Dutch burqa ban tackles issue, not root
She’s at it again. And this time it’s strategically happening just before the general elections. Rita Verdonk is the driving force behind the Dutch cabinet backing a proposal to ban the burqa from public spaces.
“The cabinet finds it undesirable that garments covering the face — including the burqa — should be worn in public in view of public order, (and) the security and protection of fellow citizens,” the Dutch Justice Ministry said in a statement.
Now consider this: is this a law designed to prohibit people covering their face, unintentionally applying to the burqa? Or is this a law designed to prohibit the burqa, justified by banning all face covers under the pretext of security? Considering Verdonk’s past record, I suspect the latter.
I agree with the main Muslim organization in the Netherlands, which called the proposal an “over-reaction to a very marginal problem.” I also think that forcing integration is counterproductive.
The burqa vs. freedom of expression discussion compares to the discrimination vs. freedom of speech debate. Does freedom of speech include discrimination, and in that same manner, does freedom of expression include the right to wear a burqa? The problem is that we cannot assume the reasoning behind wearing a burqa in the same way we can determine what discrimination is.
And ultimately, yes, in many ways the burqa is a symbol of female suppression, but forbidding it eliminates the symbol, not the suppression and the attitude itself. We have to tackle the root of the problem; the relationship between man and woman in Islam. It took Christian society almost 2,000 years without help from others to give man and woman equal rights; let’s help Islam strive toward that same equality in less time than that.
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