Burqa Ban Controversy Examined
Alternet’s article about the current burqa ban controversy led me to wonder if there was any good art on the topic. What I found was Amir Normandi’s highly contested 2006 photo essay 12 postcards for Muharram.
For the most part I agree with Sarah Seltzer’s stance in the Alternet piece – while the burqa may not be something I’m in favor of, banning any piece of clothing, be it a burqa or a miniskirt, sends a very negative message to women and to society as a whole. Seltzer perfectly states, “rather than single out other people’s problematic dress, we should all be engaged in a robust critique and examination of the way gender norms inform beauty standards everywhere”.
Of course, if we’re going to criticize France for their persistence in the burqa ban, we have to examine the messages we’re sending to women here in the United States. Middle and high schools across America institute dress codes (something I remember very well from my middle school days) that are supposedly for the purposes of ridding classrooms of “distractions”. But what does that say to young girls? That it is their responsibility to cover up their bodies so that boys don’t become distracted? Isn’t that about one step away from claiming that victims of rape were “asking for it“? As Seltzer states, communities that treat women “like jezebels…reinforce a misogynist ideal that puts the burden on women to cover up rather than men to avert their gaze”.
In many ways, this may represent the thinking behind the burqa ban, and if so, then it’s from the right place. However, banning any kind of clothing for whatever reason just doesn’t seem to fit with the feminist movement that has come so far. Even though many women are getting behind the burqa ban, I would argue that telling someone they cannot wear something, regardless of what it is or why, is wrong.
If you view Normandi’s photo essay, it will become immediately obvious why it stirred up such a controversy – while the photos of Iranian women partially nude and partially covered by a burqa are done quite tastefully in my opinion, that kind of thing is obviously far from accepted in Iran. We can think what we want about Iran requiring burqas or France trying to ban them, but if we want to set an example, we need to let go of our own hang-ups about women’s bodies and fashion.
