Well done Belgium. Veil banned

[Nuttybear]

I fully support this. Really wish the liberals would put aside there protection of these men and free the women here. I vote for bring the same law here. I despise the veil and all it stands for. I saw a woman trip and fall because she could not see the kerb!!! Her husband/uncle/dad then had to guide her over the next kerb. I saw them again in the supermarket I so wanted to throw eggs at him but it would only make her plight worse. I know a minority want to wear the veil. Well, there are countries that support that decision. I know it might make matter worse for some but there must be a stand to free these women of this 13th century habit. Wearing of the veil is not in the Koran. All for modest dress, if you so wish but, unable to look around your world freely is wrong.

Errr... people seem to be getting angry now.

Firstly, to say that white and Christian people are the definition of 'normal' in England and that everybody else should have to live by that is the kind of thing I would have expected to hear in the 1960s. A community is made up of all its members and they all deserve an equal voice to each other. Equally, I'm white and though I wouldn't say Christian I went to primary schools of Christian leaning and my views are not the same as yours, so there's one pitfall of thinking in such racialised terms - there's plurality across all groups, and many 'white and Christian people' are tolerant, thank goodness.

Ignoring posieparker.

If we're on the subject of who should do their homework, perhaps people who think that anybody who wants to cover their body has an 'issue' should go and read some psychological studies and think a bit more laterally about the millions and millions of perfectly intelligent and perfectly sane women across the world, across all cultures, who wish to do this.

Can't believe the vitriol just for saying that people can choose their own clothing!

Don't like the idea of state interference in what I wear so think they should only ban veils where they ban hoodies and motorcycle helmets.

However when a see a woman who has her face covered I am offended by it. Cover your hair if you like, wear trousers and long sleeve jumpers to hide your body if you choose but people don't see you as a sexual object for exposing your face or eyes.

And I'll believe muslim women aren't oppressed and make a free choice only when I see muslim men choosing to wear a veil.

You shouldn't ignore PosieParker she has a degree in Theology and I would hazard a guess that she has studied it in far more detail than anyone else on this thread.

So by total coincidence then caged bird, lots of religious women cover up by their own choice but most men choose not to. And that has nothing to do with the level of expectation or of differing gender roles?

Im my life I have seen countless families where the father and sons are running about with a football or whatever, wearing Western clothing, while the mother and daughters sit on a bench or whatever in covered clothing.

Are you telling me that in some familes I will see the women wearing Western dress and running about while men and boys sit covered?

And that it is just chance that so far in my 38 years I've only seen the covered women, and not the men?

Oh, I bow down to the Theology degree in awe

Perhaps we should all compare qualifications?

Alouiseq....Careful, apparently you are not allowed to [whispers] question anything.

You want to make up your mind about covering, Cagedbird(so apt), because a man that covers for God but wears a suit to work is not the same as a veiled woman because she does it always, otherwise what is the point? Oh today I will be modest and obedient but tomorrow it's cinema night so I can show everyone my face. It's either just fashion or it's religious expression and showing modesty and obedience.

Alouise, I am loving your memory!

Take that you wilfully miss the point - or mine, anyway.

I have no objection to other people dressing differently, believing different things or whatever. Life would be bloody boring if we were all the same.

I don't agree with gender inequality though, which is what I see in any culture that covers it's women while not covering it's men.

This to me is a simple debate about women's rights and role in society, not about thinking I'm normal because I am white.

In the 60's which you mention, our own mothers did not have equality in law in this country. But now mostly, we do have equality.

It's not my attitudes that come from a byegone age, thanks.

Okay for the last time I will comment to posieparker, and then I won't be posting anymore. It's none of your business what it is. It doesn't concern you. It doesn't concern me, either, so I'm going away now, and I'm going to dress however I like as I do it. If other people don't like it, it's their problem.

Do you also think it is Rivens problem and her DHs that they can't help looking at uncovered cleavages then commenting later, take that?

Morris,haven't you ever seen a Muslim man wearing this? with a taqiyah?.

It certainly isn't as extreme as niqab with ayaba or a burqa,more akin to hijab with abaya perhaps but many of them do cover to an extent.

Okay, sorry, one last reply, since Morris writes to me. I didn't wilfully misinterpret your point - I was trying to say that there was something in your reasoning that I objected to.

I am a passionate believer in gender equality, but that means not having a 'one size fits all' view that means I ignore what other women say about their own experiences and how they choose to define and frame their own lives. I guess we'll never agree on that, which is fine. I just think it's wrong to speak for somebody else and tell them how to behave.

Abaya not ayaba.

Perhaps you should stop being unpleasant to people and stick to the subject.

You are deliberately ignoring the issue, it's not about people choosing their own clothing it's about the oppression of women, it's about security and it's about integrating with the country in general.

Whether you like it or not the majority of people are white/english or they live here because they like what this country can do for them. It's just manners to fit in and be part of the machine that is England.

It's not Englandistan, Londonistan or any of the others that you hear bandied about.

The least you can do if you live in this once great country is be proud of it's heritage and traditions. NOT alienate yourself or your community, if you'd rather be somewhere else then go!

I couldn't give a toss about peoples colour or race but if you live in England it's really not about changing England to suit you but contributing to it in a positive way.

Okay, I actually have a problem with MN addiction, but Morris asked me another question that I didn't see before the last post.

I think you wilfully misinterpret Riven's post! She doesn't seem to me to have a desperate compulsion to look at other womens' breasts! It's just that what makes her comfortable is different to what makes you comfortable. It doesn't matter - she's not hurting anybody, and neither are you. So there's room for both of you.

No I haven't, and anyway I don't see what difference a long dress type garment and hat make anyway.

My grandad wore a hat every day of his life, and most men I know wear trousers that come to the top of their shoes, so they would be showing less than a man in either of those photos. Loads of men wear hats for fashion that cover more hair than the one you pictured.

By wearing a shirt and trousers, or for a woman a shirt/ top/ jumper and trousers or comfortable skirt, most people are fully covered with only hands and face showing.

(looks down at self). Today you can see my wrists and my neck.

Ridiculous. Nobody has the right to tell anyone what they can and can't wear. I love the hypocrisy of people saying they are freeing women from the oppression of being told what to wear by.....telling them what to wear

I don't like the niqab, I spend a lot of time in a muslim country, have muslim ILs, and I don't like it at all, it doesn't fit with my understanding of requirements of muslim women, I think it's restrictive, impractical and anti-feminist. But it's not my decision to make.

Being a racist prick is far more 'anti-english' and causes far more social problems than women wearing the niqab, but nobody is banning the bloody BNP's existance are they?

Alouiseg, I haven't been unpleasant to anybody. Perhaps you should look at yourself.

riven you are starting to lose me a bit.

"Women are already bing made invisible in our culture, they needs their voices heard."

By covering up from head to toe, so having literally no public identity, and not talking to men who are not relatives? How is that going to make women's voices heard?

In the countries where most women are covered they don't seem to be hotbeds of equality and breakthrough feminist thinking.

Also this thing about men not looking - so you have to cover yourself. I agree with morris that if men misbehave the answer is not for women to moderate their behaviour - as it doesn't stop the men misbehaving and simply puts the blame on the woman for not following the rules.

And you keep talking about bodies - yes fine - many women like to cover their bodies, in many religions and many athiests too. But we are talking about faces, about men not looking at faces, not at tits or arse or legs or whatever. I can understand the modesty - but not extended to faces.

Oh come on eric. The BNP are a bunch of wankers and everybody knows it. I'd very happily ban them and every other racist hateful prick on the planet.

But for me, the delightful irony is in religions arguing that we should tolerate them treating the genders differently, in the name of equality.

And nobody in England (or indeed Scotland, where I am) is banning the veil or anything like it.

I don't want to ban any clothing item. But I can debate it, can't I?

Oppression in a veil means you have no voice, oppression banning a veil means that people believe they are speaking for you.

Riven told us to butt out of other people's clothing choices. So presumably I may also ask her and her husband to butt out of my clothing choices - theoretical of course, as like most women, I show zero cleavage or thigh to the public. Boring but true.

Butt out doesn't sound v tolerant to me.

I've seen dozens if not hundreds of men,and boys wearing that.

To be fair it was when I worked in an area that was very ethnic and which had a large Muslim population with a mosque near my workplace but I couldn't go ten yards without seeing men and boys dressed in that garment,I'm not familiar with the name of it.

I saw them wearing them in the height of Summer and in Winter.

It certainly isn't equivalent to niqab but I'm comparing it with the hijab and abaya I suppose. They cover about equal amounts of flesh.

As I mentioned earlier I don't personally agree with women wearing niqab/burqa but I agree even less with a law that dictates what they can and can't wear.

I do think that the majority of impositions imposed by religions are foolish and illogical but I also believe people must choose for themselves if the beliefs have merit and if they wish to practice them,no matter how foolish it seems to me to do so.

Anecdote alert: In the late eighties early nineties I had a lovely time in Nightclubs and casinos in London.

At that time many of them were stocked to the rafters with Muslim men, some in suits some wearing more traditional robe type garments....dish dash?

The men would be gambling, drinking and general partying with some of London's finest immodestly dressed ladies.

So hypocritical! I'm willing to bet that they were married and when the wives went out shopping they were covered in abaya's, veils and all the appropriate Muslim garb.

Then in the slightly later nineties I went to Dubai, nightclubs seemed to be few and far between but again fully laden with Muslim men out for a bit of non muslim fun.

One rule for the boys!

Alouiseg, by the way, I have a PhD in English and History, if we're on the subject of qualifications, and your view of this 'once great nation' and its white past is fatally flawed. Immigration has been a part of these islands since the beginning of its history, as have multiple religions and races, and every single one of us, I can guarantee you, has heritage from outside the UK, and probably not far back either. I'm guessing the 'great' period you're referring to was the period of empire, in which Britain went and imposed itself on other countries and their religions, beliefs, and cultures, often in a deliberately coercive and oppressive manner, and in which women were busy fighting for the rights and freedoms you say you believe in.

It is your assumption that women who wear a veil are trying to change the country or not to contribute.