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| WHAT a MODEST pose! |
Is the burqini useful, harmless beachwear, or is it a uniform expressing adherence to anti-western ideology?
I can't decide. As much as I fear the sun--being blue-eyed, red-haired and fair-skinned, fear of skin and eye cancer haunts me--I would not wear a burqini, let alone a burqa, because I don't want to be perceived as wearing an Islamist uniform. To completely block out the sun on the beach, I could wear a surfer's or long-distance swimmer's neoprene swimsuit and nobody would give me a second glance.
Should the burquini be banned? My best Catholic friends fight me on any kind of governmental bans on public dress because they fear this will come back to bite Catholics. I don't mind "hijab" aka foreign-looking headscarves because Christian and Jewish women in the west covered their hair day in, day out for centuries. Naturally, I think it is nicer and less ghettoizing when western Muslim women wear western headscarves instead of Saudi desertwear; I know a Muslim female theology student who tucks her hair into a big knitted cap. If you want to cover your hair, cover you hair. I don't mind. If you want to cover your hair with a silk square covered in swastikas, I wonder if covering your hair is actually your intent.
What I object to are uniforms, the uniforms of anti-western ideologies. My father's mother's people were German-Americans, and my grandmother was a proud German-American, but neither she nor her family wore traditional German dress during the First and Second World Wars. I mean, it's not just that they didn't wear Nazi uniforms--which I am sure would have got them arrested for disturbing the peace, if for nothing else--it's that they didn't wear HIYA! I'M A PROUD GERMAN-AMERICAN NOT ALL GERMANS ARE NAZIS YOU KNOW clothing either. And France, as politicians solemnly tell us, is at war.
Well, sound off in the combox if you are moved to, but remember that as usual on my blogs, the tone of the combox is sternly restricted to good humour, wrinkly-foreheaded thought and mildly hurt feelings soon soothed by apologies and explanations.
UPDATE: This Spectator article explains the current social and cultural climate in France. I think one thing to be kept in mind is that the current fuss about the burkini is about the burkini in France. When we read about massacres in France, we feel sad and upset for a week or so. When the French read about (or see or survive) massacres in France, they stay mad. Understandably. Especially in Nice.
I'm all for the Burquini. When I was in high school (in Toronto, probably about 15 years after you did the same) there were hijabi girls who couldn't do the swimming units in gym class because our lifeguards were male. If they had this kind of sensible, modest option it would have allowed them much more opportunity to participate in the normative culture -- which is what the anti-burquini folks are asking for, isn't it? It's basically a baggy wetsuit; I don't see what the big deal is.
ReplyDeleteAs a further point, the Canadian Lifesaver Society reports that new Canadians are at a much higher risk of drowning than the general population. Not having modest attire in which to learn to swim is a barrier that puts Muslim women at risk -- so why not help remove that barrier?
Noted!
ReplyDeleteWell, I'd have to see WHY "New Canadians" are at higher risk. (Never took swim classes as kids? Think it is a sign of manhood to skidoo over frozen ponds while necking vodka?) I can imagine women going swimming in baggy constrictive clothing getting into serious trouble.
I don't quite understand why it is that some Muslim women think it is wrong to wear "normative" clothes and swim costumes when vast numbers of them clearly don't--and Syrian women freed from ISIS tyranny set their burkas on fire. A flabby lady on the beach in a one-piece just doesn't attract that much attention from other people sitting on the beach. In Pakistan, I would cover up so as not to draw attention to myself. In France, wearing a burkini quite obviously draws attention to yourself. How is something modest if it makes people stare at you?
I'd be curious to know why too. If Muslim women aren't going near bodies of water because of lack of bathing attire, and don't live in an area where flooding is an issue, are they really at risk of drowning?
DeleteI'm very intrigued and now I want to know which "New Canadians" are drowning and why. There are a lot of "commonsense" measures for "old" Canadians that "new" Canadians might not think of, like warn your kids not to go near streams in March when the snow is melting, or don't--for the love of heaven--mix drinking with snowmobiling, or put five-foot-high fences around your swimming pool, even though they are hella ugly. If you come from a place where there is no snow, no snowmobiles or no swimming pools (not a lot of backyard swimming pools in Edinburgh, incidentally), then you might not think of all this stuff.
DeleteOkay, I have Googled, and it is really interesting. It may be because "New Canadians" didn't take swimming lesson in their birth countries AND aren't used to being around water. There is a LOT of water in Canada. In Toronto there are swimming lessons for babies, actual babies, in "Moms and Tots" classes. I started at 4; my brother at 3. I hope and pray Canadian Muslims don't think their 3 year old daughters need to be all covered up.
DeleteForgot the link. Here's the link. http://www.cjob.com/2016/06/28/study-new-canadians-far-more-likely-to-drown/
DeleteThere are women-only classes, which is a good idea if students really are held back by fears that men are going to ogle them for being in ordinary boring boy-short swimsuits.
France has got this weird obsession with swimwear, ie men wearing speedos in public pools, apparently in the name of hygiene. Although, at least one Quebec pool I know of makes everyone wear swimming caps. But on the beach - there's no hygiene issue at all. The rest of the western world is quite content in people showering before entering the pool. Forcing a woman out of a burqini is just humiliating her, adding to reasons why she might not like her country. (And realistically, these police are actually forcing a woman to take clothing off. That can't be defensible.)
ReplyDeleteMost immigrants tend to hold to their native customs more tightly than they did in the mother country for a generation or two. I think what we saw with immigrants in Canada as a bit of an anomaly up until after WWII. Particularly those of German background - either become as Canadian as possible to go to an internment camp (same with Italians and the Japanese were faced with both enemy alien and anti-Asian racism; even those who were by birth Canadian citizens). Immigrants need to feel safe and connected with their new culture.
France's laicite policy is ridiculous and one which I think can only promote religious extremism -either on the secularist or the religious fundamentalist fronts. Not that Canadian-style multiculturalism or American-style melting pot (which is debatable if it truly exists) are better models. I just see this laicite policy going back to the revolution, and can't help but think of the dissolution of the monasteries and how sad that really was.
Sorry Aunty - that was a ramble!
Rambling is fine! Why not? The space is free.
DeleteMy one caution is that Canada is Canada and France is France. What happens in Canada is not necessarily what happens in France, and what works in Canada may not work in France. As far as I know, in no neighbourhood in Toronto do female tourists wearing shorts get rocks thrown at them.
I'm not a big fan of French laicité myself, but I have't chosen to live there. I'm not a big fan of Quebec's pro-French language extremism (e.g. shouting at migrants speaking not-French on break), but if I moved to Quebec, I would hunker down and try not to speak not-French at work. As so many people say of other places, "It's their culture." (B.A. by the way thinks this attitude is atrocious, but you will notice we don't live in Quebec and probably never will.)
I was really rather surprised at the number of people who were wearing visible crosses in Quebec City. Considering if the government's law against public servants wearing them had gone through, many would be in violation. Many more crosses than yarmulkes or hijabs (at least in Quebec city, Montreal's a completely different story.) I did get yelled at for requesting to speak in English, by someone speaking English. Which made it terribly ironic.
DeleteBy the same token, while women may not be getting yelled at, I've certainly heard by fair share of racists on the trolleys.
Racists or people who object to Islamic faith/practises?
DeleteI'm much more familiar (for obvious reasons) with anti-anglo sentiments in La Belle Province.The worse I've heard in Quebec (province, I mean, as I was in Montreal) was, "Why can't they speak French when they live here, tsk, tsk, tsk." (It was directed at anglo me---in EATON'S. Oh, the irony.)
Vocalized, it's been racists; but I've certainly seen the 'look her up and down and frown' given to some women wearing hijabs and full length gowns.
Delete'Is the burqini useful, harmless beachwear, or is it a uniform expressing adherence to anti-western ideology?'
ReplyDeleteMy first instinct was to say yes, but #6 in the article you linked to indicates no. Interesting.
It also seems bizarre to me that France has also banned wearing things like large Christian crosses and the Jewish kippa. (Although not surprising, given the French Revolution, as Truthfinder pointed out.)
Now I'm wondering to what extent cultures should simply naturally spring from the people who live there (and hence be subject to other cultures coming in and scooting them out, etc.), and to what extent they should be protected/enforced/whatever, by the government?
Frankly I am all for women wearing head-to-toe swimwear if they want to (and frankly, I do--I have been known to wear a hat even in the water). But I am not for them wearing it to promote or advocate a foreign agenda or create a kind of sartorial ghetto or to express "I hate you, French anti-burqini law". (That sounds way meaner than I mean it too.) I am sympathetic to the lady who just wanted to help Muslim girls visit Australian beaches, but non-Muslim women already had bathing caps and full-body neoprene suits, so what was wrong with those?
DeleteModest dress or uniform?
As a child it used to blow my mind that priests when on holiday in Florida where presumably they wore swimming trunks on the beach. I could hardly imagine it---and yet this was probably the case! :-O
I used to find that mind-boggling too, lol!! Priests in swimming trunks!
DeleteHmm . . . it seems like it might be reasonable to assume that for some people it's an uniform, but others just see it as a modest way of dressing?
And I wonder if the full-body suits might have been too form-fitting? Maybe they weren't considered modest enough?
When we're talking about wearing clothing not worn by the vast majority of the population and discouraged by the host culture, "modest enough" for who?
DeleteI suppose the correct answer is "the woman going to the beach." I suppose the life guards would have something to say, though, about women going into the water dressed in petticoats.
Have you ever seen the Duggers? They are a highly conservative Christian family from America with 19 kids and a reality show. And they wear very similar bathing costumes. Very odd looking for sure but it's what they feel comfortable in according to their beliefs.
ReplyDeleteI was very interested to discover that it was created in Australia. Mind you, I remember in the 90s when everyone was freaking out about skin cancer and my mum bought my little sister a "solar suit" to wear to the pool. Us older ones wouldn't go near it!
There is a lady who brings her son to the hospital pool we go to for Aqua therapy. She gets in the pool in her full hijab and clothing which is very difficult for her to do stuff with her little boy. If she had a burquini surely her life would be easier?
Any way, I am highly uncomfortable about police making a woman undress on the beach. It is unfortunate that it is only women who get targeted by these laws but I suppose it is because the men can dress to fit in more easily.
Aussie girl in NZ
Oh, fear not. Men's religious costume is also policed in France. If you work in a government office, no kippas for the Jewish guys, and no pectoral crosses for the Catholics.
DeleteMeanwhile, Muslim women who want to can dress to fit in more easily in western countries, too--and the men can dress in full-out Saudi or Pakistani costumes if they chose to do so. Many, many, MANY Muslim women prefer to wear the clothing normal to the country they are in, and this includes Pakistani women who wear traditional Pakistani, not Waahabist, garb.
Since I'm on the subject, there are various schools of Islam, just as there are various Christian denominations and schools of rabbinical Judaism. This does not get enough attention, possibly because various Muslims in the news are quick to say that this kind of Islam or that "isn't true Islam." I don't understand why we therefore take that at face value. As a Catholic, I don't think the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland have the fullness of Christian truth, but I would never deny that its adherences are Christians.
Oh what a controversial post. Please no-one cut-and-paste snippets and try to get me fired from the Catholic Register. ;-)
*adherents, not adherences! It's late and my brain is fried from too much Polish study.
DeleteForgot to mention that I have never seen the Duggars.
DeleteInteresting you mentioned the German American population. The assimilation went far beyond not wearing traditional German dress. In Oklahoma there were German towns with German as the predominant spoken language. After the U.S. entered WWII those towns switched to English almost over night.
ReplyDeleteYes, I mentioned the German Americans because a goodly number of my ancestors and relations during WW I and II were German Americans. It's interesting how Germany behaving badly led to German Americans downplaying their Germanness whereas how 9/11 etc has led to more and more outward signs of adherence to Islam. A very different mindset--and probably a very clever one. The disappearance of the habit and Roman collar from our schools and streets has led to a disappearance of vocations, to say nothing of continuing, or very probably increased, public disdain for Catholic priests.
DeleteSo apparently it's not just burkinis that are being banned: http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2016/08/26/nuns-cannot-wear-their-habits-on-our-beaches-says-deputy-mayor-of-cannes/#.V8A7fwL7Kk4.facebook
ReplyDeleteThis kind of thing is why B.A. and other Catholic friends always fight me on the subject of burqa bans. Well, the burqini ban has been overturned apparently, so it's all moot.
DeleteI'm glad they've overturned the ban, particularly because of them lumping nuns into it as well. Realistically, the French understanding of secularity is contrary to Catholic belief; is an assault on our faith; it is not just a quirk of French culture.
ReplyDelete