If this niqab-wearing woman thinks she can waltz through her community hurling backward religious hatred at gay people, should we really be surprised? After all, she lives in a country where even criticising the niqab itself is a no no, as Boris discovered when he rightly called it an oppressive and ridiculous garment, and also rightly said it should not be banned.

Boris was right. The niqab is ridiculous and oppressive. It is also anti-social, a big, black ‘screw you’ to contemporary society. It is a hostile garment, declaring the wearer’s fealty to archaic religious values and her disdain for the liberal, licentious society she lives in.

It shouldn’t be banned, of course. Women must be free to wear it. But by the same token the rest of us must be free to say that it is a stupid and offensive thing to wear and that the Waltham Forest homophobe is probably fairly typical of those who wear it.

Things have now been made worse by the involvement of the police, who are investigating this woman’s alleged hate crime. We don’t need more authoritarianism. We don’t need more speech-policing.
https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/07/the-curious-reaction-to-a-niqab-wearing-ho...