France moves closer to banning women from wearing veils in public

[Neo Ash]

Fighting terrorism or religious persecution?

Originally Posted by NYDailyNews.com

The nearly 200-page report contains a
panoply of measures intended to dissuade
women from wearing all-enveloping veils in
France.

It also recommends refusing residence
cards and citizenship to anyone with visible s
igns of a "radical religious practice."
However, there is no call to outlaw such
garments - worn by a tiny minority of
Muslims - in private areas and in the
street.

A full ban was the major issue that divided
the 32-member, multiparty panel which
ultimately heeded warnings that a full ban
risked being deemed unconstitutional and
could even cause trouble in a country
where Islam is the second-largest religion.

.........

The veil is widely viewed in France as a
gateway to extremism, an insult to gender
equality and an offense to France's secular
foundation.

A 2004 French law bans Muslim
headscarves from primary and secondary
school classrooms.

[Rade]

Originally Posted by Neo Ash

Fighting terrorism or religious persecution?

I really think it's a combination of a bunch of things. Seems like a really complicated issue.

[Walt Whitman]

How long till they just ban religion in public places altogether? Seems like what theyre going for.

I give it 50 years before we see the rise of new dictatorships in Europe.

[Neo Ash]

Generalizations are bad.

However; if a person had to make a generalization concerning this issue. I could see how they would associate veils with the extreme conservative members in turn creating a mental association with jihad and terrorism; basically anti-Christian & anti-Jewish Muslims.

[Rade]

Sounds like France wants the benefit of a higher birthrate with none of the trouble of religious differences compared to their own culture.

There are a lot of legitmate and illigitimate reasons for the ban though. Knowing the current conservative bent of the world's western gov't's, I'm really not suprised this is going on.

My xenophobic and ant-religios sides totally understands the motives though.

[Late]

Good stuff, fuck islam.

[LWK]

Well, isn't Islam literally just taking over most countries anyways?

Does everyone have to bow down and be extremely tolerant to it like its our god given right to submit to it?

I sure as hell know that if I pulled the same stunts in the middle east or turkey, I'd be received with a lot less tolerance. I am not submitting to any of that. It all suffers from the same symptoms both Judaism and Christianity were consumed by. Ignorant crusader types.

Raising people religiously is the worst thing we can do for our children.

[wasabi]

I understand the desire to homogenize the muslims into the mainstream society. France had to deal with terrorists for a long time, and they have found that by making their country inhospitable to islam, they have made their country inhospitable to terrorists. It's a very simple equation.

The veil is not inherently demeaning, but the way it is forced on women by muslim men is. Many women in islamic countries don't feel that they are forced, but that they do it because it is right under the quran. That's a ripe sack of shit, right up there with suicide bombing and the manchurian candidate.

France has been doing the right thing all along, and I support their decision to make life even more difficult for muslims who refuse to integrate into the mainstream society. Those muslims are more than welcome to leave and relocate in Saudi Arabia, the vatican of the middle east, where rapists run free, rape victims are executed, women are forced into slavery, and fat old men rich without ever doing a day of work roll about in their expensive cars.

[George Custer]

Originally Posted by wasabi

I understand the desire to homogenize the muslims into the mainstream society. France had to deal with terrorists for a long time, and they have found that by making their country inhospitable to islam, they have made their country inhospitable to terrorists. It's a very simple equation.

The veil is not inherently demeaning, but the way it is forced on women by muslim men is. Many women in islamic countries don't feel that they are forced, but that they do it because it is right under the quran. That's a ripe sack of shit, right up there with suicide bombing and the manchurian candidate.

France has been doing the right thing all along, and I support their decision to make life even more difficult for muslims who refuse to integrate into the mainstream society. Those muslims are more than welcome to leave and relocate in Saudi Arabia, the vatican of the middle east, where rapists run free, rape victims are executed, women are forced into slavery, and fat old men rich without ever doing a day of work roll about in their expensive cars.

Hmm... I was on the other side of this one, but you raise a good point.

Still, the inability of the West to differentiate between Islam and politically-motivated terrorism is one of the things that gets those guys so riled up. And curbing freedoms (any freedoms) in an effort to somehow safeguard freedom strikes me as dumb. And besides all that, you can't force enlightenment on people (regarding the rampant sexism of Middle Eastern countries), it doesn't work.

[DangerousK]

Originally Posted by HeartlessNinny

Hmm... I was on the other side of this one, but you raise a good point.

Still, the inability of the West to differentiate between Islam and politically-motivated terrorism is one of the things that gets those guys so riled up. And curbing freedoms (any freedoms) in an effort to somehow safeguard freedom strikes me as dumb. And besides all that, you can't force enlightenment on people (regarding the rampant sexism of Middle Eastern countries), it doesn't work.

It's a little hard to differentiate between the two when the terrorists like to hide behind the other so they can attempt to blend in, hence making the entire group look bad.

Islam is still stuck in the 14th century, and I applaud France for doing something for once instead of just standing on the sidelines like they did circa June 1940.

[ATL]

Its such a complex mess of good intentions and botched practice.

Here are a few thoughts:

France has always been the model of very noble rhetoric and inept practice. They preach the revolution's fraternity --that all are French-- and even tried to keep Algeria by saying that their people were as French as anyone from Paris (of course, this also quietly proposed that being French was superior to being a mere Algerian), but in practice any Algerians moving to France to take them up on the offer found themselves locked into limited opportunity by systematic and social racism.

Even Dutch society is full of systematic and societal bias against the "other", especially if they're non-white. A lot of Dutch people have liberal views, but few honestly want to take a step to integrate people who aren't Dutch (or Flemish, or other white European) into their society beyond a cursory hello. That's not to pick on The Netherlands, but its a common theme throughout Western Europe.

This didn't start with religion, it started with people who don't look like the otherwise homogeneous natives --something Americans aren't (always) as privy to. When France, Germany, Denmark have had one only one culture, one language, one general look for centuries, and now you have people who are different moving in --the society can have the rhetoric for openness, but the people have a hard time following through. The rejection creates self-segregation among people who will be nice (i.e. people from the same foreign culture), and in this can lead to an even stronger identity with the different culture than a person had back in their homeland. As a consequence, you see a rise in religious fervor of things like Islam because its something that becomes closely tied to the identity of being the other.

Basically all of Europe's caught up with France's rhetoric, but none of have been able to make it work --as least as well as the US has (which is not perfect by any means). Part of what helps the US is the fact that we're virtually all immigrants, and there's popular belief in the melting pot.

Now, there's another side too: generally when its a culture/race's intelligentsia (doctors, lawyers, academics, etc) and/or wealthy, they integrate pretty well. They're able to afford the things that put them in the middle of society, and a home culture is more likely to view them (however grudgingly) as being on a similar level (but even then, there can be social bias against letting them fully in). When you see lots of low or middle class immigrants, its harder for them to work their way in since they don't have any wealth or prestige to try and force something. Instead they bounce off of supposed unemployability and a lack of particularly useful skills, compounded with (depending on their source country) a completely substandard education that might have been peppered with some truly backwards cultural thinking found in their respective country's villages and other undeveloped areas (to use an analogy: the rednecks/hillbillies of their homeland). They can become a petri dish for the worse elements.

Its a mess, and its going to be hard to fix things now that things are midstream.

[LWK]

My dad was stationed in turkey years ago, and this wife was carrying her husbands bags, and she like dropped something and her husband went over and beat the shit outta her.

[wasabi]

Originally Posted by HeartlessNinny

Hmm... I was on the other side of this one, but you raise a good point.

Still, the inability of the West to differentiate between Islam and politically-motivated terrorism is one of the things that gets those guys so riled up. And curbing freedoms (any freedoms) in an effort to somehow safeguard freedom strikes me as dumb. And besides all that, you can't force enlightenment on people (regarding the rampant sexism of Middle Eastern countries), it doesn't work.

That differentiation is irrelevant. What value does the spread of Islam in a country like France bring the world? Other than hot prostitutes, nothing.

[George Custer]

Originally Posted by DangerousK

It's a little hard to differentiate between the two when the terrorists like to hide behind the other so they can attempt to blend in, hence making the entire group look bad.

Islam is still stuck in the 14th century, and I applaud France for doing something for once instead of just standing on the sidelines like they did circa June 1940.

What are you talking about? You can't tell the difference between the Unabomber and just some random white guy? Same thing. Give me a break. But yeah. Let's just lump them all together, that's clearly making things easier.

EDIT: I'm gonna add something. Speaking as someone who recently visited a Muslim country, telling the difference between regular schmucks and the radicals is indeed really fucking easy. All you have to do is just go there and talk to a few people. They'll tell you about their beliefs readily, and every single Muslim I talked to was delighted that I simply heard them out (even if I was silently, or sometimes, not so silently judging them). Moreover, they didn't seem all that fond of the radicals. They didn't like Hamas, for instance. (I was in Egypt by the way.)

Originally Posted by Bobak

Its such a complex mess of good intentions and botched practice.

Here are a few thoughts:

France has always been the model of very noble rhetoric and inept practice. They preach the revolution's fraternity --that all are French-- and even tried to keep Algeria by saying that their people were as French as anyone from Paris (of course, this also quietly proposed that being French was superior to being a mere Algerian), but in practice any Algerians moving to France to take them up on the offer found themselves locked into limited opportunity by systematic and social racism.

Even Dutch society is full of systematic and societal bias against the "other", especially if they're non-white. A lot of Dutch people have liberal views, but few honestly want to take a step to integrate people who aren't Dutch (or Flemish, or other white European) into their society beyond a cursory hello. That's not to pick on The Netherlands, but its a common theme throughout Western Europe.

This didn't start with religion, it started with people who don't look like the otherwise homogeneous natives --something Americans aren't (always) as privy to. When France, Germany, Denmark have had one only one culture, one language, one general look for centuries, and now you have people who are different moving in --the society can have the rhetoric for openness, but the people have a hard time following through. The rejection creates self-segregation among people who will be nice (i.e. people from the same foreign culture), and in this can lead to an even stronger identity with the different culture than a person had back in their homeland. As a consequence, you see a rise in religious fervor of things like Islam because its something that becomes closely tied to the identity of being the other.

Basically all of Europe's caught up with France's rhetoric, but none of have been able to make it work --as least as well as the US has (which is not perfect by any means). Part of what helps the US is the fact that we're virtually all immigrants, and there's popular belief in the melting pot.

Now, there's another side too: generally when its a culture/race's intelligentsia (doctors, lawyers, academics, etc) and/or wealthy, they integrate pretty well. They're able to afford the things that put them in the middle of society, and a home culture is more likely to view them (however grudgingly) as being on a similar level (but even then, there can be social bias against letting them fully in). When you see lots of low or middle class immigrants, its harder for them to work their way in since they don't have any wealth or prestige to try and force something. Instead they bounce off of supposed unemployability and a lack of particularly useful skills, compounded with (depending on their source country) a completely substandard education that might have been peppered with some truly backwards cultural thinking found in their respective country's villages and other undeveloped areas (to use an analogy: the rednecks/hillbillies of their homeland). They can become a petri dish for the worse elements.

Its a mess, and its going to be hard to fix things now that things are midstream.

Yeah, you raise a lot of good points here. Personally, I think the best way to deal with shit like this is to try and make it easier for everyone to get a decent education and not give in to bigotry and xenophobia... But those are pretty long term goals. In the meantime, I guess you just have to put up with it.

[ATL]

Originally Posted by HeartlessNinny

Yeah, you raise a lot of good points here. Personally, I think the best way to deal with shit like this is to try and make it easier for everyone to get a decent education and not give in to bigotry and xenophobia... But those are pretty long term goals. In the meantime, I guess you just have to put up with it.

One of the things Europeans never want to talk about is exactly how racist they really are.

A lot of it is the "oh, I like all cultures" but never wanting to actually spend any time with them or feel comfortable accepting them into the club, etc. You find it in the States too, of course, but the Europeans probably have a much higher ratio (mostly because Caucasian is such a high proportion). I think its more a factor of what people are used to/comfortable with than "I hate these people", but the results are also negative.

[George Custer]

Originally Posted by Bobak

One of the things Europeans never want to talk about is exactly how racist they really are.

A lot of it is the "oh, I like all cultures" but never wanting to actually spend any time with them or feel comfortable accepting them into the club, etc. You find it in the States too, of course, but the Europeans probably have a much higher ratio (mostly because Caucasian is such a high proportion). I think its more a factor of what people are used to/comfortable with than "I hate these people", but the results are also negative.

I know exactly what you're talking about, because Canadians are pretty much the same. Everyone likes to talk about how tolerant they are, but people are often very hostile to foreigners underneath it all. Around here, the Asian population is growing by leaps and bounds, and quite a few of the white folk (including my otherwise liberal-minded mom) will tell you (when pressed about it) that they're very unhappy all these people are coming here. Why, I can't tell you. They're not 'takin our jearbs' or anything, so it makes no sense to me.

I suppose it might be a bit worse in Europe, though, where people have more of a cultural identity that they're a bit protective of. Nonetheless, I say you have to roll with the punches as it were and just let things happen as they may. It's the way of the world — no one's culture exists in a vacuum, it's bound to change with time. And hell, why would you want it to remain the same... Look at England. Without all those Indians, their food would still be the embarrassment of Europe, man.

[galfordo]

Originally Posted by wasabi

I understand the desire to homogenize the muslims into the mainstream society. France had to deal with terrorists for a long time, and they have found that by making their country inhospitable to islam, they have made their country inhospitable to terrorists. It's a very simple equation.

The veil is not inherently demeaning, but the way it is forced on women by muslim men is. Many women in islamic countries don't feel that they are forced, but that they do it because it is right under the quran. That's a ripe sack of shit, right up there with suicide bombing and the manchurian candidate.

France has been doing the right thing all along, and I support their decision to make life even more difficult for muslims who refuse to integrate into the mainstream society. Those muslims are more than welcome to leave and relocate in Saudi Arabia, the vatican of the middle east, where rapists run free, rape victims are executed, women are forced into slavery, and fat old men rich without ever doing a day of work roll about in their expensive cars.

so much truthiness here

[ATL]

Originally Posted by HeartlessNinny

I know exactly what you're talking about, because Canadians are pretty much the same. Everyone likes to talk about how tolerant they are, but people are often very hostile to foreigners underneath it all. Around here, the Asian population is growing by leaps and bounds, and quite a few of the white folk (including my otherwise liberal-minded mom) will tell you (when pressed about it) that they're very unhappy all these people are coming here. Why, I can't tell you. They're not 'takin our jearbs' or anything, so it makes no sense to me.

Oh yeah, I've come to believe that the Canadian impression of a First Nationer is a drunk criminal.

[Spoon]

Every other western nation should follow suit.

With the exception of England.
That country deserves to choke on it's own hyperliberal horseshit...worthless Orwellian fuckhole is almost as bad as a muslim theocracy anyway.

They deserve one another.

[George Custer]

Originally Posted by Bobak

Oh yeah, I've come to believe that the Canadian impression of a First Nationer is a drunk criminal.

Absolutely. I can't tell you how embarrassing that is... It seems like everyone, no matter how enlightened they are otherwise, is a goddamned racist when it comes to First Nations. Big city, small town, it's all the same.

It's obvious that that goes back to what you were saying before. The economic conditions on reservations are deplorable, and most aboriginal people live in poverty. Naturally very few of them get a good education. I suppose it's similar to the plight of poor black people in the States, but it seems like Canadian Indians are even worse off (if you can believe that).

[Robert E. Lee]

All religious points aside, it's not a good idea in modern society to allow people to go around with their faces covered. I know banks frown on it for starters. People who have to work the graveyard shift at 7-11 aren't wild about it, either. So why make exceptions for any one group? It's common sense that you don't want people out and about hiding their faces and making themselves unidentifiable to witnesses.

[George Custer]

Originally Posted by Sp0o/\/?!

Every other western nation should follow suit.

With the exception of England.
That country deserves to choke on it's own hyperliberal horseshit...worthless Orwellian fuckhole is almost as bad as a muslim theocracy anyway.

They deserve one another.

Do you even listen to yourself anymore?

[wasabi]

Originally Posted by SouthtownKid

All religious points aside, it's not a good idea in modern society to allow people to go around with their faces covered. I know banks frown on it for starters. People who have to work the graveyard shift at 7-11 aren't wild about it, either. So why make exceptions for any one group? It's common sense that you don't want people out and about hiding their faces and making themselves unidentifiable to witnesses.

Halaa a good Muslim women should not leave the house then!

Allahu akbar!

[Robert E. Lee]

So it's the hyperliberals who put up invasive security cameras every few feet across England, is it?

Originally Posted by wasabi

Halaa a good Muslim women should not leave the house then!

Allahu akbar!

Problem solved.

[Spoon]

Originally Posted by HeartlessNinny

Do you even listen to yourself anymore?

Do you apply any critical thinking to the things you see or read in the news?