The Devil Has Better Clothes

Great article in News Review yesterday by Jasper Gerard about poor dim Shabina Begum.

He claims she's attractive but the photo shows the face of a forty something, hard done by in some third world country.

The impression that she's been coerced is given:

"Interviewers are used to the odd minder guarding a star, but never an entourage as formidable as that surrounding this teenager. There by Shabina's side, as ever, is her elder brother and legal guardian Shuweb Rahman - a radical accused of "verging on the threatening" when he kicked off the dispute by demanding that Shabina be allowed to attend school in her pajamas, (oops sorry, make that) her favoured tent-like garment. Even my hardly racy request to sit next to Shabina at lunch so we can talk is greeted with glares."

"At times the only one not expressing opinions is poor Shabina, whose dreams of becoming a doctor have been hit by disappointing GCSE results following two years' sulk leave from school."

Oh sure, blame that, not her brain power.

"...is she free to lead a British life or do those around her restrict her in the guise of Islam?" Oh for heavens sake, might as well ask is Mohammed a suitable subject for a cartoon.

"...the law lords affirmed that no school is obligated to take a pupil on that pupil's terms. If Shabina could not abide by the rules, the onus was on her to find a more congenial school."

"...if it (the school in question) made an exception for Shabina, other girls might feel pressurised by their families or mullahs to wear a jilbab too."

Here's Shabina-oops-did-I-really-say-that's take on headscarves: "There are girls pressured to wear headscarves who don't want to."

This comment had me cheering: "If girls are subject to any unwelcome pressure to cover up, then far from giving in, perhaps schools should ban all religious clothing."

Great idea!

Jasper shows us just how kind and loving her brother is:

"...her brother quietly, patiently, lists all the compromises that he suggested to the school. One, it transpires, was that Shabina be taught in solitary confinement."

"So here is the authentic voice of the extremist: prepared for his bright, giggly sister who loves medicine and handbags to be shut away from life, just so she remains theologically pure."

I would like her brother and every man in Britain who succeeds in torturing a young girl like this to be charged with child abuse. Where did he apply for legal aid? Wonder how much I could get? Wonder if they could afford to have Cherie argue the case?

"I ask what she wants to be. "My dream would be a tv presenter." There you have the dilemma for British Asian youth: the veil of Islam versus the exposure of BBC1. Some radical young Muslims may consider the West the devil in disguise - but at heart even they, it seems, accept that it has the better clothes." Sunday Times News Review Section 26 March 2006