FOR Fatma Benli, a Turkish lawyer and women’s rights advocate, the controversy over Islamic head scarves has the irritating sound of a broken record.
Ms. Benli, who is 34, wears one herself. (On Wednesday, it was light brown with a floral print, tucked into the neck of a white turtleneck.) But she would rather talk about other things.
“I could tell you about domestic violence, about honor killings, about the parts of the criminal code that discriminate against women,” she said, ticking off her areas of expertise in rapid-fire sentences. “But we can’t move on to those issues.
“The head scarf is where we are stuck.”
“This is related to my private life,” she said. “It’s my personality. My wholeness.”
