights within French society.
A lot of 2nd generation feminists believe that high heels have no place in an enlightened society. They serve no practical purpose, are hard to walk in - perhaps even unhealthy. They limit movement. They are tools of men to enforce their sexualized view of women on us. And I’m currently wearing the cutest pair of two and a half inch heeled open toe slingbacks.
I’m not sure how the state limiting what a woman is allowed to wear increases her freedom.
This story would seem to indicate otherwise.
Maybe not. InVA, NC, and SC it’s illegal to wear a mask in public. I think a garment that covers the face with only the eyes exposed would qualify.
That’s not intended to apply here, and if a woman wearing a veil were charged under a law like that, the city would end up facing a civil rights lawsuit.
In Michigan ,we had a problem when some Arab women wanted to wear veils or Burqas for drivers license or ID photos. That was hard to defend. Yet many of the women felt only the husband was allowed to see their faces. But as an ID, a covered photo would be useless. There are limits .
You know, if I thought passing a law against wearing a burka would in any way actually make life better for Muslim women in France, I’d consider supporting it.
Yes, the burqa is a tool of oppression. No, it has nothing to do with Islam. It’s an artifact of several misogynistic cultures and societies.
The trouble is, pulling the burqa off women doesn’t set them free. It doesn’t even grant them a reprieve. It means nothing unless the women in question pull their own burqas off and refuse to wear them.