On an unrelated note

I didn't have the time to type this up yesterday because this week's post required a bit more thought and will most likely be a bit longer as well.


Well I lied, it require a lot more thought. First I had to sort out what I thought happened from what actually happened, then attempt to understand what the unspoken conversation was before I can try to formulate my thoughts into some kind of coherent response that I can then type down.

You see, I had a conversation this past week that sort of detoured into feminism, which became a bit derailed when we hit the intersection point -- i.e. what women's rights in non-western cultures and my friend and I had a disagreement. We parted amicably though the disagreement was in no ways resolved, and I've been pondering, in the copious amount of free time that I don't have, what was it about this conversation that bothered me so much and what was the point that I have tried (and failed) to make.

The conversation started out about job hunting. She has recently graduated from my doctorate program and hasn't started looking for a job yet. I am graduating and need to have a job lined up before I can actually graduate. (Due to differences in PIs and committee members there is no set protocol for graduation, but that's an entirely separate rant). We agreed that in order to increase our likelihood of being hired we must take care to dress professionally, and agreed that it's' unfortunate that for women, "professional" ...pretty much comes down to make-up and heels.

Then things started to get a little interesting. She pointed out that it's fair to have a dress code because obviously we would not hire certain people that look a certain way for certain jobs. I pointed out that women are far more harshly judged than men for the same type of jobs. From that point we sort of wandered over to breastfeeding (she has a baby under a year old) to a conversation about the necessity of women keeping their breast covered. I, perhaps due to over-exposure on tumblr, argued that in a casual setting, it seemed unfair that men can wander around without shirts but women can't. She argued that it's fair because women's breasts are so sexualized that to have uncovered breasts is like going around without pants. I said something along the lines of that's assuming that men are animals and lose all capability for rational thoughts and self-control if they see a breast and men are in fact humans. Looking back, "men can be rational" is a poor sale given the "all men are beasts" undertone we get in society from both men and women and I probably should've focused more on sexualization of the breasts or something.

And then it got even more interesting. Because I did know on some level that a lot of the breast-censorship in the western world is a social construct and I paraphrased a scenario from PERSEPOLIS about how the the author, who was required to be covered from head to toe, was stopped by the police for running once because they told her her behind jiggled in an obscene way when she ran or something. My friend agreed with the cultural part and cited that she's been in a country where breasts were not sexualized but legs ( I think that was the body part) are, so the women could bare their breasts but their legs are always covered. And then, rather than discussing sexualization as a social construct and why it's harmful and not the women's fault / responsibility for how men behaved toward a specific body part, we kind of derailed into a conversation about burkas.

I am personally of the opinion that outside of work women should be able to wear whatever they like, that makes them feel good, or at least they are comfortable with. I don't think this is the point that she disagreed with. The thing in my list of "acceptable clothing" is basically "anything goes" and includes coverage from something you'd see at the beach in the summer to burkas. The interesting thing here is my friend is in fact an intelligent and well-informed individual, and she has talked to women who wear burka and listened to radio show where women who wear them say how they like wearing them because it protects their body from being objectified by men. My response to this was that women shouldn't feel pressured to dress a certain way because of men, and it's impossible to separate the socio-religious background from any of this, but if, without men as a reason, the women wanted to wear burka -- well they should be able to.

This is the point where we strongly disagreed. She thinks that wearing burka harms the women and the right to religious freedom ends when the religion harms others. Therefore women shouldn't wear burka. When I asked about why she believed burka harms women, she cited that since it covers everything but the eyes, there are many jobs that require face-to-face interaction that the women would not be able to hold --and the difficulty of intersectionality -- is that even a word? -- comes into play here, because we cannot ignore the fact that that the majority of women who wear burka comes from different cultures than the (still very much westernized) mish-mash that exists in the US. My friend cited teaching as a possible job that would be limited by this. I cited success of various online courses. She cited the ineffectiveness of many online courses. I considered whether other cultures place the same value on face-to-face interaction that westernized world does and the types of job available to women in other parts of the word... at which point I paused the conversation with the disclaimer that I don't know enough about the other cultures to pass judgement.

My friend though, insisted (presumably based on her conversations and what she heard on the radio), that covering up from head to toe is harmful to the women and that she won't be persuaded otherwise. And the thing that really bothered me was that she cited parents who refuse to vaccinate their children or provide medical treatment on religious ground as a parallel for how religious freedom should not be allowed where it harms another. I will agree that, to quote a different friend, a person's right to forms a fist ends where my nose begins. I will also say that as a scientist I've read of the Tuskegee Experiment and follow the Nuremberg Code and there is a guideline in there that is, I think, applicable -- in the sense that medical assistance should not be denied to people who need it. And the need in these medical situations is, in my mind, real and concrete -- in the sense that we know the consequences of lack of treatment (usually progressive degrade in health resulting in death), as well as the consequences for treatment (if not cure, then improvement of quality of life and length of life; not to mention we also know possible harms for treatment in the form of side-effects). In contrast, for me, to argue for the harm caused to an individual of not your religious group, not your ethnicity, by the way their dress is the first step of a slippery slope. Can we cite research or data showing the harm done due to dress-code, potential "treatment", "side-effects" of dressing differently? And how does one measure comfort and the satisfaction and the various factors that inform religious practices?

My friend said that she doesn't think this is a slippery slope at all. The harm of a burka, in her mind, is concrete. I made a disclaimer again that I don't really think I know enough to judge, one away or another, but couldn't keep myself from saying that I disagree with her.

On one hand it's nice to be able to disagree with someone and still be completely friendly and have a civil discussion. On the other hand, I'm really invested in feminism and when I disagree on something related to it with someone I care about, it bugs me for days.