Ban the burqa?

One of the Senators pulled another stunt in the Senate yesterday. She was attempting to get a bill tabled which would ban the wearing of the burqa in public in this country. She tried to do it correctly first but, on failing, put on a burqa and returned to the chamber. There was an uproar. 

The Senator had made her point. It is not the first time an attempt has been made to introduce such legislation and it more than likely will not be the last.   She is not the only Senator to have tried to have a ban enforced.

Whether it is insulting to Islam not to wear, at very least, a hijab or insulting to women to be required to wear it will depend on your point of view.  I know quite a number of women who wear a hijab. Several do so out of the belief this is the right thing to do.  The others, the majority, do so because it is what is expected of them. 

Many years ago now a good friend was about to show me a photograph of a mutual friend and her new baby. Then she hesitated and said, "I don't think I can. She hasn't covered her hair." 

I am afraid I laughed and said, "J.... invited me home last week and the first thing she did when we got inside was pull of her hijab and toss it on a chair." 

The photograph was duly produced and baby duly admired. I think, indeed hope, attitudes have changed since then.  I have been in and out of student houses since and, as they are all female, there has been no wearing of hijabs inside the house even in front of me. Why should they? Some of them only cover their heads to go to the mosque. They will wear hijabs then but a burqa? To the best of my knowledge none of them own a burqa let alone wear one.

I am told there is no religious requirement for the burqa, the niqab or the hijab to be worn. Why should there be? I am sure if something was said about this in the Koran people could quote the passage. Even then it might be rather like the passage in the letter to the Corinthians where the Apostle Paul is demanding modesty and respect from the women by covering their heads. 

My mother would not have gone to church without wearing a hat. She would not have thought of wearing trousers. Her mother was the same as was my paternal grandmother. It was the way things were then. It is not the way things are now. I know a nun who wears jeans in church and has been known to go barefoot there. It does not make her any less devout now than when she started out in a full habit many years ago.

I may be wrong, very wrong, but I suspect that most women who wear a burqa here do so because they believe they must. They come from households where the males have dictated it and/or they see it as a necessity. The sky will not fall in if they do not wear one but they feel anxious and naked without it. That is perhaps what needs to change.