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| Europe |
| French Lawmakers Overwhelmingly Back Veil Ban |
| 2004-02-10 |
| An overwhelming majority of France’s National Assembly voted Tuesday to ban religious emblems in state schools, a measure Paris wants to keep tensions between Muslim and Jewish minorities out of public classrooms. "Keep it in the streets where it belongs!" Deputies voted 494 to 36 to ban Muslim headscarves, Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses from state schools and threaten pupils who insisted on wearing them with expulsion. The government insists the ban does not single out any religion, but cabinet ministers admit its main targets are the Islamic headscarves and anti-Semitic remarks from Muslim pupils that teachers say have become more frequent in recent years. This was the first reading of the bill, which must go to the Senate and then back to the National Assembly for final approval in mid-March, which should now be only a formality. Unless, of course, France surrenders before then. The issue goes to the heart of France’s self-image as a secular state that keeps faith out of state schools and services to ensure no religion dominates or suffers discrimination. Image is everything. The ban has wide public support but leaders of France’s five million Muslims call it discriminatory. It has provoked criticism from Islamic and Christian leaders abroad, including Pope John Paul. The Christians will most likely not be the ones blowing themselves up over this. Before the vote, Education Minister Luc Ferry said France had witnessed a "spectacular rise in racism and anti-Semitism in the last three years" and the ban would help to keep classes from dividing up into "militant religious communities." I can count the dangerous "communities" with one finger. Teachers have complained in recent years of problems with Muslim pupils who interrupt history classes to deny the Nazis slaughtered Jews; boycott classes on human reproduction, saying they are immodest; or refuse to attend physical education. Bet if you added weapons training or some of those flaming hoops to the PE program they’d flock to class. They have also reported that Muslim pupils sometimes repeat anti-Semitic themes they see on Arabic satellite television. Jewish families are increasingly switching their children from state schools to private Jewish schools to avoid harassment. I’d consider switching to another continent. It was not clear whether Paris would also ban Sikh turbans, which the 5,000-strong Sikh community in the Paris area says are not religious but practical coverings for their uncut hair. Sikhs are normally very peaceful, unless you mess with their religious beliefs. They get testy about that, ask India. In Kuala Lumpur, about 40 supporters of the fundamentalist Islamic PAS, the biggest opposition party in mainly Muslim Malaysia, protested against the law outside the French embassy chanting "Long live Islam" and "Crush the infidels." Shall we make popcorn? In Washington, 47 members of the United States Congress protested to the French ambassador Monday in a letter saying: "The proposed law threatens the religious rights of French children by forcing them to choose between school and religious practices that are central to their core values." France, working to unite the world, as only France can. |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #15 hey LH - one last question...If the Christian Idenity Church decides they want to make the same day as Martin Luther King Day a religious holiday and force their children to wear white hoods, as a sign of their faith, would you support that? I didn't think so. What's the difference? |
| Posted by: B 2004-2-11 7:30:26 AM |
| #14 Believers! Let the seething begin! SH: You sure that wasn't Massachusetts? |
| Posted by: tu3031 2004-2-10 8:11:48 PM |
| #13 After we are done digesting the newest round of international law that our Supreme Court plans for us to follow, we have the next chapter emerging in France. Frenchwoman Marries Her Dead Boyfriend. I hope for the sake of the honeymoon that rigor mortis has set-in. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2004-2-10 8:08:50 PM |
| #12 LH - I'm with the French (thought I'd never say that - ackkkk!) and JFM on this. IMHO The new Islamic push is to force their customs, however ass-backward and misogynist they are, on the rest of society as a PC/civil rights argument. The head coverings are an effort by muslim patriarchy (hate using left/feminist words, but it's correct here) to subdue and lessen female standing - purely due to the Islamic male's own fears of inferiority and inadequacy. Girls are trained from the day they are born that the scarf is a good thing, along with serving as second class citizens to males. Brainwashed, they will actually accept that the scarf is a necessary part of their being. God forbid they show an ankle lest the Islamic male find it necessary to rape her through no fault of his own..... |
| Posted by: Frank G 2004-2-10 8:04:09 PM |
| #11 I completely disagree with you liberal hawk. No one is telling them they can't wear the headscarves or the yammaka's, they are simply telling them they have to take them off when they get to school. Big difference. The Koran makes no law demanding they wear headscarves - they wear them because it's a cultural thing. There are lots of things we don't let children wear to school when we believe they are disruptive. What makes the headscarf so much more damn sacred than anything else? By your logic, the schools should let the children of the Church of Satan wear dead chickens around their neck if some one deems it, "religious". Would you support an American, entering a Muslim school demanding to wear provocative clothing? No, you wouldn't. You would expect them to respect the cultural norms. These children see women's hair EVERY day. It's not like the girls are going to suffer permanent pyscological damage if they let loose their locks for a few hours. It's a known fact that prohibiting gang attire on school grounds reduces gang violence and participation - how are headscarves, yammakas (sp) and crosses different from wearing the colors of a gang? |
| Posted by: B 2004-2-10 5:15:46 PM |
| #10 Mr Yosemite Sam The Algerian islamists set bombs in trains and metros in 1995. One of this tried to derail the TGV (very high speed train, about 180 miles an hour). It didn't explode, otherwise it would have caused hundreds of victims. My daughter was in one of the trains who rolled over the bomb without detonating it. At that time |
| Posted by: JFM 2004-2-10 4:12:37 PM |
| #9 Wonder how many of these Congress people are suppoters of the ACLU and thier agenda. |
| Posted by: Raptor 2004-2-10 4:10:24 PM |
| #8 French education minister Luc Ferry is (well, by French standards) a great intellectual. He is a strong critic of radical environmentalism and, more importantly, of the post-modernist rot that has done so much damage (as a French import) in US academia. |
| Posted by: closet neo-con 2004-2-10 3:32:40 PM |
| #7 Does anyone have the IDs of the U.S. Congressmen who signed such a letter? |
| Posted by: SamIII 2004-2-10 3:11:37 PM |
| #6 Does anyone have the IDs of the U.S. Congressmen who signed such a letter? |
| Posted by: SamIII 2004-2-10 3:11:33 PM |
| #5 Accept head scarves in otrder to assimilate Muslims? And what next? Female genital mutilation? Nuts. If Muslims are unhappy about France's status of women they are perfectly free to go to Saudi Arabia or to hell (assumming there is a difference). Same thing for the Berkeleys intellectuals who play moral relativism while the Kurds are gassed, the Soudanese enslaved or women oppressed and mutilated.
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| Posted by: JFM 2004-2-10 3:05:39 PM |
| #4 Car bombing in Paris in 3....2.... |
| Posted by: Yosemite Sam 2004-2-10 2:49:18 PM |
| #3 "Muslim pupils sometimes repeat anti-Semitic themes they see on Arabic satellite television. " So how about instead of banning head scarves, you go do something about the antisemitic Arabic satellite networks? Or better yet try to reform the whole region like we're doing? Or better yet just support us in what we're doing?? B. 1. This isnt a school uniform - as long as what you wear isnt "religious" as defined by the govt, you can wear it. The govt decides whats religious, and bans only that. B. Girls getting raped - gee i thought this was generally an NRA friendly site - remember guns, dont kill, people do. Well headscarves dont rape, young men do. C. Sure they can go to a private school - is that a good way to get them to assimilate? Basically the French approach to the muslim fundie problem is to fight it on their own soil. The US approach is to go solve the problem at the root, in the middle east. Fighting it on your own soil inevitably leads to discrimination and civil rights limitations - (yeah, i know the scarf ban is kinda, sorta justifiable, and France doesnt have and doesnt have to have the US view on absolute religious freedom and wall of seperation - but this is a step in a certain direction) one of the reasons Im a LIBERALhawk, and a liberalHAWK is that I think winning the war OVER THERE, in the islamic world, is necessary to avoid this kind of clash of civs within the West. France is illustrating the danger. |
| Posted by: liberalhawk 2004-2-10 1:58:25 PM |
| #2 hmm...I guess I sort of disagree with the conventional logic here. I don't see what the big deal is in banning the additional attire. In America, many schools went to uniforms or uniform codes to prevent the problems caused by gang attire which was as simple as a colored bandana or a red-sox hat. Doing so was highly successful in eliminating much of the gang activity. Big deal if they can't wear their headscarves or yammakas (sp?). Is it worth young girls getting raped every day?? Education is free, if they don't like it, they can always can pay for a private school. This is all much to do about nothing in my opinion. |
| Posted by: B 2004-2-10 1:17:14 PM |
| #1 Well then does that mean the French themselves have to stop wearing those stupid Berets? Perhaps an Inquisition into these matters will quell discontent. Where is Torqada when you need him |
| Posted by: dataman1 2004-2-10 1:08:06 PM |