Does Hijab Protect Women from Rape?
A response to the misinformation of the “Kerala Story”
Assume there is a hooligan who is waiting to harass a woman. Whom will he tease? A woman wearing Hijab, or one wearing a tank top or shorts?
The answer is clear. It’s common sense. But some people don’t want to face reality. Some people like to create fiction!
But that doesn’t mean that dressing modestly will completely foreclose on the possibility of receiving negative attention.
This is a common argument I hear against the hijab and modest dress in general, namely that “modestly dressed women, even women in full hijab, are still victims of catcalling, sexual assault, and rape. So clearly modest dress and hijab have no impact in protecting women from rape.”
The last time I heard this flawed argument ( it’s flawed because no one claims that dressing modestly will completely foreclose on the possibility of rape or sexual harassment) is during a scene from the “Kerala story”, an islamophobic Hindutva propaganda pushing anti-Muslim tropes and conspiracies such as “love jihad” and “Islam promotes violence again women and non-Muslims.”
