Whenever anyone wants to bash Islam, they usually bring up the veil. One Pakistani guy told me that the veil was worn willingly, and I reckon that is fine by me as long as women who aren’t willing don’t have to wear it.
A Canadian Muslim once asked me if Westerners had a face fetish since they seemed obsessed with the veil thing. What about North America where men are forced, by law, to keep their genitals covered in public at all times, he asked? I cover my genitals willingly even though I have nothing to be ashamed of (let's be clear on that point), but I suppose there is no good reason to make everyone else do so. What harm can come of seeing somebody’s genitals? It’s the same principle as the veil. Show your genitals; go to jail. You will probably even have to register as a sex offender, for crying out loud.
I can see how it might be customary to cover one’s genitals or face and how it might be considered the polite thing to do in most circumstances, but why must we enforce such conventions through the threat of violence? Is it not enough that the genital or face exhibitor risks social disapproval and shunning? Don’t invite genital or face exhibitors to your dinner parties, if it bothers you. Enact a dress code at your place of business. Avert your eyes, if you can, in public spaces. But don’t use force to keep the genitals and faces out of sight. Would you really be willing to make someone cover his genitals or her face at gunpoint? Using force for such purely aesthetic considerations seems absurd, and if people truly care about these conventions it will not be necessary.
Many Muslim women in America wear the veil even though they are not forced to do so. I’ll bet most American guys will continue to cover their genitals even if genital exhibition is decriminalized. (If they don’t, the laws against genital exhibition are even more oppressive than I imagine).
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Those that insist on enforcing women’s dress codes which, in the most conservative examples, force women to go about in what could be viewed as ‘sacks’ with eye holes cut in them are not, in my view, protecting the honour of women. Rather they are dishonouring themselves by demonstrating that they don’t have the strength of character, sincerity of spirit or personal will to control their own basest instincts. The emotional (EQ) and spiritual (SQ) quotients of intelligence seem to be lacking in many. IQ is a ‘fluke’ and is not enough, the other two quotients are essential in large amounts to overcome personal stupidity or is it that they suffer from plain old ‘dumbness’ borne of a cultural indoctrination that looks to the past and pleads for the return of the ‘dark ages’!
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