The sight of monolithic cultural dress codes to the westerner often implies a lack of personal freedom, a cultural bondage so to speak. More recently we of the western hemisphere have begun to view the existence of said attire on our shores as an aggressive form of cultural and religious colonialism; not just polar opposite but a threat to Western values.
The woman’s liberation movement in the United States as well as in Europe was often expressed in terms of material liberation. For example the most infamous symbol of the woman’s movement which served as the catalyst for female independence is the students burning of bras. Female liberation was promoted through public displays of defiance towards fashion impositions. In essence women demonstrated their intention to dress by their own social standards rather than those enforced by men, the results were often rather provocative. Women felt that in rebelling against a male dominated and opinionated society, which in their eyes where responsible for the conservative nature of their being, they were essentially liberating themselves.
Recently the western woman has been confronted with what she has interpreted as a demon from her own historical past manifested in a different cultural and religious setting. When the western woman sees the Islamic dress code on her streets she sees a woman that lacks liberty and self identity. A woman ill-equipped to express her self identity by choosing what she wishes to wear as well as how to wear it and this violates the western worlds uncanny ability to create conformity by will – rather than by force. Usually women of other cultures around the world are quickly swallowed up by western materialism because everybody knows at first glance no matter how pretty your beads are they would look better with Prada.
Some would argue that the disagreement the Western world has with the Veil or the Hijab is simply security based given that the women cannot be identified. This argument has some credibility in that visibility is a main factor in identifying criminals. When somebody robs a bank they often conceal their identity, no suspect, no case, therefore there is some merit to the western notion of a veiled woman having a greater chance of committing a crime and getting away with it. Another warranted fear is that a man could put a veil on and do whatever he pleased without need to identify himself. There are some legitimate security concerns that westerners have against the veil.
The problem with these fear based arguments is not that they lack logic but probability. Notably to date there has been no significant occurrence of veiled women using their religious garments as a means of concealing their identity during criminal activities in the west. Further more a woman who wears the veil often states that they will reveal their faces to female security or police officers if requested. Therefore if our fears are not security based then what are they based upon? Primarily the fear of the western world is based upon the assumption that a veiled woman is an oppressed one and their presence among us could negatively impact us rather then security.
Given that western concepts of female freedom and autonomy are so steeped in sexual liberation and that under Islam true freedom is only acquired through submission to God; manifested by women through modesty in dress these two material assumptions seem inherently conflictual. The Islamic woman believes wrongfully or rightly that through hiding her sexuality she is able to engage men as equals without the bother of sexual tension. Her belief system asserts; contrary to western values; that the covering of her sexuality is a vehicle to gain gender equality where as openly displaying sexuality is a barrier to equality.
However, there are problems within Islamic society which propel westerners into the obvious difficulty of concluding such positive assumptions regarding a Muslims woman’s dress given the evidence within the Islamic world of gender oppression. Many examples such as the Quran’s seemingly explicit support of physical reprimand by the husband (no matter what the situation or how lightly the punishment is enacted) seems barbaric and savage to western observers whose own culture dictates that this would be unacceptable under any circumstance. The existence of suggestions within the Quran which deem a woman’s testimony as less weighty than that of a man is difficult for the most adamant Islamic sympathizers to reconcile since one of the most cherished western principles is equality under the law. Connecting the dress code of a Muslim woman smothered in cloth to male physical violence supported by Quranic texts and legal domination by a society that considers a woman’s testimony less then a man’s is effortless.
Equally as discomforting as the existence of gender oppression in the Islamic world resulting in the veiled woman is that these woman do not see it as oppression. The war that women around the world have not yet won is the ability to adapt seemingly universal concepts of female liberation to culturally, religiously or individually influence woman’s differing concepts of said liberation. The woman that the west is comfortable mending is the one who is being oppressed but she whom the west has great difficulty dealing with is she whose concept of freedom differs distinctly from theirs' and would be defined by western standards as oppression. The interaction between the Muslim woman and the female liberation movement is quit a potent quagmire because even though they may have the same goals in liberation they are very differently defined.
The question that the west is being confronted with is, how does it deal with the woman who willingly chooses to conceal herself under a blanket of cloth? The obvious answer could be said to be nothing; that the veiled woman who freely chooses to engage in such practice should be accepted. Although this answer sounds liberal enough for news prints it is my belief that people of the west feel a great threat by women who veil themselves because perhaps they are no longer dealing with an oppressed woman asking for freedom but a liberated woman challenging core principles of western belief systems.
The challenge that the Muslim woman poses to the western woman is that she does not base her freedom on her sexuality. That female liberation should not be defined by female displays of public sexuality but by the covering of it; as we need not see the curves of a woman, the size of her waist or the size of her breast as a part of public scenery. It is hypocritical to say we stand for womens' rights and still legally inundate the internet and all forms of media with pornography and then scoff at the sight of a veiled woman.
Something happened inside of the western woman’s mind that eventually became problematic. Tossing away the material constraints of a male dominated society by flaunting sexuality was using sexuality as a flag for liberation. What this flag hoped to communicate was that women are liberated, proven by provocatively dressing anyway they desired, the ultimate display of autonomy because it possessed the effective shock value.
The problem was that woman got so enamored with their victory that they forgot the goal was not being able to dress anyway they desired but one of absolute gender equality. Through using sexuality as a means to express autonomy women have created another oppression, a hyper sexualized dress code in Hollywood, Music and general society.
Whether taking off clothes or putting clothes on – these actions are not determinates of either oppression or liberation but rather these conclusions exist solely in the mind of the woman. They should not be used as measures of liberation or oppression no matter how tempting it might be less our version of liberation becomes someone else’s oppression. Liberty exists solely in situations where individual freedom thrives but evidence of its existence resides only in the proof of divergent expression.
