Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Secularism and the burka

If modern day Druids decided to stop poncing about in bedsheets pretending they are in Victorian paintings, and started trying to emulate what little we do know of the real historical Druids, they would start sacrificing people by drowning them. This would be a matter for the criminal law, though, not a crisis of secularism.

If a town in Yorkshire were colonised by the descendants of Aztecs, and they started ripping the still-beating hearts from the chests of virgins in the Old Market Square, we wouldn't be facing a crisis of secularism. It would be a matter for the criminal law.

If enclaves were established in European towns and cities, in which women were not educated, were treated as slaves and chattels, sold to men, forbidden social interaction, held powerless, beaten, raped and sometimes killed - even if these things were done in the name of a religion - it would not be a crisis of secularism. It would be a matter for the criminal law.

As Nicolas Sarkozy said, "The problem of the burka is not a religious problem, it's a problem of liberty and women's dignity. It's not a religious symbol, but a sign of subservience and debasement. I want to say solemnly, the burka is not welcome in France. In our country, we can't accept women prisoners behind a screen, cut off from all social life, deprived of all identity."

Sometimes freedoms conflict. Where it is a voluntary act, the right to wear a burka is comparable to one of two things: the right to walk around in full bondage gear complete with dog collar and leash, or the right to walk around wearing a full Nazi uniform, complete with swastika armband.

Neither type of right trumps the imperative of eliminating slavery from our cities.

Ross was right about what secularism is, which is why I quoted a short extract from one of his posts. Sarkozy is right about the burka.

Incidentally, what isn't challenged enough is the question of some Asian male attitudes. If members of the Ku Klux Klan started threatening and attacking white women who went out with or wanted to marry men from other ethnic backgrounds, we'd have a front-page headline campaign from the Guardian and the BBC. It's no different when Asian men behave in a comparable way.

UPDATE: Credit where it is due: given that I'm implicitly critical of them in this post, it's good of someone at the BBC to link to it from the Reaction from around the Web section of the Today Programme website. (The link will disappear pretty soon, of course).

17 comments:

alison said...

Yes Sarkozy is right. Right in how he attributes this issue to French principles of liberty equality fraternity, brave in reminding men and women what dignity and equality is and also how the government is attributing this to French secularism laicete through those French principles. I think Ross is confused on the latter.

It would be a crisis of secularism by the way. You need to go back to why French laicete came about and how religion is used politically. Including in those enclaves you mention.

Thank God noone mentioned that sop word "choice" in this issue.

Peter Risdon said...

There's a battle over two different types of secularism. One, the one I advocate, places as much emphasis on the right people have to belief or none, as they do on the exclusion of that belief from the public domain in the sort of terms set out in the Virginia Declaration - no religious test for public office. The other is more hostile to religion.

I maintain this is not a crisis of secularism for the reasons laid out in my post - but by all means make a counter argument. The above is an assertion rather than an argument.

In the examples I gave, religion could also be used politically by the Druids and Aztecs but it still wouldn't be anything more than a matter of criminal law.

JuliaM said...

"Thank God noone mentioned that sop word "choice" in this issue."

Are we assuming then, that for every muslim woman, this isn't a choice, but a clothing decision forced on them?

Because that seems to me to be a pretty dangerous assumption.

And letting the State dictate how a woman should dress in her own free time, even more dangerous...

Peter Risdon said...

I'm not making that assumption - I'm assuming that some do wear it through choice - when they do it's analogous to BDSM gear or a Nazi uniform, depending on their motivation, as I said in the post. As it happens, it's reasonable to have some restrictions on wearing either of those costumes in public. If people want to wear a burka in private in their own time, fine.

The State does dictate some things about how we dress in public, as that naked hiker chap kept finding out. The question is whether or not this is one of those occasions. I think it is so extreme that it is.

The issue of freedom is a very clear one here. The freedom of some people to wear bin bags over their heads is less important than the freedom of others to make their own choices and be equal citizens.

There's a danger here that in emphasising the freedom of slavers we forget that the slaves are not free.

JuliaM said...

But the problem is that they - at least, some of them - argue pretty articulately that they are making a conscious decision, and that it is about 'modesty' (or at least their view of it.

And we don't really 'ban' anyone from wandering around in a Nazi uniform (luckily for the young Prince!) or BDSM gear, within reason. It might draw glances, but the police won't swoop on you automatically.

Why, then, should we ban the walking binbags just because we don't like what some believe they represent?

Peter Risdon said...

True, nobody says they wear it because they're a clerical fascist, but they are. It's part of a particular form of Islam that is absolutely fascistic. Even in Saudi where the bin bag originates, many women wear more normal costume.

The BDSM and Nazi analogies only go so far - there aren't thousands of people forced to wear them, refused even basic rights, sold by their parents, raped in forced marriages. This is the case with parts of Islamic society, in Europe as well as elsewhere.

If we do value freedom, it's incumbent on us to attack these cultural practices and ban them.

When they have gone the way of other forms of slavery, then people can dress how they like.

Peter Risdon said...

In short, I think we should be actively eradicating these practices, and banning the burka is a part of that.

JuliaM said...

"If we do value freedom, it's incumbent on us to attack these cultural practices and ban them."

But all those things are already against the law. No need to make an item of clothing similarly illegal.

We don't need more laws - we need to be serious about using the ones we've got, and not let 'oooh, it's their culture' put us off....

JuliaM said...

I'm afraid I can't agree that we will somehow win over these women to our freedoms by saying 'It's wrong for your menfolk to dictate what you should wear. So we are going to dictate what you can't wear instead'...

Peter Risdon said...

Quite, it's about saying to the menfolk they can't prescribe those forms of dress - the ones who want to wear it are collateral damage.

I think there's a conservative equivalent of cultural relativism, something that has the same effect - it's a misplaced sense of what freedom is - it isn't an absence of law. Without law we couldn't be free. Laws that protect property and the person, and enforce contracts, are essential. Once in a while some cultural movement arises that needs to be combated. Islamism and the repressive forms of Islam itself fall into this category. You don't advance freedom by acquiescing to the enslavement of others.

Peter Risdon said...

Out of interest, why do you think women are playing such a large part in the Iranian demonstrations at the moment?

JuliaM said...

"...it's about saying to the menfolk they can't prescribe those forms of dress - the ones who want to wear it are collateral damage."

I don't think we can so blithely call the freedom for those who choose to wear the burqua 'collateral damage'. How do we tell them they are valued, and free, solely because we've interceded on their behalf?

"Laws that protect property and the person, and enforce contracts, are essential."

And I'd have no problem whatsoever with banning it is schools, or in public sector workplaces. Even allowing private companies to ban it while at work for their employees.

But not in public streets. That isn't making them more free. It's making me less free, even though I'd never wear a burqua.

I might volunteer to don one though, if there's a danger of such a stupid, ill-conceived policy ever being adopted here...

"Out of interest, why do you think women are playing such a large part in the Iranian demonstrations at the moment?"

Because they want what the men want. Why else?

Peter Risdon said...

Because they want what the men want?

There might be other reasons.

If you only watch one, watch this.

Ross said...

Thanks for linking to my post on the matter.

"Where it is a voluntary act, the right to wear a burka is comparable to one of two things: the right to walk around in full bondage gear complete with dog collar and leash, or the right to walk around wearing a full Nazi uniform, complete with swastika armband.".

It is also comparable to the wearing of those Islamic beardsthat Islamists are fond of, yet no one has suggested banning them despite the fact that bearded male Islamists are likely to be more threatening statement than burqa'ed female Islamists.

Peter Risdon said...

And people are indeed forced to grow beards in some places - by the Taliban, for example.

But the analogy isn't exact. Beards are not exclusive to clerical fascism, burkas are. Beards are not a part of the actual, practical abuse of large numbers of people, burkas are.

alison said...

Rather odd this but the muslim correspondent for the Indy whose name now slips my mind wrote a very trenchant piece of her dealings with women forced to wear a niqab here but also forced to admit to outsiders it was a "choice". She is all for banning it.

On reflection, of course we should. It's beyond time now. Initially I gave this issue the kind of free hand libertarian nonsense "let's pursuade" approach or worse let's just ignore approach but since we are never going to win around on that argument, its time to ban it as standing against all we hold dear in terms of dignity and equality. Let's do a Sarko for once in our modern British lives. Just a reminder about government "meddling" in clothing choices: we are not talking about fashion here. But anyway, we don't allow people to walk down the streets butt naked and are never likely to. So there is a legit debate to be had about banning it in the Sarko sense here. It's called public decency.

The Times posted an excellent article about French securalism and the niqab btw.

Anonymous said...

the way i look at it,you guys really dont know what you talking about!!