Is Jack Straw a racist for requesting that women remove their veils?

[magicfarawaytree]

just watching the news. didnt personally think he had done anything terrible in asking.

interestingly from all the thing that I have read - my muslim and non muslim - an before anyone shoots I am not an expert on this. The Koran does not tell any woman to cover her face. Respectable women cover their heads and necks but that is completely different. I would not in any face to face meeting be comfortable discussing things with someone with their face cover. body language and facial expressions are as much a part of communication as is the spoken word.

Agree with Jenkel it's just hard to communicate with someone whose face you can't see. Although it would give the wearer some satisfaction if the person they were talking to was pissing them off and was completely unaware the wearer was pulling face at them, I suppose.

Yasmin Alibhai Brown (sp?) wrote a column once about being unnerved by a fully-veiled woman - face and eyes covered - who followed her round a shop. When she got home, the doorbell rang, and it turned out this woman had followed her. Turned out the woman had followed because she'd seen a Muslim wearing Western dress and wanted to ask for help. The poor woman had been beaten black and blue by her husband. Who was taking advantage of the fact no-one would know. Sent a shiver down my spine.

should be 'by' not 'my'

fio - yes, apparently they all did.
batters - does it have to be anyone's "problem" though? how about a bit of give and take?
how about - would you mind removing the veil from your face because I would like to be able to see you when you talk?
no, I would rather not
or yes, ok.

but it can't be wrong to simply express an opinion, just because it relates to Islam imo

So JS could ask that question politely of an individual woman in individual circumstances - why make a public announcement about it?

Maybe someone asked him about it? Don't see that there are any topics you can't discuss in public just because they relate to Islam.

Straw 'opposes all Muslim veils'

The BBC's reporting of anything Islamic-related seems to be desperately trying to rile Muslims at the moment. All that bullshit yesterday about a Muslim police officer who asked not to guard the Israeli embassy which was OBVIOUSLY a sensible request - and the BBC headlines with quotes from the Sun newspaper instead of say, the Police.

Grrr

I have absolutely no idea, but according to the interview on the radio today he thinks it has a detrimental affect on community relations in his constituency.
I think that is a legitimate opinion, that he is entitled to it and entitled to express it.
I don't know if he is right about it because frankly he is in a much better position than me to judge.

he was asked about it by an interviewer on Radio 4.

because it is an important issue phantomcam. my mil is nearly 80 and lives in harrow. she gets frightened seeing women dressed in the full veil.

well they look pretty frightening to an 80 year old

Agree with harpsi - sums it up nicely for me.

Oh my God - am I saying I agree with Jack Straw?!?!

I think JS wrote a letter re the subject.

Southeastastralplain that's a different issue.

I agree with JS and I also agreed with John Reid for telling muslim parents to guard their children against extremists. I am fed up with these ridiculous ott and over-sensitive reactions every time something like this comes up.

I also thought the Pope was a wimp for apologising. What the hell has happened to freedom of speech?

"on a very, very basic level I don't believe Mr Straw has the right to tell ANY woman how to dress"

I think there's a very interesting contradiction in that statement batters, considering the women he was specifically referring to are effectively being told to wear veils, whether directly or through community/religious expectations! And Mr Straw appears to make clear that he requests removal, he does not tell these women what to do.

I personally find the image of women trussed up in niquab with only a small slit to see through, a sight I see increasingly in London, upsetting, particularly in this day and age. Am I a racist for feeling that way? I don't think so. But it seems that there's very little discussion about it for the usual reasons. I think Mr Straw is very brave for expressing his opinion & it's pretty typical of the likes of George Galloway to jump in and demand his resignation...

a quote from the Guardian; 'the Muslim peer Lady Uddin defended Mr Straw's decision to raise the issue, although she said Muslim women should be able to choose what they wore. "I think there needs to be a debate," she said. "He should have the right to raise this question and people should have a right to disagree. I think the Muslim community needs to address this, not just throw its hands up."

I do think the media has a lot to answer for when it comes to these issues blowing up. They very often report things out of context (viz. the Pope's speech, which was 3 hours long and was an academic lecture - the media only picked up on the one very small statement which inflamed the whole thing) and then stoke the fires by, as was said, showing headlines from the Sun (when was that ever serious news??) rather than a statement from the police. The list is endless. They pick on something they know will make news, even if the surrounding circumstances are not newsworthy. Boosts their ratings, sales, etc.

Too true Freckle

But, what the media seem to lose sight of is that, by stoking these fires, real people out there suffer - remember the nun who was murdered as a result of the reporting of the Pope's speech? What are increased ratings worth then?

True Freckle

How to be a BBC Journalist:

1. Find someone who will talk about Islam
2. Ring up The Association of Crazed Muslim Jihadists (18 year old living with parents in Neasden), get him to rant for a bit before his mum calls his for dinner
3. Jumble it together
4. Splash over front pages
5. Collect large pay cheque - it's all thanks to the unique way we're funded!

I agree about the media, it so irresponsible. The holier-than-thou attitude of 'we're only reporting what the public wants to hear' really gets up my nose. They should be reporting the news ffs and an unbiased, all angles account of the news at that. I hate the patronising attitude of all media these days. GRRRRRR.

Also agree with Aelita about the usual suspects jumping on the shocked and outraged bandwagon.

Is there that many women who wear it? I think its beside the point Even if her face is showing people will still probably not talk to her and still be totally ignorant about her culture. The place would be very dull if everyone had to wear western dress etc. There must be a trillion other better ways of encouraging integration.

I don't think anyone has suggested that Muslim women have to wear Western dress. Just remove the veil which makes talking face-to-face so difficult and unbalanced. Someone wearing a veil can see my face but I can't see hers. As so much of communication is made by body language and facial expression, the conversation is automatically unbalanced - and it may indeed lead to misunderstandings.

agree with aelita & the dull witch,

& moaningpaper, what the hell is happening at the BBC? They've gone all tabloid as if they're trying to pick a fight. Are they still smarting about the Andrew Gilligan thing? I think their stance is creating problems & danger for any poor bugger sent to the middle east at the moment.

edam I heard that story too, and another one about a family in a restaurant where all the men were able to eat but the woman with faces covered obviously couldn't. I 'm concerned by this whole repressive interpretation of Islam..anyone read 'The Handmaids Tale'?