Lifting veil on feminists’ folly
ON THE day so-called progressives celebrated a symbol of oppression, scores of women were deprived of work in the name of women’s rights.
There was irony in Formula One axing grid girls on World Hijab Day.
The absurdity of feminists in the West embracing modesty culture while their sisters in the Muslim world risk imprisonment and worse to free themselves from the hijab would be comical if it wasn’t so tragic.
Modesty culture and Muslim veils are born of a misogynistic doctrine that demands women cover up. It was invented by men and forced upon women to separate and subjugate.
Author and activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who was forced to wear the veil, describes garments such as burqas, niqabs, chadors and hijabs as “gradations of mental slavery”.
“The veil sets women apart from men and apart from the world; it restrains them, confines them, grooms them for docility,” she wrote.
It is hard to overstate how regressive feminism has become when it applauds an instrument of tyrannical misogyny and adopts a puritanical approach that robs women of the opportunity to earn a living.
Being a grid girl is not something all young women aspire to, but to paint it as a hideous example of exploitation is incongruous. These women choose that work and are well rewarded for their efforts.
I’ve known a few grid girls over the years: one a leggy blonde whose regular role was with a financial institution, and the other a feisty uni student who held down a number of jobs while completing a postgraduate degree. Both were clever, capable and strong women, who would look forward to the Australian Grand Prix.
Now, women like them who have been blessed with good looks, and work hard to stay in shape are deprived of a source of income to spare the feelings of a few aggrieved activists who have no interest in the sport.
Even a prude would struggle to describe the outfits worn by grid girls in recent years as being provocative.
Several grid girls have come forward to slam the decision, including Charlotte Gash, who said she was “disgusted that F1 has given in to the minority to be politically correct”.
From the scantily clad “ring girls” at the boxing to the “podium ladies” at the Tour de France, beautiful women at sport events are common.
Feminists won’t be happy until they are all out of a job. There are already renewed calls for NRL clubs to dump cheerleaders.
Women Sport Australia spokeswoman Louise Evans is among those applauding F1 for abandoning an “archaic practice”.
“Women in sport should be celebrated as strong, skilled athletes, not as a titillating decoration,” she said.
Feminism should be about choice. Women should be free to use their looks to generate an income.
In the progressives’ twisted logic, it is OK for the likes of Miley Cyrus and Beyonce to wear next to nothing on stage and even less in their videos because they are powerful and identify as feminists, but grid girls are, for some reason, unacceptable.
It’s absurd to have one standard of behaviour for the rich and privileged and another for ordinary women.
The sexualisation of the former is deemed empowering, while the latter are seen as hapless victims.
Your typical grid girls may not be as well connected as top models and pop stars but that doesn’t mean their work isn’t equally emboldening.
Feminists don’t have a right to impose their judgment on those who choose to work as grid girls, cheerleaders, promotional models, or any other such role. But then, a movement that abandons the most oppressed women in the world and aligns itself with World Hijab Day is obviously hopelessly broken.
Thankfully, there is a fightback, led by women who endure abuse and threats of violence to expose the degradation of modesty culture. Many of those women have been ostracised by their families.
Yasmine Mohammed is part of the growing #NoHijabDay campaign and feels betrayed by the Left’s embrace of Muslim veils.
“I risked my life to fight my way out of the darkness into the light, only to find people in the light fetishising the dark,” Yasmine said.
“Alicia Keys posted a photo of a woman in a niqab and talked about its beauty, so I responded with a photo of a slave in chains … people don’t get that it’s the same thing.”