Put a veil in it

The absurd view of Australia's most senior Muslim cleric that women who don't cover up in the Islamic fashion are inviting sexual assault has reignited the whole veil debate. His rather revealing parallel was, "If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside on the street, or in the garden, or in the park, or in the backyard without cover, and the cats come to eat it ... whose fault is it, the cats' or the uncovered meat?"

With public condemnation—rightly—raining down on him, he has felt obliged to backtrack. (Though his apology is a classic example of that weasely genre of 'I'm sorry if anyone took offense' apologies.) But there is no doubt that his remarks are going to further polarize a debate that is already in danger of spinning out of control. We've raced from the reasonable suggestion that wearing the full veil isn't conducive to integration, to claiming that "wearing the nikab in this country at this time is an expression of affinity with the enemy."