He's not clear on what would qualify as an assurance, but apparently a woman's word is not enough, because as the NYTimes says, "many women who wear the veil insist that they are doing it as a free choice and see a ban as a restriction of their liberty." Hitchens might argue that they're only saying that because their husbands are threatening them, but at a certain point, you have to take women at their word, otherwise you're insulting womankind by denying them agency. For example, when a woman tells you "no", you don't claim that she's been brainwashed by religion and that she really means "yes".
Hitchens argues that "mothers, wives, and daughters have been threatened with acid in the face, or honor-killing, or vicious beating, if they do not adopt the humiliating outer clothing that is mandated by their menfolk. This is why, in many Muslim societies, such as Tunisia and Turkey, the shrouded look is illegal in government buildings, schools, and universities." The thing is, France is not Tunisia, France is a developed first-world nation that can actually protect its women in a straightforward manner. In these backwards Muslim countries, you have situations where a woman will be stoned to death for being raped, and the neighbors and the local police turn the other cheek. These women are being oppressed by huge swaths of society,and radical measures are needed to protect them. That's not the case in France; if a woman wants to escape an abusive situation, she has many more options.
And even if there are French women being forced by their violent husbands, it doesn't seem like this ban is going to liberate them. It seems just as likely that their husbands will respond by locking them in the house. If Hitchens were really concerned about women, shouldn't he be focusing on setting up battered-women's shelters?
"We won't have to drive too far, just 'cross the border and into the city"
His other objections to the veil are bullshit. He argues that we aren't allowed to wear ski masks or other facial coverings into a bank, and that society shouldn't give special treatment by allowing an exception for Muslim women. That would be a valid point if the law were limited to banks alone, but its not - the law would ban the wearing of veils in all public places. Hitchens and French President Sarkozy make the argument that, in the age of terrorism, facial identification is necessary everywhere, including the streets, but if that was their real concern, the ban would include all facial coverings, not just the veil. Besides, what kind of terrorist would opt for the burqa; if you're trying to blend in, wouldn't you go for a hat and sunglasses, or perhaps wait for a cold day and don a nice Western-style scarf.
Hitchens also argues that a facial covering might block your peripheral vision while driving, making the veil a danger to others. Again, that might be a valid concern if the law only pertained to drivers, but the law pertains to all public places. A chicken-shit public safety argument is also a little odd coming from someone who argued that smoking bans were un-American.
If there was a society where women were only allowed to show their tits, they would inevitably evolve to have nice racks, but that's neither here nor there.
Hitchens argues that he has a "right to see your face" and that the veil is "an offense to the ordinary democratic civility that depends on phrases like 'Nice to see you'". Its a half-clever line, but an odd argument coming from a libertarian who's made a career out of being an asshole; all of a sudden, he's claiming that civility and politeness should be enforced by the police. You don't see him arguing for a law against being drunk and belligerent on cable news.
In a polite society, it should be illegal to not cover a face like his.
In his pompous and roundabout way, Hitchens says that allowing Muslims to wear veils makes a special exception in favor of one religion, "Society is being asked to abandon an immemorial tradition of equality and openness in order to gratify one faith." But its not a special exception because there aren't any laws in place against other forms of facial covering. There are no laws against scarves in winter, ski-masks on the French Alps, or hats, sunglasses and large beards. If any exceptions are to be made, they're in Hitchens' proposal that Muslims be singled-out for exclusion from civil liberties, that they be barred from the rights that allow someone to dress like ZZ Top.
In his TV appearances, Hitchens gets a lot of leverage out of his resonant English voice; its that old phenomenon where we assume the British are smart just because of their accents. The classic example is when the Ewoks mistook C3PO for a god.
In his columns, Hitchens creates the illusion of sophistication by writing in an overly complex and purposely indirect fashion. This gives the reader the impression that he's making some ultra-intelligent point that's just beyond the reader's grasp, and the reader defers to him out of fear of looking stupid. In reality, there's no hidden level of sophistication, only sophistry. Rather than striving for clarity, he creates obscurity, to obfuscate the weakness of his rationale; in the absence of any legitimate justification, you can assume his real reasoning lies with his personal vendetta against Islam. This is purely speculative, but it often seems like his little holy-war is just a clever way for him to condescend both God and liberals at the same time.
No comments:
Post a Comment