A silly scandal has now engulfed former British foreign secretary Boris Johnson. Johnson is under fire for a recent column in the Telegraph, in which he wrote that those who wear burqas “look like letter boxes.”
Accused of Islamophobia, the Conservative Party member of Parliament and favorite to succeed Theresa May as Prime Minister, is refusing to apologize. After all, he was arguing that European countries should stop passing laws that ban the burqa.
Johnson’s critics are calling on Conservative Party leaders to discipline him. And although this criticism is partly motivated by the Labour Party’s desire to distract from their leader’s anti-Semitic tendencies, Johnson is also coming under fire from some fellow Conservatives.
This is all very silly.
Johnson is well-known for his lugubrious use of humor to decorate his articles. And while I don’t believe that women in burqas look like letter boxes, Johnson’s saying so falls far short of abusive language. It’s clear that Johnson’s intent here was to be cheeky rather than malevolent. Moreover, and again, Johnson’s article was specifically written to oppose a truly Islamophobic measure that has become the rage in many parts of Europe: the burqa ban.
Burqa bans represent an unpleasant and illiberal restriction of free worship. They are also utterly idiotic. Claiming to serve women’s rights, they achieve the opposite effect by forcing devout Muslim women to remain at home than be seen in public. The absurdity here is hard to miss: Johnson is under fire for actually taking a stand against functional Islamophobia.
Ultimately, there’s a far simpler reason why this scandal is stupid — the importance of humor in our societies. Boris Johnson made a joke that was basic in form and non-prejudicial in effect. But now, his critics are using that joke to pressure the rest of us to corral our humor to that which we assess will offend no one.
And that, I’m afraid, is a poor recipe for good humor and a healthy democratic society.
