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‘In France the burqa has been illegal since 2011, as have headscarves for under-16s in schools. Portugal brought in its own similar “burqa law” last month. Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark, Austria — all ban full face coverings.’

Another high-profile British columnist doesn’t get why her country continues to carry the black mark of the burqa. “Whenever I see them, I never, ever get over the way that I feel. I feel livid — ragingly angry — like I have to do something about it. But what?”

Just exactly what you are doing. Write angrily against it. Continue to despise “the insistent, malicious arguing for separate laws, separate schools, separate communities — for, essentially, ghettos. For the headscarf on female children and the ongoing, mendacious support for the burqa and the niqab, using our own liberalism as a weapon against us.”

Persist in pointing out that there’s nothing liberal about a state openly affiliating with – indeed subsidizing – an organization of cruel fanatics. “I would like us to stop giving tacit support to female oppression from the youngest age — if you have any doubts about agency, let me tell you: there is no way a child who cannot even read yet is able to choose a headscarf.”

“No one wants to curb the poisonous love-in with one of the most woman-hating ideologies on earth.” Actually, lots of people do. But they are afraid of being classed with the right wing. They haven’t noticed that the strongest opposition to the burqa in many of the countries the writer lists comes from the left.

Much of England remains in the look away look away position relative to the burqa. Sartre called what they’re doing bad faith. Liberal states that don’t want to be in bad faith ban the burqa.

England will get there eventually. Honest writers like Camilla Long help it on its way.

Margaret Soltan, September 20, 2026 2:43PM
Posted in: end the erasure of women

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UD REVIEWED

Dr. Bernard Carroll, known as the "conscience of psychiatry," contributed to various blogs, including Margaret Soltan's University Diaries, for which he sometimes wrote limericks under the name Adam.
New York Times

George Washington University English professor Margaret Soltan writes a blog called University Diaries, in which she decries the Twilight Zone-ish state our holy land’s institutes of higher ed find themselves in these days.
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It’s [UD's] intellectual honesty that makes her blog required reading.
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There's always something delightful and thought intriguing to be found at Margaret Soltan's no-holds-barred, firebrand tinged blog about university life.
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You can get your RDA of academic liars, cheats, and greedy frauds at University Diaries. All disciplines, plus athletics.
truffula, commenting at Historiann

Margaret Soltan at University Diaries blogs superbly and tirelessly about [university sports] corruption.
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University Diaries. Hosted by Margaret Soltan, professor of English at George Washington University. Boy is she pissed — mostly about athletics and funding, the usual scandals — but also about distance learning and diploma mills. She likes poems too. And she sings.
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[UD belittles] Mrs. Palin's degree in communications from the University of Idaho...
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Margaret Soltan's ire is a national treasure.
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Margaret Soltan is no fan of college sports and her diatribes on the subject can be condescending and annoying. But she makes a good point here...
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From Margaret Soltan's excellent coverage of the Bernard Madoff scandal comes this tip...
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As Margaret Soltan, one of the best academic bloggers, points out, pressure is mounting ...
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University Diaries by Margaret Soltan is one of the best windows onto US university life that I know.
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