Skip to main content

Sex-Less-Clothes

There’s a lot of excitement in the Press just now, with two car bomb threats averted in London and another at Glasgow Airport. It strikes me as deeply chilling that the London bomb attempts were targeted near nightclubs where hundreds of young people and, in particular, slags (sic) would have been killed or maimed. This is not a terrorist attack against capitalism or even Christianity, or a general lack of faith in the UK but an attack on our women.

In the same newspaper I read an article about a magistrate who is apologizing for his unprofessional conduct when he walked out of the Courtroom because a young Muslim woman appeared before him in a hijab with a mere slit for her eyes to peep through.

I have no idea what she had done to require a presence before the beak, but identity must surely be called into question in Court. She is apparently hurt and outraged at being asked to unveil where men are present. However, anyone could have been under that veil, her uncle for instance, sent along in disguise to act on her behalf.

In post offices up and down the country, sample photographs demonstrate the acceptable identification requirement for a passport. A woman can be veiled around the face but her face needs to be visible in a UK court of law. Being tried by a panel of women is a possibility but UK laws apply in UK Courts, as surely as western women need to comply when in Muslim countries, as did the female naval officer who was obliged to be veiled during the period of her captivity in the recent detention of sailors.

The most terrifying thing to me about the whole need for a Muslim woman to be veiled and covered is the stated impossibility for Muslim men to ‘control themselves’ in the presence of a woman revealing any hair or skin. Even westernized Muslim women talk about the need to cover up in their home countries because they feel so vulnerable; at risk of attack or rape.

Friends laugh at me for saying that western young women show off too much flesh, and that I’m a bit old fashioned as far as cleavage and thigh flashing goes. I am generally in favour of modesty, and nicely cut clothes – elegance over obviousness. A bit of mystery is quite attractive I think, and I’d far rather see a man in a good shirt and well tailored pair of trousers than walking along the street in a wife-beater vest and too-short shorts, with all his skin on display. Men look good in suits as they create the illusion that there's a pair of shoulders under there.

But, as for these two extremes of women’s dressing, the very idea that a young woman in her prime, wanting to put all her goods on display for late night revellers in London should be murdered for doing so is too bizarre to comprehend.

The sub-text here is that certain extremist Muslim men are thwarted and severely repressed by the tight restrictions on their own and their countrywomen’s sexuality. They therefore seek to release that frustration by destroying free, healthy, uninhibited young British women. Such extremists have no understanding of what it is to be carefree and sexually confident.

I don’t advocate going out on the town jiggling around in a low cut top and too-short skirt and ridiculous heels but aren’t these girls just showing off? They are not saying they want to be raped, or that they will have sex with anyone, indiscriminately. If we put goods for sale on market stalls and in shops up and down the country, however tempting the fruit or produce may be to the browser, the shopkeeper is not saying “here, just help yourself,” but, “isn’t my produce the most appealing in the street?” But, if they don't cover up a bit, they'll catch their death.

Tolerance, gentleman, please. Self-control. Restraint. Education. Understanding. Live and let live. Mind your own business. Live within a culture that you can respect, not within one you despise.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

HARRIET. Dir. Kasi Lemmons. 2019

Astonishing true story of early freedom fighter, Harriet Tubman, enslaved in the Southern states of America. Despite her marriage to a freeborn African-American, she was unable to protect any of their hoped-for children from being born into that same slavery, and being owned by the farm proprietor. Her overpowering sense of injustice compelled her to act. She escapes, and eventually becomes one of America’s great heroes. Her audacity is astonishing, the level of courage she sustained, her extraordinary tenacity and physical endurance, not to mention cunning and excellent planning. One of those qualities would be worthy of high praise but she is exceptional for having all of them, created by her determination to rescue her family and then other captives. She was responsible for the escape of almost 300 slaves Her religious faith was absolute and she felt guided by God to help others, aided by Abolitionists and free African-Americans. Filmed in glorious colour, with deft

STYX. Dir. Wolfgang Fischer. 2018

Watching Styx is an uncomfortable experience throughout, and a film that raises many questions. The film outline has told us exactly what to expect so there’s no surprise when Rike spots the stricken vessel overloaded with refugees, after she has been happily sailing, reading, enjoying her solitude, and anticipating reaching the scientifically created paradise. Rike (Susanne Wolff) is an emergency doctor working in Gibraltar who has set sail on a solo voyage to Ascension Island, part of the British Overseas Territory. Previously barren land, the British introduced trees and non-indigenous planting; now there is lush bamboo and the Green Mountain (cloud) Forest, and she is intrigued by the idea of this fully functioning artificial ecosystem created by Charles Darwin, Joseph Hooker (explorer and botanist) and the Royal Navy from around 1843. Darwin’s Theory of Evolution describes the process of natural selection and survival of the fittest yet, in creating the self-sustaining and

SELL OUT WEEKEND: ADVENTURE TRAVEL FILM FESTIVAL 2014

What moment would you pick as the standout moment in a weekend of adventure travel films, workshops and presentations camping and bush craft, organised by Lois Pryce and Austin Vince ? It’s a tough call. You may have been baffled by Tim Cope and Chris Hatherley’s fourteen month trip from Russia, across Serbia and Mongolia, to Beijing, enduring cold, hunger, exhaustion and frostbite. The two twenty year old guys from Australia shared a tent, their sleeping and waking hours, and the arduous journey in ‘ Off The Rails’ (2001). Maybe you were impressed by the nomadic Bakhtiari people in the 1976 film ‘ People of the Wind ,’ filmed by Anthony Howarth, making the annual migration across the Iranian mountains, leading their flock from Summer to Winter pasture.  With speaking much, without visible signs of communication or affection, the families are individually focussed on their roles: small children carry their younger siblings, lambs or puppies, colts or calves, along hazardou