Getting hot and bothered with a headscarf

I was on BBC Radio Ulster/ Raidio Uladh’s ‘Sunday Sequence’ this morning with David Vance. I’d never met him before but as often happens, I found him thoroughly likeable. Maybe I should see a head-doctor  – I keep meeting and liking people whose views, political and otherwise, I vigorously reject.

Anyroad, our topic for discussion this morning was the wearing of the hijab/headscarf  by a young woman from Saudi Arabia in the judo section of the Olympic Games. David figured that allowing her to wear it was to cave in to Islam’s demands yet again.  Cheesh.  You might as well say the Olympic authorities caved in to the nutters who pushed for protective head-gear for boxers, to Oscar Pistorius the double-amputee who insisted on wearing artificial limbs when running, or to international male lust by including beach volleyball on the list of Olympic competitions. 

David’s argument – it wasn’t always easy to follow – was that allowing the hijab was somehow a display of weakness by the International Olympic Council. Eh?  The IOC weak? Try that with the sports authorities in Istanbul. It’s a mainly-Muslim city with a 75,000-seater stadium that has applied five times  to host the Olympic games and has been five times rejected.  Other big Muslim cities like Cairo and Kuala Lumpur get a similar brush-off. On the other hand London has hosted the games three times, ditto Tokyo, Madrid twice. Cave in? You surely jest.

The IOC is too busy caving into commercialism. Watch for fifteen minutes on telly and you’ll see what I mean  -  athletes sporting advertisements for Speedo, Asics, Nike and Adidas. Then there’s Omega and Coca-cola.    Rule 50 of the Olympic charter prohibits any kind of “demonstration  of political, religious or racial propaganda in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas”. Yet you regularly see athletes blessing themselves, pointing to heaven when they win, draping themselves in their national flag, and the league-table for medals-by-nation  is regularly flashed on our screens. And I seem to remember  national anthems sounding at the medal awards ceremonies. But maybe that isn’t seen as propaganda.

Finally, does the name Damian Hooper ring a bell? He’s an Aborigine man boxing for Australia, and he made the mistake of entering the ring wearing a t-shirt with the Aborigine flag on it.  The Australian Olympic Committee rapped his knuckles for him: how dare he bring politics into the Olympics? Right. And yet last night,  Jessica Ennis, Greg Rutherford and Mo Farah were draped in their national flag immediately on winning gold medals. Justified cheers rather than knuckle-raps.

A bit inconsistent, wouldn't you say? Compared to all that, it seems hardly worthwhile getting your knickers in a twist over a  headscarf, does it David?


You can hear our discussion  at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/player/b01lbhb1   Start at 15mins 40 secs into the programme.