It’s good to talk

robert whelan, 11 October 2006

It seems strange that Jack Straw should have said what he did when he did. Up until now, he has established a reputation for pandering to Islamists – during the cartoon fiasco he seemed more offended by the portrayal of Mohammed than the banners calling for ‘a real holocaust’ – and at all costs seeking to woo the Muslim vote. So why court controversy by expressing discomfort about the wearing of the veil?

Whatever his motivations, one thing is clear: when we get beyond the baying and braying of the media, what he said wasn’t actually very contentious. He didn’t call for a ban on the niqab – the veil which covers the entire face but for a slit for the eyes – but rather admitted that he personally finds it harder to converse with a woman who’s wearing one. He also said that this was an issue about which we need to provoke public dialogue. Predictably, he was told to shut up by some quarters – but as the days have passed since he wrote the offending article for his local Blackburn constituency paper, an increasing number of commentators have come out in his support.
It is not just Blair and Brown who have defended his statements. Nor are we talking about racists and fascists fixing for a fight. No, by expressing concerns about the potential divisiveness of the niqab, Mr Straw has evidently spoken on behalf of a wide range of people identifying themselves as moderate Muslims. Notably, on Monday, Ghayasuddin Siddiqui, leader of the Muslim Parliament of Great Britain, endorsed the intervention, saying: ‘Mr Straw has opened a debate within the Muslim community and encouraged interaction. Muslims themselves have failed to create a mechanism to discuss these issues. That is why they have had to be discussed out in the open.’
In The Times earlier this week, Saira Khan argued that the veil is not a religious obligation but a symbol of the subjugation by men of their wives and daughters. She contends that the growing number of women veiling their faces in Britain is a sign of radicalisation – or Talebanisation – because it is an extreme practice based on culture not creed. For her, the veil should not even be a matter of choice. ‘It is never right for a woman to hide behind a veil and shut herself off from people in the community,’ she states. ‘But it is particularly wrong in Britain, where it alien to the mainstream culture for someone to walk around wearing a mask.’
Yesterday, the novelist Salman Rushie told the Today programme: ‘The battle against the veil has been a long and continuing battle against the limitation of women so, in that sense, I am completely on [Mr Straw’s] side.’ In response, Sir Iqbal Sacranie, former chairman of the Muslim Council of Britain, said the author had ‘no credibility’ among Muslims, which is ironic because many Muslims say the same of Sir Iqbal. Resorting to the standard tactic for discrediting all sceptical approaches to Islamic practice, Sir Iqbal accused Mr Rushdie of being an Islamophobe. ‘Islamophobes are currently doing all they can to attack Islam,’ he said, ‘and it doesn’t surprise me if he is now jumping on the bandwagon.’
But perhaps the most illuminating comments have come from Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, not a person I always find myself agreeing with. In the Independent on Monday she declared that she found herself ‘agreeing with his every word. It is time to speak out against this objectionable garment and face down the Islamicists.’ Ad hominem mudslinging is rife, with each side accusing the other of being Islamophobic or Islamist, but sometimes mud sticks. One comment certainly applies to Sir Iqbal’s way of doing things: ‘Straw has been denounced as Islamophobic by these ideologues who have reverted to what they do best, group blackmail.’
Ms Alibhai-Brown’s reasons for supporting Mr Straw, as outlined in another article for Time magazine, warrant closer inspection.
Firstly, she objects to the veil on grounds of practicality. ‘I have seen Muslim women who had been appallingly beaten and forced to wear it to keep their wounds hidden. Veiled women cannot eat in restaurants, swim in the sea or smile at their babies in parks.’ She also points out that encouraging Muslim women to communicate more fully with others in society can hardly be categorised as discrimination.
Secondly, she defends the right of non-Muslims to object to Muslim principles. ‘So long as it ensures genuinely equal standards for all, a liberal nation has no obligation to extend its liberalism to condone the most illiberal practices. State institutions as well as private companies should have the right to stipulate that a person whose face cannot be seen need not be served.’
Thirdly, she observes that the veil is divisive and that its removal promotes integration. For those who disagree, she says that in France, where all religious paraphernalia has been banned in schools and colleges – a radical step – ‘many Muslim French girls were happily released from a heritage that has no place in the modern world. Belgium, Denmark and Singapore have taken similar steps.’
Fourthly, in contrast to the many Islamic states where violence is used to force women to wear the burqa, Britain should be a place where Muslim women are genuinely free from pressure to cover up. However, a lot of women are not free to choose, and an increasing number of girls as young as three or four are being coerced into wearing the hijab to school.
The call for Britain to be preserved as a refuge therefore comes with a warning. ‘Exiles who fled such practices to seek refuge in Europe now find the evil is following them. As a female lawyer from Saudi Arabia once said to me: “The Koran does not ask us to bury ourselves. We must be modest. These fools who are taking niqab will one day suffocate like I did, but they will not be allowed to leave the coffin.”’ A public debate, of the sort promoted by Mr Straw, is critical to freedom.
This is not an argument about the banning of the veil. Nor is anyone ordering Muslim women to throw off the burka and slip into a boob tube (though the reverse would apply in a Muslim country). That would be against the basic tenets of a live and let live liberal democracy. As David Edgar puts it in a thoughtful piece for the