Anti-Niqab activism in Tunisia

I came across this linked video on You Tube. The video is an effort by an anti-Niqab activism group EgaliteParite in Tunisia which is protesting against women wearing Niqab.

What I thought was a bit silly though is the automatic assumption that women who wear the niqab / face-veil are forced. Secondly, it took me a while to overcome the fact that there are people calling themselves anti-Niqab activists considering the Niqab / Face-veil is a cloth worn my Muslim Women to cover their faces for reasons of modesty / culture / religion. Don't they have other things to protests against in Tunisia? Or call for reform for say, education? Why is the Niqab such an important factor for people to dedicate their lives into seeing its removal?

It is a bit hypocritical though as these people who advocate banning the Niqab are taking away the choice of women who choose to wear it, just like I and thousands of women who do so. These same activists group claim to champion "women rights" are in fact, enforcing on other women their own beliefs.

Instead of showing the face-veil in such a degrading manner, steps should be taken to promote tolerance and understanding among communities. Religious discrimination is still discrimination and the world should not turn their head the other way simply because they might not understand the practice or don't know what it means for women who are forced to remove their face-veils.

Snippets from Ibn Al Jawzi: Disciplining the Soul

I have started reading a book by Ibn Al Jawzi: Disciplining the Soul. To be honest, I haven't touched anything spiritually uplifting in a while because of my busy schedule and while browsing some books I had I came across this so I picked it up.

Ibn Al Jawzi was an amazing scholar and I'm very fond of reading his works. This book starts of by discussing the idea of excess desires and I thought I'd post it here:

First and foremost I feel that this book is speaking directly to me. Sometimes I've caught myself doing things like eating too much or some other activity which is in fact in excess when I could be doing something more productive. Like sitting in front of the laptop for too long doing nothing but browsing the internet when I could be reading a productive book.