Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Burqua Tourism

13 Comments

Phyllis Chesler isn’t very impressed with Naomi Wolf’s shallow defense of Muslim oppression of women.

[Wednesday afternoon update]

Naomi isn’t very happy, and demands an apology, which she isn’t going to get.

[Bumped]

[Thursday afternoon update]

It’s round three. Someone needs to take the shovel away from Naomi before she gets to China.

[Bumped again]

[Update a couple minutes later]

Don’t miss the link to the Jamie Glazov piece:

Reminiscent of creepy and pathetic tales that fellow travelers told (about what they had “learned”) upon their returns from Stalinist Russia and Maoist China, Wolf comes back to share the news. Many Muslim feminists, she implores, apparently told her that they wish that we Westerners would focus on examples of women’s rights in their societies rather than on “what they wear.”

Sorry Naomi Wolf, the mere fact that someone told you something does not erase the reality of how tyrannical structures employ dress codes to wield various forms of oppression. If Jews were, for instance, once again forced, in any given society, to suddenly start wearing particular articles of clothing to identify and distinguish themselves from other people, should those of us who are concerned suddenly become unconcerned merely because a Jewish person in that society told you to tell us not to worry about it?

Not that you know or care anything about history, but there is a reason why despotisms and apartheid structures create dress codes. The enforcement of such codes plays a crucial role in keeping the structures of tyranny and the enslavement of a people in check (e.g., Maoist unisex clothing had a ruthless purpose). Ms. Wolf, do you really fail to grasp the fact that dress codes in the Islamic world, such as the niqab and the burqa, play a crucial role in keeping the chains of gender apartheid in place, and that this is precisely why the guardians keep them in place?

No Ms. Wolf, I won’t stop worrying about what Muslim women are forced to wear. I care about the Muslim women who have had acid thrown in their faces, or who have been raped or killed or set aflame, because of the dress code they chose not to follow. I know you don’t care about them, because they eluded you somehow during your political pilgrimage and you have yet to utter one of their names and tell us, with heartfelt concern, what happened to them and why.

As I said, someone needs to get her to quit digging.

13 thoughts on “Burqua Tourism”

  1. Wolfe is – and always has been – an idiot.

    I suspect she subconsciously hates herself, and all women. I won’t speculate as to why.

  2. Low testosterone levels, I’m thinking, Barb, which reduces sex drive in women as well as men. Wolf is a good-looking woman, and no doubt noticed that men wanted to do her from an early age, but perhaps she herself gets no joy from that fact. It might then strike her as a freakish and unpleasantly wasteful fact that so much of what we do revolves around sex, the attracting and selection of mates, and so on. I can only imagine her grinding her teeth at car and liquor ads, in which we are told buying a Lexus or drinking this or that brand of scotch will get an awesome looking babe to hang on your arm.

    More relevantly, the combination of good looks and low drive would have allowed her — strongly tempted her — to acquire power through being a cock tease. It would be far easier than any other method, sex being the powerful drive it is. That, in turn, might have led to her apparent feelings of profound self-loathing. She would hate herself for using her sex appeal, and she would hate the world that made it the easiest way for her to compete.

    She would also misunderstand the difference between acquiring power through sexuality and good looks and through, say, hard work and good ideas. Instead of realizing that biology makes the former unusually easy, she would imagine that something rotten about ‘society’ makes the latter unusually hard. I mean, if she were fairly dumb she might think that, and appearances (ha ha) suggest that Naomi Wolf is not very bright.

  6. Catifghts like this remind me why women will never rule the world. They lose sight of their common enemy and insist on attacking each other instead.

    But it is fun to watch…

  7. So Phylllis Chesler’s logical and clearheaded response to Naomi Wolf is a “catfight” and proof that women shouldn’t be in charge of anything? I could just as well turn the tables and say that your stupid comment is proof that men are all male chauvinist oppressors of women who all agree with Ms. Wolf that covered-up women are just fine and dandy. But since I’m a reasonable human being I won’t.

  10. No one “gives a shit” about her, but anyone who comes out with drooling nonsense like “Muslim women freely choose to be covered from head to toe in sacks” needs to be slapped down and hard.

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