We need to strike a sensible balance in response to burka outburst by Boris

The unfavourable comparison, made by Andrew Vass (Letters, August 8), between Boris Johnson and the imperial German Kaiser, who was complicit in the making of the First World War is absurdly over the top.

Wearing of the burka, a tribal, cultural custom and surely not of religious significance, impairs not only human communications but the wearer’s good appearance!

In childhood days, I was taught that “sticks and stones may break your bones, but names need ever hurt you,” which should be recalled by the UK political and legal authorities and, indeed by our immigrants. Any who believe otherwise should recall that, with so many dreadful problems of terrorism, real cruelty and murders in the world and even in the UK today, such offences of language pale into relative insignificance.

All we must insist upon today is old fashioned, polite good manners.

Any more offended reaction is unnecessarily exaggerated and simply stimulates and worsens everyone’s ire.

(DR) CHARLES WARDROP Viewlands Road West, Perth

Boris Johnson’s ill-considered and insulting remarks on women’s clothing in certain Muslim cultures do him no credit and provide yet more evidence of why it is that he should not lead a political party and hopefully will never be Prime Minister .

Alan Hinnrichs, however, goes over the top in his intemperate attack on the foreign policy of Western democracies in the Middle East and in Islamic parts of the world (Letters, August 9).

There is far more mutual culpability by states and groupings in the history of that part of the world than Mr Hinnrichs’ intemperate world view would suggest.

To return to Bojo’s foolish and cheap remarks , the rest of us should try better to understand the culture and beliefs of others and not always to condemn or mock them ignorantly. Oddly , I recall that until a few years ago, the Twitter profile of Mr Hinnrichs himself was to the effect that “I do not respect your beliefs and do not care if you are offended”.

That exactly mirrors the ignorant attitudes that Boris Johnson has exhibited and is the kind of blinkered prejudice that we really all must avoid.

We should all be moderate in what we say and how we say it , Mr Johnson and Mr Hinnrichs included.

GUS LOGAN York Road, North Berwick

Before another critic screams ‘racist’ at Boris Johnson – or anyone else – for opposing or lampooning the burka, hijab or niqab, please explain why at Islam’s holiest and very public site, the Ka’aba in Mecca, facial covering is strictly forbidden?

The irony of those accusing Johnson of ignorance is their defence of the indefensible.

The 99% Muslim Morocco banned the wearing and making of burkas in 2016 – before any EU nation did – as neo-colonialist imports from the Gulf States, long attempting to impose their brittle Wahabbist principles on other Islamic nations by stealth (including the funding of extremist groups).

Muslim writers Quanta Ahmed and Irshad Manji have long warned not only are these coverings dripping in medieval minded patriarchy, they have nothing to do with Islam (they were actually copied from the Byzantines – ironic as Turkey were the first nation to outright ban them under Mustapha Kemal Ataturk in 1923).

Ironically, when a follower complained that an attractive woman was distracting him, Mohammed’s response was to take hold of the man’s jaw and turn his sight away.

Like Jesus, he took the line that the key to virtue was self-discipline, not expecting the world to save you from yourself.

MARK BOYLE Linn Park Gardens, Johnstone.

Renfrewshire