Today’s Jesus and Mo, called “gaze,” is especially appropriate in light of last Saturday’s debate between Asra Nomani and Hoda Katebi on the significance of the hijab. Here are the three reasons why, as fashion-blogger Katebi wrote on her blog, she wears the hijab (the niqab, remember, covers part of the face rather than the hair, but the principle is the same). The first reason is the one releveant to the cartoon, but in interests of completion I’ll give all three.
1. It’s Sexually Liberating
Haha I bet you had to read that one twice. Yes, the Hijab–contrary to popular belief–is actually worn by millions of women around the world in order to become liberated from the rampant objectification of women within society. Through wearing the Hijab, people (namely, men) are forced to look beyond superficial appearances when forming judgments about you, and must rely on this crazy thing called character.
[JAC: I think she means liberation from sexuality rather than “sexually liberating”. And it’s especially ironic that she blogs about fashion—about those “superficial appearances.” See here, and also this: “So, I’m using this [blog] to present an inspirational alternative guide to dressing in the West that’s more modest and covered, but still very very beautiful. You can wear long clothing and you can wear loose clothing and you can still look hella fabulous.”]
2. It keeps your ears warm
Teehee okay okay this one is more of a perk than a basis for wearing it but when you’re trying not to get frostbite on your way to classes in sub-zero degree weather in Chicago you are pretty thankful that your ears are warm & cozy. c;3. For Modesty
Pretty self-explanatory here? As part of Hijab, Muslims also cover their arms, legs, body, and wear loose clothing. The Hijab also extends beyond physical clothing and into the realm of character–to wear the figurative Hijab is to act modestly as well.The strip:
What’s so great about modesty, anyway? L
Many Jewish orthodox women wear modest clothing, even wearing a sheitel. This does not alter the well know fact that Jewish women are hot!
Not when they’re wearing that crap, they aren’t.
cr
+ 1
Bending over backward for religion is one thing but I think this one is completely broken.
I guess the hijab would keep your ears warm if you live in the desert.
Actually, in the really dry deserts, it does get pretty nippy after dark. Next to no moisture in the atmosphere between you and that pesky microwave 4-Kelvin background.
(The CO2 does do it’s thing, but the dominant greenhouse gas remains water.)
You are correct. In some desert areas, particularly in winter or in high desert, it gets very cold at night. But if you have ever spent a summer in the Phoenix area, your nighttime temp. is more like 85 to 90 degrees F and on to 110 or so in the day time.
The headscarf is often practical outdoors, and cheaper than a hat, so many cultures have used it. For some reason, it is considered feminine. In my country, women working in the fields wore headscarves, and many still do, while men used straw hats in summer and other hats in cold weather.
When I was at high school in the 1980s, we had to do some labor service in the fields. The first time, many forgot to take hats to protect their heads from the sun. Our supervisors bought cloth baby diapers (none of us had yet even heard of a disposable diaper) and gave them to the girls. They were square pieces of cheep white cotton, ideal for headscarves. The boys used paper hats.
Now, when people see a headscarf, they immediately think of fundamentalist Islam.
I suspect the girls headscarves were more for keeping their hair tidy than sun protection?
But I wouldn’t go out on a hot day without a good hat, now. It really is not an option.
When I was younger and had lots of nice protective long hair, I didn’t need hats and hated wearing them. Unfortunately the long hair didn’t last (men are quite unfairly disadvantaged in that respect!).
cr
In our villages, there was a distinction between unmarried and married women. Maidens went barehead whenever they could, so that to sport their nice hair. Married women of course had a lot more work, and no need to impress guys anymore. And because it was very hard to keep hair good-looking in those conditions (to wash it, you had to first bring water in a bucket from afar, then put it over a fire to warm it…), they became more “liberal” in hygiene of the hair and tended to hide it under a headscarf even indoors.
TBH, my desert experience is in the Arabian Peninsula. Which is relatively dry. Yes, it does get decidedly nippy at night outside the monsoon season (when the humidity increases significantly, even if it doesn’t rain).
War is peace. Slavery is freedom. Wearing a bag over your body is liberating.
“Slavery is freedom”
This is literally what she’s arguing for.
I can only think handy temporarily if you have a burqua and want to be invisible to that *impossible* person or people
Ive seen women out shopping wearing the black niqab/burqua style with NO eye slits – they must be able to see somehow but its quite unnerving.
Actual reason for all this is mate guarding and lineage control projected onto women all sanctified in the name of preserving 7th Century pastoral tribal norms of clear male lineage and headship of clans of sub societies of people who are all related and clear lines of authority. Religion and political authority are blended, unlike, say the western tradition or most other religions.
A fine mesh gets easier to see through the closer it is to your eyes. If you’ve ever seen a standard fencing mask, it works on the same principle (though newer ones just use a clear solid plastic instead of the traditional wire mesh).
Incidentally, there was an article in the WashPo I believe a couple weeks ago about a conservative (though obviously not *too* conservative) Muslim woman from NYC who may qualify to compete on the US Olympic team. She took the sport up in part because she can compete while having her head and face covered. Indeed, the sport requires it! 🙂
“A fine mesh gets easier to see through the closer it is to your eyes.”
Have you seen buses with crappy advertising plastered all over them including the windows? As a passenger it pisses me off and I’d happily castrate the moronic oick responsible with a blunt penknife, but you can see through it, sorta.
cr
I also hate these buses!
Point taken – have to say though i saw this 3 times at shopping mall or airport – one time quite close and I could see no mesh at all – just completely smooth over the face and jet black like the rest of the gown so the whole face is indistinguishable, not like a burqua eye covering. The fencing mask cover is more like the eye section of a burqua covering
http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-197577131/stock-photo-fencing-mask-with-the-traditional-fine-wire-mesh-covering-to-protect-the-fencers-face-isolated-on-a.html
At work I’ve been presented with driving licence with a woman in burqua as “ID”! Presumably its probably used by the husband and useful to her as additional ID – if she drives in it she has a car with heavily tinted windows and just takes it off whilst in the car. I hope so
You think that is bad – then imagine being a deaf woman – Koran 8:22-23
“Indeed, the worst of living creatures in the sight of Allah are the deaf and dumb who do not use reason. Had Allah known any good in them, He would have made them hear. And if He had made them hear, they would [still] have turned away, while they were refusing.”
That’s just naïve; (some) humans are going to sexually objectify each other no matter what we wear. You cover up everything but the left elbow, pretty soon “hey baby, nice elbow” is going to enter into common pickup language. Horny men, in particular, can turn pretty much any fashion statement into a sexual innuendo. “Got anything in that niqab for me?” People’s choices are, unfortunately, to be objectified for the skin they show or to be objectified for the clothes they wear over it. A sweater is about the most formless and total upper body covering a woman could choose, yet there are multiple songs written about its sexual attractiveness. What you wear isn’t going to mitigate objectification; to do that, you have to confront the people doing it and tell them to stop.
I have no idea where she got this idea from, but again, its naïve. Bigots and people who don’t like you are going to be perfectly happy to judge you based on the superficial appearence of your clothing. Donning a culturally distinctive set of clothes gives them more ammo, not less. For goodness’ sake, there is already an epithet used to superficially judge arabs based on their cultural clothing choice – “ragheads.” How could anyone possibly come to the conclusion that wearing a niqab will stop people from making superficial judgments about you?
How about this: if you go out in the winter without appropriate headwear and your mother wants to harangue you for it, I won’t complain about cultural oppression. If anyone else wants to harangue you for it, though, I’m less sanguine about it.
+1
I was thinking the same things. Your hypothetical sexy elbows already have a close real life objectifying corollary: sexy ankles and their pejorative “cankles”. The author lacks imagination if she really thinks men of certain ideological points of view don’t see traditional dress as “sexy”.
She lacks both imagination AND a “Family Guy” box-set with the episode about a particular ex-POTUS with a thing for “cankles”. And damp cigars.
I just thought a cheering thought. Surely Seth MacFarlane is watching the presidential race, sharpening his pen, and boiling down the vitriol for his next programmes.
Certainly there is this effect. Some of the hijab sides looks like hair. In a lot of instances tho women from ME wear a sort of brown/black sweater down to wrists and trousers underneath with socks then loose brown black dress covering over that and hijab. So covers everything except face.
Also it still sends a message – that *if* you are still attracted remember this woman is off limits unless you are her spouse and it sends a message of control to the woman all the time – its not just something she can take off when its hot … which it is the vast amount of the time in the countries where this originates. Thats why in many cases girls are encouraged to where it young and told they’ll go to hell/shame the family if they don’t.
Oops. …girls are encouraged to *wear* it young not “where” it young?!!
Your excellent comment about the inevitability of sexualization reminded me immediately of this skit from the comedy sketch show Key and Peele:
They also have a follow-up skit with the same two characters placed in an Western-style exercise gym, where the clothing is quite different…
You cannot liberate yourself by wearing a tool of oppression.
As far as I am concerned this argument is an excuse not to stand up for equality for women.
Who has the right to decide what is modest and what is not, and why is modesty something required of women but not men? Quite apart from anything else it leads to the judgment that “immodest” women do not deserve to be treated as well and as those deemed modest, and provides an excuse for any mistreatment. “She was asking for it,” where “it” is anything from disrespect to rape.
++1
Well said, Heather!
Thanks Diane. 🙂
Clothing arrangements that inspire extra attention require no effort whatsoever to put on more than other clothes. Like wearing a Mohawk haircut on one’s head. It will distinguish one from their peers, get lots of attention, but it took no effort to do.
If you are a great lawyer, then be a great lawyer. If you are a great scientist, then be a great scientist. Putting something on one’s head supports no other honor than that manufactured in one’s head.
“Clothing arrangements that inspire extra attention require no effort whatsoever to put on more than other clothes.”
You haven’t worn much women’s clothing, have you?
1. Women who don’t want to wear hijabs or burquas shouldn’t have to.
2. Women who actually do want to wear them ought to be able to.
3. But if a large number of women actually do want to wear them, then many women who do not will feel pressure to wear them, too.
I see no way out of this.
The way out of it is to speak out against public shaming, and to help (in other ways) women who are being socially pressured by their peers to wear certain clothing. Provide a counterbalance to that pressure by giving them social support in their choice not to wear culturally or familial-demanded garb, and an tolerant social space in which to express themselves. Mom says you’re a slut for going out without a hijab? Well you are welcome here, we don’t think you’re a slut, and around here and around us you can wear it or not as you see fit.
Beginning of a way out: Ensure that all people don’t feel the need to “follow the crowd” on clothing choices. How does one do it? Wish I knew!
Don’t look to the fashion industry for help. While they talk the talk of supporting diversity of style and individuality, the reality of the industry is that production schedules means that the sheeple must start buying the new styles on schedule.
I think it is impossible. All human societies known to me impose dress codes, and a major reason is to go after those who violate the dress code, labeling them as crazy or hostile. E.g. pajamas are very comfortable to wear and often good-looking, but we do not go out in them (except in a sudden disaster). If I go out in my pajama, I’d expect something nasty to follow. And if I claim that my religion requires it of me, I guess it can only make things worse.
Oh, the bitter, bitter irony.
Have they not thought of teaching males to behave in a mature manner?
Indeed. IIRC another old-fashioned sign of “modesty” was keeping the eyes down. Well, here’s a way to kill two birds with one stone: you can promote a pious “modesty” and eliminate the need for hijabs by telling the men to keep their eyes down.
“Through wearing the Hijab, people (namely, men) are forced to look beyond superficial appearances when forming judgments about you, and must rely on this crazy thing called character.”
Ah, right. You can express a lot of character with a black sack.
🙁
cr
+ 1
It’s sexism towards both parties at once: for the females, the implication that dressing as anything other than a shapeless hyper-prude is “immodest” and thus self-demeaning; for the males, the implication that their lack of self-control renders them a few errant threads away from a sexual harassment suit.
Calling it “naive” is showing extreme restraint.