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Subjugating Women in America: Are We Allowing Islamist Imperialism?
Guest Column | By James E. Horn | February 26, 2008
Here in America we believe in the unequivocal rights of women to participate as fully in society as men do.
There has been a growing discussion and increasing controversy here in America surrounding Muslim women and their wearing of veils and burkas. Late in 2007, a Muslim man allegedly murdered his 16-year-old daughter in Toronto, Canada because she refused to be veiled. Another such "honor killing" took place in Texas, where a man is said to have murdered his two daughters because they did not behave like submissive females under Shar'ia laws. A
Muslim, he drove to the airport in his taxi and flew off, presumably to
his original homeland of Egypt,
leaving their gunshot-riddled bodies in his taxi. These are but two
tales of Islamist cruelty and murder of women here in our own homeland.
Some
Muslims have demanded the right for Muslim women to acquire driver's
licenses and photo identification cards while wearing veils and
burkas. Our proper (and legal) response should be that if a person
refuses to provide a full face photo, no ID, driver's license or other
photo ID will be provided, period. Also, when confirmation of their ID
is needed to gain entry, or for any other identification purpose, they
must remove the face and head covering to verify that the ID is indeed
for the right person. Any claim to the contrary is irrelevant in a
country governed by the rule of law.
There
are those Muslims who claim that the veil and burka are religious
requirements. That is not true. While veils are discussed in the Koran,
the requirement for a woman to be covered by a veil isn't there. According to an article in The New York Times, "Arab Societies, Not Koran, Decreed Veil":
"It
is not decreed in the Koran. The pertinent 24th Sura first calls on men
to be modest and then adjures "believing women . . . to be modest and
to display of their adornment only that which is apparent, and to draw
their veils over their bosoms. . . ."
No explicit reference is made to covering head, hair or face. The article itself states that until recently few women in Gaza covered their heads; in fact, it goes on to say:
"Looking at pictures of Muslim women all over the world, it is clear that society determines the extreme variations in dress."
This
begs the question: in our own society, should we allow women to be
forced to wear the veil, and indeed to be covered from head to toe? Should America allow the forced "extreme variation of dress" within its own borders?
In
my view, veiling and covering women with sacks called burkas in Western
societies is another form of subliminal Islamist cultural
imperialism. Simply, those Muslims are working to impose anti-modern
Islamist social and cultural values on more modern Western cultures, a
practice that is rightly objectionable to a land that believes that men
and women receive equal treatment and justice under the law.
The veil and burka pre-date Islam in what was a lawless, pagan, predatory Arabia. Women
wore head-to-toe body coverings to protect themselves from sexual
predators. Attractive, unprotected women were subject to being swept up
by the rich and powerful, sexually used, and cast away. The practice of
keeping women hidden away and let out only when fully covered and
accompanied, and protected, by trusted male family members was a
necessity of the time. But you cannot say the same today, here, now.
In Turkey,
the secularism established by Kemal Attaturk when he dragged the Turks
kicking and screaming into the 20th Century outlawed the burka and
veil, and the fez. Now, the increasingly Islamist and regressive
Turkish government is disbanding Attaturk's laws and "allowing" women
to wear the veil. We can only wonder how long it will be before women are forced to wear it.
Veils
are not exclusively Muslim. In the past, they have been used in many
parts of the world to protect women from predators. Most recently,
during the wartime occupations of Manchuria, Taiwan, Korea, Thailand, Indonesia, Indochina, and the Philippines,
many women were also covered with shapeless, baggy clothes and hidden
by veils to protect them from rapacious occupiers. When the Muslim
Moghuls ruled India, the veil and burka were then common throughout the land, to protect Hindu and Buddhist women from their conquerors.
Here in America,
where we believe in the unequivocal rights of women to participate as
fully in society as men do, we need to pass national laws against the
imposition of burkas and veils. We need to do this to protect women
from being compelled to submit to Islamist domination. At the same
time, we should establish a mandatory 20+ year imprisonment for any man
who disfigures a woman or treats her in any other way that is allowed
under Shar'ia law, but not allowed under our own laws, such as stoning,
honor killings, female castration and other barbarities.
America is guided by Constitutional law, and anyone living here must abide by it...or leave.
The original article can be found at http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor James E. Horn is a retired Foreign Service Officer who has served internationally for more than twenty-five years as a U.S. diplomat. He has enjoyed diverse assignments as a visa officer, an administrator, a security officer, and as an official in counter terrorism.
Guest columns do not necessarily reflect the views of Accuracy in Media or its staff.
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