The prevailing assumption was that Muslim girls were coerced into wearing a garment that symbolized women's inferiority. Evidence that complicated this picture made little difference. Remember that the two sisters in 2003 removed from gym class came from a family that discouraged them from wearing headscarves. Moreover, some girls wore the hijab because they did not want to be treated as sex objects. They saw tight clothing, short skirts, and exposed skin as evidence of sexual exploitation, not liberation. But the idea that a law was needed to liberate oppressed Muslim girls, irrespective of their own views, was persuasive, and it received broad support across the political spectrum.

XREF: Connects to broader patterns of policymaking driven by assumptions rather than evidence, and Western savior narratives about non-Western women.

Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Intro…, loc. 614