Article

2003-12-12 Europe

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Posted by Steve 2003-12-12 3:26:29 PM|| || Front Page|| [3 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 No, they'll probably forbid you from being French. Asshat.

Posted by BH 2003-12-12 3:31:03 PM|| 2003-12-12 3:31:03 PM|| Front Page Top

#2 I think unless you can pass the test in apache dancing they shouldn't let you be naturalized. If you can't apache dance, you just ain't French.

Maybe, just maybe, they could substitute singing Maurice Chevalier songs from memory. But you'd have to play your own accordion...

Posted by Fred 2003-12-12 3:45:09 PM|| 2003-12-12 3:45:09 PM|| Front Page Top

#3 Women "are emeralds, jewels - the more they are shielded, the more beautiful they become. They lose their luster if they are outdoors,"
uh, yeah. What's the law on Muslims wearing foil hats to school?

Posted by D. Gephardt 2003-12-12 3:48:13 PM|| 2003-12-12 3:48:13 PM|| Front Page Top

#4 Women "are emeralds, jewels - the more they are shielded, the more beautiful they become. They lose their luster if they are outdoors,"

Ummm.... Dude - French chicks are hot. Women hiding their uni-brow and mustache behind a scarf are not.

Posted by Yosemite Sam 2003-12-12 3:48:38 PM|| 2003-12-12 3:48:38 PM|| Front Page Top

#5 Well Mohammed, that was exactly the French point: Don't take your flag to school.

German schools will have the same regulations pretty soon.

Posted by True German Ally 2003-12-12 3:52:12 PM|| 2003-12-12 3:52:12 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 "I urge all our brothers not to take their kids to school!" cried Mohammed, a Muslim of North African origin.

Ignorance is Strength!

Posted by mojo 2003-12-12 3:56:35 PM|| 2003-12-12 3:56:35 PM|| Front Page Top

#7 wait a minute guys - this is truely stupid. I presume that in France youre required, as in the US, to attend school. So if you cant afford a private school, the govt is basically forcing you to violate your religion. Isnt this the same intrusion on religious freedom that we despise in muslim countries? And that wouldnt pass muster for two minutes in the US of A? Ive subbed in my local schools, and there were girls with head scarves. Didnt cause the downfall of the west in THAT classroom, I'll tell you. What mattered was what was TAUGHT, not what the kids wore on their heads.

Other day, my daughter was in a holiday season concert at her school. Other kids were wearing christmas hats - my daughter, who is nothing if not proud of who she is, insisted on wearing a big floppy BLUE Hanukkah hat, with dreidels and Stars of David on it. My wife asked - should she call attention to herself like that - my reply - What do you think this is FRANCE???? This is AMERICA - even to ask such a thing is almost an insult to my fellow citizens. They are HAPPY to be tolerant of difference - indeed several came up and told my daughter how cute her hat was.

God Bless America
F**k France.
And pity on those of you who dont see what this is about.

Posted by liberalhawk 2003-12-12 3:58:02 PM|| 2003-12-12 3:58:02 PM|| Front Page Top

#8 "Young Muslims Angry"? Isn't that redundant and repetitive?

Posted by Dar 2003-12-12 4:08:14 PM|| 2003-12-12 4:08:14 PM|| Front Page Top

#9 LH, are you aware of the fact that many (if not most) of these girls don't have much of a choice whether they want to wear the scarf or not?

What if the Neo-Nazis declared themselves to be a church and insisted on sporting swastikas in schools?

Posted by True German Ally 2003-12-12 4:08:24 PM|| 2003-12-12 4:08:24 PM|| Front Page Top

#10 DAR LOL Yes. Seethe we must.

I'm with LH on this one tho, maybe fine for France, but the US is not officially atheist. I still think it's not the Devil in the details.

Posted by Shipman 2003-12-12 4:26:30 PM|| 2003-12-12 4:26:30 PM|| Front Page Top

#11 Paraphrasing George Carlin: "Your stuff is shit and my shit is stuff."

Posted by ,comma 2003-12-12 4:28:10 PM|| 2003-12-12 4:28:10 PM|| Front Page Top

#12 Yes! ,comma that's it exactly, they're frogs, we're freemen with stashes.

Posted by Shipman 2003-12-12 4:41:10 PM|| 2003-12-12 4:41:10 PM|| Front Page Top

#13 Women "are emeralds, jewels - the more they are shielded, the more beautiful they become. They lose their luster if they are outdoors,"

They are joools, so we hide them away, and we beat them or kill them if they dishonor us.

Posted by alaskasoldier 2003-12-12 4:52:59 PM|| 2003-12-12 4:52:59 PM|| Front Page Top

#14 Prob'ly not as far as Algeria, though...

I'd settle for half way though

Posted by Cheddarhead 2003-12-12 4:56:49 PM|| 2003-12-12 4:56:49 PM|| Front Page Top

#15 I'm with LH -- the French mania for secularism is beyond reason. Instead of banning differences, they should start doing things to teach tolerance. It IS possible; here in the US we seem to do a halfway decent job.

Posted by Robert Crawford 2003-12-12 5:10:43 PM|| [http://www.kloognome.com] 2003-12-12 5:10:43 PM|| Front Page Top

#16 I hear ya LH..and generally agree. However, look at the argumentative logic (or lack thereof) that the Muslims present. We see it as an issue of individual liberty...unfortunately too many Muslim have no concept of that. It's just another tool to use to keep the masses seething. That's where the French failed....and need to be better adept at taking the wind out of their sails or burkhas as the case may be. And obviously, they could give a rats a$$ about the welfare of their women.

Posted by D. Gephardt 2003-12-12 5:17:31 PM|| 2003-12-12 5:17:31 PM|| Front Page Top

#17 LH, from what I understand the absolute requirement for wearing head scarfs is a fairly recent addition to Islam and its not supported in the Koran.

I think the French should advertise how Algeria still allows the wearing of head scarfs, and how the French government will pay train and boat costs for anyone who wishes to emigrate.

Posted by Ruprecht 2003-12-12 5:34:38 PM|| 2003-12-12 5:34:38 PM|| Front Page Top

#18 It's all interpretation - that's why the covering req's vary so wildly in different places.

The key phrase in the Qu'uran is that women should cover their beauty. If you want the exact Sura, just pop over to http://www.islamicity.com/ and click on Quran and then index and look for beauty.

A good link to hang onto for those inevitable moments in the future when the actions fail to match up with the text. Note that the Haddiths (far less "available" online) generally supercede the Suras, where they disagree - which is rather often - because they came later as a "history" of Mohammed's actions. Each is a follower's sworn recollection / statement of an event and either what little Mo said - or what he did: Islam in action by Da Man. The poor lowly Suras are merely that Word of God revelation stuff he got on Day One of Islam.

Posted by ,comma 2003-12-12 5:51:58 PM|| 2003-12-12 5:51:58 PM|| Front Page Top

#19 TGA - er, theyre minors. They're supposed to dress the way their parents tell them, no? In any case this policy doesnt ask what the girls think, it bans it flat out. Re Nazis - are you saying that wearing a scarf is a symbol of a murderous regime - are you saying that Islam is not in fact a religion?

BTW, I hope youre not planning on banning the wearing of Kippahs by Jewish kids in Germany.

Ruprecht - did you know that Jewish men are NOT required to wear headcoverings at all times - just in prayer - constant wearing arose as a custom, since there are LOTS of occassions for prayer in traditional jewish life (like before and after every meal) So conservative and even some Orthodox jews will go bareheaded. But thats NOT a question the State should be involved in - if an Orthodox Jewish kid feels a religous obligation to wear a kippah, should the govt get into the details of the Shulchan Aruch and the Mishneh Torah?

Look - guys this is either a war for freedom, including freedom of religion, or its a war for secularism and/or christianity against Islam. It cant be both, no matter how much you shout that Islam isnt a real religion. George W. Bush, bless his heart, seems to have gotten this one right. The French, with their tradition of militant leftie athiests fighting militant Rightie Catholics have NOT. Tolerance IS our genius, - its NOT the same as laicism or secularism, and its NOT clear to me that the Europeans get it even NOW. That is why WE are a superpower and they are not - WE can assimilate minorities, they can only either squash them or roll over to them. (pardon TGA, Im thinking mainly of france, though im not sure others have done better) Frances intolerance towards headscarves is PART AND PARCEL OF their view of the middle east - a total other, to be manipulated, or appeased, but NOT the Bush vision of transformation.

Posted by liberalhawk 2003-12-12 6:07:27 PM|| 2003-12-12 6:07:27 PM|| Front Page Top

#20 LH I have to disagree with you here. Societies work to the extent they are coherent. In American terms the USA works because immigrants assimilate. If they didn't the USA wouldn't exist. Its that simple! You would be like Somalia, or held together by a Saddam like dictator.

Sure you can tolerate non-assimilation to a degree and you can tolerate celebration of group differences, but only in the wider context of general assimilation.

This is why muslim immigrants are such an issue in France and to a lesser extent in other places. You get a large non-assimilated sub-population. The head scarf is a badge of non-assimilation. The French government is right to ban it. I see this as very positive. At last the French government is facing up to a threat to the very existence of their society.

Posted by phil_b 2003-12-12 6:15:33 PM|| 2003-12-12 6:15:33 PM|| Front Page Top

#21 Phil:

No, actually I think that Liberalhawk is onto something, or rather you both are, and you're probably closer in opinion than you might think, looking as I do from the outside.

I'm a Canadian who thinks about multiculturalism here more negatively than most. I'm also a Uke by ancestry and therefore someone who purportedly should be more warm and fuzzy about it.

The greatest strength of US culture, is its strong sense of identity. It's the thing that binds the place together. It's a sense of "being American" that's certainly unlike what we've got here in Canada. Yet, to a degree, it *is* like what we've got here in Canada, in that there exist a lot of sub-cultures in the US that stick with a lot of great traditions they bring to the table.

The difference between the two places I think, is that the unifying point in American culture is an idea - a concept of freedom and personal responsibility - rather than a place (which I think better characterizes Canada's national identity - ASIDE: that's a simplification but I think there's a big grain of truth there), or a "genetic" identity which seems to hold sway in Europe (ie. you can live in France your entire life but never be "French").

Liberalhawk mentions the importance of "diversity" in America, and it's true. It's true that America almost invariably benefits from the diversity of it's population. But to speak to your point Phil, there's a unifying idea and that binds people together: "freedom; responsibility; the American Dream" that trumps the differences.

There's diversity of expression and at the same time, a cohesion of purpose in the US. If ever there should be something to fight against when you see it in the US, is any sort of erosion in that very unique cohesion of purpose. It's something that you don't see in many other places in the world. And I think that it's a key part of what makes American culture so strong.

-Vic

Posted by Vic 2003-12-12 7:27:22 PM|| 2003-12-12 7:27:22 PM|| Front Page Top

#22 Personally I think it should be encouraged the other way.The kids should be incouraged to wear thier religious gear.(Or not,thier choice.even the Muslim girls should be able to decide)
If any group or member of a group causes trouble for another group,come down on the offenders with both feet and grind in the heels.
Teach these undusipluneds urchins tolerance the hard way.

Posted by raptor 2003-12-12 7:29:19 PM|| 2003-12-12 7:29:19 PM|| Front Page Top

#23 I have to correct my previous posting: In Germany the veil will not be banned for the children, only for teachers: a move I agree with.

In Germany schools are seen as neutral ground. Maybe that's an egalitarian view you don't share, but nobody saw a problem in British school uniforms either (from what I hear in Australia all pupils, including those of public schools, must wear them). You might say, how repressive.

LH, of course Islam is a religion, but so are many others and for example Scientology is recognized as a church. Where to stop? What does it take in the U.S. to found a new church? Are there churches more equal than others?

Had the veil just be a religious requirement I don't think the French would have been so rigid. But obviously the veil creates trouble at school. I guess no Jew puts pressure on another Jew to wear a kippah (except in a synagogue, but then even I wear one out of respect). To understand the French view, you have to know whats really going on in the French "banlieue" (crime ridden suburbs with high rise low rent apartment blocks where an overwhelming majority are immigrants). Girls endure heavy social pressure to wear veils (if not they are seen as free-to-be-raped "whores").

Minors, LH? I don't think parents should force 16 year old girls to wear veils or burkas, sorry. A religious symbol that is forced upon you is nothing but a symbol of repression.

Maybe you find the French step too radical. Maybe it is. But as long as the veil is more than just a religious accessoire and in many cases a symbol of repression (at least for many women) I won't blame the French for ensuring that kids are equal at least in one place: the school.

I kinda disagree with you LH that the U.S. have been doing a so much better job with assimilation than Europe. First of all the U.S. was built on immigration, while in Europe immigrants always had to face a population with a more or less homogenous ethnicity and a dominating religion, language and culture.

They haven't fared badly. Italian, Spanish or Greek "guest workers" managed the assimilation process very well without giving up their identity. It is different with immigrants of Islamic countries who most of the time only expect tolerance but do not return the favor. They DON'T WANT to assimilate and what is more, they are actually expecting that the population of the country that received them follows or at least adapts to THEIR rules. Remember that Norwegian example: Norwegian girls were told to dress more conservatively because miniskirts incite Muslim men to disrespect and molest them? Sorry, that's not the assimilation I want to see.

And I'm not so sure whether I should be too impressed with the U.S. method of assimilation when the taxi driver in D.C. will only find the Capitol if I explain the way to him in urdu.

Nobody is going to restrict the freedom of religion in Europe. But you know, there are "holy man" who justify the clitoral mutilation of young girls in North Africa as "mandated by the Qoran" (which is not true). But if it were, would we tolerate it in the name of "religious freedom"? I know, it's an extreme example. But first the veil, then the burka, then separation of genders in school, then not sending girls to school at all. How "tolerant" should we be?

The French take the view of "stop the beginnings". I cannot blame them for that.

Posted by True German Ally 2003-12-12 7:39:14 PM|| 2003-12-12 7:39:14 PM|| Front Page Top

#24 for example Scientology is recognized as a church

Bad example; just a few years ago the French passed a law that specifically targets Scientology and (bizarrely enough) Southern Baptists. Supposedly it's to deal with criminal conspiracies using the mask of religion, but oddly enough, I've never heard it being applied to Moslem criminal conspiracies.

And, seriously TGA, if you think there's a "slippery slope" from tolerating unusual dress to tolerating mutilation, you need to get a grip.

Posted by Robert Crawford 2003-12-12 8:57:26 PM|| [http://www.kloognome.com/] 2003-12-12 8:57:26 PM|| Front Page Top

#25 True TGA but you and Liberalhawk forget the tolerance extended to the Ultra-Orthodox Jews in the US--their women wear wigs and have to breed like cows--and are separate in the house of worship--just like the Moslems you feel so free to criticize

Posted by NotMikeMoore 2003-12-12 9:25:01 PM|| 2003-12-12 9:25:01 PM|| Front Page Top

#26 Liberalhawk, I had heard that. You wear the headcovering when you are thinking about God, so naturally that became a constant thing because who wants to admit that they aren't thinking about God all the time.

In the US (until fairly recently) assimilation was promoted, it was one of the keys to success. You could succeed without it but it was far more difficult. In Europe that has not really been the case, which leads to unassimilated, semi-hostile groups living in their midst. That's not a sustainable position.

Posted by ruprecht 2003-12-12 10:02:34 PM|| 2003-12-12 10:02:34 PM|| Front Page Top

15:54 Doc H
09:47 raptor
05:36 The Dodo
01:47 ,comma
01:05 Tresho
01:01 Aris Katsaris
23:27 Anonymous
23:24 Steve White
23:13 4thInfVet
23:09 Anonymous
22:57 4thInfVet
22:50 4thInfVet
22:22 Fred
22:13 Fred
22:05 Denny
22:02 ruprecht
21:54 Fred
21:29 Kentar
21:25 NotMikeMoore
21:23 Glenn (not Reynolds)
21:21 Jarhead
21:17 4thInfVet
21:16 Jarhead
21:06 Jarhead