Piercing the Veil

As conflicts in the Middle East have heated up lately, some of my friends' social media posts have commented on what they perceive to be negative Muslim cultural standards, particularly the injustice to women forced to veil themselves.  And while I can't speak to what women might face in other parts of the world (particularly Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan and Yemen), I can at least hopefully dispel those allegations with regard to the rest of the GCC countries, notably the UAE and Oman. 

So first off, the Qur'an (the Muslim bible) requires both men and women to dress conservatively:

"Say to the believing men that they should lower their gaze and guard their modesty: that will make for greater purity for them...And say that the believing women that they should lower their gaze and guard their modesty that they should not display their beauty and ornaments except what (must ordinarily) appear thereof; that they should draw their veils over their bosoms and not display their beauty except to their husbands, their fathers, [long recitation of other male family members], or their women...or small children who have no sense of the shame of sex..."

— Sura 24 (An-Nur), ayat 30-31, Qur'an

 

"O Prophet! Tell thy wives and thy daughters and the women of the believers to draw their cloaks close round them. That will be better, so that they may be recognized and not harassed."

—Sura 33 (Al-Ahzab), ayah 59, Qur'an

Requiring modesty of dress is not unusual to Islam - both Judaism and Christianity require it, though it is often only the most religious who strictly adhere to modest dress (check out the way Orthodox Jews dress for more evidence).  There is also no requirement in the Qur'an requiring women to veil their faces and what "modesty" means is up for interpretation.  So how Muslim women in Afghanistan wound up covering their faces and wearing a burqa has more to do with ideological and political reasons rather than purely religious reasons.



Examples of burqas

To be fair, I don't know a single person who wears a burqa and I rarely even meet anyone in Oman who wears a burqa.  I'd love to meet a burqa-wearer and be comfortable enough with them to ask why they do it and whether they find it demeaning or difficult to perform daily tasks in, but I'm not sure that's going to happen anytime soon (side note: I once sat next to a woman on a plane who wore a sheer veil over her face and every time she needed to see something clearly (like her plane ticket), she had to lift the veil up slightly and place the plane ticket under the veil so she could read it.  It seemed like a lot of extra work and a total pain in the ass). 

So what do most women in GCC countries wear (excluding Saudi Arabia)?  Most women wear an abaya and hijab.  The abaya is a loose-fitting robe (generally black, though in Southeast Asia they were very colorful) that is worn over normal clothing and the hijab is the head scarf that covers everything except the face.

Abaya and hijab



While it may seem like a boring outfit, the opportunities for customization are endless and some abayajabs (my new word I came up with so I don't have to keep writing abaya and hijab) cost a fortune.  Earlier this week I saw what can only be described as a goth abayajab - it had chains and spikes coming out of the shoulders!  Below are some examples of the wide variety of abayajabs available for purchase:



For more options, check out this site and this one or just Google images for "abaya and hijab"

So while the customization of the abayajabs might be interesting and even fashionable, none of the above makes me want to trade in my normal wardrobe in exchange for a long-sleeved robe and a headscarf.  But then I think about this - my normal morning routine for work consists of washing my hair, blow drying my hair, finding an outfit that matches and that hasn't been worn recently and then, throughout the day, adjusting my outfit (trying to figure out how to get my skirt to look less wrinkly, maybe adjusting a waistband after eating too big of a lunch, buttoning and unbuttoning (and belting and unbelting) every time I go to the bathroom, etc.).  Meanwhile, my coworkers get to grab an abayajab, throw it on over comfy house clothes (usually yoga pants and a tank top) and put their hair in an unwashed ponytail.  I'll admit -- there's definitely days where I'm jealous that I can't wear an abayajab to work.

The other thing to consider is the whole reason behind the abayajab - dressing modestly.  I can't count the number of times when talking to a guy that I've wanted to snap my fingers and say "Hey buddy, my eyes are up here."  Or how many of my girlfriends have complained over the years that guys never look at a girl's face, only at her body.  Not to mention the gazillions of dollars we spend each year on our obsession with perfect bodies - plastic surgery, gym memberships, fad diets, etc.  This isn't to say these issues don't exist over here, they're just not as noticeable because a woman's body isn't constantly on display.  So while I don't (and will never) wear an abayajab, the more modest style of dress is nice over here and it's certainly more comfortable (this shouldn't come as a surprise to many of you, but tight and revealing clothes are generally not comfortable). 

I've asked some of my Omani friends how they feel about wearing the abayajab and, for the most part, they don't mind it.  For them, it's a cultural uniform -- just like a lawyer might have to wear a suit to work, they wear the abayajab to work.  If I might wear jeans and a t-shirt on a weekend, they wear an abayajab (though generally fancier/more embellished ones than they'd wear to work).  And when many of them travel outside of the GCC or to Dubai, they put on "normal" clothes (though often still with a hijab).  One of my Omani colleagues dresses completely Western, except she wears a hijab to work and she only started doing that because it saves her styling time in the morning and because some of the catty women at work were giving her a hard time about not wearing one.  I asked her if she ever wears an abaya and she said she does fairly often when she doesn't want to attract male attention, particularly at busy places like malls. 

I'd say that most of the women in the GCC don't see the abayajab as a demeaning method of keeping them subservient to men (as many Westerners perceive it), but rather as a way of diverting unwanted attention (hell, I even wore a hijab a long time ago in Morocco to try to dissuade some of the men from approaching/grabbing me).  As Sura 33 of the Qur'an states, the goal of modesty is to avoid harassment, not to try to demean women. 

Now, all of that being said, I personally think the abayajab can make it difficult to garner respect in a professional environment.  I'm a lawyer and in order to be a good lawyer sometimes I have to give people advice they don't want to hear.  Sometimes I have to a bitch and drive a hard bargain.  Sometimes I have to scold people or investigate people.  I have to be able to look someone in the eyes and speak with authority.  And if I need to look really authoritative, I'll wear a suit, since to me a suit is much more official than my normal business clothes (I've even read advice that you should wear a suit even during a phone interview because the mere act of wearing a suit makes the interviewee feel more serious and important).  I think it would be much more difficult to do my job successfully if I wore the equivalent of a hooded bathrobe, especially if I was wearing yoga pants and a tank top underneath.  I also think it would be hard to do my job if I was trying to be demure and modest, not only in my appearance but also in my demeanor. 

But the previous paragraph isn't really about the oppression of Muslim women, but the whole gender debate that's currently raging in the US (see the whole "leaning in" movement or the endless articles on the wage gap between men and women).  There's plenty of American men that think being a strong (sometimes bitchy) lawyer is unbecoming of a woman regardless of what she's wearing.

So, at the end of this very long and rambling post, I hope at least some of you will see that the way many Muslim women dress in the GCC isn't about oppression, but, for many of them, is about freedom.  Freedom from being ogled by men, freedom from being judged on their bodies or their clothes, freedom from having to style their hair in the morning or wear uncomfortable "professional" clothes to work and freedom from even needing a professional wardrobe.  And if you're worried that they're missing out on all the fabulous fashions in the magazines...don't worry, they're wearing them under their abaayas.