When you title your book Win Every Argument, you create the very definition of a hostage to fortune. So it’s especially unfortunate that Mehdi Hasan, the author of said book, is an inveterate poster on social media – and most of his posts seem to demonstrate that he has, indeed, a knack for the very opposite.
On Tuesday, Laura Trott, the shadow education secretary, raised the issue of Barnet Hill Academy, a newly state-funded Islamic faith school in north London, which requires female pupils to wear hijabs from Year three onwards. Trott said: ‘No one should be telling girls to cover their hair, least of all a school. We, the Conservatives, are campaigning to make sure that this (policy), which we believe breaches various rules and possibly the law, is overturned. Under a Conservative government, this would never happen, and we’re trying to stop it under this awful government too.’
It should be a relatively uncontroversial statement that no female child in Britain should be forced to cover their hair in school
Not all the school’s pupils are Muslim. But only after its enforcement of mandatory hijabs sparked a backlash did the school add a line to its uniform policy statement online to say that the hijab is ‘not a requirement for any non-Muslim students attending the school’. It’s quite something to think that even non-Muslims might have had to wear a hijab. But the statement also, of course, makes it clear that it is indeed compulsory for pupils deemed to be Muslim.
It should be a relatively uncontroversial statement that no female child in Britain should be forced to cover their hair in school. Religious observance should always be a matter of personal choice. Some parents choose to send their children to faith schools so they are brought up in the traditions of their faith. As a society we have decided that taxpayers should subsidise such a choice. But we still impose rules on how those schools should behave – the same regulations which apply to all pupils and all religions. It is one thing for schools to allow the wearing of a hijab; it is quite another to compel it.
There is certainly a serious argument to be had about the age at which someone is considered intellectually capable of deciding for themselves if they wish to follow a particular faith tradition, such as wearing a hijab. But whatever that age may be, it is surely older than seven: the age from which it is compulsory at Barnet Hill Academy.
It did not take long for Hasan to wade in after Trott promised that a Conservative government would stop seven-year-old girls being forced to wear a hijab at school. Hasan posted this on X: ‘Will the Tories also be requiring state-funded Jewish schools in the UK not to make the kippah mandatory…Or are the Tories only picking on Islam and Muslims, as usual?’
The problem with anything Hasan now says is that he long ago made it very clear where he is coming from, having made a notorious speech in 2009 in which he described ‘kafirs’ (non-Muslims) as comparable to ‘animals’. And that was the least of it. Hasan has at least said sorry for those remarks, writing in 2019 that ‘like a lot of journos (humans?) I’ve said things years ago that I now deeply regret.’. But his comments are still hard to forget.
Hasan is not alone in making the argument he does in response to Trott. The Tory MP’s posts on X are full of replies making the same argument: that there is a contradiction between concern over Muslim girls being forced to wear the hijab and ambivalence over Jewish boys wearing a kippah. Worse, that it shows that Trott is bigoted about Muslims. As another poster put it: ‘Will the Tories also be requiring state-funded Jewish schools in the UK not to make the kippah mandatory, as it reportedly is for male pupils at the state-funded JFS Jewish free school in Brent. Or are the Tories only picking on Islam and Muslims, as usual?’
The comparison is revealing because it shows the extent to which those who compare the two are prepared to make sophistic arguments to buttress their view of Muslim observance.
The kippah is a religious symbol which signifies nothing other than that the individual believes there is a higher power to which he wishes to show respect. The hijab, on the other hand, is designed to control what are seen as the base sexual urges of men – and thus sexualises the young girls forced to wear it. No man or boy is attacked by other British Jews for not wearing a kippah, whereas British Muslim women and girls are attacked – verbally and physically – for not wearing a hijab. Add to that, many Islamic scholars argue that the hijab is not mandatory.
Trott is right to have highlighted Barnet Hill Academy’s hijab policy – and those who think they have found an example of anti-Muslim prejudice reveal nothing other than their own bigotry.
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