LETTER: Should women wear burqas?

To the editor:

I am writing in response to the letter which was printed in the Statesman on Monday, April 09. The topic the letter addressed was modesty, something very familiar to our ultra-conservative campus. The attitude of the writer is on par with many at Utah State today; however, there are those who feel differently. Like others in my apartment I was shocked and befuddled by the attitudes expressed by the writer which sound a lot like the attitudes of Islamic societies in Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan. In which, females’ bodies are forced under the cover of a burqa . We live in America, a nation where people are allowed and encouraged to exercise our individual freedoms. One of those freedoms is the freedom to look as we wish. In a society that maximizes individual freedoms and individuality, why are we so scared of our bodies and our sexuality? One of my high school teachers (a woman) used to tell the young ladies in her classes, “You may as well flaunt it while you can.” Over spring break I had the pleasure of visiting a friend attending the University of California at Davis. Here I witnessed something that many students at our university would have been very shocked to see, skin, lots and lots of skin. Needless to say, Utah is a different state than California and many say it would be comparing apples to oranges. However, it is a major university campus much like our own. I guess what I am trying to say is this isn’t a private boys school and we should be mature enough to accept the human body. Spring is a great time of year, with new life all around and temperatures beginning to climb. Why should the young woman (and men also) at this university be relegated to sweaters and khaki pants when the temperature outside requires less clothing for comfort? My friends at UC Davis dressed with less because they had to, to stay cool. Besides, “You may as well flaunt it while you can.”

Andrew Baker