OpEdNews - Page 3 of Article: To Veil or Not to Veil: Is that the Question?

According to the Campaign Against Racism and Fascism (CARF) this state of affairs is rooted in "a whole history of racism and social exclusion." CARF reports that in 1993, Oldham Borough Council was found to have been operating "an unlawful segregation policy in its housing allocation". The policy effectively "ghettoised Asians onto a rundown estate, while whites were given homes in a more desirable area." The legacy of this policy, which has gone on for decades, has continued to this day, exacerbating an informal type of apartheid between the white and Asian communities. In 1990, Oldham Council attempted to cover-up a council housing allocation report it had commissioned which exposed a "staggering catalogue of discrimination." The report found that Asians "spent longer on waiting lists, were more likely to be offered lower quality housing, and were segregated on specific estates around the town centre." A Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) investigation into private housing conducted in the same year similarly revealed that at least two estate agents were "redlining the practice of confining different racial groups to their own areas." Other problems include the fact that the Council has no race relations or quality officer; similarly, the local racial equality council was shut down two years ago.

Straw wants to blame Muslim women for the results of the racist and discriminatory social, economic, and housing policies of local authorities overseen by his own government, when it is such women who remain the principal victims of such policies. What a bitter irony indeed.

So if you're interested in genuinely tackling "Muslim ghettos" and parallel communities, you could start by writing to Home Secretary John Reid and asking what he's doing to reverse the deliberate entrenchment of "informal apartheid" between white and Asian communities dotted around the country, by corrupt local authorities.

And if you're rightly concerned about the rampant repression of women in Iraq and Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, you could start by writing to the Foreign Office and asking them to stop financing and supporting unpopular, tyrannical regimes throughout the Middle East.

And if you still think that covering the face is a danger to community relations, don't pontificate: prove it. I don't think compromising on yet more civil liberties at home is the way forward.

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