Everything Old Is New Again
Welcome to the Middle Ages. Tim Ross writes in the Telegraph:
Opponents of the veil claim it oppresses women and presents a barrier between those who wear traditional dress and the rest of society.But in a new report from think-tank Civitas, Alveena Malik, a former faith adviser to the last Labour government, said the test of whether religious symbols are appropriate should be based on whether they are practical.
Politicians in France and Belgium have voted in favour of banning the full veil, or "niqab", and other European countries are thought to be considering similar action.
In a new report, Women, Islam and Western Liberalism, Mrs Malik said: "We in Britain need to take a different direction from others in Europe and to accept the veil as part of a modern British way of life."
"As part of a MODERN British way of life"? Right.
Here's modern.
And here's Ahmadinejad's wife.
A few words from dhushara.com on why women must be veiled under Islam:
The need to cover the woman entirely comes from a mistaken notion that because women are beautiful and attractive, they are entirely awrah (sexual parts), and thus must be entirely concealed, even to covering one eye, or they will pose a shameful threat to themselves and to their family, through being uncontrollably attractive to strange men....Mashad, 10 April 2008 (AKI) - A top Shia cleric in Iran has said that unveiled women are a serious danger to Iranian society as they cause men to be "transformed into beasts". "Women without the veil are a danger that the authorities underestimate," said Hojatolislam Seyyed Ahmad Elmalhoda, a powerful cleric who leads the Friday prayers in Mashad, a site considered sacred for Shia Muslims as it houses the shrine of Imam Reza. "This situation is very serious in that if men see these bad women, they will turn into beasts, and then the whole of society will have to pay the consequences." According to the Shia cleric, women who do not respect conservative Islamic dress rules are "sources of all that is bad in society." "Respecting the chador (a long, black cloak that covers the arms and legs and is usually worn with a hijab) is the law of the state and the authorities must severely punish anyone who does not respect this law, in the same way that they punish thieves and murderers," said Elmadhoda.
What kind of societies are these people running? I mean, I wear tight, body-hugging skirts all the time and see girls running around So Cal in itsy-bitsy teeny-weeny outfits, and they are not being dragged out of Starbucks or Target or the supermarket to be raped in the parking lot.
Civilization: It's a beautiful thing. Let's invite everybody to join it!
New and old ones from Reynolds.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at October 17, 2010 5:10 AM
Link rot ruined a perfectly good internet joke!
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at October 17, 2010 5:15 AM
those comments after i am a nutjobs wife's picture are hilarious
ron at October 17, 2010 8:42 AM
If Islamic men may behave like beasts, that's their problem. If they cannot control themselves at the sight of a woman, perhaps they should be required to wear blindfolds outside of their homes. There's no reason to punish everyone else, just because they behave like animals.
bradley13 at October 17, 2010 9:21 AM
"What kind of societies are these people running?"
Mark Steyn answers that question for you here:
http://www.steynonline.com/contenr/view/1516/26
Presumably this top Shia cleric who believes unveiled women turn men into beasts follows Ayatollah Khomeini's Islamic protocol for having sex with actual beasts.
Martin at October 17, 2010 9:23 AM
Another Reynolds passalong.
Crid [cridcomment at gmail] at October 17, 2010 9:24 AM
bradley13 makes a great point: the Islamic world does not seem to realize that the message that it's sending is that Muslim men will fuck anything that moves at every opportunity, and cannot be trusted to keep it in their pants for even a second. Do they not realize how badly this message plays in the West? Evidently not, or else they don't care. I guess there's no reason for them to since most Western feminists don't care either.
Cousin Dave at October 17, 2010 10:36 AM
> the Islamic world does not seem to realize
> that the message that it's sending is that
> Muslim men will fuck anything that moves at
> every opportunity, and cannot be trusted to
> keep it in their pants for even a second.
Perhaps so, but that sentence is dipped and dusted with a VERY western sort of high school condescension about how male sexuality ought to work. A bunch of six-grade girls snarking and rolling their eyes at these guys ("You are Sooooooo immatuuuuuuure") is not going to make this go away.
Also, men ARE, as a rule, opportunist.
Crid [cridcomment at gmail] at October 17, 2010 11:05 AM
Men veil women not because they are afraid the women will turn them into beasts, but because they don't want other men ogling (or successfully hitting on) their women.
Conan the Grammarian at October 17, 2010 11:13 AM
That impulse isn't universal. I'm guessing that Gregg doesn't have to fight a primal urge to stuff Amy into a Hefty bag so that no other man will ever lust after her. A sexy woman is also a status symbol - something for a successful man to show off, a chance to say "look what I've got!". This distinction isn't a product of modern times. If Francesco del Giocondo had no desire to show off his new wife, he would never have commissioned Leonardo to paint her portrait.
In my Western frame of mind, a man so paranoid about preventing any other man from catching the briefest glimpse of his woman is a man who is terrified that at any moment a better man than he is will come along & snatch her away from him. That denotes unfathomable insecurity, not confident manhood.
Martin at October 17, 2010 1:58 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/10/17/everything_old_1.html#comment-1767551">comment from MartinGregg, in fact, loves when I wear tight dresses, and I feel like it's my job to make him look good by looking good. Women who don't understand men or refuse to (they adhere to feminist notions of how men "should" be rather than how they actually are) think they can be lazy about their looks. I find that disrespectful to one's boyfriend or husband. I have a piece coming out soon in Psych Today on beauty and dumb notions we have about it in America (most of which come out of Academy feminism).
Amy Alkon at October 17, 2010 2:12 PM
Right. And while it's fun to be all snippity about it, that's not a sentiment that sells to easily in the primitive (and often isolated) cultures where everyone who knows you is everyone who will ever know you. The rest of the world isn't America, where –when your high school sweetie breaks your heart– you can re-invent yourself over the summer and arrive at college (even community college) as Joe Cool.
The rest of the world is tragically unimpressed with our standards of "confident manhood". People forget that our American approaches to success are unique.
Crid [cridcomment at gmail] at October 17, 2010 2:26 PM
(The right was more for Martin... America has many faults, but it's still the only game in town.)
Crid [cridcomment at gmail] at October 17, 2010 2:27 PM
In my Western frame of mind, a man so paranoid about preventing any other man from catching the briefest glimpse of his woman is a man who is terrified that at any moment a better man than he is will come along & snatch her away from him.
As I've said before, jealousy is a manifestation of one's own insecurities. SO if all the muslim men in the world are that insecure about themselves, it stands to reason they don't want their women to be seen. But why aren't more of those women catching on to that, and getting the hell outta there?
Flynne at October 17, 2010 3:24 PM
What kind of societies are these people running?
Khomeini's thoughts on Islam and infidels:
http://books.google.com/books?id=YpT93oHXFLAC&pg=PA7&lpg=PA7&dq=Those+who+know+nothing+about+Islam+pretend+that+Islam+counsels+against+war.+Those+people+are+witless.+Islam+says:+'Kill+all+the+unbelievers+just+as+th&source=bl&ots=99COef_cxo&sig=9jn79r0OFWkyKI0mqZsKlgI3_d0&hl=en&ei=1U-mTM6IAZK1ngfj7vyPAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&ved=0CCgQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q&f=false
biff at October 17, 2010 4:22 PM
Crid has a great point: Western men today (more in Europe than the U.S.) are seemingly offered a bipolar choice between two equally distasteful alternatives: accept emasculation under Western political correctness, or sign on for the Muslim sexual cuckoo-pants parade. The funny thing is that each of those, in its own way, is so incredibly uptight about sex that it makes the Victorians all look like Al Goldstein.
Cousin Dave at October 17, 2010 4:31 PM
> But why aren't more of those women catching
> on to that, and getting the hell outta there?
Getting out of there and getting to where? Would you put one up if she knocked on your door with a suitcase full of chador, but no modern toothpaste or sportswear?
I think we're not just talking about asshole masculinity, THOUGH WE'RE CERTAINLY TALKING ABOUT THAT. The whole culture is goofed. Primitive and goofed.
Or as O'Rourke once put it (paraphrase), the United States is a magical island of sanity.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at October 17, 2010 4:34 PM
You expect muslim men in those societies to display the same self-control around women expected of men here?
RACIST!!!
Firehand at October 17, 2010 7:14 PM
Having only recently had my first live experience of a fully veiled woman (Israeli Muslims are not that extremist in these matters) - I want to emphasize the significance and impact of obscuring a person's face in public.
This basically removes that person from the public sphere, and dehumanizes their presence.
It is very creepy.
My wife and I are religious and dress modestly. This goes way beyond that to dehumanization.
Ben David at October 17, 2010 11:40 PM
Would you put one up if she knocked on your door with a suitcase full of chador, but no modern toothpaste or sportswear?
Ya know, Crid, if I had the means, I just might. Because toothpaste and sportswear are easily acquired. Self-esteem should be, but sometimes ain't.
Flynne at October 18, 2010 6:14 AM
Because they've seen what happens to the ones who do.
Better in their minds to be live chattel than stoned to death.
brian at October 18, 2010 9:03 AM
Yeah, I guess there's that, Brian.
Flynne at October 18, 2010 9:08 AM
> I just might. Because toothpaste and
> sportswear are easily acquired. Self-
> esteem should be, but sometimes ain't.
Right, but you can't give her THAT, either. These patterns are the oldest at work in the human heart....
Great to be American, ain't it?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at October 18, 2010 12:18 PM
I just mean... Our lives are so RICH. The experiences that form us in a America and the west are so specific. There's so much structure and opportunity and learning that comes from being able to read... An American, even a dim one, with a bus schedule in his hand and two dollars in his pocket can change the world (and his own life) in ten thousand ways that a women in chador can't dream of.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at October 18, 2010 1:10 PM
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