Muslim women who wear face veils are suffering rise in abuse and hostility
Muslim women who wear face veils say they are seeing a rising tide of hostility and abuse because of the way they dress.
Women spoke out as police reported a sharp rise in crimes, ranging from verbal abuse to physical attacks, against Muslims in the past year.
Two women who wear the niqab, a veil which leaves only the eyes showing, said Leicester had become more "hostile" since the French Government said it planned to ban the garment and the burka, which covers the entire body.
The women also believe publicity surrounding Conservative MP Philip Hollobone's decision to refuse to meet constituents wearing veils had deepened public hostility.
Mr Hollobone, an MP in Northamptonshire, also attempted to introduce a private member's bill in the House of Commons to pave the way for a law similar to that being considered in France.
One of the women, a 29-year-old from Leicester's Clarendon Park, said: "There is a more hostile than usual atmosphere at the moment.
"I have been called names like ''Taliban'' and ''terrorist'' and one man, who was drunk in the middle of the day, told me to go back to where I came from.
"I just want to live my life in accordance with my faith, I don't see what harm I am doing by wearing the niqab.
"People talk about women who wear these garments being outside of society in some way. I was born and brought up in this country and don't want to live anywhere else.
"I have been to university and I have a well-paid job, I live by the law and I love my family. How am I not taking part in society?"
Another woman, aged 32, from Evington, Leicester, said: "Women are saying that they feel intimidated by some of the comments they hear in the media or in the street.
"There seems to be this feeling now that women who choose to dress this way are some kind of threat to the British way of life."
Police in Leicester have seen the number of cases of Muslims being verbally abused or physically assaulted rise in the past year.
Between April 2008 and March 2009, officers in the city recorded 25 offences. In the following 12 months, it rose to 42.
Chief Inspector Bill Knopp, of Leicestershire police's community safety unit, said: "Although the number of offences is relatively low, it's the trend that concerns us.
"We cannot be sure whether that rise reflects greater public confidence and people are coming to us when these things happen to them or an actual rise in incidents.
"What I do know is that we are getting better at catching the offenders."
Suleman Nagdi, spokesman for the Leicestershire Federation of Muslim Organisations, said meetings had taken place with police to discuss the recent incidents.
He said: "The figures the police have only show the number of women who have come forward to tell them about their experiences.
"I fear there are others who have been abused in this way but have never told anyone about it.
"There is a debate going on, but calling people names in the street is never part of any debate."
Leicestershire police have a new hate crime website: www.stamp-it-out.co.uk
Treat everyone equally
I found the Bishop of Leicester's article "Ban on religious symbols is not the way forward" (First Person, July 17) rather confused.
He states that "in secular societies religious symbols are increasingly seen as dangerous and problematic" and "in secular societies there is always a tendency to get anxious about expressions of religion".
I would suggest that it has nothing to do with whether or not a society is secular, but on whether the constituent parts of that society are comfortable with each other. Indeed, I think the Bishop would probably find a high proportion of his own congregation would advocate banning full face veils.
As a member of Leicester Secular Society, I can say that we are certainly not unanimous in our approach to this issue, but we do maintain that all must be treated equally, regardless of religion. We also believe that people should have the greatest possible freedom both in action and speech.
As a man, I find the idea that a woman wants to hide their face from me because she thinks I am a threat to her and is not prepared to allow full communication with me (of which facial expression is an important part) offensive. However, it is necessary if we are to live in a free society to tolerate both actions and speech that offend.
I suggest that in the case of the "'wooden-headed bureaucratic silliness' that stopped Christians wearing religious symbols at work" the correct solution would be to advocate getting the rules on what can be worn changed for all, rather than demanding an exception for a particular religious symbol.
People should be allowed to cover their faces where they so wish, but where this is problematic, all should have to show their faces.
Where motorcycle helmets and hoodies are not allowed, the same should apply to the full veil, with no exception on the basis of religion.
John Catt, Loughborough
The Bishop of Leicester's First Person column appears in today's Leicester Mercury:
Ban on religious symbols is not the way forward
The Bishop of Leicester sees France's move to ban the niqab as a disturbing development
Earlier this year a nurse was banned from wearing a crucifix by her employers. In his Easter sermon the Archbishop of Canterbury subsequently spoke out about "wooden-headed bureaucratic silliness" that stopped Christians wearing religious symbols at work.
He went on to say that there is currently a strange mixture of contempt and fear towards Christianity.
Last Tuesday the French took the banning of religious symbols one step further. Their parliament passed a law which will affect fewer than 2,000 people out of a population of 64 million. The people whom the law targets are the small number of Muslim women who wear a full-face veil or niqab.
The French parliament voted 335 to one in favour of a bill that would make it an offence punishable by a fine to appear in public in the full veil. Any man convicted of insisting that his wife or daughter wear it can be imprisoned for up to a year. During the debate the niqab was described as a "walking coffin" by one MP, and "a threat to French values" by another.
In secular societies religious symbols are increasingly seen as dangerous and problematic. Last month I listened to a distressed woman speak about being attacked by a youth in Leicester while she was wearing a niqab. The youth tore down her veil and shouted abuse at her. This was not the first experience of abuse she has suffered but it was the most serious.
The woman went on to speak of how the incident had knocked her confidence, but she knew that she must stand up and go ahead with the complaint to the police. The offender was found through CCTV evidence.
Subsequently, other Muslim women have come forward to her to say they have suffered the same kind of abuse, including the woman's own daughter.
The Lord Mayor of Leicester recently expressed the view that "religion has no role to play in the conduct of Council business". In secular societies there is always a tendency to get anxious about expressions of religion. The niqab can be unsettling for many people but why do the state and employers feel the need to ban it?
Many of the great cities of the world are made up of people from different cultures and faiths. In plural societies people live plural lives. One of the main strengths of Leicester is that its diverse citizens and communities respect each other's cultural and religious differences and value them rather than be threatened by them.
If we follow the example of the French and try to impose a single culture it leads us to question what would be banned next? Banning religious symbols is not the way forward.
What do Leicester's Muslim women think of the face veil, or niqab?
Black for Monday. Black for Tuesday. Black for Wednesday. And so it goes on. A clothes rail filled with almost identical, same colour, shapeless, top-to-toe outfits, writes Adam Wakelin.
You might not think it would take Noorjahan Khonat long to pluck one from a hanger, but it nearly always does.
The daily whims and tiny agonies of what to wear don't stop at the wardrobe door of a devout Muslim.
Noorjahan has her favourites, the ones that make her feel good.
Only someone who didn't understand would think they all looked the same. That's part of the problem.
It can still give her a jolt, just how much fury those baggy black clothes and head scarves can provoke.
"I've had boys come up to me in town and try to tear them off," she says "They call me ninja and laugh, like it's funny.
"I try to talk to the younger ones, but some of the bigger boys can make you really frightened."
Noorjahan wears a face veil, a niqab.
For some, that makes the 42-year-old from Highfields the ultimate faceless victim.
Not just to those boys, but to the French government and a growing clamour of critics over here who would like to follow France's lead by banning the burka and the niqab from public places.
It is a curious coalition; an unlikely alliance of well-meaning liberals and none-too-clever closet racists.
As of last week, in the words of French president Nicolas Sarkozy, the veil was "not welcome" in a country which values sexual equality.
If he gets his way, niqab and burka wearers will be refused access to things such as schools, hospitals and buses.
The liberal justification for this is that the veil is more than just an item of clothing.
It is a symbol of male repression; a backward garment that has no place in modern society, something from the dark ages that reduces women to the status of a formless, faceless non-person.
That might be true for some, but not of Noorjahan, she insists.
She says she wears the veil because she wants to wear the veil, not because someone has forced her to. Funny, thoughtful, and tirelessly talkative, she doesn't give the impression of a downtrodden little woman.
"I wear it because it gives me independence," says Noorjahan.
"No-one can judge me on my looks or my figure.
"I feel more free. I don't get stared at with dirty eyes. If people like me, they like me for who I am inside, as a person. That, to me, is liberating.
"And besides, I like the colour black!" she giggles. "So that's a bonus.
"Sometimes people make fun of you or pull at your clothes. That doesn't make you feel good, but I try to make them understand."
Noorjahan adopted the veil after she got married and had started having children. It has been 18 years now.
Her husband didn't force her into it, she says. It was her decision, something she feels has brought her closer to God.
"It's hard to explain in English", says Noorjahan, fumbling for the right words, "but it makes me feel like a better person. I don't swear or give bad advice or think bad thoughts. It's like sitting on a prince's throne. You have to behave properly.
"Nothing feels more comfortable than wearing my clothes and my veil.
"If I don't wear the veil, I feel naked. It doesn't feel good at all. I feel frightened. I don't feel as though God is protecting me."
It is a strange thing for something so apparently anti-fashion, but the anonymous black silhouette of the burka and niqab has become a status symbol.
A sports star pulls on a pair of expensively-endorsed Nikes, a Tory politician dons an electric blue suit, and the Muslim woman who has to be seen as holier than thou draws a veil over her face.
So says Parvin Ali, a Muslim chaplain, member of the Prime Minister's National Muslim Women's Advisory Group, and board member for business support and enterprise for the East Midlands Development Agency.
The veil has become dangerous and divisive, believes Parvin.
"People see those who wear the niqab as the ultimate practitioners of their faith," she says.
"Creeping elitism is coming in. There is a differentiation. People who don't wear the veil are seen as not such good Muslims, or as strong in their faith. It is almost like there is a hierarchy, and that is very damaging."
Parvin, who lives in Leicester, does not wear a veil or a head scarf. She prays five times a day and she faithfully follows the scriptures of the Qur'an.
Nowhere in that holy book, stresses Parvin, does it state that Muslim women must cover their heads. Many of the most eminent Islamic scholars now decry the veil, she claims.
Preserving one's "modesty", something that is mentioned, should be left up to the individual, based on their personal convictions and faith.
"The veil should be a matter of personal choice," she says. "I have concerns that it's not, particularly in Leicester. Young people are being pushed down a certain road without being given the full information. They feel compelled to wear it by their family, sections of their community or their mosque.
"A lot of women feel isolated, not just from non-Muslim communities but Muslims as well. It is polarising communities."
The rise and rise of the veil is making Leicester more like Dewsbury and Blackburn, she argues, northern towns which have fractured along religious and racial lines.
"I had someone ring me up from Birmingham," says Parvin. "She told me her husband wanted her to move to Leicester because more people were wearing the niqab here.
"What an awful reason to move to Leicester," she sighs. "I said, 'Please don't move to Leicester wearing the niqab. We've got quite enough already'!"
Parvin is not in favour of the state trying to ban burkas or niqabs, but she does believe there is a time and a place for them – doctors, nurses, teachers and others in the public sector should not be allowed to do their jobs behind a veil.
"Nurses should not be allowed to wear a veil," she says. "It is wrong to bend over to that extent to accommodate a minority of individuals.
"A lot of patients don't feel that comfortable interacting with people they can't see.
"If people feel that strongly about wearing a veil they should be in another profession, or do it in a private capacity.
"People may have lots of piercings. That's fine on a personal level. You don't condemn them, but there's a host of reasons why they shouldn't be allowed in a hospital. That's the way I feel about the niqab."
