P
olitical opportunist Nicolas Sarkozy forgot three fundamental lessons when he decided to denounce the burka.
The first one is that men should stay well clear of becoming embroiled in expressing opinions on women’s clothes, unless of course you happen to be called Lacroix, Gaultier, Lagerfeld or Ghesquiere.
This was a lesson learned the hard way by former British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw who was pilloried when he questioned the nikab after asking a female constituent to lift her veil so he could see her face.
Could you imagine him making the same request of any female members of the Saudi royal household during one of his galloping missions to the Middle East?
Foolishly Scotsmen Gordon Brown and John Reid, hailing from a country where men wear pleated skirts and paint their faces blue, then waded in with the grace of a couple of dancing bears.
Even the Bishop of Rochester – a man who wears a pointy hat and a purple dress – chipped in his dislike of the nikab, full face veil or burka.
Of course they were all despatched very quickly by Muslim women in Britain who proved themselves to be anything but oppressed, subjugated creatures. And just to show there’’s real solidarity across women of faith and no faith, quite a few western feminists expressed their disdain at Straw and co while standing shoulder to shoulder with their Muslim sisters.
Vyonne Ridley : read full post
