Sunday, March 19, 2006

It's just clothing!

A pet peeve of mine is when people assume that Western Muslim women are oppressed when they choose to wear a chador, hijab, or burqa. Yes, in some places, particularly theocracies, these garments can be a symbol of oppression. However, it is patronizing and dehumanizing to assume that just because someone chooses to cover more of their body than average, they are automatically being oppressed and therefore need to be liberated from it.

Sometimes if you grow up with a certain standard of modesty, you just aren't comfortable walking around dressed less modestly. For example, about 10 years ago, it became legal in Ontario for women to go topless. However, most women continue to wear tops at all times. That isn't because we are oppressed, but rather because we simply prefer to keep that part of our bodies covered. With my shirt on, I am comfortable. With my shirt off in public, I would feel uncomfortable, over-exposed, unsupported, and humiliated. I feel my breasts are something to which I'd rather control access, and would strongly feel that my basic human dignity was being violated if I were forced to expose them. Perhaps this does have cultural origins, but that does not negate the fact that I prefer to have, at minimum, a bra and a shirt covering the top half of my body at all times. It doesn't hinder my ability to live my day to day life, it doesn't oppress me, it makes me more comfortable and more confident in facing the world than if it wasn't there.

Similarly, a woman who has grown up her whole life wearing a chador or a hijab or a burqa simply might feel over-exposed if she had to go without one. She might feel that her hair, for example, is something to which she'd rather control access, and she feels her human dignity is being violated if she's forced to expose it against her will. Maybe she prefers to just put on a hijab rather than have to spend the time and effort grooming her hair to a standard at which she'd be comfortable exposing it to the public.

Our duty as a society is to let people know what freedoms are available to them, have resources available to help them if they're being oppressed, and make sure they are aware that they don't have to be oppressed. It is not our place to go around telling people that they are being oppressed instead of letting them decide for themselves. No good can come of pressuring or forcing people to go out in public with more of their body exposed than they are comfortable with, regardless of the reason why they are not comfortable exposing certain parts of their body.

This isn't a frat party. This isn't middle school. We should simply operate under the assumption that everyone has a good reason for wearing what they're wearing rather than patronize grown adults by telling them that they didn't know what they were doing when they picked dressed themselves this morning.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are assuming these women have a choice.

Be thankful that you are living in a society where it is up to you if and how you display your breasts. Where you can go to a hair salon without risking public execution. Where you can go out in public alone without your master (err... man). Where you still have a clit because your mother was not brain washed into practicing the inhuman practice known as female circumcision.

impudent strumpet said...

That's why I put the word "Western" in my first sentence. :)