its based on the premise that society is in a state whereby you need to protect all your resources. plenty of countries have people struggling for resources and dont seem to need to cover up their women. says more about the society and culture than the economic circumstances
Can religions modernize/update themselves by coming up new version time to time to keep up the new realities of the world? Many off shoots of the religions are due to this issue of not changing with time.
I would bet how unattractive a woman is (directly correlated with age and number and of children) is a better predictor of how keen they are on veiling themselves and other women
This hypothesis might also predict that the pressure on a young woman to veil might be coming more from the mother (who wants a world of hidden women) than the father.
If being unveiled means losing your security, or being considered a woman with no virtue to protect (and therefore fair game for assault), then to what degree is veiling really a free choice?
The fact that women use patriarchal roles to differentiate classes of women into those worthy of protection, and those unworthy, doesn’t make those roles, or the systems they thrive in less problematic.
The issue isn’t whether or not women have agency in choosing veiling. Of course they do. It’s in how desperately women need to signal that they are good.
This doesn’t disprove that veiling is about controlling women’s body. That married woman may find veiling adaptive is actually further proof because it signal her fidelity and ensure the paternity of any offspring born. The logic is the same, the control and restraint of female body and sexuality to secure legitimacy and prevent cuckoldry.
This is an interesting theory. But how does polygamy factor into the situation? Wealthy Muslim men are allowed as many as four wives. So women who are veiled have no guarantee that their husbands will not only take interest in another woman, but actually marry her, bring her into the household, and have children with her! Whatever problems unveiled western women have, given the social taboo and legal restrictions against polygamy, they certainly don’t have to worry about that!
It's important to note that before polygamy was regulated to a maximum of four wives, this limitation didn't exist. However, the key point here is something else: given the option to marry a man without wives or concubines, many women prefer and choose to marry a man who already has wives rather than a single man. The reason is obvious: they consider it more advantageous to be one of the four wives of "that" man—powerful and wealthy—than of a single man with few or no resources.
This is a good point. Moreover, in the West many powerful and wealthy men have had mistresses on the side, though typically in a discreet manner. Also, in the West, with respect to “unwanted attention from men” and even sexual harassment, single women are much less likely to complain about that if the man in question is attractive and wealthy. A lot of these issues beg the question of what women really want from men.
Married women in any culture could similarly benefit from veiling norms, no? This may explain how veiling can be culturally stable but not why it is practiced by Muslims and not by non-Muslims. Emmanuel Todd argued that veiling comes from the practice of cousin marriage in clans; veiling reduces the risk that a girl will marry someone outside the clan, something which could be devastating to a clan which relies on internal cousin marriage. And Islam is the religion that was tuned to spread among cousin-marrying clans.
It's an interesting question on what "freedom" means, that liberal society has not found an answer to.
Because what does an individual really want, separate from what others ask of them? Is there such an individual who has desires separate from what others want, from peer pressure, who only wants things their "true selves" want?
its based on the premise that society is in a state whereby you need to protect all your resources. plenty of countries have people struggling for resources and dont seem to need to cover up their women. says more about the society and culture than the economic circumstances
Can religions modernize/update themselves by coming up new version time to time to keep up the new realities of the world? Many off shoots of the religions are due to this issue of not changing with time.
Okay but what about violence against women who don't want to wear a veil?
I would bet how unattractive a woman is (directly correlated with age and number and of children) is a better predictor of how keen they are on veiling themselves and other women
How does this idea fi
with the rigours off these honour societies ? Interpersonal dynamicsx
are all based upon the honour of the man , the family, the clan.
My knowledge is limited but Victoria C Fontan is an amazing French academic who has researched and written about these issues.
I think this analysis needs a bit more work.
then it’s also about women controlling the choices of other women
This hypothesis might also predict that the pressure on a young woman to veil might be coming more from the mother (who wants a world of hidden women) than the father.
The ham of Procrustes...
Makes sense - don't bother me, I'm taken
20 years ago a Saudi woman on Reddit praised the burka as armor against lecherous, rapey eyes.
But what happens to the unveiled?
If being unveiled means losing your security, or being considered a woman with no virtue to protect (and therefore fair game for assault), then to what degree is veiling really a free choice?
The fact that women use patriarchal roles to differentiate classes of women into those worthy of protection, and those unworthy, doesn’t make those roles, or the systems they thrive in less problematic.
The issue isn’t whether or not women have agency in choosing veiling. Of course they do. It’s in how desperately women need to signal that they are good.
This doesn’t disprove that veiling is about controlling women’s body. That married woman may find veiling adaptive is actually further proof because it signal her fidelity and ensure the paternity of any offspring born. The logic is the same, the control and restraint of female body and sexuality to secure legitimacy and prevent cuckoldry.
This piece was, I thought, an interesting take: https://woodfromeden.substack.com/p/making-sense-of-honor-culture?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=cxkao
The thesis is essentially that the belief in the impossibility of male sexual self-control has become a self-fulfilling prophecy in Arabic cultures.
This is an interesting theory. But how does polygamy factor into the situation? Wealthy Muslim men are allowed as many as four wives. So women who are veiled have no guarantee that their husbands will not only take interest in another woman, but actually marry her, bring her into the household, and have children with her! Whatever problems unveiled western women have, given the social taboo and legal restrictions against polygamy, they certainly don’t have to worry about that!
It's important to note that before polygamy was regulated to a maximum of four wives, this limitation didn't exist. However, the key point here is something else: given the option to marry a man without wives or concubines, many women prefer and choose to marry a man who already has wives rather than a single man. The reason is obvious: they consider it more advantageous to be one of the four wives of "that" man—powerful and wealthy—than of a single man with few or no resources.
This is a good point. Moreover, in the West many powerful and wealthy men have had mistresses on the side, though typically in a discreet manner. Also, in the West, with respect to “unwanted attention from men” and even sexual harassment, single women are much less likely to complain about that if the man in question is attractive and wealthy. A lot of these issues beg the question of what women really want from men.
Married women in any culture could similarly benefit from veiling norms, no? This may explain how veiling can be culturally stable but not why it is practiced by Muslims and not by non-Muslims. Emmanuel Todd argued that veiling comes from the practice of cousin marriage in clans; veiling reduces the risk that a girl will marry someone outside the clan, something which could be devastating to a clan which relies on internal cousin marriage. And Islam is the religion that was tuned to spread among cousin-marrying clans.
It's an interesting question on what "freedom" means, that liberal society has not found an answer to.
Because what does an individual really want, separate from what others ask of them? Is there such an individual who has desires separate from what others want, from peer pressure, who only wants things their "true selves" want?