Shorter Robert: My racism isn’t racist.

Her headscarf is exactly the same as a WWJD bracelet – if the WWJD bracelet was being worn by a Christian girl attending school in Riyadh

Ah. So public schools in the US are equivalent to schools in Saudi Arabia, where a particularly conservative brand of Islam is part of the curriculum.

Nothing at all.

If the bracelet was perceived as a social barrier by her classmates, then they would be racist in exactly the same way as Muizza’s classmates are being racist when she wears hijab.

Whatever.

Someone didn’t want to be my friend because I dress funny, they’re racists.

Versus

Someone killed my family and burned down our house because they hate us, they’re racists.

Perhaps you can have a coherent theory of racial relations that uses the same label for ordinary human suspicion of difference, as for democide. I don’t find the conflation cognitively useful.

Her headscarf is exactly the same as a WWJD bracelet – if the WWJD bracelet was being worn by a Christian girl attending school in Riyadh.

And so long as that girl was wearing that bracelet as a quiet expression of personal faith, what would be wrong with that? If the bracelet was perceived as a social barrier by her classmates, then they would be racist in exactly the same way as Muizza’s classmates are being racist when she wears hijab.

I didn’t call Muizza an asshole. From what Lauren has said, which is the only data we have been provided, she seems a perfectly nice young woman.

Her headscarf is exactly the same as a WWJD bracelet – if the WWJD bracelet was being worn by a Christian girl attending school in Riyadh.

they’re too racist to see Muslim women as individuals;

Actually, they did; the instant she removed an obvious social/cultural “block” that’s designed to prevent it, and signals a willingness to let that happen.

How does hijab prevent seeing the individual? Women in hijab have their facial expressions fully on view. Several of your (APF) statements have led me to believe you are confusing hijab with the burka. You are aware of the difference, aren’t you?

Muizza wasn’t being an asshole by wearing her hijab; it was the other students being assholes to her and her sister.

A reasonable distance.

What’s wrong with that?

This makes sense. However, your analogy with the skinhead is ludicrous. See, the headscarf has not traditionally been viewed by those of European heritage as being a sign of disrespect—on the contrary, headscarves have been worn for centuries by those of European heritage, and have traditionally been seen as very respectful garments—just try being a female and entering some of those beautiful old European cathedrals without one! Assuming that someone is being an “asshole” by wearing one makes about as much sense as assuming that a woman who prefers dresses to blue jeans is being an “asshole”, or trying to assert a superiority trip.

Robert, I’m old enough to remember when headscarves on women were a common sight in inclement weather and in churches during all seasons. You’re Sicilian? Well, then your grandmother (possibly even mother) wore (or wears) one. Mine still does (grandma, I mean). I wear one when the weather is bad (and I’m not in my workclothes), because it looks much more attractive than a ball cap. I’m seeing a little headscarf-as-fashion-accessory action around here too, although not generally in women under 25. Are we all being “assholes” by wearing scarves instead of baseball hats?

How is Muizza’s headscarf different from her WASP classmate with the “WWJD” bracelet, or some version of rock-n-roll Jesus T-shirt? To call one an “asshole” and not the other, is frankly racist.

But don’t you know you’re purposefully cutting yourself off from others, making it “cost” more for them to acknowledge your presence, being antisocial and divisive, and making yourself indistinguishable from all other, um, Muslim women, or women, or something?

That’s what I don’t understand about this argument. Many people have asked what makes wearing hijab different from wearing crosses, or wearing yarmulkes, or wearing Hassidic dress, and no one has argued that these things also make these ethnic/religious groups difficult, or not loyal to American culture, or excessively hard to assimilate, or whatever. And I think that there’s a reason for that, and it’s not because the hijab means anything in particular, *objectively*. It’s bound up with these womens’ ethnicity or race and with their being women, and not because as white (or otherwise) Americans we must rescue them from their pathetic 12th century oppressive head scarves and school them in the ways of freedom. Or wait, maybe it is that.

Also: I heart you, piny. You make teh good argumentz.

I don’t get what the big deal is. If I see one of my classmates wearing a hijab I think either “she must be warm” or “she must be hot”. It’s my own fault if I want to spend my time thinking about the possible temperatures of other people.

I had trouble responding to a post by Lauren on Feministe entitled “Consider the Hijab: Blogging Against Racism” – or rather, it wasn’t the article itself I had so much difficulty reacting to, it was the discussion that followed. Par…