To feel sad to see 5 year old girl in hijab

[INeedSomeSun]

Probably will get flamed for this & iabu as its not my business.
I am not racist in any way. I am Asian myself and have many Muslim friends.

Growing up, I never saw any muslim girls with hijabs. This is a trend which has been growing since the late 90s.

I know that the meaning behind the hijab is to protect modesty and show committment to Islam. It is supposed to be the girls/womans decision after much thought and dedication.

At 5 years old they are still getting changed in the classroom for PE and she won't be able to do this now with boys around. How will she play and do PE freely? She has been singled out by the views of her parents.
Also, she will barely know what religion means, so she has not made an informed decision for herself.

Normally she is chasing about with my DS and other kids before school.Today she was just stood there, perhaps embarrassed or told not to?
I felt very sad

Many little girls want to look like their mummies. Plenty of five year olds do PE in a hijab, go to school and do PE. It was be a very extremist muslim family to object to a five year old girl doing PE with five year old boys.

Rickets is a disease of povety. Some children do not have enough vitamen D in their diet. It is not just about black/ dark skined people having no exposure to sunlight.

THERhubarb - what is your culture that you speak about?

I love posts which start with 'I'm not racist but...'
'Some of my best friends are mozlamic...'
'I'm indian....' does it somehow make you less prejuidiced and xenophobic

I've got two dd's both appear to have an extensive wardrobe of hijabs (heascarves)...my wardrobe, despite having spent considerable money on it, appears to be vastly inferior to my childrens , my dd's are 8 and 10.

I also have mozlamic friends and not a single one of their children wear hijab even the older girls are a bit hit and miss, some do some dont it's a personal choice. The mozlamic women I know and firends with wear dress ranging form headscarves atop normal clothing to all encompassing veils.

My eldest DD always spends ages wrapping and accessorising herself in fancy hijab before going out, she also as a much younger child once went to nursery in her PJ's and my youngest once went out shopping with me wearing fairy wings and carrying a light up wand. I couldn't be bovvered to argue, it was a sunday and the shops were going to close and I had no food in the house...priorities....my DD's are oppressing me.

thebody - teens perhaps but little girls? This is what I was talking about. What possesses a mother to go out and buy her little girl a padded bikini? Or a t-shirt with a sexualised slogan on it?

Make-up for young children is not unheard of and many primary school children will wear it.

Yes you could say they are copying their parents but you need to also remember that make-up and revealing clothing is there to attract the attention of men, so is it really suitable for little girls?

In our society we encourage our girl to be as attractive as possible for the benefit of men whilst in their society it's the opposite.

Both societies are guilty of pressurising young girls to conform and both are guilty of thinking that girls/woman only have one aim and that is to attract attention from men. They discourage it and we encourage it.

Both practices are equally obnoxious.

YANBU.

I'd go further and say of females of any age. But I add I would never condone someone (adult) being prevented from wearing one.

Yes Rhubarb - it's two sides of the same coin.

ThePurpleCarrot you want to shout me down I know. You want to tell me that this does not exist, not in your experience, not amongst your friends, not where you live.

Then you walk around with your eyes shut.

Why did Mumsnet feel the need to start a campaign to stop the sexualisation of young girls if this was not thought to be a problem?
Why are so many make-up kits aimed at and sold to children (Hello Kitty?), why is it nearly impossible to buy a bra for my 12yr old dd that is not padded?

And I've read enough posts by other women, other mums, to realise that sometimes rape victims are blamed. There is this notion that they shouldn't have put themselves in that situation in the first place.

I think it is pretty unlikely any British primary school would allow girls to attend in mini skirts, push up bra and makeup. Even at secondary we spend an enormous amount of time daily making girls clean off makeup, remove jewellery and roll their skirts back down. We therefore do not approve of girls dressing in a sexualised way in institutions like schools. It's not encouraged in a lot of workplaces either.

So there is a double standard.

In the Koran it instructs both genders to dress modestly, doesn't it?

It has very specific instructions in the Koran about how women should dress.

Phiney, I went to a seocndary school in East london, and if you really think the girls there didn't cake on make, up roll up their skirts to barely cover their arses, wore massive hoops in their ears despite the shool rules, I must have attended a very unique school (this was 20 or so years ago). AND I went to an all girls school!!!!!

Rhubarb it's about repurcussions and enforcement isn't it....what happens to the child or young woman who refuses to wear the niqab in an ultra orthodox muslim community, compared to the child who refuses to wear a glittery sparkly top or tight jeans in western society?

In a western society teenage girls can take or leave the provocative clothing without any consequence from their family or those around them, I don't think this is afforded to young woman from strict muslim families who want to abandon the niqab hence why people feel justified to criticise

Depends on the school fuzzy. My dd's school is quite strict but the one I went to was like the one you described and I've seen schoolgirls myself wearing arse-skimming skirts with stockings (presumably they roll their skirts back down before going into school) and full make-up.

Yet you get a teenage girl in a burkha and suddenly everyone feels obliged to have an opinion and to voice that opinion as though they are the superior ones.

This sense of superiority really rankles me.

thats not true baking, every single woman I know had to fight her own family to wear hijab, my sisters husband wont allow her to wear a niqab.

The justification to prevent women dressing as they wish is that theyre being forced to wear a headsarf against their will, I dont kow any who have personally nor do my friends or family, we have come across the opposite many times.

If girs were being pressured to wear hijabs I'm sure I'd have come across at least one. I havent.

That is true bakingaddict and a very fair point.

Yes there are some clear differences. My dd is teased because she is 12 and doesn't have her ears pierced, doesn't like One Direction, doesn't wear make-up or trendy clothes and doesn't have a boyfriend. She's been called a lesbian, a nerd and a geek and is generally avoided at lunchtimes so she sits on her own or with one or two girls who will still speak to her.

I got the same treatment at her age, not just by my peers but also my family who took every opportunity to poke fun at my lack of fashion and opinionise loudly that I would never get a boyfriend or that I should be a lesbian.

But like you say, at least that doesn't include beatings, being cast out or worse, murder.

fuzzywuzzy, honour killings do exist and in countries like Afghanistan, women ARE forced to wear the burkha.

Woooaaaah THERhubarb. I asked you a civil question and you tell me that I walk about with my eyes closed!

I live in the most remote city in the world. I have never seen a grown women in the town that I live in, dressed in burkha.

Perhaps if you are more civil, people will engage with you more.

I thought we were discussing the UK?

I dont dispute that many countries opress women, and use sexual abuse as a method of control they prevent girls from being educated and try ot force thme to stay behind clsoed doors to prevent thme form 'gettign above thmeselves' I don't dispute any of that.

I beleive firmly in educating women and for mothers to treat bring their sons up to treat women as equals and for girls to be boguht up to consider themsleves equal to any man.

I also feel everyone should wear what the hell they want witohut fear of physical violence for their dress or lack thereof.

I have to question the whole meaning behind girls wearing a headscarf/ full dress when you see 13/14 year old girls with a headscarf on yet make up which would put Lilly Alan to Shame - If these girls are truly following a religion should the meaning not be explained to them? And Anne gorilla I don't think you can compare a Sikh And a Muslim - I think you will find that the Sikh religion actively promotes equality and respect between the genders and doesn't tell one to cover up to quash the lustfulness of the other. It also doesn't promote man as superior to a woman in that a man can take so many wives to demonstrate his wealth and still go to heaven to find an endless line of virgins!

My personal understanding is that some Muslim girls in the uk can choose to wear the attire but when visiting their families in India/Pakistan they are expected to conform or face the wrath of villagers/ relatives

honour killings and forced marriages and preventing girls from being educated is not confined to the Muslim religion, Islami specifically states that men and women are equal and everyone should pursue education and furthering knowledge, a girl cannot be married against her will that is also unislamic and such a marriage is void on relgious grounds.

A lot of Mulsim men prefer uneducated wives so they wont have to give her her due and she will quietly accept culutral practices as relgious edicts instead.

I've only read the first page but why do people make judgements based on the own stereotyping without knowing facts? My daughter is five and begs me to let her wear a hijab to school. It was difficult enough to find one her size after she pleaded for it. We live in a hot country but sometimes she asks to wear it when we go out. No doubt judgmental people will think I'm forcing her to wear it when they see her hot and sweaty trying to adjust it while I'm trying to take it off her and reminding her that I told her not to wear it in the first place.

I went to school with sikh girls who were pulled out of school and had arranged marriages against their will. The Sikh are very conservative with their girls ime.

The headscarves with make up is those individual girls choices, ask them why thety do this. I don't so wouldnt know the reason behind it.

And muslim men are not allowed to marry lots of women to portray thier wealth. They are relgiously allowed to take up to four wives providing they can treat them equally. I would not personally make an informed deciision to be a co-wife, also I do not believe in the UK you can be an equal co-wife as the law of the land only recognises one wife.

Taking many wives does not guarantee heaven, it guarantees hell if you are at all unequal in their treatment.

Forced marriages, beatings and killings also exist in the UK. The man is a dominant force and the woman is duty bound to be obedient to him. The focus is on pleasing him.

Same as with the Christian faith as it happens.

Yes everyone should be able to wear what they like but the western culture has this huge force called the media and this media targets women and girls, making them believe that sexualisation at an early age is normal.

I honestly don't believe that in a cold easterly town in the north of the UK, young women would brave the icy wind and lashing rain dressed only in a white mini skirt and white boob tube with impossibly high heels if she was not led to believe that this look made her more attractive to the opposite sex.

Fuzzywuzzy with the upmost respect you cannot begin to assert yourself as the voice of muslim woman based on your own circle of friends and family, just because it doesn't happen within your limited circle doesn't mean enforcement isn't happening. Just like any religion there will be a spectrum of believers, from the moderate to the ultra orthodox. The statement 'my sisters husband wont allow her to wear a niqab is quite telling'. Hasn't she just replaced one form of male subjugation with another, whatever happened to free choice

If every woman was free to make an individual choice on the matter then why do so many Muslim countries such as Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia have such strict laws on what woman can and cant do/wear in public

That was my point, girls try very hard to wear sexualised clothing at school but the school uniform code and the teachers try to stop them -- so therefore at an institutional level we do not approve of young girls dressing like this and we try to stop them even if it is a doomed enterprise.