"They say life is a sum of all your choices, if you want a different life, make a different choice."
These are nice quotes, but they do not always measure up to real life because in real life many choices are forced like what women wear. A lot of us have the freedom to pick what we want. A lot of us do not one piece of clothing that best sums up the debate on choice is the hijab. It's perhaps the most controversial piece of clothing in modern times. It is imposed on many women.
It is freely adopted by some, some wear it all the time, some only when they pray. Some wear it as a symbol of cultural identity somewhere it because it's the norm in their family.
But is the hijab mandated by Islam or is it a product of political Islam?
Is it a symbol of devotion or is it a symbol of oppression?
These are controversial but frequently asked questions, and it is important to unveil the answers.
Let's start by understanding what the hijab really is.
The word appears at least eight times in the Quran. Each reference denotes a barrier, a partition or a curtain. The concept is spiritual, not sartorial.
The hijab is simply a concept that emphasizes on decency and modesty in the interaction with the opposite sex. A concept that is applicable to both men and women. The general idea behind it is that all Muslims should behave modestly dressed decently, cover their private parts, and avoid sexual exploration irrespective of their gender. Yeah, but the vast majority of Muslims believe that these rules apply only to women. This misunderstanding, or should I say ignorance, largely stems from patriarchy.
Look around in religious texts and history books you'll only find interpretations, rules, and laws dictated by individuals who always happen to be male scholars, clerics, priests, intellectuals, all men projecting themselves as custodians of Islamic values and guardians of female modesty. Most of them have cherry picked Islamic versus to suit their narrative. That said, literature on the hijab is much more dense and diverse.
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| full article |
There are some scholars who say that it's not at the core of the Islamic faith, not a part of the Sharialaw, not obligatory like the five pillars of Islam, and that wearing a hijab is just a personal choice. Their argument is that if the hijab were meant to be obligatory it would have been clearly commanded, not phrased in the way it is in the Quran.
Over the years we've seen both sides of this debate influence politics.
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| Reza Shah Pehlvi |
In laws in 1936 Iran ruler Reza Shah Pehlvi issued a decree banning all veils. Women who still chose to wear it were beaten and had their scarves torn.
In 1979 the Islamic Revolution took place in Iran, and the hijab was made compulsory and women who did not wear it were beaten and detained.
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| Mustafa Kemal Ataturk |
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| Recep Tayyip Erdogan |
In 2013, the current Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan lifted the ban, matched the outrage of secular Turkish citizens.
This cycle of veiling and unveiling has played out in several parts of the world. The hijab itself has evolved into different forms. There is no uniform style of what it looks like, there's Kemar which covers the head, neck and shoulders. There's the burka which covers the entire body. There's Niqab which covers only the face. There's the Chawder which covers the full body, revealing only the eyes. And then there's head scarf that covers the hair and neck. For most of the world, the headscarf represents the hijab. And for most Muslims it has become a commodity, something that depends on one's nationality, social status, economic status, religious belief, or the lack of it.
I have some figures to show you in 2014 a survey was conducted by the Pew Research Center in seven Muslim majority countries. The question was should women be allowed to choose their own clothing?
Thing in Tunisia, 57% of the respondents said yes. In Egypt, 52% said yes, Turkey, 46% said yes. 32% in Lebanon, 63% in Saudi Arabia, 44% in Iraq and 24% in Pakistan. These figures are indicative of the kind of societies that exist in these countries.
In 2015, a poll was conducted. In Iran, the respondents were split based on the level of their education and where they stood on the Human Development Index, the question was should the hijab be voluntary or mandatory? 51% of those with the university degree said it should be voluntary. In contrast, 61% of those without higher education supported an obligatory hijab policy. In terms of Human Development Index those from less developed areas supported a mandatory hijab, those in relatively well off sections not so much the point here is that education and environment has a lot to do with how the hijab is viewed and practiced.
In some societies, women have to wear it simply because the people around them insist on it. Any debater position is labeled as blasphemy, and play down as western influence, so women are forced to comply.
Now these arguments are further backed with foolish arguments where women without the hijab compared to exposed meat, coverless candies and pearls without shells. Not only is that offensive, it is UNACCEPTABLE. But then, which society does not have religious sexist? And bigotry just one aspect of the hijab story.
The another aspect has to do with integration hijab are seen as a statement of identity many western countries view it as a symbol of parallel societies as a barrier that increases cultural separation. They believe that if Muslims are settling in their country, they must live like them, they must look like them, accept their dress code and their culture. There are also security concerns when your face is covered it's difficult to identify you, and many westerners feel that this puts them at risk and they're just not comfortable with it.
The result is this, at least 12 European nations have banned the hijab in one form or the other. France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria and Switzerland have a complete ban on all types of hijab. Germany, Spain, Italy, Denmark, Latvia, Bosnia and Herzegovina have limited prohibitions in some places all these countries believe the hijab has no place in a modern world.
Critics call it Islamophobia.
They point at increasing hate crimes against women who wear the hijab in public in London, Berlin, Paris, Vienna. There have been numerous xenophobic attacks on women. Where hijab has been pulled off and their heads carved stone, and this too must be called out. Most Muslim women in the Western world today say they're making the choice to wear the hijab freely to embrace their ethnic identity, to build cultural solidarity and as a means of resistance to popular standards of feminine beauty.
And this has led to some high profile fashion houses promoting the hijab. GAP 2018 back to school campaign featured a girl wearing the hijab.
Nike sells the Nike Pro women hijab.
But this is where things get complicated. You see for thousands and thousands of women the hijab is not a choice. It is forced on them. It is used to threaten them with divine punishment, sometimes to simply subvert them. Women who do not wear the hijab are banned from holding certain positions. Some women have even been killed for not wearing it, they've been murdered by complete strangers, beaten to death by their own parents. They've been shot dead by Islamist terrorists. All I'm saying is that in a large part of the world the hijab is a piece of clothing that is being used to apply group pressure, tool to shackle thousands of women and every time we call the hijab a choice, we run the risk of further perpetuating this oppression to further fuel a social narrative that completely absorbs men of sexually harassing women and puts the burden on the victim to protect herself by covering up.
In 2017, Iranian women decided to challenge this narrative. They threw off their hijab. There were unprecedented demonstrations. The Iranian regime carried out a harsh crackdown more than 40 women were arrested, hefty fines were imposed. The movement died down and this is the kind of bullying Iranian women now have to deal with on a daily basis.
Watch this.
You wear it, you're attacked.
You do not wear it.
You're attacked, you oppose it.
You're called blasphemous.
You ban it.
You're called Islamophobic.
Why can't we just let women be?
In this religious, cultural and political war over the hijab, it is the women who suffer. Take the religious implication away and the hijab is just a piece of cloth. It's a choice if you do not care much about the repercussions. If a woman feels that her public identity shaped by the hijab have a nuanced debate or just let her be. And if she's informed enough and does not want to wear it, then let her be.
This is possible, but it's not suitable because from religious clothing to abortions to traveling alone, to staying out late at night to having male friends and to choosing their life partners, the world thinks it is their business to decide what women should do. NO it's not
To sum up, the Indian constitution has given the right to practice any religion which means one can wear any clothes according to their religion, but at the same time the individual should also respect the code of conduct of certain place.
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