ssainhu, I think it can be replied to your points and hence not being problematic.
Sahar, I agree with your sentiment totally.
My problem is:
what level does government decide is "modest" enough?
do women HAVE to wear the headscarf in public?
what happens if a woman doesn't wear the headscarf? can she not live in Iran?
does said headscarf have to be tied and cover each and every solitary hair?
can women wear pants?
do men have rules, and are they enforced?
do men need to keep a beard?
Where do we draw the line? No one likes to be forced to wear anything. What do you mean by people agreeing with the government's dress code? Do they have elections with the rules attached? I know there will never be a time when everyone agrees to everything,
Well in 1979, 99% of the Iranians voted in favor of the Khomeni's form of Islamic republic...this is not just an overwhelming majority but it's almost the whole people!!
This was the choice of the Iranians!
Who draw the lines is the people. This is how democracy works. The laws in any given democratic state represent the public orientation and mood. It's just like how the niqab was banned in France or the headscarves (what's called the ban of "religious symbols", ironically hijab is not a symbol) was banned in the French schools. The Parliament voted for the bans. The school managers stood at the gates of the schools prohibiting the Muslim girls with headscarves from entering their schools, up to prohibiting them because they wore long blouses and long dresses!!
Why should this be difficult when it comes to enforcing an Islamic dress code?
If we are talking about a democratic Islamic country and where there is separation of powers, then if any similar law was to present, why should it be any less democratic?
Why should it mean that it speaks about religiousness of the government rather than the people?
I know there will never be a time when everyone agrees to everything, but I'm really stumped at how all the religious revolutions would take place if everyone agreed with the government's guidelines on dress code.
Inherently, I have issues with any government sanctioning religious dress code; it will all be based on that government's level of "religiousness" at the time. This whole subject is very touchy, because it's quite obvious that every society and religion has their own idea of conservativeness.
Okay and each society can manage its affairs based on its own idea. We are not talking about Iranians who are supposed to impose their own idea on Egyptians!
Even within the Muslim community there are various opinions...even regarding the headscarf, and particularly the jilbab/burqa, etc.
I know there are silly details about this specific issue, and there are more important issues but whether more important or less important, there are various opinions about the variety of issues, and determining which direction to follow is through the democratic process.
The problem also lies within mens' responsibility to lower their gaze and to control themselves in general. The old "men will be men" and "men are weak" argument is getting old.
This is the argument of who? Men
and women are required to lower their gaze.
The idea is women and men are created differently and God prescribed certain teachings that fit the uniqueness of each. Who added the requirement for women to cover more parts than men is God! So this shouldn't be the topic. The topic is whether to enforce an Islamic dress code by the way of Law or not. Or better the topic is about our reaction to the
reality of imposing an Islamic dress code in some Muslim societies.