Covered heads, covered hearts
Reader comment on item: Bibliography – My Writings on Burqas, Niqabs, Jilbabs, Chadors, Hijabs, and other Islamic Coverings

Submitted by Linda (United States), Aug 10, 2007 at 00:31

"Hideous" -- the smarter they are the funnier they are (Pipes).

Covered heads, beautiful faces -- yes -- it's tragic, stupid.

I remember in the 80s, seeing covered Muslim women smoking cigarettes in bathrooms of D.C. restaurants.

As a Navy person, with my shipmates, I was perhaps too much at the other extreme.

Whether or not there's an afterlife (I often doubt it, but each day I wake up trying to muster faith), these women are so, so missing out on life.

Life isn't partying, as we did in the Navy or in college. I believe in restraint. It makes you strong and makes you feel good. But you can't force one to be profound. Profound -- is just that -- above the fray. It comes from understanding a Van Morrison song, playing Beethoven on the piano, understanding Sergei Dovlatov's disgust with editor creeps, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Jackie Gleason, The Ramones, Oscar Peterson, Dave Brubeck -- profound is integrity with a heart. By the way, in Dostoevsky: Dreamer & Prophet, author Judith Gunn writes, "Small wonder then that men were driven to violence. But, Dostoyevsky (as she spells it) points out, if the conditions cause the violence, why isn't every peasant beating his wife?"

The problem with covered women is a matter of principle, not the covering itself.

My best friend said he burned his red Soviet neck scarf in the Soviet Union when finishing school there. That's heart.

Covered women and their men had better realize they're in for the fight of their lives if they think Americans will give up. We won't. Just wait.

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