Kim Hjelmgaard, USA Today:

Prime Minister Manuel Valls said burkinis represent “the enslavement of women,” and the ban should be handled with sensitively so as not to worsen religious tensions.

That’s not what enslavement is. Enslavement is forcing other people to do things against their will. Like, say, controlling how they dress.

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy, who announced this week that he intends to run again in 2017, called the burkini a “provocation” that plays into the hands of Islamic extremists.

Actually, no, it’s the burkini BAN that’s a provocation that plays into the hands of Islamic extremists, who wish to portray the West as a place that is hostile to Muslims. And France has now made itself more hostile to Muslims. Good going, France!

An ardent secularist, Sarkozy told French TV on Wednesday that “we don’t imprison women behind fabric.”

You know what they do in prison? They tell you what you can wear and not wear. Outside of prison, you can wear what you want. Like a burqini.

Muslims, he said, must “assimilate” and shouldn’t “impose their differences on the majority.” If elected, Sarkozy said, he will ban every visible religious sign in French universities.

Here in America, we know something about assimilation. The way you get people to assimilate is to give people choices. Encourage assimilation, but let them do it on their own time and comfort level.

Women born in Muslim cultures will probably never be comfortable wearing anything other than burqas, but that’s fine. They can be fully part of French (or American) culture otherwise. And their daughters and granddaughters will be proper Frenchwomen, smoking Gauloises, eating stinky cheeses, and enjoying Jerry Lewis movies.

I kid. I kid you, France, because I love you. But seriously the burqini ban is messed up. You guys nearly INVENTED freedom; you know how it works.

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