“There is a real concern the face veil and issues like it will be used as an election tool.”

- Shaista Gohir, executive director at Muslim Women’s Network UK; Source: BBC

A French parliamentary committee has been convened to discuss the status of the Islamic face veil worn by women—an accessory which, according to President Nicolas Sarkozy is “not welcome” in France, and “contrary to the values of the Republic.”

I had my first encounter with a face-veil at age 16, greeting some African friends at Leeds-Bradford airport. A strapping Malawian man stood beside his burqa-clad wife and introduced themselves. Without thinking, I reached out and shook the lady’s hand, looking her in the eyes as I did. Then I recoiled slightly, and wondered if I’d made some colossal faux pas. However, nobody seemed to register this, and the group continued to chatter away quite happily. In fact, I engaged well with this mysterious woman in conversation, even though on parting I had yet to see any more than her eyes.

Potent symbols of religious conviction always make us wishy-washy liberals uncomfortable. It’s difficult not to stare when confronted with Jewish forelocks, Sikh turbans and Muslim burquas, particularly when they appear in an unconventional place. They represent a dogged stubbornness to conform, an immovable religious conviction and, in some eyes, the persecution and restriction of their wearers.

France banned “conspicuous” symbols of religious denominations (including large Catholic crosses) from its state schools in 2004, and some UK schools chose to legislate against specific religious clothing when given the right to self-determine their dress codes in 2007. Sarkozy is particularly fond of appeasing France’s growing far-Right by legislating against “inappropriate clothing.” Back in his days under Chirac he introduced a law against “racolage passif”—”passive soliciting”—making French women who displayed too much flesh or makeup in public subject to arrest under prostitution laws. Now the furor has been stirred up again, and, as usual, it’s that most maligned of religious paraphernalia, the burqa, which is under attack.

Why are we so afraid of this item of clothing? While 9/11 paranoia and the general trend of Islamophobia veiled as public-protection has a lot to do with it, politicians seem particularly keen to seize on the burqa as the ultimate symbol of Islamic repression.

Guys, it’s a piece of cloth. A symbolic one, sure, but so is the Turin Shroud, and nobody’s accused that of being repressive of modern thought. Maybe because atheists aren’t forced to wear it.

Islamic repression of women is not caused by the burqa. Like all inanimate objects, it is incapable of doing good or ill towards anyone when left to its own devices. The repression of women in Islam and in other cultures comes from millenia of misogynistic tradition throughout not only the Arab world, but also Africa, South America, Asia, and, yes, Europe and North America. We in the West are not exactly above reproach when it comes to dictating standards for the fairer sex—it’s just we use advertising instead of the Koran to convince women to conform to ideals of feminine propriety. Just as women were trussed up in whalebone corsets for five hundred years in Europe, modern women continue to squeeze themselves into uncomfortable and impractical clothing in order to get ahead in life. Is this any different than a women donning a burqa in order to be a wife and mother?

It is of course beyond doubt that the burqa is not adopted merely out of personal choice—innumerable factors, including (and probably most potently) cultural pressure are among the reasons women wear these voluminous garments. But the very notion that legislating against a garment can somehow alter cultural perceptions is palpably absurd. Women cast aside their corsets when given the right to vote and to involve themselves actively in political and social life outside the home. It wouldn’t have happened in reverse. The same story with the burqa: make education available to all Islamic women, reach out to the housebound housewives with initiatives, and above all, respect their cultural choices. Help Islamic women feel equal to everyone else and perhaps they’ll stop wearing the burqa of their own accord. If not, then you’ll know it’s their choice. Keeping Islamic girls and women out of public buildings and schools will only serve to further antagonize and reinforce what their most vitriolic clerics want the Islamic community at large to believe—that non-Muslims wish to destroy Islam.