麻豆社

Good morning

Yesterday in the Women鈥檚 World Cup, Morocco played current world champions Germany. Although Morocco lost 6-nil , the team has caught the attention of many around the world.
25 year old Moroccan player Nouhaila Benzina is set to make history as the first woman player to wear a headscarf, or hjiab, at the World Cup level. Initially wearing a hijab on the pitch was banned by FIFA, the international governing body of association football. But after intense campaigning by many women, in 2014 they changed the rules.

However, for me, the fact that Nouhaila is the only one on her team to wear the headscarf points to the issue at the core of this - that of choice.

I converted to Islam in 1995 and since then I鈥檝e chosen to wear a headscarf. I have many friends who wear it and many who don鈥檛. When I鈥檓 not wearing it I would not look, to many, like a Muslim. But when I put it on, I can then become a target for discrimination and prejudice. It never ceases to amaze me how much focus one small piece of material can bring.

On the other side of the argument, in Iran, women have protested publicly about being forced to wear the headscarf, often risking their own safety.

For me this all comes back to the problematic idea of women鈥檚 bodies being policed, mostly by men. That we can be told what we can and can鈥檛 wear and that choice is taken away from us.

Given the scrutiny and attention the hijab has always been given and how politicised it鈥檚 become, one could be excused for imagining that the Qur鈥檃n contains a lot of specific direction on this topic, but it doesn鈥檛. It talks about women drawing a cover over themselves, lowering their gaze and guarding their modesty. But in those same verses men鈥檚 modesty and the direction to lower their gaze is actually mentioned first. Interestingly this is talked about far less.

Nouhaila is reportedly proud to be the first woman footballer to wear the hijab in a World Cup, but I imagine that ultimately she just wants to win and play good football. But her participation means that young women will see her and realise that they too can be part of something like a world cup if they choose to be.

Morocco is the only Arab team to get this far in the competition, so I want to wish them all the best. And I also want to particularly thank Nouhaila for being a symbol of hope but also choice.

Show less