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| False equivalence. Bikini lady does have a choice. Bag lady doesn't |
When critics if Islamisation say we should not pander so much to Islam, the apologists shoot back, snarkily, "in what way are we 'pandering' to Islam, then?"
Well some ways are obvious: like the Sharia courts in the U.K. Or having women-only sessions at council swimming pools. Pandering to Islamic blasphemy laws, by "hate speech" legislation.
In other ways the pandering is less obvious: as in women's dress in Europe. Becoming more restricted and "modest" simply because of the pressure resulting from Islamisation.
Not wearing mini skirts may seem like a small thing, but it's part of the whole cloth, part of the irrevocable trend weaving more of Islam into our woof and weft. None of it good, in my view. There is nothing - simply nothing - that the West can learn to its benefit from Islam.*
From the Spectator:
Nowhere is the effect of Salafism in Europe more evident than in France. In 2002, a group of French Muslim women launched a feminist movement called Ni Putes Ni Soumises (Neither Whores nor Submissives) in reaction to the growing violence being inflicted upon them, which ranged from verbal abuse to gang rape. The violence has not only continued – it has expanded, prompting the noted French feminist philosopher and writer, Élisabeth Badinter, to warn in a recent interview of a "regression" in women's rights. This week, a report in France revealed that topless bathing, once de rigueur, is a thing of the past with only 22 per cent of women under 50 daring to strip, compared with 43 per cent in 1984. Francois Kraus, whose company conducted the survey, told Le Figarothat "the risk of physical or verbal intimidation" was a factor in the decline, adding that other surveys revealed women "no longer dared to wear mini-skirts or low-cut dresses on public transport"
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* That's "nothing" as in nothing.
(But note the qualifier, "to its benefit". There's certainly much we can learn from Islam that's not to our benefit: treatment of women, for example, or of gays, of apostates of non-Muslims)
