But, here's the thing.
It doesn't really jibe with this.
Most of the women that I see covered from head to toe in their body bags are overweight, or obese. It would appear to me that they are seeking comfort in food, because their lives are so dreadfully unhappy.
Moreover, most of the women that I see in hijabs, are not smiling. Their faces are rarely animated. Many do not wear any make up whatsoever. If they wear glasses, they are old-fashioned and thick and quite ugly.
The exception is some of the Somali teenagers that I see on the streets, some of them seem to be having a little bit of fun, and are dressed in western clothing, save the hijab.
I don't think that I am imagining this.
Yesterday at the Canada Day celebrations near my house, there was a group of new immigrant women, all covered from head to toe, with their hijabs tied under their chins in traditional Iranian style.
One of the young girls was uncovered, but a six or seven year old child was covered (those six year olds can really arouse men I guess....).
One of them was quite heavily pregnant and trying to keep up with her toddler in the park. None of their menfolk were around. Did that make it easier or harder for them, I wondered.
None of them were smiling or joking around, compared to the breezy laughter of most of the other parents around the park.
I'm not exactly a softie when it comes to Islam, but a little part of me truly mourns the childhood of Muslim girls, and their minimal possibilities for a truly free, spirited life. When I see young girls covered up, I am outraged and my blood boils.
Is that a sign of weakness or humanity? I don't know.
6 comments:
Very interesting. Over here these is a very clear class divide between Muslims (like all of British society). I often see women in hijabs working out at the gym (in a posh part of town). The "Oil Princesses" as we call them are often in Harrod's - with a full mask of eye makeup, perfectly manicured hands and Jimmy Choos that they can kick out from underneath their burqa. In other parts of town it's more like you described. Either way, all roads meet in front of the Israeli Embassy on protest days. Like you, my blood boils when I see little girls, especially toddlers, covered up. And I see it almost every time I leave the house.
It is a sign of horrendous cowardness that no one will rise to defend these young girls from the abuse that wearing these head-to-toe covers represent...present and future abuse of course.
It is also cowardness not to constantly remind people that Mohammed married a 9-year old girl...his favourite apparently! We do have lots of names around here for men who sleep with 9-year olds, but prophet certainly is not one of them.
Andre-ya the pedophile thing. Can you imagine if a regular white dude tried to marry a 9 year old now, using the "prophet" defense?
SMW: All roads lead to the Jew-hate junction. It's like the Hamas, and CAIR dudes with their fancy suits. The hatred is bubbling under the suit and tie.
Yes, even the most beautiful woman can't hide an evil soul behind the veil.
The religiously mandated covering of women in Islam is both very new and very ancient. The practice of forcing women to hide their physical attributes head-to-foot in burkhas is actually a pre-Islamic practice, prevalent among the Bedouin at the time of Mohammed. Women were kept out of sight as much as possible, and, if not possible, were rendered as unappealing to the male eye as practicable (hence the burkha); the widespread practice of female infanticide combined with the usage of polygamy and large-scale concubinage by wealthy and powerful men resulted in a shortage of nubile women relative to the male population at large. Bedouin raiders often kidnapped young women to be kept in or sold into--essentially--sexual slavery. To his credit, Mohammed, influenced by Jewish and Christian teachings on the subject, was largely responsible for rolling back the barbarous practice of female infanticide. However, the Bedouin custom of concealing women's physical attributes completely remained the touchstone for feminine modesty in Islam.
Fast forward to the mid-twentieth century, the high-water mark of Western civilization, and you see the adoption of Western customs and modes of dress among educated urban middle class women; the hijab and the burkha had by then become emblems of underdevelopment, something worn by the "hicks out in the sticks," as we would say here in the South. I well remember meeting large numbers of very attractive, chicly dressed, sassy, and flirtatious young Iranian women when I was at the University of Florida in the early 1970s. (Most of them were also very vocal opponents of the Shah, a political stance that, no doubt, many have come to regret in retrospect.)
Fast forward again to the present. Young women of Middle Eastern appearance wearing hijabs on campus are no longer a rare sight; in fact, I cannot remember a single visit to the campus over the last eight or so years when I have not come across several. Even burkhaed women can be glimpsed in the public areas of campus family housing sections. The burkha and he hijab are no longer relics of cultural backwardness. As our own civilizational confidence in the West has waned, atavistic Islamic cultural practices have waxed, even in our midst.
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