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I spent part of my childhood in the Middle East before immigrating to Canada in my late teens. None of my Muslim girlfriends liked wearing the hijab or niqab. Whenever they could, they took it off because they found it oppressive. If their parents found out, there would be consequences.
I often helped my friends carve out a few hours of freedom at real personal risk. Some came from extremely powerful families. Had I been caught, they could have had me jailed and deported. Anyone who has actually lived in an Islamic society understands how pervasive and institutionalized the oppression is, especially for women and girls. While conditions have improved in a handful of places, the absence of genuine theological reform in Islam means many of these changes are superficial, largely designed to make life more comfortable for expatriates rather than to liberate local women.
So imagine my horror when Canada began celebrating World Hijab Day which is a celebration of paternalism and the normalization of female subordination. Many naive Canadians particularly white folks are deeply naïve about Islam. A kind of white saviour multiculturalism prevails, “isn’t diversity wonderful, therefore everything associated with it must be good”.
Children are assumed to lack full agency. If a child says she wants to wear the hijab or niqab, an enlightened parent should say no, and revisit the question when she is an adult. The rationale behind the hijab is explicit: it exists to shield women from the male gaze. When young girls are made to wear it, they are being sexualized at an age when they should not be thinking about sexuality at all.
This video is of Liberal MP Salma Zahid commemorating World Hijab Day in the House of Commons. She has blocked me for my views on the hijab.
I wonder how many women like this, coming to the liberalised west from societies with deeply ingrained views of women as subservient, find themselves astonished that their new hosts, far from supporting their desire for freedom, go out of their way to praise and support these customs which have misogyny written all over them.
Mick Hartley 
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