Daniel Pipes makes a very odd statement about feminism and the veil in "Study the Koran?," which appears in today's New York Sun.
The admonishment for female modesty meant one thing to Egyptian feminists in the 1920s and another to their descendants today. Then, head coverings represented oppression and exclusion from public life. Today, in the words of a British newspaper headline, "Veiled is beautiful." Then, the head-covering signaled a woman not being a full human being; now, in the words of an editor at a fashion magazine, the head-covering "tells you, you're a woman. … You have to be treated as an independent mind." Reading the Koran in isolation misses this unpredictable evolution.
On the Koran, Dan's the man. On feminism, not. Meryl explains.
Update: Meryl got some mail on this one, and she's replied. Even better, she found the article that Dr. Pipes was referring to and quotes it extensively for, er, context. Sheds a whole new light.
Yes, we've had a few email exchanges about this topic. It's important. The extent to which women buy into myths of their own inferiority or are misled into thinking they've co-opted the tools of their oppression is a measure of how deep that oppression runs. As Meryl says, it's all about choice. Real choice.
