A prison cell made of cloth

Much has changed since then. Around the world, Islam has been distorted, corrupted and sullied by male theologians, chauvinist leaders and fake fakirs. I am a Muslim, flawed and sometimes full of doubt, but still a believer. Prayers give me solace, briefly taking me out of this world to intangible, numinous spaces. I feel it is time, indeed my duty, to state why I truly, deeply believe the veil, in all its permutations, is indefensible and unacceptable.

Vast numbers of Muslim and other objectors dare not voice their views, but needs must. Muslim and non-Muslim champions of the veil say that this is a fuss about nothing important: it is simply another way the West picks on followers of Islam and, confusingly, that it is a requirement for true worshippers. They are being disingenuous or possibly naive. These pieces of cloth have become the flags of revolution and counter-revolution, of enforced conformity and sassiness, of tyranny and political resistance.

Rows periodically burst out over the veil — bad dramas, full of commotion, which simply entrench positions. One striking example demonstrates just how contentious the issue has become. On September 10 last year in Britain, Birmingham Metropolitan College issued new guidelines: on college premises everyone was required to show their faces. Hoodies, caps and veils were not permitted. It was a perfectly reasonable directive. Nudists after all cannot attend college stark naked. They have to compromise, follow regulations and recognise social conventions.

Hood-wearers and cap-wearers accepted the rule, but not veiled women. Thousands of students signed a petition; the college head, Dame Christine Braddock, was accused of “Islamophobia”. The rule was “disgusting”, they said, and an infringement of “freedom”. Within three days the college surrendered and revoked the ordinance. The organised bullying and blackmailing was disgraceful, “disgusting” even.

Similar co-ordinated outrage is whipped up against politicians who raise objections to the niqab. Some parliamentarians do harbour prejudices against Muslims, but not all of them. A good number have genuine misgivings about veiling. And so they should. They must also be able to express concerns in an open society.

In the 1970s, when I came to Britain, British Muslim women did not wear headscarves or body and face coverings. When oil-rich sheiks turned up on shopping sprees with their veiled entourages, cartoonists enjoyed mocking them. Now veils are ubiquitous — a depressing and scary development. Do not believe those who say these clothes are adopted by only a small number of Muslim women. The practice is spreading across the country and all classes.

I live in west London, where entire localities now seem to be full of covered-up women — it started after the Saudis set up a school in Acton. At local Muslim celebrations they keep out women who show their hair. I know, because it happened to me.

One saying attributed to the prophet is this: “God has not created anything better than reason, anything more perfect or beautiful than reason.” Here, I use reason, argument, facts, personal experiences and history to back my viewpoint that Muslims, feminists and liberals of all shades should repudiate female body wraps.

Modern Western life can be disorienting, meaningless, amoral. It is materialistic, hedonistic, socially anarchic, sex-obsessed and atomised. Feminism is betrayed and humiliated by so-called girl power. One sees young women in clothes that call out to men. Pre-teens, younger girls, sometimes toddlers are dressed in flirty, foxy gear. The little ones are being trained to think of themselves primarily as eye candy and, in time, pullers and pleasers. Bovine followers of fashion are shaped by subliminal promotional messages; marketing and the media have infiltrated their heads. These come-hither styles benefit only men and big business. Females become body parts; meat.

However, I believe strongly that cloaks, scarves and masks also degrade women by regarding them primarily as sexual creatures, but severely controlled ones. Again, the beneficiaries are men. They too are manipulated, though they would deny it. Half-naked lasses and young veiled women are all an affront to female dignity, potential and autonomy. They are all marionettes in the hands of forces they do not understand and have internalised messages about what it means to be female. The only difference is that, with the exception of pimped sex workers, non-Muslim females are not forced into alluring clothes.

A question: why is market-driven brainwashing scandalous, but brainwashing perpetrated through religious dogma perfectly respectable? Why are we allowed to question and criticise women in tarty clothes, but not hijabis (women who wear the Islamic headscarf)?

On July 22 this year the sun had been shining for a fortnight. At midday I went to Ealing Common, which is opposite my flat, and sat on a bench under a tree. No playful breeze lifted the leaves or wafted over the skin. It was one of the hottest days of the year.

A woman veiled in black, her hands gloved and feet in trainers, passed by slowly with a soft tread. I was wearing a midi-skirt festooned with daisies and a short-sleeved top — nothing immodest. She turned her face to me. It was covered, but she had black gauze over her eyes, too. Eyes must have become sluttish in the hardening rules of Wahhabi Saudi Islam.

This woman’s total negation of womanhood was mortifying. I couldn’t smile at her because of all the tumultuous feelings she had generated in a fleeting encounter. I knew that if anyone had racially insulted her, I would have rushed to her defence. But in my own head I hated what she was doing to herself and to the Sufi-type Islam with which I had grown up.

The way we practised, and still practise, is open, lyrical, meditative, private, quiet, in the heart rather than noisily on the streets. Men and women are equal before God in mosque halls; women often lead prayers and hymns.

My reactions were probably unfair. What right did I have to be so censorious? Live and let live is the great British way. Only one can’t. Not really. Clothes worn by women and men, girls and boys, are full of meanings and messages — intentional and unintentional. Advertising, psychology, physiology and social strictures determine buying and sartorial behaviour.

Say the woman in the park actually wanted to mask her face and hide every inch of her skin. Well then, to me she was acquiescing with and projecting religious misogyny and cultural disdain. Her slight glance was disconcerting and full of meanings I could only try to guess. For a moment I felt that by wearing summer clothes I was being cheap, offering myself up to male lasciviousness and dirty fantasies. Though that feeling did not last, it was disconcerting.

But what if her unseen eyes were not reproaching but envying me? Was she made to wear the mournful shroud; to deny all the physical attributes that made her who she was, her unique humanity; to turn herself into a ghost before she had passed on? Was her niqab a sign of defiant pride or utter powerlessness?

I wanted to know what had led to her taking up the Taliban approved kit; if she thought I was bad and she was good; whether I was bound to end up in hell and she had a guaranteed place in paradise. But we both knew there could be no conversation between us.

It was clear that only those of her tribe could approach her. Her soft polyester was less penetrable than the thick walls of a prison. She was in a moving cell without a window or small opening — a space of absolute darkness. The sun, giver of life and joy, was firmly kept out. Her peripheral vision was more restricted than the view from a small letterbox. I smelled sweat and perfume on her — a sign that she was not indifferent to feminine artifice and allure. Maybe it was a subversive olfactory message: I am still a woman, I am sensual and want attention. If it was her silent mutiny, it was pathetic.

If it was a sign that she was just like any other fashionable woman, it was equally pathetic. I am sorry to sound so harsh — but those were my honest reactions.

I know these are the reactions of many others, although they don’t openly express their revulsion for fear of encouraging racism (a light sleeper that is always around and ready to pounce). I too am apprehensive that my arguments will give succour to those who detest Muslims and other diverse populations. But in the end those people do not matter and cannot matter. They hate us enough already.

No one really knows how many such women are coerced; how many feel this is what God wants; how many see veiling as a badge of honour; how many hope it will protect them; how many are being defiant in the face of real anti-Muslim prejudices.

No research has been done in this area. That, I suppose, would be thought too intrusive — a step into forbidden territory.

Back again to the veiled woman in the park. She was pushing a baby in a pram — a girl, probably 10 months old, who had on a bright orange dress and an Alice band with a pretty bow. The buggy was one of those in which the child faces the world, not the pusher. Just as well. Imagine the child looking at a face that was not a face, trying to connect with a mother who could not coo at her, smile, make funny faces or laugh in public. We know the tiniest babies respond to voices, facial expressions and touch.

As the girl grew older, the family would, I imagine, start to define/confine her too. All over the country, younger and younger girls have headscarves on. Stretchy baby hijabs are available in London markets (some have false designer logos — “Chanel” or “Calvin Klein” are de rigueur).

So this child, in all probability, would not be allowed to show her hair. Then, from the age of eight, she might be put into long-sleeved grey or brown or black gowns. Why don’t they at least make the infant jilbabs red or bright green or blue? Can’t have that: too much fun. The gowns impede free movement; they are an encumbrance, a lesson. The children thus clad cannot play properly in playgrounds — they will trip over as they run. By the time they are teenagers, the indoctrination will be complete.

The world bursts with colour, but many of them will be dull shadows on the landscape and most will never let the wind blow through their hair. Of course they still laugh and play and love life — but in a severely restricted environment. They will be incessantly watched. Saddest of all, they will not know how small their world is.

Extracted from Refusing the Veil by Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, published by Biteback Publishing.<