1. You liberate women by criminalising their clothing because you send out a strong message that garments that have nothing to do with religion, and everything to do with grotesque misogyny and the treatment of females as second-class citizens, have no place in a modern democracy. If the state bans such clothing then the hope is that young women will gradually be empowered to hold out against it, and attitudes within their community will have to change. Last week, France’s highest court upheld the firing of a crèche worker for “serious misconduct” after she arrived for work wearing a veil. No parent of a child at her school will be left in any doubt what is takes to be a French citizen.