Amara Bamba examines the background to the current campaign in France against the veil and draws attention to an online petition against a ban.
Category Archives: Secular
French secularist defends hijab ban
“… the burka and all ostentatious religious signs have already been banned in state-run schools since 2004. And in hospitals or municipal offices, anywhere where people interact as equal citizens, staff are not allowed to wear hijabs or burka, and patients or members will be told to unveil.
“The ban in schools was passed in 2004 as a reaction to the Socialist Government of Lionel Jospin, which was seen as violating the spirit of the 1905 law on the separation of Church and State. Its laissez-faire attitude allowed a handful of teenagers to start wearing the hijab in school, provoking national outrage and a debate that lasted until the 2004 law finally enforced the Republican principle.
“That such a debate is taking place again reveals the sturdy health of secularism in France, a tradition that doesn’t shy away from being confrontational even in a country with the largest Muslim and Jewish communities in Europe.
“Similar debates seem impossible in Britain. When Jack Straw dared to state the obvious in 2006 by saying that the burka and the niqab were ‘visible statements of separation and of difference’ before asking politely that women visiting his constituency surgery consider removing them, it provoked angry protests from Islamic associations and the British liberal-Left, always inclined, it seems, to defend the rights of liberty’s enemies.
“Seen from France, Britain’s tolerance of extremist views looks at best naive, at worse dangerous…. Seen from Britain, French principles of equality and secularism are often misinterpreted, and dismissed as authoritarian or prejudiced. But critics of the French approach don’t seem to understand that secularism is neutral – the State doesn’t recognise any religion in particular but protects them all, guaranteeing cultural and religious diversity by ensuring that one faith does not get the upper hand.”
Agnès Poirier in the Times, 24 June 2009
Yes, that’s the same French state that is so committed to observing strict neutrality towards all faiths that it banned the Islamic headscarf from schools but ordered flags on all public buildings to be flown at half mast to mark the death of the Pope.
And it’s the same Agnès Poirier who is so committed to the principle of public debate that she rejected an invitation to speak at Ken Livingstone’s “Clash of Civilisations” conference because she would have faced other platform speakers who disagreed with her narrow and dogmatic interpretation of secularism.
Will France ban the veil?
“Secularism is the religion of contemporary France. And the enforcers of that faith have a new target. ‘Today… we are confronted by certain Muslim women wearing the burqa, which covers and fully envelops the body and the head like a moving prison,’ said Andre Gérin, a Communist Party legislator who joined 57 others Wednesday in signing a motion for a parliamentary committee to study possible legislation to ban the wearing of the traditional costume in public….
“But what about the rights of Muslim women who honestly feel faith-bound to voluntarily don a burka? Or those prohibited by law from attending public school with the headscarfs they wear everywhere else? Why is no one ranting about nuns’ habits being ‘degrading’ (as Gerin called the burqa), just as no one lashed out at creeping extremism when then-First Lady Bernadette Chirac covered her head during Vatican visits?
“Probably because Catholicism has deep roots in French history and culture, and is not viewed as a foreign faith the way Islam is ….”
Bruce Crumley in Time, 19 June 2009
See also “Muslim council slams call for burqa inquiry”, AFP, 18 June 2009
‘Fears of Muslim anger over religious book’
An academic book about religious attitudes to women is to be published this week despite concerns it could cause a backlash among Muslims because it criticises the prophet Muhammad for taking a nine-year-old girl as his third wife.
The book, entitled Does God Hate Women?, suggests that Muhammad’s marriage to a child called Aisha is “not entirely compatible with the idea that he had the best interests of women at heart”.
It also says that Cherie Blair, wife of the former prime minister, was “incorrect” when she defended Islam in a lecture by claiming “it is not laid down in the Koran that women can be beaten by their husbands and their evidence should be devalued as it is in some Islamic courts”.
This weekend, the publisher, Continuum, said it had received “outside opinion” on the book’s cultural and religious content following suggestions that it might cause offence. “We sought some advice and paused for thought before deciding to go ahead with publication,” said Oliver Gadsby, the firm’s chief executive. The book will be released on Thursday.
Sounds to me like a cynical attempt by the authors, Ophelia Benson and Jeremy Stangroom – who are associated with the notoriously Islamophobic website Butterflies and Wheels – to boost sales of their book, which has already been turned down by Verso.
The report concludes with a quote from a Muslim critic: “No one will swallow talk about child brides. It would lead to a huge backlash, as we saw with The Jewel of Medina.” And who is the individual the Sunday Times has chosen to approach as a representative voice of British Muslims? Wouldn’t you know it, it’s Anjem Choudary, leader of the minuscule gang of provocateurs who previously traded under the name of Al-Muhajiroun.
Which only goes to show that, when it comes to depicting the UK Muslim community, the “serious” press often shows the same irresponsibility and contempt for accuracy as the worst of the tabloids.
Update: See also Benson’s opinion piece in the Observer and Yusuf Smith’s response (“The article left me wondering how a respectable liberal Sunday broadsheet can print such a shoddy article containing such obvious generalisations and faulty logic”) at Indigo Jo Blogs.
Reworking racism
Yuri Prasad interviews Liz Fekete of the Institute of Race Relations about her excellent new book A Suitable Enemy: Racism, Migration and Islamophobia in Europe.
National Secular Society promotes ‘Islamization’ of Britain
Which will no doubt come as a surprise to the deeply Islamophobic NSS. But the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon is convinced:
“A disturbing cultural trend is emerging in Britain – one that could result in the eventual Islamization of this great ally in the war on terrorism. More than 100,000 Brits have downloaded ‘certificates of de-baptism’ from a National Secular Society (NSS) web site. These men and women have decided to openly reject their Christian heritage….
“Last year, the Bishop of Rochester, England, Right Rev. Michael Nazir-Ali warned against the increased secularization of British culture. He noted that Britain’s ascendency in world history could never have been achieved unless it had been based on Christian principles. He noted that Islam poses a major threat to England. In fact, he was so outspoken about Islam last year that he faced death threats. Regrettably, he resigned his post just a few days ago. A prophetic voice is now gone.
“With a Christian vacuum emerging in England, radical Islam will fill the void – and those Britains who so casually rejected their Christian heritage, will eventually be subjugated under Shariah Law…. Christianity not only brought the truth of Jesus Christ to Britain and other nations, but the concept of progress and human freedom. As Britains reject Christianity, the evil totalitarian political system known as Islam waits to fill this vacuum. If Brits thought Nazism was bad, wait until Islam seizes control of this island nation.”
Students protest France anti-hijab law
Muslim students have held demonstrations in Paris on the fifth anniversary of the banning of the Muslim headscarf in French schools.
The protesters, mostly Muslim girls with hijab, described the “French law on secularity and conspicuous religious symbols in schools” as racial discrimination saying people should be free to choose their dress code.
The law, which is an amendment to the French Code of Education separating state and religious activities, bans students from wearing religious symbols in schools. France’s national legislature passed the controversial bill and President Jacques Chirac signed it into law on March 15, 2004 and it came into effect on September 2, 2004, at the beginning of the new school year.
Many say the bill contradicts court decisions that had allowed students to wear religious signs, as long as they did not amount to “proselytizing”. Although the law does not mention any particular symbol, it is widely believed that it targets Muslims’ headscarves.
‘No to Sharia’ flop
Photos are now appearing on the internet of the Worker Communist Party of Iran’s “No Sharia” demonstration in Trafalgar Square on Saturday (the one above is courtesy of Yusuf Smith). As some of us predicted, it proved to be even smaller than the laughable “March for Free Expression” back in 2006. Whatever happened to the “mass demonstration” that Ruth Gledhill – no doubt briefed by the WPI – was anticipating?
I ask you, if this poor showing represents the forces that Enlightenment secularism is able to rally to its cause, how long can it be before Western civilisation succumbs to the tidal wave of Islamo-fascism?
Update: Under the headline “One Law for All Campaign against Sharia Law in Britain’s International Women’s Day was a resounding success” Maryam Namazie of the WPI reports:
“Nearly 600 people joined the One Law for All anti-racist rally against Sharia and religious-based laws in Britain and elsewhere and in defence of citizenship and universal rights in Trafalgar Square and marched towards Red Lion Square in London.”
Nearly 600 people? Looking at the picture above, you can only conclude that 500 of them must have been hiding behind Nelson’s Column.
Hundreds expected at anti-sharia demo in London
“One Law for All, the group that campaigns against the adoption of Islamic law or sharia in the UK, is planning a mass demonstration in the centre of London tomorrow, Saturday.”
Ruth Gledhill gives a plug to the latest stupid initiative from the sectarians of the Worker Communist Party of Iran. Well, we shall see how “mass” this demonstration proves to be. Who knows, perhaps Trafalgar Square will be filled with secularists protesting against religious courts.
No, hang on, against Islamic religious courts. The One Law for All website calls for the abolition of “all religious-based tribunals” – but attacks only “Sharia courts”. The Beth Din courts that have operated within the Jewish community for centuries don’t even rate a mention.
What would you say about a campaign against “all religious-based tribunals” that concentrated exclusively on attacking Jewish religious courts? You’d say the organisers of that campaign were antisemites themselves or at least irresponsible idiots whose actions served to encourage antisemitism. Wouldn’t you?
Call to organise against the WPI ‘One Law’ campaign
Over at Indigo Jo Blogs Yusuf Smith calls for Muslims to protest against the anti-Sharia demonstration in Trafalgar Square this Saturday – a stunt organised by the Worker Communist Party of Iran. Personally, I think there’s just as good a case for communists to protest against it, given that the sectarian idiocies committed by the nutters of the WPI are a total embarrassment to any real Marxist. The question is – is it really worth organising against an event which in all probability will make the tiny March for Free Expression of 2006, in which the WPI shared a platform with hard-right racists, look like a mass mobilisation?