“In Egypt, Some Women Say That Veils Increase Harassment”

In a Muslim country where the numbers of women wearing the veil are rising, and so – by most accounts – are incidents of groping and catcalls in the streets . . .” The more women veil the less men learn to behave as decent and civilized members of society . . . And the more women are harassed, the more they veil thinking it will ‘protect’ them,” says Mona Eltahaway, an Egyptian
social commentator.

The above seems to contradict the moral purpose intended by shari’a laws on why Muslim women should wear their veils: to inculcate modesty in women and self-restraint in men. But as this piece shows, it seems to have an opposite effect. The veil has come to represent fear in Egyptian women and uncontrollable desires in Egyptian men. This has both moral and political implications.

Morally speaking, virtue, as everyone knows, should not depend on externalities but on one’s personal cultivation of it, in the way he or she habituates himself in the ways of virtue. Politically speaking, if Egyptian women want to be treated as human beings equal to all and not as objects of sexual harassment, they should rethink why they would like to continue wearing the veil.