French legislators are considering a measure that would impose a fine of more than $1,000 on women who wear a burka, a garment that covers Muslim women from head to foot, with a thin, gauzy slit for the eyes.
The government maintains the ban would be a statement in support of "French values," which, as appears to be endlessly the case in France, are the subject of much public debate. Burkas have been denounced as "a walking coffin" and "a prison for women." President Nicolas Sarkozy last year declared the burka a "sign of subservience and debasement."
We share this abhorrence for such clothing: The burka signifies the notion that a woman is a piece of male property, which must be packaged and caged. Contrary to received wisdom, the use of burkas has no "traditional" basis in Islam. It is a vestige of primitive tribal practices from certain parts of the Middle East and Asia, where honour killings are common, and female sexuality is a subject of phobic paranoia.
Still, banning burkas is not the right way to battle the sexist ideas that burkas symbolize. In our society, women have a right to wear what they want, assuming they choose to do so of their own free will.
If women are being forced to wear the burka, that is unacceptable, of course. But even in such cases, the crime lies in the coercion, not the clothing. If radical Muslims forced their wives to memorize the Koran on pain of beating, we wouldn't ban the Koran "” we'd throw the husbands in jail. The same principle should hold with burkas.
Western liberalism means, among other things, the right to dress, eat, pray, and speak as we please. And so the government's role in the burka debate should be to educate all immigrant cultures, including those that are Muslim, that women have every right to behave as they wish, whether or not it pleases their fathers, brothers or imams.
If a woman understands this fact, and still chooses to go around in a burka, well, so be it. Being free means having the right to make bad decisions.
I disagree totally. Like most Canadians, I find the burka extremely hostile to all the principles of our free society. Allowing it is caving in to the most extreme form of Sharia law, which is pre-empting the Canadian Bill of Rights. If they want to wear it in the privacy of their own home, that's fine. But not in public. It's the thin edge of the wedge, and we need to strongly oppose such extreme fundamentalism, just as the French are doing.
"If a woman understands this fact, and still chooses to go around in a burka, well, so be it. Being free means having the right to make bad decisions."
What choice do you have? Burka or death?
Not much of a choice when you have been trained to be subservient from birth...
This is exactly the position one would expect from the editors of the NP. The burka is an outward sign that women have been victims of abuse since birth. When you stand beside someone wearing such a costume some will try to imagine that persons life and what she must have been through to get her here standing beside you in the most open society on earth. She would have most likely been indoctrinated from birth to believe that this is her lot in life to be subservient to males and an imaginary male god. If she was allowed to grow to the age of majority in Canada I believe that most women would not volunteer to marry a relative thirty years their senior along with many of their sisters or at age 18 to be circumcised or to spend the rest of ones life living inside a hideous bag. The reason the post supports such a position is that it panders to right wing Theo-cons and that makes them no different than other abusers it is merely a matter of degree. If Canada or France are to prohibit the burka we should also prohibit the cause of such barbarism namely childhood indoctrination and for all children regardless of which hegod is the master.
BC2009, I agree with everything you say except banning.
I say let's have these nutbars displaying themselves in public so we can identify them. I intend to defy the Canadian way and openly laugh at them and exercise my right of public free speech to inform them what I think of them.
cloudlift:
With respect to Jonathan Swift;
what do we do to fight this "indoctrination?'
If Muslims send their children to Islamic schools...
If Christians send their kids to Christian schools...
If Sikhs send their kids to Sikh schools....
The only way to counteract that these kids are educated correctly would be to ensure that the parents dont poison them with the incorrect ideas.
We could do away with all forms of religious education but they would still go home to places where the Koran, the Bible, the Torah hold sway.
So maybe we need to get rid of those poisonous holy scriptures, and places of worship and forbid people from learning about them? So lets repeal freedom of religion too.
That still leaves the problem of the parents who hold these beliefs indirectly "indoctrinating" their children with the wrong values and ideas (not acceptable ones like yours)
How about forcing all children into large re-education institutions where they can be educated and raised properly on the views that the government wants them to hold.
BUt that doesnt sound very fun...so lets call them .....camps instead.
"The reason the post supports such a position is that it panders to right wing Theo-cons and that makes them no different than other abusers it is merely a matter of degree."
cloudlift,
you had a point till you impaled yourself...
right wing Theo-cons don't read secular papers... Where is the audience?
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