The women’s rights campaigner Kelly-Jay Keen aka Posie Parker is someone who has done a brilliant job on attacking the Cult of Trans and defending the right of women to have their own single sex spaces. Like anybody else I find that I might not agree with every word that comes out of her mouth or every one of her viewpoints but I have to acknowledge that she’s done some brilliant work in defending women and women’s rights.
During a recent demonstration in London near Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park Ms Keen walked past a groups of women imprisoned in the Islamic niqab garment a form of clothing that leaves no part of the woman uncovered except the eyes. She is said to have spoken to them about being free as she walked past them and this simple action of saying to the women Free your faces later brought quite a few anonymous Muslim women to her social media telling their stories of the oppression of women’s Islamic garments and the culture of Islamic societies that force women into them. Here’s some of the responses that Ms Keen got from oppressed Muslim women from countries like Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Iraq. They make for sobering and upsetting reading.
“hi dear , I'm 24 year old Saudi female , me and my sister choose to wear mask insted of niqab , my mom said don't come back to home , she closed the door , we rent a hotel to stay for one day , next day my brother called us to come home , we came and my mother was waiting us with wooden spoons, she hit us with them until they broke over us , my sister's little finger broke and we had bruises all over our arms and back, all this because we choose to take off niqab , I swear non of this is lying , I still shocked from that accident and can't forget, I hate the fact that I'm waisting my youth to live in such community , . they all trying to convince you that wearing niqab is our choice, no it isn't, the woman who wear it either brainwashed or forced , this accident is so ashamed and non of my friends know about it so please hide my account”
“Hello, I’m a girl from Saudi Arabia. My experience is not different from that of many other women. I don’t have much to add, but I want to say this: there are no women in Saudi Arabia who wear the niqab purely out of free will. You are not free when you wear a shirt that you’re not allowed to take off whenever you want. You are not free when your brain is washed from the age of seven to believe that this shirt is your ticket to heaven, and taking it off will lead you to eternal hell — where your skin will burn, and then a psychopathic god will replace it with new skin so you can suffer again and again. This is literally what is taught in religious classes in Saudi Arabia. It’s full-on brainwashing. Most of the women who say, “We freely choose to wear the niqab,” are simply trying to cope with their miserable reality because they cannot bear the risks of walking in the opposite direction.”
“Since early childhood, I was subjected to physical abuse by my mother without any clear reason—only because she harbored hatred toward me. There were no laws in Saudi Arabia to protect children like me, and if any laws existed, they often served to empower parents in further oppressing us. I was forbidden from leaving the house and forced to cook because, in my family’s view, that was a woman’s role—even if the “woman” was just a little girl. I was made to wear the niqab at the age of 10, and even to this day, women are not allowed to go out alone. Wearing the niqab and dressing in black is not enough—without a male guardian, we simply cannot leave the house. When I graduated from university, I was not allowed to work. I spent two years confined at home, deprived of sunlight, battling depression. But I never stopped fighting for my right to live and work. Today, at the age of 30, I have finally secured a job. Yet, my family continues to monitor and control me—even though they are the ones who drive me to work. I cannot even go to the grocery store next to our house on my own. We are denied even the basic right to form friendships. In Saudi Arabia, many women continue to suffer. There are no real laws that protect us—it is merely a façade for the media and the outside world. The truth is that women are still being silenced, enslaved, and in some cases, even killed.”
“Hello , I'm not a sudia girl but I am from an arabic country exactly Algeria a Muslim country, here when the whole society is against women and they see women just as objects to marry stay at home babies and nothing more , men here are against women working , they keep harrassing women on the streets slutshaming them and in the mosques were men stay in the inside they talk about how all women should be covered no matter what they say 12 years Olds are women Algerian women started a trend where they film the men who harass them and post it on TikTok with the famous "Labour song" it's a huge it's a way to fight since the society don't believe women, and the parents force the girls to wear hijabs, and it's growing to niqabs with time it's so hard for women in Muslim countries were men control women in the name of sharia it's so bad that women can't go outside the house to have fun or to ride a bike or go for a walk at night or play sports ,it's suffocating living here they way that men have all the freedom in the world all the fun all the beachs and gardens and coffees but and we as women , they force us to stay at home. And many women are killed by men if they don't do as they want . In islam women have no freedom to live breath and enjoy what she likes Islam hates women You can't have a full life experience as a women in a Muslim country .”
“I’m just afraid for my life—that my sisters and brothers will hate me forever simply because I don’t want to wear the niqab. I’m scared they might attack or insult me. I can’t forget any hurtful words or situations, so I’m afraid to bring up this topic with them. I’ve hinted to my mother several times that I want to uncover my face just to feel alive, but she insulted me and compared me to other girls who wear the niqab and don’t hate it (even though no one asked them how they feel about it since they’ve been wearing it since childhood). She distanced herself from me for a long time, which led me into depression during my studies. Now I wonder: why do men defend the niqab more than the women who are forced to wear it? Is it because we’ve been compelled to wear it since childhood, and men have become accustomed to hiding their flaws through us? How long will I continue to wish for the simplest of my rights? I know that the men and women in my family hate me because I talk so much about removing the niqab, and I know I won’t be alive if I take it off in this society. I’ve promised myself that if I ever have a daughter, I won’t force her to wear the niqab or hijab or anything else. I won’t make her live through the same suffering I did. On the contrary, I want to see her happy and free to choose everything for herself. But when I said this in front of my family, they immediately prayed that I would never have a daughter—just because I said I wouldn’t force her to wear something like the niqab.”
Hi I'm 16 from Iraq When I go out I am forced to put the hijab on my head to cover my hair... They say that hair tempts men... And this is killing me inside. I feel like I am suffocating or dying every time I put it on. I feel like there is a hand strangling me... My mother forced me to wear it and until now I am thinking of taking it off and I don't know how... Once I tried to open the pin that holds the hijab so I could get more air and breathe more comfortably... She said to me, why are you trying to bring shame on us? I'm thinking of taking it off when I turn 18 I don't even know if I could do this... I know that I would get really nervous from my parents and maybe even get beaten or locked up in the house :)”
“Your stance is brave, and I want to thank you for speaking up. I’m a Muslim woman who is forced to wear the niqab. The replies under your post show no real respect for freedom because any woman who decides not to wear the niqab is often shamed, bullied, or insulted as “ugly” or even called a “whore.” Some might “advise” her politely, believing she’ll go to hell. But others might go as far as violence or even murder. My government doesn’t force me to wear it, but family and society do. If I choose to remove it, the law might protect me but what if they don’t reach me in time? What if the price of my freedom is my life, or a hospital bed? Even if no harm happens, I know I’ll be rejected. Love here is conditional if you break the rules, you’re left alone. Either way, I’ll pay the price. “Free your faces, ladies” as a sign of support for you, and for every woman like me. Thank you. I truly appreciate your courage.”
Many religions including Christianity and Judaism have modesty rules about clothing but the sort of oppression that Muslim women suffer with regards clothing is normally found in the extremes of these religions. In Muslim lands and Muslim cultures such oppression is normal and part of the Islamic cultural norm.
Ms Keen has done oppressed women in Islamic cultures a great service by giving these normally voiceless women a voice. She’s also taken on a very dangerous enemy in the form of Islam and an enemy that is increasingly pandered to by the British state that pays political ‘Danegeld’ to the ideology of Islam. I pray for the success of her venture of freeing Muslim women from the garments that are the signs and sigils of their oppression and I also pray for her safety as I suspect that her actions will enrage those Muslim men who do not want to see the women in their community have any freedom of thought or action whatsoever.