AIBU for stopping a nice Muslim girl from showing my son her hair?

[BeSpoonyRedCat]

It was on Monday after school, 10 year old DS, a very traditional 10 year old Muslim girl, and another 10 year old girl from my son's school were in the living room.

DS asked to see the Muslim girl's hair and she was actually about to show him. I stopped her, nothing dramatic. I basically said no sweetie, don't do that. I wasn't loud. Both girls looked like they wanted to laugh while my son looked annoyed. After I finished dropping the girls home, my son was all moody.

Yesterday he was still moody and I asked why he's upset. He basically explained that the Muslim girl doesn't show any other kid her hair. I said there's a reason for that. And I'm thankful my son didn't ask me the reason because I actually don't know.

From my perspective, I was being a responsible adult with my son and 2 girls under my supervision. I don't know the ramifications of that little girl showing my son her hair. I don't know if her parents would have been upset with her. I don't know if her parents would have banned my son from being friends with her. But I'm still wondering if I was dramatic.

Am I being unreasonable?

I think you did the right thing, being cautious in the heat of the moment. I think ideally you could have asked a 10 year old "are you sure that's a good idea" or "would your parents usually allow that? " or something similar, but it must have happened so quickly!

This is a very good point. In a situation like that, IF I felt it appropriate, I would have told my son not to ask things like that of girls clearly do the girl had a clear get out if she wanted.

I would certainly NOT presume to tell that girl not to uncover her hair as a) it is none of my business and b) she may have wanted to.

What if the question came about because the girl was chatting to OPs son about how much she hated wearing hair covering and then up pops OP to further reinforce her lack of freedoms as a girl.

I am asking this in a positive spirit but I am genuinely bemused as to why do people think that OP reinforcing a misogynistic set of social rules (there is no equivalent for boys) is a good thing?

What if she wanted to take it off? Why would OP tell her not to? Is this people keen to demonstrate how tolerant and understanding they are towards a different culture (that also uses coverings to oppress women en masse) but those kind intentions have now tipped over into enforcement on behalf of the belief holders?

Muslims come from many different countries where cultures are very different e.g. Pakistan is very different from the Gulf States. But they are all Muslim (Sunnis).

Yabu. If a muslim girl chooses to wear a headscarf that's ok. If a muslim girl doesn't want to wear a headscarf that's ok. If a muslim girl is being made to wear a headscarf by her parents and doesn't know or understand why and doesn't have any inhibitions about taking it off then it's ok for her to take it off. If her parents aren't making her wear it, but saying she can if she wants to but there's no problem with her choosing not to until she reaches puberty then she already knew it was fine to take it off if she wanted to and you massively overstepped by telling her "no". You are not the boss of her body. Her parents are not the boss of her body. She is the boss of her body.

If a girl is going to wear a headscarf all the time after puberty it's not a binary thing that the day before she starts wearing it she's never worn it at all and next day it's a permanent thing. It's quite normal for prepubescent girls to wear it for school hours but not in the evening. It really isn't your job to police this.

It is your job to teach your son about boundaries so it would be a good idea to chat to him about women's choices and how it's not appropriate for him to ask any woman or girl to make a different choice than the one she wants when it's about her body.

Protected her from what?

I imagine they think its a good thing when hosting a child to supervise them in accordance with what they believe would be the parents wishes.
Like if you knew a visiting child wasn't allowed to go to the park without an adult you'd probably tell them to stay in your garden.
Its a sound principle to follow when hosting children, which people typically adhere to I'd have thought?

It says ‘nice’ because the girl is culturally different from the op.
these types always make a point of saying how nice and lovely non English people are (normally non white) when they’ve had any kind of interaction with them.

It sounds a lot like a story

https://img.gifglobe.com/grabs/partridgecloud/S02E02/gif/Jwxi1ghe4CAs.gif

Nonsense. OP was clearly trying to signal that her thread was not going to be Islamophobic.

But is the OP respecting the child's choice?

I agree with you OP on erring on the side of caution with someone else’s child. I don’t think there is a right or wrong to this. We don’t know the kids, you don’t know what the parents would want, we weren’t there. You were and made a decision based on the situation.

some of these comments are pretty harsh.

Exactly.
How anyone who cares about women and girls can support this misogyny dressed up as piety baffles me.

I simply meant a 10 year old is old enough to decide what to do herself BUT 10 year olds do lots of things without thinking and it would have given her a minute to pause and think about it.

Making a girl keep an age inappropriate headcovering on is not the same as letting kids go to the park. HTH.

But that wasn’t OPs intention. If she had intended to give her a minute to think that she could have addressed herself to her DS and given the girl the opportunity to either say yes or no as she chose. OP decided to enforce whatever rule has been imposed on this girl and remove her choice.

Please don't come that silly HTH nonsense with me, when it's you that appears to need help to understand my point.
The similarity is clearly not between the two actions. It's in the fact that both are based on the preferences of the parents for a child they have left in your care.
If another child's parents have rules for their child, we tend to respect them, don't we?
If those rules upset or inconvenience us, the right thing to do would be not to host the child at all, not use them as a tool to indulge our own principles.

Yes. That's why I suggested a slightly different approach.

I don’t accept your ‘similarity’ though. Enforcing a rule about not going to the park is about a child’s welfare and a reasonable rule to be respected.

It is amazing that you think that if OP was uncomfortable enforcing this somewhat questionable rule (not a religious requirement, not a cultural requirement for a girl her age etc etc) that she should have not allowed her to come into the house.

That’s pretty harsh on the girl. It doesn’t send her a positive message about her personal freedom of choice either.

Ah yes, sorry I forgot that.

I guess my point is that that suggestion is still a direct challenge to the girl taking off her head covering though. If she addressed herself to her DS as many PPs have suggested, it takes the pressure of expectation off the girl.

It's hair. Not burning herself on her husband's funeral pyre.

Interesting results on the votes

You may or may not think enforcing a rule about going to the park is reasonable. The park may be next door and you may allow your child to go. You may privately think the other parents are over protective and stifling their child's independence with the rule.
When you host other people's children it's far from unusual to find their parents have different rules about all sorts of things than you do. Screens, diet, limits on freedom.
My point is that most people will respect the other parents rule rather than create an unfortunate situation whereby you are allowing a child to do something their parents may be displeased with them about.
Its not your place to send 'messages about freedom of choice' to children in your care on a play date when you have no idea whether the child is allowed that freedom. Be it the park, what they may eat or how they may be clothed. That's a huge overstep when casually hosting a child.
And yes, if your principles are so strong you feel compelled to message them to another person's child, when this might be contrary to the way their parents are lawfully choosing to raise them, it would be better for you not to host the child.
Because whether you like it or not, our society places the responsibility for decisions regarding children with their parents, not with casual acquaintances. And unless there is harm or neglect, that has to be respected.

When you host other people's children it's far from unusual to find their parents have different rules about all sorts of things than you do. Screens, diet, limits on freedom.

All the parents I knew when my kids were that age (including me) had a ‘my house my rules’ approach - it is ridiculous to expect a host a parent to know and enforce every single parental preference in behaviour. We would quietly check out general rules of the host and could judge whether to let our children there accordingly. In one instance I would not let my children go unsupervised to a friends house that didn’t have a net on the trampoline. I understood that if I wasn’t there and my kids wanted to go on the trampoline (against my instructions) she wouldn’t stop them. That was about the extent of it.

How would the host manage it when you have a group of children whose parents set different rules? It’s not a workable approach and I’m surprised you would do that if you had children.

In my opinion OP has absolutely no place or obligation to enforce a rule on a child that is used in many instances as a tool of oppression of women.

And yes, if your principles are so strong you feel compelled to message them to another person's child, when this might be contrary to the way their parents are lawfully choosing to raise them, it would be better for you not to host the child.

Do you seriously think it is reasonable to say that if OP wasn’t prepared to enforce a hair covering rule, then DS isn’t allowed to invite a girl like this home? Maybe try imagining the explanation she’d have to give.