The Iranian ambassador to the UK has been ordered back to Tehran and is to be removed from his post after a video circulated showing an embassy reception at which some women did not have their heads covered.

In her wonderfully diplomatic way, Yale student Sude Yenilmez notes how moral relativism and political correctness drive indifference – even among the best and the brightest – to the suffering of millions of women all over the world.

Can she really be saying that her fellow students think global forced veiling is unimportant?

Well, yes. That is exactly what she’s saying.

I love this shit. We estimate: No one! You can go to Google Image and easily find pictures of burqas and niqabs being worn in Swiss cities; you can ask yourself why several cantons already have burqa bans (Psychotic cantons! Seeing things that aren’t there!); you can ask yourself why 65% of Swiss will probably vote for an upcoming national ban (Psychotic Swiss! Bigoted Swiss!).

This article also begins with the Swiss far right’s complaint about the burqa; it doesn’t mention anywhere that there’s some left and plenty of center support and of course plenty of moderate right support as well. The article’s list of other European countries with full or partial bans is curiously incomplete:

France banned wearing a full face veil in public in 2011 and Denmark, Austria the Netherlands and Bulgaria have full or partial bans on wearing face coverings in public.

Tons more than that, mes petites.

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UD has long noted the game plan for trying to keep women in burqas:

You dismiss burqa-wearing as in any way a significant social phenomenon.

You dismiss bans as nothing more than far-right bigotry.

You gas on about everyone’s right to appear in public in any way they damn well choose.

You gas on about religious freedom, but fail to take the time to note the history/controversy revolving around the burqa as religious or tribal.

You condemn the bigoted European Court of Human Rights for upholding burqa bans.

You condemn the stupid bigoted super-majorities in country after country that vote in favor of bans.

You never ever calm down, take a deep breath, and spend a few moments considering why so many people – not just Europeans; there are full/partial niqab/burqa bans all over the world – want to ban burqas. You do not take the time to wonder why Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria all have bans, while Egypt is well on its way to one. One third of the members of the Swiss Socialist party support the ban.

None of this appears in what you write, even though it is exactly what you need to reckon with.

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The only truly intelligent response to burqa/niqab bans comes from rich guys who pledge to pay the fines of women penalized for wearing the garment. Go for it, lads.

Not that it helps much.

In every country that has passed one, ideologues tried frightening people about how destabilizing it would be. Riots street violence blah blah. Country after country has seen calm and orderly implementation of a law that no doubt makes many otherwise swaddled women and children very grateful.

As for the fanatics out there who can’t imagine life unswaddled, or whose husbands threaten them unless they swaddle, there are so few of them that they are, I suspect, simply pitied and accommodated.

If I were anointed the PM for a day, I would put a ban on burqa and hijab for women in the country. … During my posting in Sawai Madhopur, I used to see women draped in burqa walking with four kids in scorching heat with their husband.

It was disgusting to look at their plight as her shameless husband walked along with her with all the unwanted and unnecessary pride. I always used to think if I can ban the burqa for these women …

A media executive in India gets it said. There’s no way around the word “disgusting” in regard to such sights, and it’s good to see her use it.

France extends its now well-established burqa ban to everyone providing public services. Excellent. And if you’re having trouble understanding the separation of church and state, this secular republic will be happy to educate you in its citizenship.

UD, by the way, has been giggling at the argument some people lately make about masks and burqas. Like, uh, covid forces everyone to wear masks in order to save their lives and the lives of others in a global pandemic. How is that different from parents making their eight year old daughters wear burqas? Or women in the banlieues intimidated or beaten up if they’re not wearing burqas? It’s the same thing, ain’t it?

Awhile ago, I said on this blog that I wasn’t going to cover the big-ass burqa story going on in India, because so much of it is in fact motivated by bigotry; but I’ll make an exception for this exceptionally stupid statement by an Indian politician. As one of many amused Twitter responders puts it:

If Burqa … is “essential” for Islam, then how can it also be by choice for Muslim women?

… for teaching staff.

… Egypt’s High Administrative Court turned down … appeals against the ban in an irreversible verdict…

The swaddled masses yearning to breathe free are getting lots of good news from around the world lately – burqa and niqab bans proliferate left and right, particularly in the Muslim world. But there’s always a new story from Europe too, as in a Norwegian municipality where no public employee may sport full swaddling. (Norway already has a well-established ban on burqas and niqabs in academic settings.) The debasement and absurdity of total veiling in a world of human interaction is proving increasingly unignorable almost everywhere. No doubt all them adorable ISIS pix helped rivet attention to the garment.