Word: burqa
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...headscarf in what has been painted as a landscape of cruel, racist taunting. Her death has also become the latest weapon in the controversy over remarks made last month by French President Nicolas Sarkozy in which he equated the most conservative style of Islamic women's dress, the burqa, with subservience. "This is cowardly act supported by many western politicians like Sarkozy ... We should stand against such an inhumane act," wrote one man on the message board of a Facebook group titled Defending the Rights of the Late Marwa El-Sherbini, which claims more than 1,000 members...
...champions of French secularism note that the Scientology trial is based on fraud accusations, not religious practice. Meanwhile, the burqa offensive is aimed at protecting the rights of women forced to efface themselves by covering their bodies entirely. "The rights of women isn't an issue of a few centimeters of cloth, but the burqa is the symbol of the oppression women suffer, so this debate should be encouraged," says Siham Habchi, president of the Neither Whores Nor Submissive women's movement, referring to the parliamentary initiative. (Check out a story about Europe's "veil wars...
...what about the rights of Muslim women who honestly feel faith-bound to voluntarily don a burka? Or those prohibited by law from attending public school with the headscarves they wear everywhere else? Why is no one ranting about nuns' habits being "degrading" (as Gerin called the burqa), just as no one lashed out at creeping extremism when then-First Lady Bernadette Chirac covered her head during Vatican visits...
...this point, no Muslim defenders of the rare French burqa have emerged. Indeed, Dounia Bouzar, a specialist on Muslim affairs, notes that while she and many fellow Muslims opposed the headscarf ban as meddling in private matters of choice, she is relieved at action taken on the burqa. "Imposition of this garment on women is one manner Salafists get individuals to renounce their individuality and submit to the extremist cult thinking that masquerades as Islam - but which is an abomination of it," Bouzar says. "That Salafist influence and activity is spreading, and if it takes political action to prevent their...
France isn't the first nation to consider a burqa ban. In 2006, Dutch officials caused a storm of protest from its Muslim populace by proposing a burqa interdiction. A law imposing a ban may soon be passed. France is not that far yet. The parliamentary motion to form an investigating committee must be approved before that body can be formed. If it is, it must study the burqa and reasons why those women who wear it do so, and consider recommendations whether to ban it. Drafting and voting legislation to that end would take months. Before then, public debate...