French MPs vote to ban Islamic full veil in public

[Deckard]

In the UK the "debate" continues.

First, the Daily Mail was apoplectic with rage (when is it not?) when Conservative environment secretary Caroline Spelman appeared to defend the wearing of burkas.

INTERVIEWER:
There seems to be a bit of a dispute in the government at the moment about this issue of whether or not the wearing of veils and burkhas should be banned or not, a lot of public opinion would like to see that ban, seeing it as somehow un-British. Where do you stand on that?

CAROLINE SPELMAN:
I take a strong view on this actually. I don’t, living in this country as a woman want to be told what I can and can’t wear. That is something which both myself and Sayeeda Warsi have argued very strongly that one of the things we pride ourselves on in this country is being free and being free to choose what you wear is a part of that so actually banning the burkha is absolutely contrary I think to what this country is all about.

INTERVIEWER:
You don’t see burkhas as being repressive of women? You don’t see a lot of men wearing them do you?

CAROLINE SPELMAN:
Indeed you don’t but I think it is quite interesting, I’ve been out to Afghanistan and I think I understand much better as a result of actually visiting why a lot of Muslim women want to wear the burkha. It is part of their culture, it is part of understanding that they choose to go out in the burkha and I think those that live in this country, if they choose to wear a burkha, should be free to do so.

INTERVIEWER:
You really feel that? You don’t think it is a manifestation of a culture which puts women in second place?

CAROLINE SPELMAN:
I think it is something you have to understand the actual culture and it was probably only when I went there and spent some time amongst women that I really understood that for them it’s a choice. For them the burkha confers dignity, it’s their choice, they choose to go out dressed in a burkha and I understand that it is a different culture from mine but the fact is in this country women want to be free to choose whether or not to cover their heads, whether or not to go out in the morning wearing a burkha, that’s for them. We are a free country, we attach importance to people being a free and for a woman it is empowering to be able to choose each morning when you wake up what you wear.

The Mail followed shortly after with a piece by Yasmin Alibhai-Brown headlined The burka empowering women? You must be mad, minister. And Brown knows her onions - she is, after all, a Muslim. Even (gasp) a left wing one. (Mail readers' heads must have popped after reading that piece)

The Conservative immigration minister Damian Green was next up, insisting that the French ban was "very unlikely" to be copied in the UK. ("Telling people what they can and can't wear, if they're just walking down the street, is a rather un-British thing to do ... we're a tolerant and mutually respectful society.")

All the while, the right wing newspapers are doing their best to faciliate a calm and rational debate on this topic:



I'm confused. I thought it was only "the PC brigade" that called for things to be banned?

As in "Now the PC Brigade wants to ban the veil... in case it offends.... and YOU pay.... " etc etc

Btw, isn't that photo great? Nice and direct, communicating to the dear reader the gravity of what Britain is up against. Photojournalism at its best.