Quebec (twice) refuses to teach French to woman because she wears a Niqab

skdadl wrote:

You persist in dodging issues of democratic principle by imagining utterly irrelevant and trivial examples pulled out of the ether every which way.

What, pulled out from where.

Unionist wrote:

And just so you know, Bill 94 (the product of cheap pandering to xenophobia)...

This entire debate, in the wider sense of course, has been cravenly used as a wedge for xenophobia and its panderers to stoke their usual hatreds.  We open this field of public debate to them not at our own peril, but at the expense of others.

Michelle wrote:

For me, Snert, it's about not giving an official stamp to a religious civil institution.

What's your precise objection, Michelle? A person claims (say) that their religion forbids them from engaging in or recognizing any marital/family ceremonies, certificates, structures, or decisions, other than those administered by their own religion. The person asks no funding, but certainly demands that their marriage and divorce and family relationships be recognized for spousal benefits, survivor benefits, etc., just like everyone who gets married or divorced under the white, western system. What's your problem with that scenario?

To be clear - I totally oppose that scenario. I totally oppose individuals opting out of uniform social norms for religious (or any) reasons, but then claiming social rights and privileges. For example, the law which legalized same-sex marriage allows religious homophobes to continue officiating over religious marriages - [b]and those marriages have legal recognition[/b]! That was Paul Martin's "compromise", and no one is fighting to eliminate this craven pandering to homophobia.

My problem with the niqab was never the niqab - it was the demand by some individuals to be served by (or to bare their face to) members of a particular sex, for trivial issues (like getting a photo id for a health card). The human rights commission here issued a correct opinion that such "accommodation" was over the top - just as it dismissed those customers who didn't want to be served by someone wearing a turban or hijab etc. That's the right balance to strike. But now, on rabble, we have some character condemning "Québec feminists" for refusing to stand up for the so-called "right" to cover one's face, as if this is anything but a trumped-up issue in this province aimed at getting the dinosaurs out of their caves, after the provocations of 2007 failed.

Your indignation is very much misplaced. The problems of racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia, and misogyny have nothing to do with a handful of women who for whatever personal reason want to cover their faces when males are around. But it is very convenient for the Charests and Marois of this world to have the debate framed in this trivial way. You know why? Because just as they lost in 2007, using this issue, they think they have a chance of winning.

"The problems of racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia, and misogyny have nothing to do with a handful of women who for whatever personal reason want to cover their faces when males are around"

I couldn't agree more, Unionist. Meeting Muslima students in London it was often claimed that ladies only wore a niqab on the insistence of their husbands/families. These ladies often told me that they were against this kind of chauvinistic covering. How many feminist Muslimas wear niqab? Many choose to wear a light covering or even a small scarf but would not submit to covering their whole faces. They did not consider niqab a free 'choice' as we Western-minded people understand it.

Here are my thoughts. 

While I look good in a suit [I'm talking the new james Bond where he looks great in the suit but you can tell he detests wearing it] but being a surfer I prefer comfortable clothes.  Spring hits and it's sandles and shorts until October.  I like to dress very casual.

If I go into a fancy restraunt I may be refused service because I don't meet the dress code.  Even at our defense head quarters in Ottawa there are services I will be [and have been] refused for wearing jeans due to the strict dress policy. Uniform OR dress shoes, dress pants dress shirt.

I will be refused service for my choise of attire however if it is a religious garment then it is discrimination to refuse service.  How I see it someone choose their religion and accepts the various dress rules the very same way I choose NOT to be religious and choose to dress how I want.  I find it unfair that someone's choice of religion superceeds my choice to be an athiest. You choose to follow a religion and it's discrimination to tell you not to follow your religions rules.  If you don't follow a religion then you don't have a say.

To be fair, the issue isn't just that atheism isn't given much credibility, it's also that atheism makes no demands of atheists.  Atheism doesn't, for example, demand that atheists wear a cowboy hat, but Judaism demands that a Jew wear a kippah or yarmulke.  So, we accomodate that Jew, but not the atheist.  Further, it's unlikely that the atheist could make any kind of convincing argument that demonstrates that his cowboy hat is part of an articulable system of beliefs, whereas, for example, a Catholic would be able to demonstrate that while their religion doesn't demand that they wear a crucifix, it's still part of a personal religious requirement, so to speak.

I'm a secular guy myself, and not at all unsympathetic to what you're saying, but for all kinds of screwed up reasons, personal free will takes a backseat to the arbitrary commandments of invisible deities. 

Quote:

Talmudic and Canon Law tribunals are also alive and kicking.. above ground as they are apparently deemed a better fit for a white, Judeo-Christian society. 

Are they? It could be that they still are, in practice, but after Muslims asked for their own tribunals, the Premier vowed to eliminate all of them, Jewish and Catholic included.

I think that no religious tribunals should be given standing Canadian courts.  In most courts now they ask you whether you want to affirm your oath or swear it.  I also think they should totally do away with swearing an oath and make everyone affirm without any religious trappings.

I agree with P4's point too.  It's also a class thing.  It reaffirms the ridiculousness of this law.

There should be no such thing as dress codes in a civilized society.

kropotkin1951 wrote:

 

 When they start banning nuns wear because it is based on the modesty concept I will believe it is something other than hatred of Islamic people.

Many Islamic people want to be freed from these conventions! Why else do they want to live in non-Islamic countries? We have fought for our rights and as women we have struggled against patriarchy and the conventions that treated us as second class citizens. how can we not extend that hard-won liberation to others who choose to live with us? The theory behind niqab is that a pretty woman is a distraction to a man, a thoroughly misogynistic belief that goes far beyond 'modesty'.

Unionist wrote:

Michelle wrote:

There's a difference between setting up religious legal systems and letting people wear what they want.

So that's where [i]you[/i] draw the line - where the white western judicial system is called into question?

By the way, I do not believe there is such a thing as a "human right" to "wear what they want" - for anyone.

And just so you know, Bill 94 (the product of cheap pandering to xenophobia) does [b]not[/b] force women to remove their niqab in publicly-run language class. Any woman who wants to invoke religious belief may ask to be accommodated. What Bill 94 does is to [b]deny[/b] that accommodation where the requirement for a bare face is justified on grounds of security, identification, or communication. That is a matter that a tribunal can hear and decide. So, if showing one's face is in fact not required for language instruction (as several here claim), then a niqabi will have the right to wear her niqab in language class. But first, they have to invoke their right to ask for accommodation, and stand their ground.

Wow. For someone who seems to find it in himself the ability to muster a definitive opinion on just about everything, this moral curve ball is pretty astonishing. When do we start the "Afghan People will win (only if such is deemed justifiably legal after all the facts are established in a Canadian Supreme Court decision)" thread?

Nice defense of the reverse onus by the way.

There you go again. Suddenly Niqab = Islam. Personal prejudice, Usually based in ignorance.

How breathtakingly simplistic. I see you are still avoiding the issue.

Point being, the only people who are restricted in their dress on the basis of religion in Canada are Muslims. The rest of us folks are simply limited by the law not to be obscene. These are two different things. Lily_C knows the score. This is about Islam, not dress code, or problems learning to speak French. Go get some coffee, think about this, and get back to me.

I believe people have the right to dress as they wish in accordance with their religious practice.

The reason that it does, Cueball, is that people have a hard time seeing certain kinds of religious apparel being worn as a free choice, in the way that we understand religious freedom. I believe that people should be allowed to dress in accordance with their religion, but not to force others to do so. Which is not to say that all face-coverings are worn under duress, of course they aren't, but it can seem that way to our Western minds.

I suppose where I'm coming from is a context where many women I worked with (Lesbian/Queer Muslim women) saw the covering as a symbol of their oppression, although the covering itself was the least of their worries. I would love to believe that religious clothing was freely worn as a proud badge of identity, but in so many cases it is not. Sorry if I have gone off topic

I am really having trouble understanding why people keep using the word "religion." This is more broadly a question of cultural identity, and quite frankly, it is no one's business why a woman continues to choose to cover when she comes to Canada. Attaching that so closely to religion just gives white Western males (and obviously some females who don't really get how choice works -- it doesn't allow for mind-reading or putting words in other people's mouths) the opportunity to grill her on her doctrinal correctness, which is none of their forking business on several counts.

Freedom of conscience comes first in the Charter, and there's a reason for that. In spite of what some have said above, you don't know and can't know and don't need to know and don't deserve to know why any particular woman covers, and that is a statement not about individuals but about women's equality. I agree mainly with Cueball's analysis, and I am shocked by claims that equality means asserting men's rights in every situation, as if there were a level-playing field. That's not where the concern for equality comes from, and just pretending that women are not marked in these situations, that men and women are neutered equals, is reactionary to me.

That is their business, don't you think?

So, laws for all personal conduct then?

The only limit on such free expression as far as clothing is concerned is what is clearly obscene. As far as I know there is no other limit on what people may wear, until now. So, this is different. Sorry. I don't know why you are tainting your reputation for clear insight with nit-picking on this point.

This isn't about someone getting ID'd, and other than the fact that I am probably opposed to the whole idea of "ID" in the first place, i don't necessarily disagree. That said I hardly think that having someone step aside to a female attendant (or making them wait until one is available) is a great big deal, and amounts to an unreasonable demand. On the other hand, that is very work-a-day civil example we are talking about. How about a police officer now having the implicit right to demand the removal of a veil during the process of interviewing and ID'ing passengers in an automobile when some breach in the law has occurred?

But maybe that sounds a little more like an US army check point in Iraq?

It's nice that you have such a soft spot for Quebec sovereignty. I admit a man using "identity politics" to try and trump a debate being had among feminists about a law voted in mostly by men, on the basis of the right of "self determination of peoples" sounds a bit like someone from Alabama invoking "states rights" when talking about the "right to life", but perhaps that is just my mood. Odd, that the premise here is that a woman should be denied the right to "respect" the sovereignty of Quebec by learning the official language in the cause of her "liberation"....

Let's remember that aside from the complexities of the right of the national security aparatus to make it necessary that everyone have photo ID handy when they go to a public toilet, lets remember that what we are really talking in this thread is denying a woman the right to education.

The onus as to what is "reasonable" should reside where, in this case? On the person who wants the education, or with the state?

Cheers... I mean Salut.

Women Know Your Limits

Cueball wrote:

Women Know Your Limits

freedom of expression is the right to present yourself to the world as you want. I can wear a t-shirt with a protest slogan as well as show my devotion to a cultural practice, it is the same right I would argue.

Lily_C wrote:

The reason that it does, Cueball, is that people have a hard time seeing certain kinds of religious apparel being worn as a free choice, in the way that we understand religious freedom. I believe that people should be allowed to dress in accordance with their religion, but not to force others to do so. Which is not to say that all face-coverings are worn under duress, of course they aren't, but it can seem that way to our Western minds.

I suppose where I'm coming from is a context where many women I worked with (Lesbian/Queer Muslim women) saw the covering as a symbol of their oppression, although the covering itself was the least of their worries. I would love to believe that religious clothing was freely worn as a proud badge of identity, but in so many cases it is not. Sorry if I have gone off topic

"Many women saw the covering as the symbol of their oppression". Gee and I thought bras played that role ! Before we start banning innocent things, let us know what exactly is the symbol of women's oppression? Could it be a thong? High heel shoes? How about skirts.. Very few men wear skirts. 

and a thong is only oppressive if it's too small :)