Why do people get angry seeing a Burqa

[Astonished]

I've heard Muslim women defend it as a way of prohibiting themselves from being looked upon and judged for their attractiveness (or lack thereof, as the case may be) and while I can't see any intrinsic flaw with wanting to do that for that reason, I don't for a minute believe that's the only, or even biggest, reason for them doing that. I'm fine with someone making a completely informed, free-of-coercion choice to accept certain stereotypical or perceived degrading roles like homemaker and parent with no higher education or career prospects if that is what they genuinely want. But if you're brought up in a culture that has a strong influence on not being given all the facts, not being given as many choices, having those with authority over you constantly influencing you to think or behave a certain way, that sort of takes the autonomy out of the choice. It may not be indoctrination the way we see some ideas form, but if opportunity is stymied, one can't really say a person is doing something like that of their own volition given how differently things might have gone with a broader spectrum of choice and knowledge.

Sure yeah, this is a good point. Like for example if I went to live in a first world developed country I would bring some of my country's culture along with me since they're so deeply printed in me because of living here for so long. That's the same for Muslim women too, when they spend so much of their lives in their culture of course they're going to feel more comfortable with it. Although the correct way to go about things would be to sit down and have a conversation with them. Tell them they don't really have to wear a burqa and nobody is going to stone them to death for it but finish with "if you'd still like to exercise your RIGHT to wear what YOU want to though, it's still okay, we just wanted you to know that there's an alternative.

Good. End it at that. Their decision. Not our place to dictate what they wear.

The wrong way to go about this is to FORCE them to wear what YOU think is good for them, deny them the freedom to wear what THEY want, try to strip them naked in broad daylight, assume they're weaklings that can't stand up for themselves (for all you know she's actually proud of being Muslim), all of these kinds of assumptions and prejudices won't solve anything. There's NO reason to get angry seeing someone wear a burqa. I also faintly remember of a incident where police forced a bunch of Muslim women to take off their headscarf in the beach or they had to leave.

A lot of people actually support outright banning the Burqa but that's basically the same thing extremists do forcing them to wear it and these people forcing them to not wear it. Shouldn't the FREEDOM of whether what THEY want to wear or not be left to them? I think it should.

Thing is, when a child is indoctrinated and grows up to adulthood and you tell them, "Hey, it's cool now, you don't have to worry about getting kicked out of the house for not believing the same thing your parents do", they don't feel like dropping the faith because they've been conditioned into it with no freedom to choose otherwise. Yes, you could call it culture, but when there's deliberate prevention of exposure to other points of view, that skews how a person develops a sense of self-identity and precludes the curiosity or desire to pursue other avenues that they might otherwise have an interest in. If you want to call something freedom, you have to take that into consideration; for example, a Muslim woman who grew up in the U.S. is probably going to have a lot more exposure to alternative viewpoints (regardless of what her parents might want) than someone growing up in a third-world country, and have that much more opportunity to see things differently than the one-dimensional mindset that a conservative parent may wish to instill. Are they both equivalently free? If not then there's a flaw in your conclusion.

Like I said, I'm fine with anyone ultimately choosing to practice whatever they like as long as they are under no restrictive coercion or conditioning that restricts their freedom to explore as many alternatives as possible. That, sadly, is very rarely the case.