Boris Johnson and the liberal criticism of Islam

A truly bizarre thing happened yesterday: Boris Johnson was branded an Islamophobe and a bigot for writing in defence of Muslim women who wear the niqab.

In his Telegraph column, Johnson said it was wrong for Denmark to ban the niqab and burqa in public places because the state should not be telling any ‘free-born adult woman what she may or may not wear, in a public place, when she is simply minding her own business’.

Top-down burqa-banning risks ‘play[ing] into the hands of those who want to politicise and dramatise the so-called clash of civilisations’, he said. That is, authoritarian state controls on religious dress are both illiberal and also seem ‘intended to make some point about Islam’ that could whip up those who believe the West is at war with that religion.

So he defended Muslim women’s right to wear religious garments in public and he expressed concern about the state appearing to be in conflict with Islam.