LONDON – Protesting against the controversial burkini ban, British people staged a “wear what you want” beach party outside the French embassy in London on Thursday, August 25, sporting burkinis and park deck chairs, lilos and makeshift sand.
“We’re here to show anger over the Burkini ban in France; so many people are shocked by it,” explained Yasmin, a protestor outside the embassy, The Telegraph reported.
“It’s absolutely ridiculous that in 2016 governments have the right to tell people what they can and can’t wear.
“What I think is more shocking is that France is a country that screams “fraternity, liberty and egality”, but none of that is reflected in the burkini ban.
“What is oppressive is that they are telling us what we can and can’t wear. That in itself is oppressive.”
Early on Thursday, protesters held an impromptu beach party complete with sand, deck chairs and a lobster-shaped lilo outside the French embassy in London.
The protest was called against burkini bans which have become law in many French coastal towns and cities.
Esmat Jeraj, a campaigner at Citizens UK and one of the protest’s organizers, said the argument that the burkini was a symbol of repression “needs to be turned on its head”.
“A lot of women wear it by choice,” she told The Guardian.
“If the burkini enables women to go and sit on the beach and enjoy the sunshine, surely that should be encouraged. It helps ensure these women are no longer on the margins.”
A recent controversy on burkini has erupted in the wake of the French authorities’ decision to ban the swimsuit in Cannes, Corsica and Le Touquet.
The decision was criticized by many commentators who see burkini as something that grants so many women access to sports and experiences they would have otherwise avoided because of health, body or religious concerns.
Wear What You Want
Organizers of the protest wrote on Facebook: “We are disgusted to hear of armed French policemen telling women what they are allowed to wear and making them undress in public.
The protest launched #WearWhatYouWant hashtag which has also been trending.
“Our bodies, our clothes, our choice. We stand with the women targeted by the #BurkiniBan. #WearWhatYouWant,” Amnesty UK tweeted.
“#WearWhatYouWant beach demo. So impressed that the organisers brought actual sand,” another protester added on Twitter.
Anger has maximized after a series of photos showed four police officers armed with handguns, batons and pepper spray standing around the woman who was lying on the beach wearing a blue headscarf and matching top.
The 34-year-old mother of two, whose family have been French citizens for at least three generations, told French news agency AFP she had been fined on the beach in Cannes, 18 miles from Nice, for wearing leggings, a top and a headscarf.
The former air-hostess from Toulouse was issued a ticket saying she was not wearing “an outfit respecting good morals and secularism”.
“It’s a protest in response to the French police’s violation of the Muslim woman on the beach by forcing her to strip off her burkini surrounded by armed police officers … so I’m here in solidarity for the right of all women to choose whatever we put on our bodies,” a protester said.
“I’m also here in solidarity for the right of Muslims to express their religion freely without fear of persecution.”