by Sanita Fejzic

Many Canadians have been weighing in on whether Muslim women should be allowed to wear niqabs during their citizenship ceremony. Journalists, so-called experts, feminists, politicians and judges have had their say — so have women who wear niqabs and others who don’t. Amid the emotional intensity, the niqab has become the centre of a passionate national debate.

Between Prime Minister Harper’s comments that niqabs are “rooted in a culture that is anti-women” and Justin Trudeau’s rebuke that “it is a cruel joke to claim [that Harper is] liberating people from oppression by dictating in law what they can and cannot wear,” there doesn’t seem to be any space left for a more nuanced debate on Canadian values and the government’s right to intervene in the defence of such values. There doesn’t seem to be any space left for the voices of women, some of whom are indeed pressured, whether by their husbands or their cultures, to wear niqabs, to be heard. According to a 2013 study from the Canadian Council of Muslim Women, 10 per cent of the women surveyed cited “encouraged by a spouse” as the reason they wear the niqab.  While it is risky and complicated for them to come forward, it troubles me that we haven’t heard their voices.

It also troubles me when the debate becomes saturated with unproductive comments like those made by Conservative MP Larry Miller, who stated that women wearing niqabs during citizenship ceremonies should “stay the hell where you came from.” Yes, he has apologized, but that’s not the point. His comments are symptomatic of the sarcastic and antagonistic tone of the debate. His comments are polarizing the issue, distracting us from what’s really at stake.

The discussion is quickly being polarized between “this is an anti-woman issue” and “these are racist comments.” There isn’t any room for more-nuanced understandings. There isn’t any room for looking at what really matters: what the communities umbrellaed under the notion of Canada really value.

If we say equity and women’s rights, then the Prime Minister shouldn’t rail against niqabs. Instead, he should be forced to answer questions about why he slashed the budget to Status of Women in Canada (SWC), a federal organization which advocates for women’s equality and participation in social and economic life, back in 2006. In September of that year, then-Treasury Board Secretary John Baird enforced a $5 million cut to the SWC’s budget. This reduced funding to 66 government-sanctioned women’s programs that Baird called “wasteful” and “ineffective”. This cut forced SWC to close down 12 of its 16 locations.

And what about the Prime Minister’s lack of commitment toward Canada’s epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women? The RCMP’s 2013 study accounts for 1,181 cases of missing and murdered Indigenous women, and that is just what has been reported. Though activists are split on whether or not the federal government should have a role in investigating these cases, the Prime Minister refuses to acknowledge the institutional roots of this problem. Mightn’t we ask, then, whether it’s more important to work towards healing the effects of systemic violence at home than it is to create new ones with different targets?

What about the fact that Harper’s government slashed plans for a government-funded daycare that would have allowed countless women to have more choices once it was time to go back to work? The $100/month subsidy doesn’t come close to covering daycare costs, which are exuberant.  According to a study from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, the average cost for daycare in Ottawa is over $1,025 per month. The average woman living in Ottawa pays 26 per cent of her income to cover daycare costs.

So let’s not allow ourselves to get distracted from the larger issues at stake. Though I won’t pretend to speak for all Canadians, I don’t think it’s contentious that we ought to value a more nuanced, inclusive, broad-ranging and sensitive conversation about women’s rights in Canada.

This article first appeared in the Leveller Vol.7, No.6 (Spring 2015).