 It looks like they don't want women being able to wear whatever they want. They want them all to be wearing what they want. The bikini being banned on French beaches, I think it's kind of a way of France trying to force secularism onto people instead of letting them maintain their identity. You know, there are nuns that go to the beach. I'm sure that there are nuns in France and I'm sure they're not forcing them to wear bikinis. Muslims are in the target of France for like a lot of years now. There is really more hidden behind that. And I think some elements of secular style feels threatened by us. So the word hijab actually means to block one's view. That's what the word literally means. So a curtain that you draw across your window, that's a hijab. But it's come to mean covering up because when we cover up our sexuality, we're blocking that view. Islam tells people that they should, for women especially, they have to cover their hair, most of their bodies, you know, just maintain the modesty so people don't look at you as a sexual figure. I have a strong opinion about being forced to cover myself. I think that I'll cover myself if I want to. My name is Tanzila Ahmed and I'm an activist, a writer and a podcaster. This idea of shame and this idea of women having to look a certain way or dress a certain way is really a product of patriarchy. I was raised with a lot of shame, right? Like to cover myself up and to not show my legs and my arms. And so I actually never learned to swim because of that. I decided to cover myself more than 10 years ago now. The wetsuit usually is super tight and there is a lot of Muslim women who doesn't want to wear tight clothes. I know there's a stereotype, I understand that but people need to understand that that is a stereotype and the majority of Muslim women are not forced to cover up, they choose to do so. I think women should feel free to wear whatever they want no matter where they are in the world. That's how splash gear was started. At one point I was not a religious Muslim and then I became a religious Muslim woman and then I decided to cover and abide by the Islamic dress code. I never set out saying let's ban the bikini. I always loved to be in the water. Since I'm a kid I follow swimming courses and stuff like that. When I decided to cover myself and to put my hijab on, then I couldn't stop going for beach. Women who are modesty conscious have been invisible and I don't think people realize that they want to play, they want to participate, they have to go to water therapy as well just like everybody else but they want to do it on their own terms. They want to do it with more coverage. You know you come to the beach, you can dress with bikini, you can dress in a bikini. So as you like.