Women Can Wear Or Not Wear What They Want
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Brittani Bumb
Publication (Outlet/Website): Assorted In-Sight (In-Sight Publishing)
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2016/12/05
2016 has been a strange year. It has been a dangerous year, too – not only in climate change and the increased potential for nuclear catastrophe, but in the predictable human preoccupation with unhealthy nationalism, and xenophobia, and ethnic, religious, and clothing chauvinism.
Take, for instance, the common case of tacit expectations of women rather than men in terms of what to wear or not wear (American Civil Liberties Union, 2016). In particular, this has impacted American Muslims more because of targeted hate crimes.
Indeed, even today, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights expressed “deep concern about the rise in reported hate crimes cited in the FBI’s November 2016 report, “Hate Crime Statistics, 2015”. Since last month’s election, there have also been an alarming number of hate crimes and incidents reported.” (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 2015).
With 2016 drawing to a close, many American Muslims are fearful and anxious as to how they will be treated or perceived by their non-Muslim counterparts in the coming years (American Civil Liberties Union, 2016).
No one fears the unknown more than Muslim Women, many of whom expressed their fears via Twitter shortly after Donald Trump won the Presidency of the United States. With anti-Muslim rhetoric being spouted on his campaign trail, it is no shock to witness these women’s uneasiness rise, especially considering many wear a rather prominent symbol of their religion and culture: Hijab.
Examining this relationship brings up a rather pointed question surrounding the Hijab and what kind of significance it yields to the women who wear it. Many in Western Society view the Hijab as a form of oppression to the women who wear it. In some instances, this is true. In many others, it is simply false.
To many Westerners, it symbolizes the inability to show one’s self off fully or express one’s self honestly out of fear. There’s some truth to that, but it is largely a stereotype and a myth. Whether that “fear” stems from the men who allegedly en masse force women to wear them or an over-zealous religion that deems walking outside without being covered from head to toe as “immodest,” are either of these two viewpoints entirely accurate?
It depends, and for the vast majority the answer would appear to be a resounding, “No.” Upon plumbing the depths of the ‘mystery’ that seems to surround the Hijab, we begin to realize that the relationship is more complex than what many view on the surface, and it is highly personal to each woman who adorns herself with one daily.
So, why is it that so many in public officials feel they have any right to tell women what they are permitted to wear or convince the public why going against the society-deemed standard should be viewed in a negative or fearful light?
It is rather astounding. It takes a brief honest look to observe some Western countries, by law, banning the Islamic garb for Muslim women (Sanghani, 2016; Rubin, 2016) and some Eastern countries forcing, by law or culture, Islamic garb for Muslim women.
One might think women’s autonomy isn’t the problem here, but, rather, the denial of fundamental rights, freedoms, privileges, and, therefore, restriction on autonomy. It is not as ridiculous, but is absurd to have France ban the Niqab, or the government tell women what they can’t wear, as it is in some fundamentalist societies tell women what they can wear.
Men dress themselves; hence, women should too. It is a simple ethical precept advocated by the dominant Western religion, Christianity, and by the dominant Eastern religion, Islam: Golden Rule. Unless they wish to act as the Pharisees, as men can wear or not wear whatever they want; women should be able to as well. In short, women should be able to wear whatever they damn well please.
Bibliography
1. American Civil Liberties Union. (2016). Discrimination Against Muslim Women – Fact Sheet. Retrieved from https://www.aclu.org/other/discrimination-against-muslim-women-fact-sheet.
2. Rubin, A.J. (2016, August 27). From Bikinis to Burkinis, Regulating What Women Wear. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/28/world/europe/france-burkini-bikini-ban.html.
3. Sanghani, R. (2016, July 8). Burka bans: The countries where Muslim women can’t wear veils. Retrieved from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/burka-bans-the-countries-where-muslim-women-cant-wear-veils/.
4. U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. (2016, December 5). U.S. Commission on Civil Rights Statement on Hate Crimes in the United States. Retrieved from http://www.usccr.gov/press/2016/PR-12-05-16-hate-crimes.pdf.
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In-Sight Publishing by Scott Douglas Jacobsen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Based on a work at www.in-sightjournal.com.
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