The burka – or burqa as some write it – is the head-to-toe covering that some Muslim women wear over their clothes when they go out in public. Sometimes all you can see is their eyes, but sometimes even their eyes are covered (with a netting that they can see through).
Burkas are mostly seen in Afghanistan and South Asia – Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. In India only one Muslim woman in 20 might wear it; in Afghanistan under the Taliban all women were forced to wear it. In Pakistan it used to be quite common, but it has been dying out, especially in the big cities.
Even though some will argue it is not in the Koran, in most of the Muslim world hijab, or modest dress, is understood to be a religious duty or virtue for women (and, to a lesser degree, for men).
The form that hijab takes is different from place to place. The burka is the most extreme form.
In Iran women wear a chador, which covers everything but their face, hands and feet. In some Arab countries women wear the abaya which does the same thing. In other places, like Turkey, women wear just a headscarf. And some Muslim women dress in a completely Western fashion, though with more of their body covered than Western women.
Burkas, abayas and chadors are just for going out in public. They are something women wear over their clothes. When they are at home they take them off and you find out that they are not dressed quite so plainly. When Neda died during the election protests in Iran in 2009, for example, we found out that under her chador she was wearing blue jeans!
Governments sometimes force women to follow hijab, like the Taliban or Iran under Islamic rule. Yet others have forced women to do the opposite, like Iran under the shah.
In France it has been against the law to wear a burka to public school since 2004. And now they want to go even further and outlaw it altogether. In 2009 President Sarkozy said:
The issue of the burka is not a religious issue, it is a question of freedom and of women’s dignity. The burka is not a religious sign, it is a sign of the subjugation, of the submission of women. I want to say solemnly that it will not be welcome on our territory… I tell you, we must not be ashamed of our values, we must not be afraid of defending them.
This only makes sense to me as a piece of xenophobia: Muslims make him feel uncomfortable.
For many Muslim women it is in fact a matter of religion. And keeping themselves covered up from the eyes of men is a matter of dignity. Even in the West, modest dress was seen as part of a woman’s dignity until the 1900s.
Your religion – or even a lack of religion – is part of who you are. To be told you cannot express it when you are hurting no one goes against one’s freedom and dignity.
See also:
Although I believe a person should wear what they want and even more so if it is your religious duty…I understand the outlaw of burkas. The covering of women from head to toe is NOT in the Koran, and I understand the security measures that wearing a burka could impede.
But hey, if women want to wear them it is fine, but I believe that in a public institution such as school or university, it shouldn’t be worn.
LikeLike
i know some women like to wear the burqa because they feel special. i’ve seen women wearing head scarves with makeup and everything looking glamorous and cute too, nails done…you can really make those head scares look cute and fashionable if you want.
LikeLike
abagond i bet your cute in reality, i hope everything works out with you and your wife…
LikeLike
Have to disagree here. This is not a instance of xenophobia, but by of the misogyny that pervades many religions, but Islam in particular. Thats why I am agnostic . . .
LikeLike
The Burka cannot be considered in a vacuum. It must be considered in the continuum of the treatment of women in Islam. Infibulation, honor killings, bride burnings, stoning for simple public displays of affection — these and many other are examples of the truly inhuman way in which Muslims treat their women or, if they do not personally do so, certainly look the other way and ignore it as fellow Muslims do. In context, the Burka is a symbol of the treatment of women in ways that we in the US do not tolerate for dogs or farm animals.
I have no issue with a woman who chooses to dress modestly. I know many devout church going women who choose to do so. Even the most modest among them does not wear a burka.
It’s time to call a spade a space. Islam’s prehistoric views toward its women has no place in a civilized society. Certainly I realize that we ourselves have our own issues with our women. In fact, we are probably as dysfunctional as Islam, but on the other end of the spectrum. We have turned our princesses into whores — Paris Hilton as exhibit A. Without question, we have laundry to clean and stale air to void.
Nevertheless, I salute the courage of Sarkozy, and other, in banning this symbol of oppression.
LikeLike
I am sorry, but my heart skips a beat every time I see a person in a niqab or a burka. That is creepy. God alone knows who is behind that thing. For all I know, it could be G.I. Joe. I don’t mind the other types of hijabs, but when they start covering faces, I get scared. I just need to see people’s faces.
LikeLike
It’s my opinion that, here in the West, men STILL feel that they are owners of women’s bodies, just as much as any other patriarchal society. But whereas many cultures have, and continue, to preach modesty- Western culture has used a woman’s freedom against her and has decided that she must show he flesh to be considered worthwhile.
“See the goods.”
“Take a gander at the girls.”
We’re actually in a catch-22 as to show nothing makes one prudish and to show too much is to make one “skanky.” But in the end it is men who choose these terms and outline them with the rest of us scrambling to meet requirements due to social pressure and biological drives.
The burqa doesn’t make Western men uncomfortable purely for racial reasons, but also because it flies in the face of their assumption and social conditioning that they have a RIGHT to view a woman. They have a RIGHT to ascertain her worth based off of her curves, whether too much or not enough.
The cultural implications lie in the fact that these women, whom cover themselves, are silently refusing to assimilate to the Western standard that would rather regard them as objects for observation. Madonnas or Whores. The assimilation of the women means the men of the dominant culture can bed her/mate with her/give her offspring and remove from her her foreignness.
The burqa shuts that noise down before it can even become a whimper in the wind.
So while this whole issue is more than just xenophobia- it’s about sex, cultural assimilation, and sexism- all wrapped up in a pretty “progressive” package that smells like crap. LOL!
LikeLike
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/24118241
It sounds like some people are confusing a burka with a hijab. A hijab is a covering that covers a woman’s head and hair but leaves her face open. It is what most Muslim women wear. A burka covers everything including the face and a net over the eyes. A nijab covers everything but the eyes. I’m perfectly fine with the hijab (and things like the Chador, and coverings similar to the hijab),but not the burka. If you ask most Muslim women, they will tell you that the hijab is the main thing that is worn (and still optional in many circumstances) but the burka came along with extremists. You rarely saw the burka before the Wahabis and the Taliban. I absolutely agree that banning the hijab is xenophobic and wrong, but I think it’s ridiculous to say it’s xenophobic to ban something that literally covers a person to the point of invisibility; the whole point of the burka being done by extremists was to render women invisible and obedient. That’s sick. I can’t help but notice that it’s mostly men who stick up for the burka. If you look at traditional Islam, it talks about dressing modestly, but not about the burka. It’s a long way from dressing modestly to having your whole head completely covered. I do agree that completely banning it can start a slippery slope, but I think it should be discouraged as much as possible. The other coverings should be allowed of course. I have yet to meet a Muslim woman who actually likes the idea of a burka or wants to wear a one (again very different from the hijab and similar coverings which most Muslim women do wear at some point and are fine with). A hijab, chador, nijab, etc, yes, but a burka no. That doesn’t mean they don’t exist, but from what I hear, they seem to be rare. Most women who wear burkas unfortunately forced into it.
LikeLike