I was referring to viewpoints within Muslim communities, and more specifically to the American Muslim community, from which that article emerged.
The point is not freedom of choice, the point is analyzing the factors that go into people’s choices - from laws to cultural norms to history to politics religious obligations to identity to family and more - and get more information to do everything from making better-informed choices, to justifying unpopular choices, to advocating for changes in society, or to determining policy. It does no good to ignore history and context.
What I meant by saying that some people think the headscarf is “not good” is not that they think that there is something objectively wrong with wearing a cloth on one’s head, it’s that the self-identified American Muslim women who wrote that article have weighed these factors, judged them to be negative, and conclude that the headscarf as it exists and is regarded in Islam, perpetuates on-the-whole negative effects to the individual, to them and to society. I mentioned in my last post the problems that people in or connected to (particularly American) Islamic communities with sympathy for this viewpoint have, and the way their presence complicates sincere outsiders’ desire to show solidarity with the many American Muslim women who disagree, who may wear hijab, and who currently are the recipients of undeserved social stigma, prejudice, and bigotry.
I’ll take this chance to recommend Why the French Don’t Like Headscarves: Islam, the State, and Public Space by John Bowen for people with additional interest in this issue.
Then they should not wear them. And we should uphold their right to so choose.
I don’t see how women who choose not to wear hijab “complicate” gestures of solidarity with those to do. We agree that the latter should not be stigmatized and abused for it: that’s all that’s needed.
Yes, women make their choices for a variety of cultural and personal reasons. The point is, it is their choice. It is not for me, or you, or women who choose differently, to tell them what they’re allowed.
I interpreted the OP to be asking how best to uphold someone’s right to choose in this context.
I made the distinction between women who choose not to wear hijab and women who argue that the hijab is negative in some way. The point the women were making in the article was fairly clear -
They identified a movement in the Muslim community to make headscarves a religious obligation for Muslim women, and that they claim “promotes a social attitude that absolves men of sexually harassing women and puts the onus on the victim to protect herself by covering up.”
They made some arguments for why they were against this movement and why they saw the hijab as “a symbol of an interpretation of Islam we reject that believes that women are a sexual distraction to men, who are weak, and thus must not be tempted by the sight of our hair.”
They asked that non-Muslims not contribute to legitimizing this movement and in doing so define the Muslim woman in larger society as one who covers her hair. They also specifically stated that they are fighting for women to be able to choose to cover or not.
There are certainly many ways to criticize their argument, but just repeating “freedom of choice” is not a helpful one and good intentions are not enough.
Those factors do not just give women information to make a free and independent choice, they more often than not compel and pressure them toward specific choices. If the goal is free choice, then we should consider whether our actions are encouraging that or not.
You would be surprised at the level of stupidity some bigots display. I wear a head scarf sometimes (and some type of head covering all the time for religious reasons) and as I mentioned earlier I am sometimes, in cold climate, mistaken for Muslim. It doesn’t bother me. It’s an honest mistake. But what’s odd, really, really odd to me is when it happens it summer. My traditions make no requirements to cover areas of the upper body like arms and shoulders, so if it’s hot there’s probably a lot skin exposed. How headscarf paired with a tank top equals possible ISIS terrorist in some bigots mind is a level of stupid I can’t comprehend.
And this is where they are most critically mistaken. A scattering of non-Muslim women who oppose bigotry by wearing a scarf sometimes, does neither of those things.
Exactly so. And in this, a doctrine that women must not choose a certain garment is as much an enemy as a doctrine that they must.
Their argument is like telling women that they should not participate in a “slut walk,” because doing so legitimizes the idea that women are sluts. No. Talk about missing the point.
To the extent that it does anything at all, the biggest influence is in the way this is being portrayed in media and in community narratives. Based on my experience with this issue and on how the article has been received by American Muslim activists, I think the authors have a point that it plays into the larger narrative of conservatives who do want Muslim women to feel a religious and social obligation to wear a headscarf. Writing an article or responding to a thread to bring that up is not an inappropriate response.
An interesting book on the history of that conservative movement would be *A Quiet Revolution: The Veil’s Resurgence, From the Middle East to America *by feminist scholar Leila Ahmed.
It’s very unfortunate that the not-insignificant amount of Muslim women - or ex-Muslim women - who wear hijab because of family or community pressure exist in an awkward and invisible space. They often have the worst of things, since they are often disaffected from their communities AND have to deal with anti-Muslim bigots.
I think there are other “everyday” ways to show solidarity with hijabis that have a more positive effect, like treating them with respect and kindness like normal people, or like standing up to bigots when they reveal themselves. I would imagine many of the non-Muslim women who would wear a headscarf and publicize it as an act of solidarity do this already, and they should be applauded for it.
Saying 'If you want to help us, don’t do that because it is not helping us" is not the same as saying “must not”. Criticizing something is not the same as advocating for banning it, just like praising something does not mean wanting to require it.
Actually, feminists - notably some Black feminists - did make arguments that include some similar to your analogy, and their critiques influenced how “slut walks” developed over time as a movement.
That said, I don’t think your analogy is accurate. For one thing, they identify as Muslims. As I understand Slutwalk, it is arguing that women’s dress or behavior does not ever make them acceptable targets of violence. They are trying to take away the power that the word “slut” has to socially justify violence against women rather than claim “slut” as an identity. They therefore do not have to consider a dynamic of “sluts oppressing sluts”. On the other hand, claimed identity groups like Muslims or Mexican-Americans do have oppressive dynamics and conflicts within their groups. There are many women who want to wear a headscarf who are oppressed. There are many women in or connected to Muslim communities who see the hijab as oppressive. Outsiders shouldn’t let complexity paralyze us but we shouldn’t ignore the fact that it’s complicated.
But the women saying this are not “us.” They are not targeted for their hijab, because they’re not wearing it. The gesture is not about them. Is there not considerable irony in their presumption to speak for hijabi women?
“Us” means Muslim women. They say “As Muslim Women…” The post cited in the OP talked about acts of solidarity with Muslim women, not just hijabis:
If people were explicit that this was a gesture just toward hijabis and not related to Muslim women in general, maybe they might not have written that article.
FWIW I am sure they are painfully aware that they don’t speak for Muslim women in general. They are claiming their voices as ones specifically located in their community. If you want to find Muslim voices who are saying “this is helping us” you can, and they shouldn’t be ignored either.
And it’s worth noting, as the OP, that I did specifically word the OP and the poll that way because I’m interested in the point of view of Muslim women here, as well as the rest of us. I didn’t have the vocabulary word “hijabi” when I started, to refer specifically to women who wear hijab, as opposed to Muslim women who don’t wear hijab. If I had known the word, I would have used it, possibly as a second sub-category whose opinion I’m particularly interested in.
I don’t know any hijabis who I believe are forced to wear hijab. All the women I’ve talked to are very clear that wearing one is their choice, and one that they feel pretty strongly about. But that does get into questions about what “forced” means. Am I forced to wear a bra because I was raised in a culture where women with large breasts wear bras? Or because I’m more comfortable wearing a bra? I feel like it’s the later, and I’d be very upset if someone tried to ban bras. But I can’t discount the former, either. If I’d been raised in the Himba tribe, I probably wouldn’t wear a bra, and I’d find wearing one very uncomfortable. I don’t know how to disentangle culture from choice here.
This whole issue has me completely baffled. When I was a little girl (1950s), men and women still routinely wore hats. Even after the decline of hats in public, women wore hats in church. Or scarves. Or mantillas. At my Catholic girls high school we wrote “chapel caps,” lace doily things, on our heads at Mass. I almost ALWAYS wore a headscarf when out and about, and so did my mother. To keep your hair neat, to keep your head/ears warm, and just as a fashion accessory. In a convertible, you’d better wear one, or spend the rest of the day untangling your hair. If your hair looked like crap that day, put on a scarf. The politicization of headscarves (even though I’m aware of why it has happened) seems absurd to me.
You wore chapel caps because you were required to by the RCC. It was a rule that was changed with Vatican II. Women being required to cover their heads in church was of course political, as was the removal of the restriction.
Women’s lives were not in danger depending on whether they covered or didn’t cover their heads in church pre-Vatican II. It was a convention, a custiom, and the changing of it was not political in the same sense that a headscarf today can be interpreted, correctly or incorrectly, as an overt political statement.