Men in Tajikistan ban women from wearing hijab. Man in US protests.

[DrNickedMaCorpus]

https://www.cair.com/press_releases/cair-condemns-ban-on-hijab-islamic-clothing-in-tajikistan/

'CAIR Research and Advocacy Director Corey Saylor. “We condemn this draconian, repressive law and urge the Tajik government to reverse this decision.”'

The clothing ban is an interesting issue, but this morning it was the absurdity of men across the world arguing about how women should or shouldn't dress that really struck me when reading this article.

I wonder what the women of Tajikistan think?

I saw that Tajikistan uses Cyrillic and Farsi! That's pretty impenetrable for most.

Thanks, Warrior, for taht detailed article. The historical/political context is very useful. I hadn't realised the extent of bans on the burqa through Europe.

Seems to me that women and womens appearance are used as tokens or flags to try and control men's actions. If your problem is with ISIS, why target women wearing the hijab?

@Killingoffmyflowersonebyone "It’s very Soviet Russia in many ways - and unless you speak Turkish or Russian (which I wouldn’t advise you do…) it’s quite hard to get by." Why would you not advise to speak Russian or Turkish, out of interest? Thank you for the insight. My step sister was meant to go and teach English in Azerbaijan many years ago, but met someone and got married so they stayed in the UK. I was disappointed as I loved the idea of going to visit her, no idea why as I knew nothing about Azerbaijan, I think I just wanted to go somewhere unusual!

I phrased that badly! Turkish is fine!! Russian is more challenging.

The smaller Central Asia countries have quite a complex attitude towards Russia. They’re EX-SU but the culture/language represents a difficult time in their history. They’ve also seen Russian actions in Ukraine (recent issues escalated this) and in Nagorno-Karabakh as deeply problematic - they view it as interference in domestic issues of those countries. And they’re all very ‘young’ countries so they worry about their own stability - particularly those who are more autocratic (Turkmenistan) - and what Russia might do to undermine that.

There’s also the Afghanistan ‘problem’ where when Russia withdrew lots of Taliban fighters moved through CA towards Russia.

BUT they need Russia for trade and typically for access to the west (which up until recently had no interest in CA). So, they’re ‘pragmatic’ - they recognised they need a relationship with Russia (CSTO, trade etc), but they don’t want to be reminded of their ties hence why it’s better to speak Turkish, if you can! In some of the countries there’s been an active shift to try and stop Russian being the second language.

They won’t hate you if you speak Russian, but it won’t endear you. Much the same way speaking English is France never really helps!

Azerbaijan is incredible - really worth visiting. TBH the whole region is just fascinating - both for the people/culture but also the politics!

Fascinating thread thank you all.

I do that Mongolia is mad about breast feeding. They think it's fantastic.

I'll try to find an inspiring article I read many years ago.

@DrNickedMaCorpus sorry I derailed your thread a bit! It’s not just ISIS it’s with religion as a whole. They’ve seen what it can do to politics and stability in a country and they want know part of it. Many of them are very autocratic and the two biggest risks to their stability are external interference (Russia) and religious interference (Islam). Clamping down on hijab’s is an extension of this.

For example; Iran has just mandated that hijabs must be worn on the street whilst Uzbekistan has just relaxed rules on religion (Edit: I say ‘just’ - but it was earlier this year) - and as a result lots of those who once hid their religious affiliation are now asking for more and calling for action against the government and justifying ‘jihad’ and demanding women where the hijab.

Other CA states will be watching this and the likely result will be a further clamp down on religious identities.

The outrage should come from the women to whom this outrage is done but they don't because they have no support network. I'm not sure how much you know about what a Muslim woman/girl has to endure, they are indoctrinated into believing this is how they serve their men folk and God from birth and it is almost impossible to escape . Child forced marriages to much older men , rape, physical and mental abuse, even death if they rally against this fate , no power, no voice over their lives, no /little education, this is where the outrage should be ! There is no support for them either within or outside their families due to the burden of honour that is laid upon them due to their gender. I was lucky ,I was brought to England, was able to survive despite being ostracized from and feeling ostracized from my birth community and my adopted ( racism) one. In countries which practise Islam the female has no/little control over all aspects of her existence.

This.

Hey, don't apologise, it's fascinating, thanks for your insights.

My observation when I read the first article was not just the new law, but the instant condemnation from a man in the US. Perhaps he has a greater awareness of the region's complex historical, social, political context, but it struck me as more of a knee jerk response. And from a distance, like men using women as tools to express their political wishes.

I have tried to find info directly from women in Tajikistan, but tbh the language barrier is a tough one.

Corey is a shill for increasing Islamification, and enforcing ‘traditional ’ behaviour on American Muslim women. Hence his statement.

The Hijab unfortunately is used as a tool of male supremacy.
Look at women in Afghanistan.

There are not many women in the video wearing the hijahb so if they as a majority supported the motion it would be surprising