Ban women!

First, I feel a tad bit bad that I haven't used this blog to talk about knitting... at all. Not even once. I will!... Once I unpack my life (I just moved on Friday!)

Anyway, it's time to talk about the niqab. If you are not aware, the niqab is a type of veil worn over the face (leaving space for the eyes) of women (it is usually associated with Islam). The province of Quebec has decided that this shouldn't be allowed because they feel it would make identification difficult. Furthermore, this would lead to identity theft/other crimes that are too ill defined to discuss here. I believe (/know), however, that this is thinly veiled (pun intented) racism/sexism. Although there are more roots to "reasonable accommodation"/racism in Quebec, I believe a lot of this started when a woman wearing a niqab refused to remove her veil in French class and was later expelled from TWO schools [link to a blog post on the issue].

For reference, I'm a woman of colour and an atheist. I, admittedly, know very little about Islam. I also do not know, nor have I ever seen in person, a single woman wearing a niqab (which makes me wonder why it's so important to have this ban when a person who has been living in Quebec for over 3 years has never even SEEN a woman wearing a niqab!) That said, there is this thing called empathy which makes me able to try to understand something without having to experience it personally. I'm also a feminist and I believe that allowing several white men to determine what women (of colour) can and cannot wear is absolutely NOT ACCEPTABLE.

If, as the Quebec government has been saying, this bill was drafted in order to end (or lessen) female oppression, why didn't they ask women wearing the niqab how they felt about it (it's possible that they weren't able to find one, since there really are so few of them!)? How could they think that preventing a few dozen women from accessing government and/or public services would be lessening oppression? How is telling women what to do with their bodies lessening oppression? Did they think, for a minute, about women who may be forced, by their families or partners, to wear the niqab? Those women will now be more oppressed than they were when they could at least leave the house if they wore a niqab. If they truly felt that women wearing the niqab were oppressed, their actions are counter-intuitive and are really the best way to ensure that these women stay oppressed.

So, obviously, the issue has nothing to do with women's rights. Let's see if it has anything to do with security/the ability to identify people. I think it's important to mention that, to date there have been no identity crimes committed by people wearing a niqab. That doesn't mean that it can't happen, but it raises suspicion as to why so much attention has to be placed on preventing these two dozen women from potentially committing crimes? It's also important to note that, as far as I know, women wearing the niqab are willing to show their faces to female employees. I do not believe this is unreasonable. I do, however, believe that it is unreasonable to ban these women from accessing public services (including healthcare and education, among others) because of their religious expression.

It's likely that this ban has little (if anything) to do with women's rights and/or security and everything to do with racism/islamophobia/sexism. That, on its own, should be enough to make reasonable people quite angry... yet it's not. People are either applauding the ban or shrugging their shoulders, essentially dismissing the rights of these women. I think what really gets scary is when you think about what could happen next, if we let this ban happen. Honestly, I really don't know what could happen next in the name of "women's rights" but I'm positive that if we don't fight this life may very well become much more oppressive for women (especially women of colour).

You're fat because you drink

How terrible of me, starting a new blog and not updating it for an entire week! Tsk tsk!

This week I found out about a soda tax. It's probably exactly what you're thinking (if you're thinking that it's a tax on soda). I thought it sounded like an OK idea at first since soda is really bad for your health. It's ridiculously sweet, horrible for your teeth, it probably does a lot of weird stuff to your insides (I'm obviously not a dietician!) and, in a few people, I bet it definitely contributes to obesity. I definitely do not think that it is an important enough contribution to obesity to justify having a tax on it. How many obese people do you see drinking soda every day? How many skinny people do you see drinking soda every day? How many average weight people do you see drinking soda every day? Probably a lot in each of those categories.

For me, a better way to try to battle obesity would be to provide delicious and nutritious foods at a lower cost, rather than to tax snacks. I know the point of the tax is to generate money, and providing low-cost food would definitely not generate money, but then I just consider this whole soda-tax as being a way of getting money under the guise of doing something useful.

But, furthermore, I really think that this tax could be detrimental to obese people. People aren't going to stop drinking soda or eating pizza (which is another thing that politicians are considering taxing) just because they cost more, but they are going to feel a lot of resentment towards overweight and obese people because of it. I suspect that it would lead to a lot of feelings of overweight and obese people "not being able to control themselves", eating/drinking in excess and then becoming overweight. Although I can't say that this is not the case for everyone, I truly believe that people who eat themselves into obesity are in the minority. There are a lot of people that, although they may have all the will-power in the world, are just unable to lose weight (or lose weight to an "acceptable" level). Plus, think of all the people that associate food with weight 100%, starve themselves for a while, lose a bunch of weight and then gain it all back (plus some) once they start eating again!

I just think it's very unhealthy to completely associate food with obesity. There are so many issues at play, but I'd be willing to bet my life that there isn't really a huge population out there that is fat just because they drink.

Hello!

So I've decided to give this whole blog thing another shot after an incredibly long hiatus from LJ. There are a lot of reasons for me to decide to return:
- Lots of things have been changing in my life.
- I've become a lot more interested in writing, in general, and I feel like writing "for fun" is a good way to improve my writing.
- Due to all of the changes I've alluded to in the first point: I need to write.

I've gotten pretty horrible at both expressing myself and/or understanding my emotions since I've left LJ. I guess I don't want to start an LJ again because I don't really want to do the commenting business/keeping up with other LJs business. I just want to write.

So, obviously, it's tough to decide what this blog will be "about" (other than my life!) I think I'll probably talk a bunch about yarn/knitting/crafting stuff, for sure. I think I'll also talk a lot about politics, feminism, issues about being fat, how much the weather is driving me crazy, and where I want to go from here.

So for now: it's international women's day! I'm not really an Academy Awards type of person (and so I didn't even watch it last night) but I feel pretty happy about a woman winning best director for the first time ever. I also feel amazed about a fat black woman winning for best supporting actress. I suppose there aren't listings for how many fat women of colour win various acting awards so this may also be a first! I felt a strange sense of... pride (maybe?) when Monique got up to accept the award. She looked so strong and stunning and her speech was just lovely! Maybe this is why people like sports? Does "your" sports team winning a game feel as good as "your" weight/gender/colour team winning an award? If so, I'm going to be less hard on people who like sports so much... maybe!