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But of course, this essay isn’t really about Orthodox Jews, or Hutterites or Doukhobors or Sikhs.

It’s about the niqab.

As a secular feminist, the niqab makes me deeply uncomfortable, as a historic symbol of the oppression and erasure of women. The message of the niqab, it seems to me, is that women are fundamentally unequal, that they must be hidden from the male gaze. Very few Muslim women in Canada actually wear the niqab. And some of those who do wear it out of very clear choice, as a way of making not just a spiritual but a political statement. Still, like many people, I am somewhat discomfited by the occasional sight of women, particularly young women, in the niqab. As human beings, we are so used to meeting people face-to-face. Instinctively, when we can’t see someone’s face, we are uncomfortable.

But my discomfiture is not the point. It’s not up to me to decide what my fellow Canadians wear. It’s no more my business to tell a Hutterite girl I meet at the farmers’ market to take off her head scarf than it is my place to tell the the girl beside me on the LRT that her skirt is too short. I can make an argument that both the head scarf and the short skirt are artifacts and symbols of male oppression, symptoms of patriarchy. But I’m not an agent of the feminist fashion police.

For many of the women who wear the niqab, it is a profound expression of their faith, their culture, their social history, and their personal identity. I may not like it. But then, I’m not the one wearing it. And it’s facile to argue that since most Muslim women don’t wear the niqab, it’s not a necessary part of Islam.