World Hijab Day

[Marzipanface]

AIBU to feel uncomfortable with this day and also really irritated at the lack of discussion over this event from a feminist perspective. There seems to be a wholesale silence from the Feminist blogs and papers I subscribe to, and I can't find any discussion on here. No-one wants to talk to about it.

Just that really.

I support an individual's right but I would never support a day that includes many women who have no rights on what they wear.

I work with a woman who started wearing a hijab after 9/11. She said fellow muslim women were being abused in the street and on public transport for being muslim. She says she does as a act of solidarity with her muslim sisters. She is educated and intelligent and I like this reason better than others.

how about we have a 'women wear what the fuck you like day' - but INCLUDE Hijabs in that

I never tire of the irony of feeling you are freeing women from the 'oppression' of choosing to wear a Hijab by suggesting they don't wear one to make 'us' feel better

surely Muslim women have as much right to choose what they wear as everyone else?

nancy, I responded to the post to you with some reasons why I think they might not come on here to say that. It's the post just above yours.

I support an individual's right but I would never support a day that includes many women who have no rights on what they wear.

YY. My exact position. People are missing the point.

how about we have a 'women wear what the fuck you like day' - but INCLUDE Hijabs in that

Yes, great. A bit different to "World Hijab Day", don't you think?

I haven't read through all the replies, but this is an interesting article written by 2 Muslim women; apologies if it's already been posted:
As Muslim women, we actually ask you not to wear the hijab in the name of interfaith solidarity

We reject this interpretation that the “hijab” is merely a symbol of modesty and dignity adopted by faithful female followers of Islam. This modern-day movement, codified by Iran, Saudi Arabia, Taliban Afghanistan and the Islamic State, has erroneously made the Arabic word hijab synonymous with “headscarf.” This conflation of hijab with the secular word headscarf is misleading. “Hijab” literally means “curtain” in Arabic. It also means “hiding,” ”obstructing” and “isolating” someone or something. It is never used in the Koran to mean headscarf. In colloquial Arabic, the word for “headscarf” is tarha. In classical Arabic, “head” is al-ra’as and cover is gheta’a. No matter what formula you use, “hijab” never means headscarf.

never heard of the day and dont wear a hijab, so dont care.

Totally agree with wear what you like day.

Sorted!

I'd like a 'no girls, boys and women being sexually assaulted, whatever they wear' day.

no not really

we have many 'world ...days' I don't adhere to most of them - do you?

so just ignore it rather than getting your knickers in a twist!

I'm conflicted about it, as others have said I don't want to impose a code of dress that overrides another woman's free will but then... I feel especially right now in Europe that it's important for muslim men to see women's heads uncovered and learn to accept it. There are already many challenges for women in places like Germany who work and interact with recent refugees and migrants. Female social workers, doctors, police officers etc... have reported how difficult it is to be treated respectfully by muslim males. This article in Der Spiegel makes me very depressed about the chances of successful integration of muslim men in Germany.

www.spiegel.de/international/germany/sexism-and-islam-debated-in-germany-after-cologne-attacks-a-1073751.html

As for the Hijab, I don't know if a ban like there is in France will work. I hear that many younger females have taken to wearing hijabs as an act of defiance which rather defeats the whole purpose.

no not really grin

It's entirely different. "Wear Whatever the Fuck You Want Women Day would be about choice, whereas the hijab is in many cases (I'm aware that this is not always the case) something which is imposed on women by men and patriarchal society.

Not sure you've quite grasped the point. I'll ignore or not as I like thanks all the same.

this is what i meant with slippery slope

another overview

That is really interesting, thanks, Onykahonie.

Agree with people saying they can't find much to celebrate in something that is imposed on millions of women against their wishes.

I get that some women in the UK feel they are wearing it out of choice, but personally I find it abhorrent. I wouldn't ban hijab though I would ban niqab.

I would support a burn your hijab day! Covering your head is sexist and damaging to all women and needs to stop.

I've worn full veil and abaya.

I was invisible, vulnerable, mute and absolutely at the mercy of men.

I said recently in another thread that I thank god every day that I no longer need to be someone who doesn't exist. That's how I felt.

I had dinner this weekend with two Lebanese sister I went to school with, jeans and T-shirt tomboys. They live in Paris now.

They said they are horrified when they come to London at the number of covered and veiled women. Their husbands would not dream of asking them to wear a hijab; their mothers and grandmothers didn't either.

They believe it is a political statement that, in the West is provocative. It is not a legal
requirement or cultural necessary to cover. If it's a choice that is.

If it isn't, then that's just so very sad.

Or all women could spend a day walking in another's shoes; we could have wear an Amish dress or a poncho or a stripper's pasties?

"Choice" is relative thesocietypages.org/socimages/2012/02/22/questioning-definitions-of-freedom/

I find the suggestion that all Muslims condone sexual assault of un-covered women really quite offensive. You get arseholes who treat women like shit in every culture. Disrespect due to a woman's choice of outfit is pretty ingrained in western culture too.

ony, that is a good read.

copying this but here from that article - it contradicts the 'empowered women wear hijab' argument maybe?

"But, starting in the 1980s, following the 1979 Iranian revolution of the minority Shiite sect and the rise of well-funded Saudi clerics from the majority Sunni sect, we have been bullied in an attempt to get us to cover our hair from men and boys. Women and girls, who are sometimes called “enforce-hers” and “Muslim mean girls,” take it a step further by even making fun of women whom they perceive as wearing the hijab inappropriately, referring to “hijabis” in skinny jeans as “ho-jabis,” using the indelicate term for “whores.”

World Hijab Day can get lost.

How about a "You do realise we live in 2016 Day"

Women don't need to cover their hair or face in this day and age.

Disrespect due to a woman's choice of outfit is pretty ingrained in western culture too.

Yes, it is. No argument there. But you do see a difference between the UK and say, Afghanistan? I think even you would have to admit it's a worse place to be a woman. Not everything is relative.

Widow if that was in response to my op I don't mean to be offensive, apologies if I have offended you . My wish is that everyone gets along and that women, girls but also boys are free from unwanted sexual harassment and degradation. There have been so many news articles recently and it really seems to be a problem that some Muslim people have learned to believe that non-muslim women are worthless. This Muslim professor (Suad Saleh) of Al-Azhar University says Muslims may capture non-Muslims as slaves and rape them as spoils of war,

and Muslim cleric Sami Abu-Yusuf of Cologne states that he was not surprised the girls in Cologne were sexually assaulted, groped and raped, because of the way they dressed and because they wore perfume. what is one to think?

But, starting in the 1980s, following the 1979 Iranian revolution of the minority Shiite sect and the rise of well-funded Saudi clerics from the majority Sunni sect, we have been bullied in an attempt to get us to cover our hair from men and boys.

And if you look at pictures of Kabul and Tehran in the 70s, many women dressed entirely differently to how they do now. It is patriarchy writ large.

I think some people here would be surprised to see the photos, and would perhaps wonder exactly why all those women suddenly chose to cover themselves up so much?

I'm afraid that I also think that this is a case of freedom being wasted on the free, the hijab is nothing to be celebrated.

Those of us who are 50 and above will remember when, in countries like Iran and Afghanistan, women were free to wear Western dress, and most of them did. As soon as the governments of those counties became orthodox Muslim again, out came the veils and women were compelled to wear them.

I would not support a ban, as in France, but I feel profoundly depressed that many women chose to wear it. You cannot ignore the fact that so many women regard it as a symbol of oppression, and when an item of clothing takes on a symbolism like that then wearing it becomes a bit more than just exercising a personal choice, whether you intend it or not.

Yasmin Alibai Brown has written on this subject far better than I can, and I agree with her points in this link.