Education minister says students can wear hijab but are no longer allowed to use face veils
The Egyptian government has announced a ban on the wearing of the face-covering niqab in schools from the beginning of the next term on 30 September.
Education Minister Reda Hegazy made the announcement on Monday, adding that students would still have the right to choose whether to wear a headscarf, but insisted it must not cover their faces.
He also said that the child's guardian should be aware of their choice, and that it must have been made without any outside pressure.
This might prevent a lot of women from going to school or work if their male guardians don't let them step out without Niqab or Buqra (which is the real problem).
I wish people would just leave women the fuck alone when it comes to their choice of dress and put this much needed focus into ensuring that all women are able to make their own choices.
My reading was they expressed concern that the guardians who imposed face coverings on these girls would deny them education rather than give up the garment, then frustration that some people, like those guardians feel they have the right to impose such rules. Seems consistent to me.
You think you've found some logical inconsistency, but you haven't. They're talking about IN GENERAL, people need to stfu about women's clothing. Including the men in an unapologetically patriarchal country.
Yeah rhis is what happens when you take phrases out of context. I meant they should have the choice to not wear it if they don't want to. I explained a bit more about my position in other comments under this discussion.
Good thing in the US we all have complete freedom in how we can dress. We would never persecute people for not dressing in the way our society says they should be dressing based on their genitals. Er... Wait.
(Yes I know it's not the same, but it comes from the same place of ignorance, and this is exactly where we are headed if we allow it to continue to escalate)
🤣 What the hell is this comment? You honestly believe women want to wear black beekeeper suits?
I can't believe how blind people are to the suffering and degradation of women brought on by the Muslim fate.
Imagine they required, instead of women, all black people to wear this shit? Would you be here telling people "jUsT lEt bLaCk pEoPlE wEaR wHaT tHeY wAnT!"
These outfits, and forced make guardianship are inhumane vile bullshit and needs to be eradicated.
I wish people would just leave women the fuck alone when it comes to their choice of dress and put this much needed focus into ensuring that all women are able to make their own choices.
Bullshit! In all the free countries of the world where women can dress whatever they want, you see face tattoos, extreme body modifications, hairs of every color and not once you see women actively deciding to cover their head and faces like you see in Muslim countries, so fuck you with that rhetoric that this is what "women want"
Okay, let me explain my position better since it seems like people think this was badly worded.
For me, the one thing that should be protected is the absolute choice to wear what you want as a woman, and since hijab is forced on a large number of women, be it in psychological or physical or emotional, there should be all sorts of programs and help and support they can get especially as teens or children. I don't think banning it is helpful in this way, as in I don't think it's effective. The real issue is that control is being exerted on these women. Putting more control over them from the opposite direction is giving them more shit to deal with. What Egypt or France should have done was have a long conversation with the parents and girls who wear hijab and make it easy for these girls to get support to stop wearing it. That's how you get good results. Banning a piece of clothing is often more of a political gesture.
Edit: I also want to say that that position is not what I meant to convey in the paragraph. Sorry if it was badly worded but I feel like when read alongside of the first paragraph above it, it's more clear that what I mean is that women are forced to wear it by their guardian and parents and that this should not be the case. I didn't think I had to explicity say "ofc many women are forced to wear it and this is wrong" because I thought that was obvious. My mistake, I guess I should be more explicit with such controversial topics.
Agreed. I don't understand why this is so difficult a concept for people who claim to be trying to help women. Banning certain head garments because they're "symbolic of women's oppression" is just another way of restricting women's choices and doesn't promote their independence at all. Just let women choose how to dress themselves, same as men, it's really not that complicated.
Exactly. No one is saying those women should be forced to wear a Niqab by society. We are actually saying the exact opposite, Egyptian women should be more free to take the hiajb or niqab off if they like, and not have to live with legal or societal consequences.
There are feminist organizations already working on that. It's not like the only two choices are a ban or no ban.
That's one way to solve the issue in a method that works, rather than going around to destroy all "symbols of oppression". Like go ahead and bash at all these symbols, but make sure you don't bash women along with it.
The problem is, you know most (80-90%) of these girls are forced by their parents to wear religious clothing. Not doing so will result in beatings or, when they're older, being kicked out of the house.
How are you, as a society, going to protect these children? Just sitting behind your keyboard philosophizing that you shouldn't restrict their free choice does not protect them at all, as history proves.
France has banned Hijabs and Abaya robes in schools not just Niqabs. Egypt is preventing people from hiding their face in school, France is doing a lot more. I don't think it's directly comparable considering the Niqab bans at least have a safety component. Whos safer because school kids cant wear head scarfs?
My initial reaction is the same as to the recent abaya ban in France. Opposition. I'll need to read more about it though, because I think the motivations and outcomes will be different.
I recently learned that this ban on France doesn't really including everything. Small crosses are okay. Some Turbans are okay. Jewish kids can go to Jewish schools. At least that's what the wikipedia page said. I found the one about the cross interesting.
Again, we see the same male dominant governments, decide, for absolutely no necessary reasons, what women should and should not ware. While people respond with the same; deciding on behalf of other what is good for them. Saying hijabs, nigab, and othe religious clothing is oppression, is by itself a personal opinion. Making rule based on that, is oppression.
Instead of focusing on education itself, social support and protection, they put out laws that devide people further and distract them from major issues that's going on.
Yep, but worse of all it seems that some people would respond to any criticism of the ban as one being okay with oppressing women. Bans are shit, usually poorly motivated, and often motivated by politics and xenophobia. No one likes the slow way of social change, and people sometimes ignore the efforts already done by women in these communities (in other words, they are already liberating themselves with their own hands)