Alanna makes her case against banning the veil in France. She uses an argument I've often heard (and am sympathetic towards):
Making the face veil illegal takes that stigma to the ultimate level. Women who wear the veil by choice will take it off, true. But women who are trapped in oppressive patriarchal structures won’t get to remove their veils and go out in the world. They’ll be kept from going out at all by the same men who force them into the veil in the first place.It seems to me that there is little evidence/data on:
- What percentage of women choose the veil freely (as an unconstrained choice).
- How crucial the veil is for public engagement in communities where women are forced to wear a veil (i.e. what does the elasticity of demand for public involvement really look like for these families).
Looking beyond the war of cultures, we should be treating the proposed ban the same way we treat any rights-based intervention: with caution, as well as much emotionless analysis as possible.
If readers know of any relevant empirical studies, please post them.
4 Comments
No empirics for you, but it is true that the veil was originally a progressive achievement for women: it allowed them to participate in public life to an extent they never had before, just by going to the market, meeting with each other etc.
It's always important to bear in mind the choices are freedom or oppression, but different levels of each.
btw - you should read Palace Walk, the first book of Naguib Mahfouz's Cairo Trilogy. The first section is the home-bound life of the mother of the family. If the choices for an individual are the life described for her and the veil, the veil clearly wins.
"If the choices for an individual are the life described for her and the veil, the veil clearly wins."
Points and recommendations taken - but my question still stands, we don't actually know to what extent this is the actual choice set for Muslim women in France today.
This was something I actually thought about addressing in my blog post, but I was afraid it would derail the main point - both sides here are arguing in the absence of data. What we really need is some kind of polling of Muslim women in France to find out how the veil affects them.