Well done, France!
Posted on: September 15, 2010 - 7:46am
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Well done, France!
No more the indignity of the BURKA on the streets!
Parliament has outlawed it.
Also, not decent to see and not being seen.
Let us hope ALL European nations adopt the same policy.
Islam degrades women big time!
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There's only about 2000 women in France who wear that thing. Shouldn't be too much of a problem.
Apparently, men who force a woman to wear a burka or niqaab face a 30.000 euro fine. Not entirely sure how they're going to enforce that one. If he can force her to wear it, he can force her to say it was her idea in the first place.
Anyway, muslims threatening violence in 3...2...1...
http://blogs.timeslive.co.za/common-dialogue/2010/09/15/asian-muslims-threaten-france-with-terror-over-burkas/
*yawn*
All valid points Mr. Mouse... But I believe this to be less about actual "Liberation" than making a statement by drawing a line in the sand... especially when islamics recently shut down Paris by swarming the streets in protest... I think this is the gov't's way of saying "You've over-played your hand, stupid"...You are probably correct that this will result in violence...and France's reaction will speak volumes....
www.RichWoodsBlog.com
I support this ban 100% (See earlier threads on the subject), wether it's about security, liberation or drawing a line in the sand. I'm just extremely curious to see if this is going to work.
(I'm also looking forward to seeing fox news report this, and going on about how "right-wing" France is being)
Ah, actually, I don't think it will be that bad. Sorry, I should have elaborated a bit.
So far, that link I posted is the only real threat of violence I've heard of, and it's not from french muslims, but from the chairman of the Indonesia Ulema Council.
I've had some experience with veil-related muslim protests in my own country, and while they can get very enthusiastic while enjoying the right to protest, it eventually simmers down to nothing.
And this is anecdotal, of course, but I personally know a surprising number of muslims who support the ban, and even more who simply couldn't care less.
They've got about 6 million muslims in France, I think. I'd be very surprised if more than a few thousand will even bother to protest against this ban, if any.
I could be wrong. We'll see.
No, not that creepy thing outside in public.
The habit is humiliating for those trying to keep a dialogue with the person behind the burka.
No such medieval stuff in a modern city, for decency's sake.
In any case, I'll by buying up the local supply of french flags, and selling them for big profit.
You'll what?
Sell them for profit. Buy two and get a free box of matches.
Great 1st step France. The next step is to ban Muslims.
Click here to find out why Christianity is the biggest fairy tale ever created!! www.nobeliefs.com/exist.htm www.JesusNEVERexisted.com
Uhm....no.
They can use the ugly mask inside their houses, but not OUTSIDE in public.
Very simple & appropriate.
Do this experiment yourself:
Wear the stupid mask and go to a bank to open an account.
Then tell us what was the manager's reaction [if he did not need to see the ID book].
The "mask" is not only ugly, but it is scary to children.
And then you have the NEED to identify people very quickly, in case of danger.
The moment you walk outside your house you do not have the freedom to cover your face with the pretext that it is religious practice!
Not in a laic/secular society.
I want to see the face of people walking by me, like they need to see me.
Fair is fair; it's not religious to wear masks in the name of gods!
Just back away slowly, he's rabid.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
Aw geez, not another one.
This is a useless ban. It is too easy to get around. They can just wear a head scarf and a medical mask and it provides the same coverage.
To solve this problem we need to attack the virtue system that burqas represent and show how it is abusive towards women. Refusing federal aid to any imam who advocates the use of a burqa along with a pr campaign would probably be more effective. I also like the law against men forcing women to wear the burqa being on the books despite it being unenforceable.
I Am My God
The absence of evidence IS evidence of absence
I oppose this ban, not because I love Islam, or think that burqas are a good thing, rather I oppose it because it shows that it's okay for the majority to take away the rights of the minority. I support if they for example banned women from being forced into burqas as that would protect liberties, not take them away.
Imagine if this happened in America or if Obama banned the mosque on ground zero. Obama said "I will protect the rights and liberties of Americans", he didn't say "I will protect the rights and liberties of Americans except for Muslims"
If he did that what's stopping him from adding "except for Asians", or "except for atheists"?
I don't know if you guys noticed, but we atheists are a minority. Once we give them permission to dictate what the minority can and cannot do or say, we lose.
Can someone who's followed this clarify exactly what this law was about? I mean did they just decide they don't like burkas and banned them for the lulz or is it about not letting anyone wear anything that covers them up from head to toe?
So you're in favor of people who force women to wear burkas, being fined 30.000 euros ?
What's this law about ? It's about Sarkozy and his chums getting their asses kicked in the polls by extremist rightwing parties.
I am 6'2 " , white and 250 lbs. If I walked into a bank with something covering my face, 90% of the people in the bank would have their hands in the air. The other 10% would be shoveling money into a bag.
"Very funny Scotty; now beam down our clothes."
VEGETARIAN: Ancient Hindu word for "lousy hunter"
If man was formed from dirt, why is there still dirt?
The written Law is very carefull in not saying Burkhas, Islam or females. It says, one should never cover their faces beyond recognition in a public area. For health reasons, for security reasons for safty reasons; religion is not recognized. The same standard that is recognized in Bangor, Bombay, Belgrade, Belfast, Bagdhad, Beirut and Berlin; and those are just the "'B"s. Those are the same laws that existed decades ago when a man dressed as a woman could be arrested. The laws were never repealed; they were simply ignored. Now France wants to un-ignore them. Go for it!
"Very funny Scotty; now beam down our clothes."
VEGETARIAN: Ancient Hindu word for "lousy hunter"
If man was formed from dirt, why is there still dirt?
You'll what "by buying up"??
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
As long as this is not being done as "We are afraid of all Muslims" and strictly being done for pragmatic reasons, such as the ability for law enforcement to prove identity and prevent radicals from hiding their identity.
We have similar laws in the states, regarding the ability for workers to do their jobs. One cannot claim religious discrimination if their religion prevents them from doing a job.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
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That should have been "be buying up". Typo.
There's a question of the legitimacy of the states actions and there's a separate question of the legitimacy of wearing it. In reality women in free societies are not clamoring for the right to be veiled, and while I hate to see the state try to impose dress codes on people it is an insidious and not so subtle form of societal pressure away from modernity and laïcité to compel women to veil themselves.
Personally I think if a woman wants to wear it and get rickets then it's her life and choice to do that but it may not be so simple when we talk about our shared public spaces in a secular country.
Some women are masochists they love to be beaten so when you see a woman being beaten on the street you ask her "are you a masochist?" If she loves her boyfriend and doesn't want him to get in trouble she says yes. Fine you're a masochist and you're in love but if you are going to beat your girlfriend then beat her up in your own fucking apartment and not on the sidewalk please.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
The Rational Response Squad ladies and gentlemen!!!
I am in favour of preventing people from forcing the burka.
That's stupid, I'm afraid.
If 9 10s of the ladies in your town had the burka, you would not be able to have friends!
How do you greet Muslim friends in burkas?!...
No such MASKS in public, no!!
And do you think a hefty fine and a prison sentence will be able to accomplish that ?
I'm actually sort of with Cpt Pineapple on this one. I'm uncomfortable with this ban because I don't think it should be within the governments power to tell people what they can and cannot wear.
I agree with the idea that men who force women to wear the burka should be punished. I also occupy the middle ground in that I think the government should be able to ask people not to wear a face covering in places where it might be suitable (banks and other institutions where covering the face can help criminal intent) but a blanket ban on this feels like a huge over-reach of power.
Forget Jesus, the stars died so that you could be here
- Lawrence Krauss
I'm with the Captain as well.
I doubt you even need a new law...if someone can prove a woman is being forced to wear a Burka and get her to press charges I am sure France has some laws that would cover the situation (Not that you could convince most women in that situation to do any such thing).
I don't even think anyone can say this is about helping police keep tabs on people with a straight face. Of course it is about Islam, all the news I've seen on both sides is about Islam. The only people trying to obfuscate are the politicians pushing for the ban.
On the flip side, I understand the problem...France has a fast growing population of poor, fundamentalist Muslims who are not integrating with the existing French culture. America has the same issue with Mexicans. I don't know what the long term solution is, or if there should be a long term solution, or if there is a long term problem. I can understand why they are worried though.
But I don't see this as a productive response, it will likely be the opposite. To top it off there is already a very large endowment set up to pay fines so people can ignore it if they want (heard on NPR a while ago).
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
Well I don't agree. I lived in the Belleville quarter of Paris for 5 years where lots of Muslims reside and I saw women wearing burquas maybe 3 times. It's not an attack on Muslims or backlash against them in fact it would not be absurd to think that the majority of Muslim families have felt relieved. A large majority of Muslims don't want their daughters to wear headscarves, veils, or burquas but also feel uncomfortable with being unfaithful in certain ways to their religious tradition. They feel pressure from the more conservative members of their families and communities "you're a bad Muslim" etc... With such laws in place they can say "I agree with you but I can't break the law."
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
You don't think the law will just give the conservatives something to get people riled up about? It looks like direct religious persecution, I just don't see that making things more calm and rational among the Islamic conservatives.
I could be wrong though, I guess we'll see.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
But they are outraged anyway. France is the most secular country in Europe and Muslims want to live there more and agree with the laws more in polls and get along better with other religious groups there. It's a tiny minority of people who are calling for all this veiling and other such things and almost none of them are women. Why should we be so concerned that a small group of radicals whose views are even outside their own community standards, and who want to persecute people themselves are put out by this?
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
I imagine the concern among those outside of the group is that you can legislate particular types of voluntary non-harmful minority belief.
Granted, this is a U.S. centric viewpoint, I know the European countries, in general, are more willing to censor religions and might be more used to that.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
I'm with Pineapple too but feel the need to point out you don't need a government law to require people not to cover their faces in a bank or elsewhere as private companies can certainly have a dress code. I've been to restaurants that refuse to serve anyone who isn't dressed formally and go to any beach you will see the "No Shoes, No Shirt, No Service" signs. Of course, the government already has already told us what we must wear, see what happens when a woman walks around topless.
As for punishing the men who force women to wear burkas 30000 euros doesn't sound like enough to me. Throw them in prison in the same cell as Butch and turn around, they are probably terrorists and wife beaters anyway.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
I would argue that it is harmful because there is an obvious health risk and a clear element of coercion involved. But France has signed onto the European Convention on Human Rights, which recognizes the right to publicly express one’s religious beliefs and the french conception of laïcité doesn't extend to what clothes people are allowed to wear in public. I can understand the concern though because only Muslims wear full veils.
However, just like the headscarf issue I would probably agree with you and be more disturbed by it if not for the fact that girls are compelled and the majority of Muslims don't actually like it. I think people should be able to harm themselves if they want.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
I agree that separating true voluntary cases from involuntary would be tricky.
Of course, from most of our perspectives I'd say 90% of theists were not allowed to make an informed, adult choice so most of it is coercion. The Burka is just a very visible example...but there are lots of groups that mandate clothing for women and no-on (well, not as many) gets upset at those, even though it isn't much better.
Oh well. I hope there isn't a backlash. In my ideal world western countries are de-conversion engines where crazy theists come in one side and their great grandchildren come out the other side fully secularized. I worry that someday the ratio will change and immigrants will be conversion engines turning secular states into theocracies.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
As many have already pointed out, none of us can wear just any old thing just anywhere we want. Even going naked is restricted to certain places - and isn't that a good thing.
The burka could be harmful in those health and safety situations in the ways others have mentioned. But I believe it is harmful in another way as well - to the men of that community. What does it say to and about those men? That they have no self control - that they are like two year olds in a candy store - that they are allowed to be out of control with just a glimpse of a part of a woman's body - that they may treat any woman who dresses differently with disdain. These attitudes are not appropriate and are detrimental to those men who are trying to fit into a western society.
I agree it is a symbol of slavery for the women who wear it. Unfortunately there many who have been raised to believe it is the only way to be a respectable woman. And so they wear it voluntarily. It isn't that the men have forced them, it is that they have been convinced from childhood that that article of clothing protects them from the ravaging hordes of men out in the cold cruel world and makes them "good" in the eyes of their god. If it is illegal, they may see that they are not automatically "bad" nor are they going to cause men to grab and rape them on the street if they go out without one.
It's sort of like skepticism - we don't want our brains to fall out here. It isn't legal to beat your children or wife to the point of injury even if your religion says it is. It isn't legal to marry a 10 year old in most western countries even if Mohammad married a six year old girl and had sex with her. Many countries already have laws that restrict the more extreme religious practices. This is just one more.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
Too perfect...
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
"Unfortunately there many who have been raised to believe it is the only way to be a respectable woman. And so they wear it voluntarily. "
Yes, because having choices is terrible... we all should all be forced to dress as secularly as possible.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
I don't like the burqa and I don't like the ban.
Talking to some one through the slot of a post box is a piece of cultural baggage I can live without unless I'm in a sandstorm.
I can never help thinking when I see this outfit in the street that it's a robust statement of otherness.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
Many women in muslim countries have no other choice. They would be killed if they went out of their home without a burka on. And if they were raised in that culture, in one of those countries, the freedom we have in the west is too many choices. Slaves can not easily free themselves of their fetters.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
I don't want to see in my suburb BARBARIC propaganda of a religion that humiliates, denigrates and diminishes women.
Take for example Malaysia where pregnant teens end up abandoning their babies for fear of Qur'an verses like 24:2!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11214652
Yes, but the burqa is at most an outward symbol of oppression, compared to how those women are treated at home you are hardly helping them escape slavery by keeping them out of the burqa. With a law like this you might make yourself feel better because you don't see it but the women still live in an Islamic fundamentalist household. And so now the women forced to wear burqas will get a small fine, what do you think is going to happen to them when they get home? And if she is brave enough to tell the police she is being forced to wear it her husband or father gets a big fine and maybe a year in jail. One year isn't very long, what do you think happens to her when he gets out? Rather than focus on the damn piece of clothing why don't we create rescue shelters where women from extremist families can go for physical protection? Then when you see someone wearing a burqa you can encourage them to go to the shelter. It is kind of like a big sign saying "help me". Take that sign away and it becomes a lot more difficult to separate the women being oppressed and those who live willingly in more moderate families.
There was a case here in Ohio where a teenager in an islamic family ran away and hid with some christian family in Florida I think. Granted, she was trading one religious crazy for a different religious crazy but she believed that her father would kill/beat her for becoming christian and the courts forced her to go back to her islamic family. Now that is a problem. We need to create places where teenagers and women who fear for their lives can go and be confident that the law will protect them and not force them back to their families. Create laws that encourage and protect women who decide to leave the abusive situations not punish them for wearing some stupid religious garb. Yes, there will be some women who will stay in abusive families because they are too afraid or maybe even believe it is the way things are supposed to be and there isn't much you can do for them. Just make it as easy as possible for them to leave. I don't see this law doing that.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
they have standardised the response "Assalaamu 'alaykum"
so what happens in 5-6 years time when the media have a slow week and pick up on a new strain of Flu Virus working its way through Asia, the normal Panic kicks off in the western world and we all go round wearing face masks to protect us from the scary Flu germs, what do the french Government say? "sorry guys, no protection for you, Its the law".
the Law is Broken, simply broken. as pointed out earlier its a grose over reach of power and an infringment on basic human rights. this is not the way to deal with religious differences especially when dealing with a minority. Take the fight to the source of the problem, stop wasting time taking the small toy out of the childs mouth when the kids stood in a room full of small choke hazards!
"Our culture is superior. Our culture is superior because our religion is Christianity and that is the truth that makes men free."
Speech to the Christian Coalition, September 1993
GOT TO TAKE MY HAT OFF TO THIS GREAT BIT OF REASONING, WELL DONE, TRUELY WELL DONE. its easy to sell lies, not so easy to return them.
Why are you trying to find a justification for the oppression of women in Islam?!
Islam offends women.
Islam also offends me.
Allah is a barbaric IDOL invented by a mental syphilitic.
Women are inferior humans in Muslim countries!
Well done, France!
Im definately not trying to Justify the opression of women or anyone else for that matter. I'm trying to make the point that this is not the right way round of doing things. banning an item of clothing does nothing but remove a symbol of opression, the opression is still there alive and healthy. I think if one cares about the subject enough a reminder that it is happening just down the street from you can be used to drive people into positive action. positive action needs to be taken against the opression of Women in Islam and any opression against anyone in the name of a belief system.
setting a nation wide dress code does nothing but hide the issue.
"Our culture is superior. Our culture is superior because our religion is Christianity and that is the truth that makes men free."
Speech to the Christian Coalition, September 1993
GOT TO TAKE MY HAT OFF TO THIS GREAT BIT OF REASONING, WELL DONE, TRUELY WELL DONE. its easy to sell lies, not so easy to return them.