Wearing a hijab in Iran

[CanadianJohn]

Top women chess players are threatening to boycott the world championship in Iran because they will be forced to wear hijabs.

Female Grandmasters will risk arrest if they do not cover up to compete in the strict Middle Eastern country due to host the knock-out tournament next year.

There is a variety of opinion:

• when in Rome, do as the Romans do
• if you don't like it, don't go
• complain to the governing body (FIDE)

I'm wondering what posters on this board think.

Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3814137/World-chess-uproar-women-told-play-year-s-world-championships-Iran-wearing-hijabs.html#ixzz4LiUB7wzz

Barbarian: Do you accept there are thousands of Muslim cultural imperialists in the UK? Who don't adjust your clothing/what you eat/how you behave to travel, so as not to offend against local custom?

What about showing solidarity with female Iranian chess players? They are forced to cover up whether they like it or not, and may not have the opportunity to attend many international competitions. Refusing to go is not likely to help their case at all.

Yes it is, it helps them by making a news issue out of it. How does it show solidarity by undergoing the same oppression?

Not really, no. I guess you could argue (and I'd agree) that wearing a burka counts as such, as covering your entire face is pretty much a cultural taboo in the west. But I don't think I'd class wearing a hijab as significantly different from wearing the sort of headscarf my granny used to wear. Muslims in the UK are subject our laws, not sharia law and you don't meet many muslim men with 4 wives here. Food-wise, there are long traditions of not eating pork in some communities of the UK (unless you believe British Jews are cultural imperialists too) and halal meat mostly seems to be killed in the same way only with a tape recorded prayer read over it.

What sort of thing do you have in mind?

No - I thought not. Double standards.

There are many tribes around the world (I presume, I cba to google) where it's normal to walk around uncovered from the waist up.

Try that in London and you'd be arrested for indecent exposure. Try to play a chess match with your boobs out and I imagine you'd have an issue.

Cultural norms. Same thing.

Actually in Iran you probably could self identify as a man and avoid hijabs, as long as you get a doctor to sign off. But then you'd presumably have trouble entering a woman's chess competition!

Treatment of woman in Iran is not too bad actually as Islamic countries go (eg a lot of very highly educated women there) plus a lot of woman wear their hijabs half falling off so it's not too restrictive. I don't see being forced to wear a hijab any worse than being forced to wear heels, or forced to wear a skirt, and that happens in plenty of places here (UK). And if you are worried about human rights abuses, you presumably wouldnt want to go to a competition in the US!

That's fine Aqua. So I assume you'd ask Muslim communities not to cover up, not to enjoin supermarkets to sell Halal meat and not to set up Shariah councils.

And by the way Barbarian: it was you suggesting that if you don't do as the Romans do you're a cultural imperialist. Not me. But it seems it only works one way.

not too restrictive?

I'd find wearing a hijab or even an old lady style headscarf horribly restrictive. I can't even bear the feel of an alice band or hairband on my head, and wearing a scarf or hat makes my head itch like mad. And that's in a cold climate. It's very subjective indeed to say it's not terribly restrictive.

If you choose to go to Iran because for some reason you want to go to Iran then yes, those are the rules. But if you need to play at high level tournaments to keep at the top of your game, then it's probably difficult to refuse to go. Much like the poster upthread who said she worried that she might have to go there for her work. That's a much greyer area, because you're not really there by choice.

Winchester the lovely thing about the UK is that generally we get on with things like halal meat and muslim dress.

I just can't get that excited about wearing a headscarf in a country where NOT to wear a headscarf is the equivalent of walking down a street naked.

You really, really wouldn't want to show your bare head in Iran, any more than you'd walk down a street in the UK with your arse out.

Yes I agree - that is the lovely thing about the UK. It is a very unlovely thing about Iran that they do not do this, particularly with regard to women.

If you think the UK should do this, then you think Iran should do this. You can't have it both ways.

I don't think it's unlovely. Iran is a different country, they can do what they want

Your position is very confused. Do you think people should respect the cultural norms of the country they are in or not?

It seems with Iran you think yes. With the UK you think no.

Obviously Iran can do why it wants. The question is whether or not it's objectionable.

pmsl Winchester.

Righty oh.

You really, really wouldn't want to show your bare head in Iran, any more than you'd walk down a street in the UK with your arse out
I agree that a bare head iin Iran is not the same as a bare head in the UK, but I'm not sure that it is the equivalent of bare buttocks iin the UK, if indeed these things can be accurately quantified across cultures.

This also doesn't address the fact that men are not required to cover

It's not a cultural norm to wear a headscarf. The men don't do it.

It's a sexist restriction which Iranian women are protesting at risk to themselves. To have knowledge that Iranian women are begging the rest of the world to support them in protesting this discriminatory law, and then to suggest that Western women can just cover up for a little while to compete at chess, because, sorry, Iranian women, sucks to be you, but seriously ladies, what's the big deal, cultural innit, oh is that my flight they're calling, seeya..."

That's not respecting a country. It's disrespecting Iran's women, disrespecting women everywhere who reject symbols of being second class citizens, and it's demonstrating submission to male superiority and acceptance of oppression of women.

But nice for the women who don't mind wearing it at all. Good for you.

pictures from 1979 showing 100,000 Iranian women protesting the law compelling them to begin wearing headscarves.

Cultural my arse.

what a cogent case you present aqua
better luck next time

The date was March 8, International Women’s Day, and the image shows women from all walks of life — nurses, students, mothers — marching, smiling, arms raised in protest. More than 100,000 of them. At the time, Golestan recalls, Iranian people were very “politically charged” and believed change could be effected by demonstrating in the streets. “This time they were disappointed,” she says. “From the next day everybody had to wear the scarf.”

100, 000 women protesting in 1979. They never used to wear headscarves - you see the photos and they could be us.

I think some people see women who look so different to our Western sartorial norms because of their enforced dress codes, living in countries so different to ours and just immediately imagine they are another species - NOT like us, NOT freethinkers, NOT in need of the same basic human rights as us. It's OK folks, they like it, it's their culture.

Look at those photos. It's so unnerving to see Iranian women as exactly like us, certain that they couldn't be forced into such a retrograde step. 37 years ago.

I agree Hairy, it's chilling to see a culture go backwards, to become primitive and unenlightened
We absolutely should take heed

I don't like it and personally would never even contemplate visiting a country where women are treated so poorly (I wouldn't visit Saudi either).
But this isn't just about someone choosing not to visit a county, these women who have been practicing for many years at their sport have to also decide not to attend the WORLD championships.

For years South Africa was rightly banned from competing in international sporting competitions due to them treating one section of their society unfairly, why should countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia be included when they are doing the same to half their population?

Thanks for the fantastic photos Hairy. Brought a tear to my eye. And then we have people like aqua 'pmsl'-ing.

"For years South Africa was rightly banned from competing in international sporting competitions due to them treating one section of their society unfairly, why should countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia be included when they are doing the same to half their population?"

Exactly.

A friend recently came back from a weekend in Dubai

She told me she now had a new understanding of their culture

She told me very earnestly that the woman want to wear the burka (and hijab)

Unfortunately my poker face wasn't working and i was unable to stop the "youre a fucking idiot" expression on my face