Questioned in Parliament about banning burqas, the PM got all How Dare You? flustered, as did a bunch of other politicians. In a country where comfortable majorities support a ban, this was not a brilliant move, because now UD‘s Google News alerts are exploding with BURQA stories out of Britain. Everybody’s talking about it.
The minute a country initiates a serious debate about the burqa, it is on its way to a ban. Talking and reading about it all the time unburies a latency: Latently, millions of modern people really dislike burqas and what they blatantly say about women; and all it takes is manifesting the subject for their dark inchoate messes of feelings about them (pity, guilt, repulsion, studied indifference, helplessness at their small daughters seeing invisible women) to firm up into opposition. I’ve followed this narrative many times; it’s a step by step process into referenda, partial restrictions, etc etc.
So the latest thing is an important Conservative party member announcing that “employers should be able to ban their staff from wearing face coverings.” Also, she will not talk to constituents in “surgeries” if they are fully covered. These announcements will activate religious and political indignation, which will in turn inflame the other side, and so it goes.
The problem is that there’s absolutely no reason for a modern democracy to tolerate gender-based repression and a total refusal to join civil society, and even good people who pride themselves on their tolerance know this. This is why so much of the world already bans/restricts this garment.