The Baroness and the Sheikhs

The U.K. just got its first female Muslim cabinet member, a divorced young baroness who represents the country’s contradictions. Naseem Khan on what Pakistanis—and the Taliban—think of her.
Baroness Sayeeda Warsi embodies the sprawling contradictions of contemporary British politics: She is a young, divorced Muslim woman—and the co-chairman of the Conservative Party.

Last week, she dazzled the cameras, resplendent in the vibrant pinks and shimmering gold of her traditional Pakistani dress, striking a remarkable contrast to her dark-suited colleagues, who are mostly white males educated at Oxford or Cambridge.

The oddity of Islamic dress is that it is, in its won way , as provocative as Western sex obsessed teen's clothing.   The ad below illustrates the irony .. with all apologies to  the Baroness.

The odd thing is that after thirty years of feminism, the bra burnings and dress for success of the Steinem years has finally been replaced in the West by an almost neutral attitude towards most woman's clothing,  Although both exposed lingerie and enveloping Islamic hadjibs remain sexually provocative, the flowered blouse with pearls is a female and ordinary as the manly bulging breast of an Armani suit when either costume is worn by a CEO.