That personal choice

Submitted by Jeff (United States), Apr 7, 2008 at 18:21

Fatima,

We in the West do not have any problem with a Muslim woman's "personal choice" to cover her hair or anything else. I don't know why you would think such a thing.

But when we see videos of Iranian police forcibly arresting women whose hair is not (in their opinion) adequately covered, pulling them off the sidewalk and throwing them, panicked and screaming, into a police car that speeds away, we begin to wonder, to what degree it really is a "personal choice." How personal is the choice with the threat of Evin Prison hanging over you?

When Muslim young women in the West are murdered by their fathers for not covering their hair in public, whose "personal choice" are you defending?

At least 14 young women died in a fire in a girls' school in Mecca a few years back, when the police blocked their exit, because they weren't wearing "obligatory public attire" as they tried to flee the fire. By whose "personal choice" did they burn to death?

Were I to say I disapprove of that behavior by Muslim parents, by the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and by the Saudi police, would that make me a typical racist, western Islamaphobe? Yes? Then count me in.

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