“The burka and the niqab should be banned in Britain. They are a barrier to integration, a statement of hostility to the host country. Poor women who have been brainwashed into hiding their faces are victims, not martyrs. The burka is a not a sign of religion, but of subservience.”

Allison Pearson in the Daily Telegraph, 14 April 2011

Still, at least we’re spared references to Muslim women “wearing nose-bags over their faces” or to Pearson’s sense of “burkha rage” against veiled women who are “taking the mickey out of our country and its tolerant ways”, or her more general complaint that Britain has done “too much” to “accommodate its immigrant groups”.

Update:  The EDL are impressed by the article: “Allison Pearson seems to have started to understand the nature of the 7th century Islam that has taken hold in our towns and cities”.

Further update:  See also ENGAGE, 15 April 2011