‘Having met with you, great happiness happened.’ That’s what I should have said (in Hindi) when my Muslim auto-rickshaw driver friend introduced me to two teenage nieces in an Indian street. Instead I came up with a lazy, instinctive ‘It’s nice to see you’ (in English). It was lazy, and inaccurate. Sparkling, vivacious and well-educated the girls’ masked eyes might have been, but without the skills of the blind I was flummoxed – how do you engage with a person who has been de-personalised into a black blob?
On February 21st Mr Justice Silber decided that a 12-year-old Muslim girl was not entitled to present herself as a faceless entity at school if that school’s uniform policy said otherwise. It’s a case that will chunter on wherever its educational, sociological, legal, cultural, political, religious and ethical ripples are seen as significant. Of possible knee-jerk reactions mine might be: 1. Should a 12-year-old be allowed so much power (to expend money, create havoc, take up judicial time etc)? 2. If the child is actually being manipulated to fulfil the ends of adults, that is also unacceptable. 3. Being the subject of a high-profile case is vastly more distracting for an adolescent than learning to deal with ‘the gaze of men’. 4. I’m not a fan of ‘slippery slope’ arguments, but then again, supposing a pupil rolled up and said, ‘I’m a sky-clad Jain. I won’t be wearing any uniform – also I’ll require you to turn the heating up.’ Won’t happen? Don’t count on it!
Let’s face the ‘face’ question, however. The girl’s school did argue that facial expression was vital in the normal teaching-learning process. Though we’d all like to have veiled the spots and blushes of our school-days, that wasn’t an option. In my day-job, teaching English to international business men and women, the role of eyes, smile and tone of voice in communication is easily as important as that of correct prepositions. Is not this too big a matter to be labelled ‘cultural’ or ‘religious’ – because it is actually universal? Different codes of facial expression and readings of people’s faces are ‘cultural’. Wearing impenetrable sun-glasses is an adult choice. But surely no female should, by any ideology, be sanctioned to avoid human facial contact? (Nobody has suggested veiling for males, lest they incite the lustful gaze of women or other men.) Facing people is a privilege and, arguably, a duty: without it how could great happiness happen?