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Criticism of the veil
is not about liberating woment
by Lindsey German
One of the more distasteful features of the
wave of attacks on Muslims has been the
sight of feminists lining up to support Jack
Straw’s comments against the veil.
Women who claim they believe in liberation
should know better. The women’s movement of
the 1960s was anti-racist, coming out of the
civil rights and anti-war movements in the
US.
Those who espouse their ideas today are
attacking some of the most oppressed women
in the name of liberating them. Their
assumption is that any Muslim woman who
wears the veil or the hijab does so because
of pressure.
This is false - some women may fit into this
category, but many Muslim women choose to
wear the niqab or the hijab for their
identity, or for political or other reasons.
They are making a statement which they have
every right to make.
You would think from the attacks that it was
only among Muslims that women’s oppression
still exists. In fact, women in the West do
not have even the most basic equality,
despite nominal lip service to the term.
Women suffer worse wages, have to do most
housework and childcare and are subject to
sexual double standards.
Feminists often say superior ideas on
women’s liberation in the West go back 200
years, which makes the West more advanced
than the Middle East or South Asia. But
women’s liberation has long been a minority
view.
It took until well into the 20th century
before women won the vote after a long
struggle. It took another struggle to put
issues like abortion, equal pay and gay
liberation on the agenda in the 1960s and
1970s.
These struggles are still to be won. Only a
small minority of women have benefited from
changes in society - they pay other,
often immigrant, women, to do domestic work.
They have turned their backs on any struggle
to change the world and supported a series
of bloody wars aimed at countries with
Muslim populations.
They now presume to tell Muslim women
they can’t be liberated unless they dress
and behave like them
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