Comments on: The right to veil

By: Why free speech is a feminist issue | Index on Censorship

Why free speech is a feminist issue | Index on Censorship — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 08:59:58 +0000

[...] expression is not only a right but the means to protect other rights, nor the social contributions women could make if their voices were not continually [...]

By: Karl Pfeifer

Karl Pfeifer — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 19:57:50 +0000

How comes, that Muslim countries like for instance Turkey ban the veil at their Universities?
And how about the bad example a teacher who wears such a veil would give the pupils?
Should a woman have the right to present herself before a court in veil?

By: Jess McCabe

Jess McCabe — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 14:11:18 +0000

Yep, Emily is right, I don’t see this as a special case, all attempts to control what women wear in public places are wrong.

That said, there’s undeniably a different texture to the calls for banning (some forms of) veiling, which a simple position against ‘censoring’ sartorial decisions would ignore. This is because it occurs in the context of ongoing Islamophobia and also, of course, sexist notions that women’s bodies are somehow ‘in the public domain’, and the intersection of these two issues with Orientalist notions about Muslim women.

I’d really recommend reading the MMW post I linked to, which very clearly draws the connections between (overwhelmingly) male calls for ‘unveiling’ Muslim women and Orientalism.

Those implications add layers to the debates on this ban that simply don’t apply in the same way to other cases.

The issue of shopping centres banning teenagers wearing hoodies, though, is linked up to classism of course, and therefore has its own layers to untangle.

By: Emily Butselaar

Emily Butselaar — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 12:35:26 +0000

@Cannonball Jones
I’ll email your question onto her but I think its unlikely she’d see this as a special case just because the veil has a religious meaning.

The idea of telling women what they can/can’t wear in public places is repugnant whether its the veil or a hoodie.

By: Cannonball Jones

Cannonball Jones — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 03:39:26 +0000

It is offensive, but where was the furor over kids being banned from wearing hoodies which obscured their faces while in shopping malls? Or protestors being banned from wearing masks. Seems like half of the protests against the proposed ban come from the “it’s special because it’s religious/cultural’ camp rather than making a more general argument which would cover all forms of ‘dress code censorship’. Would be interested to hear the author’s views either way on the other two cases I mentioned.