This month, we, the Swiss people, are voting as to whether burqas should be prohibited here. We already have to live with an unnecessary ban on new mosques, our first “fake law.” As a peaceful and freedom-loving citizen, I don’t like to tell other people what to do, as long as they don’t exert coercion. I imagine women being “forced under the veil”, as they used to be disposed of in convents in our culture. They are few, and our laws must suffice to protect them, and all of us, from such assaults. If a woman cannot leave the house because she is only allowed to go outside fully veiled, she will hardly find an opportunity to stand up for herself. I have only seen one fully veiled woman here so far, except in photos of tourists, and I found this hidden person a tad disconcerting. But did she hurt me in any way? Rather, she gave me the impression that she liked to hide under her burqa, that much was visible in her movements. As everyone knows, a covering or disguise offers a certain amount of freedom. What nobody minds at our Carnavals: you don’t know who is hiding underneath the costume. We want to be able to assess whether someone is about to aggress us, that is our right. But is the cowardly Islamophobia hiding behind this fake law also our right? Disguises abound, there are no limits to the imagination. Terrorists walk around like normal people. Will three dozen burka-wearing women in Switzerland be able to shake my sense of security? Hate should not be stirred up – where will it end!
Cordially yours,
Susanne G. Seiler
The Peace of Wild Things
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Wendell Berry