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Politics : Canadian Political Free-for-All -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Stephen O who wrote (9378)	6/6/2006 3:03:06 PM
From: SofaSpud	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 37274

Someone agrees with you ... Burka doesn't look like freedom Danielle Smith, For The Calgary Herald Published: Tuesday, June 06, 2006 For me, the most memorable image from this weekend's terrorism bust was not the sight of 17 Muslim men being arrested and the revelation of their plans to blow up Canadian targets. It was the sight their family members outside the Brampton, Ont., courtroom: a group of women dressed in a head-to-toe burkas, one of them drinking a Tim Hortons coffee. How were homegrown terrorists raised on Canadian soil? This image, to me, says it all. I have no doubt many Muslim women voluntarily choose to wear a head scarf to satisfy the tenets of modesty in their faith. But the burka, which completely covers a woman, including her face, and leaves only a tiny slit for her eyes, is not about modesty. In the extreme views of extreme Islamists, even the sight of a bare ankle can be enough to drive a man wild with lust, which is why they believe women must be completely covered. It is oppression and it should not be happening in Canada. If young men are being brought up in households where women dress in burkas, it does not surprise me they would grow up to be extremists. Here, young women are constantly seen with bare heads, shoulders and legs. Magazine racks, cinemas and movie stores prominently display beautiful models and actresses in suggestive poses. If a man believes women should never show any skin in public, there would be cause for fresh outrage every time he leaves his house. Canada must now face the same questions other western countries have grappled with. This nation offers a haven for the oppressed to start a new life and live freely. Yet, what do we do when groups continue the oppression of their homelands under the guise of religious freedom? Are these burka-clad women free? I don't think so. The Italians have gone so far as to enact anti-terror laws that forbid individuals from hiding their faces in public. Seeing these women with their faces uncovered would be far less disturbing. But what is more troubling is the attitude their clothing represents. In her book The Rage and the Pride, Italian author Oriana Fallaci issues a scorching indictment of the growing Muslim extremism in her country, with good reason. She experienced the misogyny of extreme Islam first-hand. As a reporter in the Middle East in 1973, she was with a unit of Palestinian fedayins at a secret base when an Israeli air raid began. While the men ran for cover in a mountain cave, she was told she couldn't hole up with them because it would be "obscene." They put her in an isolated wooden hut instead -- when she lit her lighter to see where she'd been placed, she discovered she was surrounded by boxes of explosives. "They did it on purpose, to amuse themselves, as if my risk of blowing up for a nearby blast would be the most hilarious thing on earth." More to the point, she discusses a Taliban-era documentary by a London-based journalist which shows the execution of three women in burkas in a square in Kabul. Their bearded, turbaned executioner walks behind the three kneeling women, lazily scratching his genitals as he goes along and, one-by-one, shoots them in the nape of the neck. In a final act of defiance, one of the victims lifts her robe to show a bare leg before she falls dead. Why were these women murdered? The next scene of the documentary shows a group of women in "one of the most prohibited places of the city." The women have unveiled faces, low-cut dresses and laugh while they curl their hair, put on makeup and apply red nail polish. The three women had been executed because they went to a hair salon. I have read stories which suggest life in Afghanistan, even after the removal of the Taliban, remains depressingly backward. A young, female Afghan VJ was forced off the air by the mullahs under threat of death; a 17-year-old teenager was killed by her brother because he had not given his permission for her to date; foreign female reporters have been beaten for not abiding by local dress codes. What really burns me is the burka was widely seen to be a symbol of repression, and went a long way to build public support for the Canadian mission. It makes little sense for our soldiers to be putting their lives on the line to bring liberation to Afghanistan when we can't even guarantee such freedom here.