The ‘enemy’ within: Muslims in France
July 4, 2009
Sahar
It seems France hasn’t had sufficient amount of negative attention. News has been buzzing on the latest debate over dress in the country. French President Nicolas Sarkozy has set up a commission to study the wearing of burqa in France—a long garment that covers the entire body including the face. According to Sarkozy, the burqa “deprived women of identity” and believes it is unacceptable to have women in France as “prisoners behind netting”.
Nor is Sarkozy alone in such sentiments. French feminists have been particularly vocal about the burqa and like Sarkozy see it as a symbol of subservience. According to Silhem Habchi from the women’s rights group ‘Ni Putes, Ni Soumises’ (Neither Whores Nor Subjected), it is a symbol of fascism and “the Talibanisation of religion.” More than 50 MPs from across the political spectrum have called for restrictions on wearing burqa which they describe as a “coffin”.
Yet the actual number of burqa and niqaab (with eye-slit) wearers in France is low. Muslim groups estimate that there are perhaps only a few hundred women fully covering themselves out of a Muslim population of over 5 million. Ironically, many of those who fully cover are converts. 
Underneath the language of laicite and paternalism bares a history that only partly explains the fetishistic approach on the part of the state to maintain a particular French identity that is secular, European and homogeneous.
France’s past attests to a long struggle between the state and church which culminated in French laicite (secularism)—the strict division between the state and church. The 1905 law of secularity is enforced militantly but relevant to the current context, the law was founded on a homogeneous France that no longer exists today.
Since the 1970s, France has been growing in cultural diversity with the presence of cheap labour workers from its former colonies in the Maghreb. However, French attitude toward cultural diversity would suggest little has changed in the demographic makeup of the country. The state does not recognise minority rights and enforces a colonial-style assimilation model on its immigrants whereby they’re expected to assimilate into a French abstraction. Thus, religious and cultural rights are only approved in consideration of a particular French secularism and mainly relegated to the private. In the case of Islam, this has been hugely problematic considering the private and public aren’t divided as such in matters of religious practice. The hijab has become symbolic of this contention.
An interesting debate occurred on Al Jazeera between director of Human Rights Watch in Paris Jean-Marie Fardeau, writer Anne Elizabeth Moutet and Saudi media personality in the Middle East, Muna Abdulsulayman. I’m in agreement with Abdulsulayman that the burqa isn’t obligatory in Islam and shouldn’t be defended as such, but I think she should have really stressed the right for a woman to choose to wear it. I’ve blogged about the burqa in France here and here in note of this, however, I pointed out in my post that I do believe that a woman’s right to choose how to express her religion (her interpretation of what modesty is) or her culture as she sees fit is fundamental to her dignity and should be protected. So, it is a matter of choice—whether we agree with it or not is irrelevant.
My other main objection to the proposed ban of the burqa is within the context of the 2004 legislation which prohibits the wearing of “ostentatious religious symbols” in public schools and government offices. Though it was claimed it was not specifically targeting any religious group, it mainly affected the wearing of headscarves for young Muslim women. Like they have been with the burqa issue, French feminists were equally as vocal and supported the ban. Well known French feminists like Anne Vigerie, the leader of a feminist think tank and Elisabeth Badinter reinforced the media’s theme of associating the hijab with Islamic extremism, viewing the headscarf as ‘le drapeu sur la tete” (flag on the head) that confirms the underdeveloped status of women in radical Islam.
The ban too was justified with the claim it was to ‘protect’ women from religious misogyny. In actuality, these debates are emphatically demonstrating the state’s attempt to eradicate the presence of Islam in public.
In its attempt to justify the violation of basic religious and cultural freedoms, France has vehemently responded to criticism explaining that it is for the state’s security. From what exactly? A type of dress worn by a ridiculously small minority of women? It’s interesting to note that at the time of the 2004 ban, the number of women wearing it was small in proportion to the total Muslim population. But in both cases the hysteria that the headscarf and burqa has whipped up would suggest that it is worn by millions striving to dominate French society.
French philosopher Alain Badiou writes that it is fear that drives such criticism of ‘foreign’ (Muslim) dress. The justification for protecting a secular identity is a front to undermine Islam in France, and this is closely tied with another part of France’s history: the French conquest of Algeria in 1830. The country suffers from a pathological fear of a ‘Muslim threat’ born in the Algerian revolutionary struggle against French colonialism. The hijab in its haik form was used as a form of national assertion and a reclaiming of a Muslim and cultural identity. Thus, the same French mission to civilise Muslim women persists today. French Muslim women are being ‘unveiled’ as part of a contemporary French colonial mission civilisatrice, in order to ‘teach’ the Muslim Other the superiority of Western knowledge and culture.
Today, the presence of the hijab in whatever form is one that offends. This is because it’s a symbol of the failure to ‘civilise’ the Algerian and by extension, Muslims. The burqa’s presence awakens a French fear and humiliation of the ‘loss’ of Algeria and the historical defeat to Islam. It is also symbolic of the irreducible difference and thus the unassimilability of Islam. Europeans –in this case French– identity is conveniently constructed to contrast with the other (Muslim) who do not belong in Europe.
These fears are accentuated further in the post 911 context in which Islam and Muslims have become victims of a bogeyman mindset which has had major implications on Muslims: They are the ‘enemy within’–dehumanised to the point of irrelevance.
So the current burqa issue can only be understood in its proper context which recognises Europe’s history with the Muslim world, France’s colonisation of the Maghreb and the current 911 political climate where Islamophobia has permeated all levels of European society.
F
Sahar
Farah
July 4, 2009 at 2:12 pm
i agree with you!!
July 6, 2009 at 2:38 am
Sahar,
I find it amusing that a random number of your posts (or any other post on this blog) ends regularly in the same pattern – resorting to dressing up ‘contexts’ in a thinly veiled attack against the West, its Colonial Past and its Liberal Schools of Geo-political and social thought.
Does it really matter that the French (and any other European country) reinforce their ‘assimilation model’? Or that they bear grudges against Muslims due to their bitter experience in Algeria?
I keep wondering over and over again – what is the message you are really trying to get across here?
That the World-Life and Western Values System is a joke? well, guess what? Everyone knows about it (even the French do!). What you’re trying to do is bring home the stale state of affairs.
Don’t despair. We can continue to play the game left and right, liberal and conservative, in black and white until there is a possibility of re-aligning the interfaces between our spectator-societies and redundant social/political institutions in a way that it is truly representative. Until then, I suppose, you can continue in your role to voice your concerns in (ironically) the Democratic Spirit, while the antagonists against your welfare will thrive on putting up false apperances just to show the spectator-societies of the world that democracy works, as it should.
Have nice thought dreams.
July 7, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Forever, ironically, I’m struggling to understand the point of your post – which makes yours all the more retarded, since you established yourself on the moral high ground, in regards to the need for genuinely instrumental and politically novel speech …
A few responses to what you’ve said:
1. “Does it really matter that the French (and any other European country) reinforce their ‘assimilation model’?”
Of course it matters! Honestly I won’t even dignify with what you said with anything other than…WTF?
2. “Everyone knows about it (even the French do!).”
You think the “French” know it. Okay, let me ignore the nuances in their mainstream expressions, the ceaseless stupidity of their media, and generally ignorant public sentiments, that all suggest otherwise; lets entertain your point. Okay, let’s say they do, they the French “know it” – what’s your point then? Their “knowledge” about the West being a joke is not reflected in governance, or policy is it – and they are acting like we, who question the West, are the fools — are they not? In other words, if they know it why are they acting like they don’t…
So what am I suppose to do towards the spectator society then? … Invest in its complexity and appreciate that they know they are only acting like they don’t know. – How about, instead, you get some sleep…
3. …while the antagonists against your welfare will thrive on putting up false apperances just to show the spectator-societies of the world that democracy works, as it should.
What a retarded and circular point. Notwithstanding you organizing political responses in categories of democratic or otherwise. Whitey is always talking aren’t they, even when they are not… Your point followed to its logic is this: Sahar must always take into account whenever she speaks that ultimately what she says is going to be used for someone else’s political project. The moral of your feeble story: Don’t speak out against democratic society otherwise you are reaffirming the myth of democracy for your antagonist… that gives the subaltern a lot of options doesn’t it – Of course, we are always actors on whitey’s stage.
How about this …fuck the antagonist.
It is almost as if you believe, or inherent some flawed enlightened ideal, that speech, political or otherwise, should somehow coincide with a “correct” reading of an accessible reality – or subsequently introduce a novel approach.
Here is a point you might not appreciate. Certain Muslims are not speaking to be heard, we are not speaking to educate, we are not speaking to engage and relate, (even if we assume this posture) — we are mostly speaking to learn how to speak again…
… its empowering to talk back to the world instead of being constantly talked about; the crescent is raising – so who gives a fuck what the French know…
July 7, 2009 at 6:06 pm
[...] The ‘enemy’ within: Muslims in France « Nuseiba In its attempt to justify the violation of basic religious and cultural freedoms, France has vehemently responded to criticism explaining that it is for the state’s security. From what exactly? A type of dress worn by a ridiculously small minority of women? It’s interesting to note that at the time of the 2004 ban, the number of women wearing it was small in proportion to the total Muslim population. But in both cases the hysteria that the headscarf and burqa has whipped up would suggest that it is worn by millions striving to dominate French society. (tags: religion&state islam hijab france multiculturalism) [...]
July 8, 2009 at 1:25 am
i.Sadiq – I believe the entire purpose of my post was to provoke a debate (and quite a racy one at that), although certainly without the intention of being a wise-ass.
Let me explain – and I’ll respond beginning from the last argument: in fact, you were correct in stating the implied logic about Sahar’s need to understand that her well-meant efforts to broaden the public debate and dialogue among Moslem women are doomed to failure. It will only exist minutely if at all in the yellow-press (Ye wordpress), without making little or no impact on the current issue we’re talking about here. It is not that she isn’t putting her best foot forward; she is after all, reading her lines to perfection in Whitey’s Play. And as always, Whitey will always have the advantage of foreseeing the next scene and thereby render her earnest efforts, emotions and thoughts ineffective.
What I would suggest that she do different is start ad libbing, so to speak. Instead of posting a whole lot of irrelevant drivel about fancy social constructs and abstractions, would it not be more effective to ask questions that provoke and encourage participative and communicative action?
To elaborate, let me put out a few questions off the top of my head:
>> “Why Moslems are discriminated both socially and economically – what can community groups do to engage the French (or insert any other ‘antagonist’ here)?”
>> “What are the traditional roles assumed by women in Moslem societies and how would they want to transform those roles when Moslems migrate to Western countries? Do these roles need change at all? Or do Western Societies need to accommodate those roles instead (assimilation in reverse).”
– And so forth.
The key difference between conceptualizing such participative ideas against the flummery of modern and post-modern socio-political critique is that we can avoid prolonging the legal and political foreplay with Western Democratic Institutions (and yes, the French people know that it is exactly what it is!). By creating a public dialogue within _accessible realms_ in which people who are genuinely affected by the _accessible reality_ – which you pointed out – the Western Societies and Moslems in it have a better chance of reaching a normative resolution to problems than would be provided through the convoluted and the intricate web of formal, privileged Institutions (the Fourth Estate inclusive).
Finally, the point I appreciate the most – the fact that Muslims can engage, relate and educate each and every other social agent, as a means of empowerment and coexisting with diverse cultures and communities. Regardless of whether you are learning to speak again or not, my hope is that people like Sahar invest their efforts in realizing this enormous opportunity – and not end up being just another player in Whitey’s World.
p.s. I understand the sentiments of a Muslim – been there, done that (literally)
July 10, 2009 at 8:02 am
[...] burqa ban discussions: here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and [...]
July 12, 2009 at 11:05 am
“What I would suggest that she do different is start ad libbing, so to speak. Instead of posting a whole lot of irrelevant drivel about fancy social constructs and abstractions, would it not be more effective to ask questions that provoke and encourage participative and communicative action?
To elaborate, let me put out a few questions off the top of my head:
>> “Why Moslems are discriminated both socially and economically – what can community groups do to engage the French (or insert any other ‘antagonist’ here)?”
>> “What are the traditional roles assumed by women in Moslem societies and how would they want to transform those roles when Moslems migrate to Western countries? Do these roles need change at all? Or do Western Societies need to accommodate those roles instead (assimilation in reverse).””
Forever, if you read my posts you’d realise these are the questions i’m already asking implicitly and at times explicitly.
July 28, 2009 at 1:51 am
[...] “Do we ban the burqa?” debate considering the excellent stuff that’s been written, including Sahar’s response and Shakira Hussein’s post at new site South Asian Masala. I’m also aware of the dangers of [...]