Crosses, in case you're wondering, were already banned in schools, along with Jewish kippahs and Islamic headscarves. The abaya is less clearly religious, which is why it hadn't yet been banned. France puts the value of secularism ahead of individual expression.
August 28, 2023
"The school of the Republic was built around strong values, secularism is one of them. … When you enter a classroom, you shouldn’t be able to identify the religion of pupils."
Said, French Education Minister Gabriel Attal, quoted in "French education minister announces ban on Islamic dress in schools/Students will no longer be allowed to wear the long, flowing dress known as the abaya in classrooms" (Politico).
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This probably is a contributor to why the French are such awful people, and an awful place.
"France puts the value of secularism ahead of individual expression."
How to explain what a miserable job they're doing protecting their Jews from Islamic terrorists, like the case of Sarah Halimi, the elderly woman horribly and sadistically murdered by her neighbor shouting "Allahu akhbar." A heavy pot smoker, he was said to be not responsible for his actions.
Sarah was far from alone. Google "murder of Jews in France."
"France puts the value of secularism ahead of individual expression."
"[I]ndividual expression" doesn't shine through uniformity,
https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/1581F/production/_96459088_gettyimages-491268851.jpg
France puts the value of secularism ahead of individual expression.
secularism is the state religion of France.. Which explains MOST of France's troubles
secularism is on the way to becoming the state religion of the US.. Which explains MOST of OUR troubles
France are making a huge mistake, in that by trying to FORCE assimilation they are producing the opposite effect, to the extent that there are now 'banlieux' [= neighborhoods] in Paris which are increasingly no-go zones for police or anyone else, and where Muslim dress prevails. In Québec, where I lived for almost 20 years, it is just as bad in different ways. Syrian refugees find that they are expected to learn French within six months and are not allowed to receive even medical services in any language other than French after that point. Chinese immigrant cooks in Chinese restaurants have been fined heavily for speaking Chinese amongst themselves in the kitchen, as have the owners.
Francophone culture is now profoundly insecure, and in the two places I know quite well, governments have clamped down with an authoritarianism incompatible with a free society. This is not happening in the Anglosphere. Not in English Canada, and certainly not here in the States.
I live and farm outside a small town of 6,000 some 30 miles west of Kansas City. Steve's Meat Market [a slaughterhouse/retail shop founded 1968] has been Halal certified for 10 or 15 years. It has created a wonderful market for local lamb and goat, and is especially popular around Eid al Fitr [end of Ramadan] and Eid al Adha [end of Hajj (=Mecca pilgrimage)]. Like Kosher, Halal, involves only the front half of the animal, so what do you do with all the back ends? Around here, and I've heard it's similar elsewhere, the local Mexicans show up in droves to buy the rear halves.
What is America? It is hearing dozens of Mexicans wishing heavily-accented 'Eid Mubarrak' [=happy feast] to the Muslims there at the same time to share a carcass. It's Nigerian Christians coming in to buy back ends and sharing recipes with Muslims. It's German Baptist women and Muslim women comparing and admiring each other's "religious" full length clothing. It is grown professional Muslim women coming into Steve's with their abaya-clad mothers in order to handle the translation. It is the occasional van-load of Muslims and observant Jews coming out from KC together, because there's no officially Kosher slaughterhouse anywhere for hundreds of miles and the Jews figure Halal is close enough. It's everybody figuring out that traditionally-awesome KC barbecue is VERY tasty, because Steve's gives them a front-end taste of several styles, then sells them the sauce for what they like best.
It's not perfect, but this small town, in the middle of America -- a town which as late as 1964 had active Klan and "Sunset" signs at the edges of town -- has rather decently figured thing out, and usually we all enjoy it.
France and Québec are lurching backwards to what this place was 60 or 70 years ago. Wanna bet on the Future? Bet on America and its free-choice approach to assimilation.
Amen, Bart.
John Henry
I think I've told you this story before: I'm in France at a water park, where everyone is swimming in splashing around, when a Muslim family comes walking in, with the women, all dressed head-to-toe in black. The entire park stopped, music included, and everyone just stared at them.
It was probably one of the most uncomfortable social scenes I've ever encountered.
When Vivek during the debate said something about God, I wondered if/when the GOP will get into a discussion of religion. I've read he's a practicing Hindu. Pence is on the stage openly pushing his Christian faith. RFKJ, who I wish were on the stage, often references God to promote environmental stewardship, although I don't think he's still a practicing Catholic.
Are we reaching a point when we "shouldn't be able to identify the religion" of our candidates?
I have three Muslim girls this year, all in the same class, and all wear hijabs and abaya every day.
It's always entertaining to watch incompetent management trying to un-fuck themselves.
A last gasp of the Republic before it submits completely.
I fear it's too late for France
Secular religion (i.e. behavioral protocol or model).
"When Vivek during the debate said something about God, I wondered if/when the GOP will get into a discussion of religion. I've read he's a practicing Hindu. Pence is on the stage openly pushing his Christian faith. RFKJ, who I wish were on the stage, often references God to promote environmental stewardship, although I don't think he's still a practicing Catholic.
"Are we reaching a point when we 'shouldn't be able to identify the religion' of our candidates?"
When I hear politicos referencing god I always assume they're just pandering to the public, and I henceforth become more prone to be skeptical of everything they say. It's fine for politicos to hold religious beliefs personally, but their beliefs have nothing to do with their work (or hoped-for work) as legislators and representatives of the public, among which many different (or no) religious beliefs will be found. Accordingly, there is no reason for them to reference their religious beliefs in public statements other than to grandstand or to blow dog whistles. It's special pleading, saying, "Vote for me because I believe in your god, too."
As one wise man once advised: “When you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men … but when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your father who is unseen.”
In short: Kudos to the French on this issue.
"secularism is on the way to becoming the state religion of the US"
Our founder established a secular nation, not a religious one, so if there is to be a "state" religion in the US, it must and should be secularism.
Kudos to the French on this issue.
I'm confused. Are you for diversity or against it?
Gotta go with Cook on this one.
People broadcasting their religiosity is boorish and annoying. We here knock Lefties for their virtue signaling but be assured that many of the same here will find sophistic ways to make Christians doing the selfsame virtue signaling (obsession with overt school prayer, etc.), not virtue signaling. And will of course find Cook's incisive comment offensive.
We had a family friend who was a devout SDA and when joining us for dinner would ask if she could say "the prayer" and stick out her arms for that hand-holding thing. I tolerated that a couple times but before the next time, with other guests coming, I told her, "OK, look, feel free to pray before dinner but please keep it silently to yourself; your omniscient god can surely read minds."
Count me among the Secular Supremacists.
Like others though, I think this might be too late to be other than a clarifying moment--the old continent is going to convulse soon.
Mark my words.
I’m old enough to remember when every morning at the public school in the town where I grew up in New Jersey, our teachers read a bible verse. Usually something from Psalms or Proverbs.
Strange, huh?
"I'm confused. Are you for diversity or against it?"
I'm for diversity in individual beliefs, creeds, ways of living, etc., in people's lives, but in a public school, (as opposed to private or parochial schools), I'm for dress and behavior codes that emphasize the commonality of all the students attending to learn the information considered crucial for the general education of the society's young people. I think allowing differentiating clothing or disparate rules of behavior that might disrupt the school's mission of teaching the common curriculum to all its students should be prohibited.
The founders forbade the government from establishing a religion, but they also forbade prohibiting the free practice of religions. You seem to only want to talk about one side of the coin.
Are you not simply saying:if there is to be a "state" religion in the US, it must and should be mine.
The founders saw how establishing a religion and banning religious practices led to centuries of wars and conflicts in Europe and knew it would not lead to their goal of a stable, peaceful and prosperous new nation.
Diversity is not a strength in and of itself. It's an enormous challenge.
Robert Cook said...
"Our founder established a secular nation, not a religious one, so if there is to be a 'state' religion in the US, it must and should be secularism."
Wrong. Our founders created a nation with no state religion; they did not create a secular one.
"France puts the value of secularism ahead of individual expression." What value is that?
Can't wear _kippah_s in public? Wow. I guess the "value" to them is that they can forget how they cooperated with the Nazis in murdering their Jews in the Holocaust. Kippot probably disturb their smug moral arrogance.
These people think they own us.
@Ice Nine "People broadcasting their religiosity is boorish and annoying." Yes, and people forbidding other people to wear a kippah are boorish and annoying. Or worse.
Like Kosher, Halal, involves only the front half of the animal
=========
for kosher the hind half need to remove the sciatic nerve and processes.
for halal needs to invoke allah before cutting throat.
"I tolerated that a couple times but before the next time, with other guests coming, I told her, "OK, look, feel free to pray before dinner but please keep it silently to yourself; your omniscient god can surely read minds.""
Translation: I'm a prick.
"It was probably one of the most uncomfortable social scenes I've ever encountered."
I would have been uncomfortable, too- my first thought would have been, "Are they all carrying bombs under the clothing?"
"Kudos to the French on this issue."
Absolutely. One mistake progressives have made is vocally criticizing the exercise or open display of some faiths, while giving others a pass. If you believe that all expressions of faith are to be removed from public life--and I'm not sure I do--then you have to mean ALL expressions of faith.
In short: Kudos to the French on this issue.
and
People broadcasting their religiosity is boorish and annoying.
I urge you both to think more deeply.
Yes, both "virtue signaling" and obviously religious dress can bring to mind the hypocrites of Jesus's teaching. Yes, it can be irritating when a person ostentatiously forgoes meat, for instance, because of (pick your reason) religion, animal welfare, personal health...
But is your irritation or disagreement sufficient cause to prevent someone else's religious expression? In no way was the Constitution written to prevent religious expression. It was written explicitly to protect each citizen's right to religious expression, especially when that person's religious convictions were different from those of the State.
Roll your eyes. Be annoyed. In your own home, by all means refuse to allow someone else's religious practice to hijack your dinner. But if we start saying that no outward sign of religion is permissible, we are smacking right up against one of the issues that prompted the American Revolution in the first place.
France will do what France does; being wrong has never stopped them from being certain. But we don't have to follow their lead simply because we are "secular" (which we're not - we're pluralist, by intention and design), and we absolutely shouldn't.
A follow-on to my previous comment: so, I stand firmly in favor of personal religious expression, however annoying it may be to others.
But. The other side of the question is this: in the US, you, the religiously observant, don't have any right to impose your religion or its requirements on anyone else - even your own children, beyond the limits of how parents can influence their children. (None of my three goes to church unless I ask, despite being raised in a family that attended church every Sunday and participated heavily in church life. Because we're Episcopalian, God's Frozen People, I have hopes that they'll come back to it eventually, but I can't force them.) And, in Europe, you, the religiously observant, came to a place with an extant culture, and the burden is properly on you to live peaceably within that culture. (The US was explicitly founded on the idea that it was creating a culture out of whole cloth based on individual rights and mutual respect therefor. I don't think this means we as a society have no right to demand that newcomers live peaceably within this created culture - just that it's not a culture that arose organically over many centuries. And France's secular culture is even younger than that of the US, so.)
So - if your 15-year-old daughter keeps Western clothes in her locker at school and doesn't cover unless she's in your presence because she is not as devout as you'd have her be, you chose to bring her into this culture and you should not ultimately have the right to force her into your religious observance. If she chooses it herself, I don't see why a supposedly liberal nation would deny her that right.
Are we going to have to get into how this question differs from transgenderism in teens? Man, I hope not. But if it's needful, at least it's easily dispensed with: religious dress is not the same as potential or certain permanent physical changes.
"We" may not be 'secular,' but I am.
I'm old enough to to remember bible verses in the morning at our public schools (well after the famous SC ruling), sometimes over the school PA and other times by students in class. It was a waste of time, but didn't take long.
Come to think of it, an awful lot of what we did was a waste of time.
Bon chance, France.
"Wrong. Our founders created a nation with no state religion; they did not create a secular one."
If the nation has no state religion--as it does not--the state is secular. Too many Americans labor under the mistaken notion that we are a Christian nation. We are not.
Individuals who so choose may and do hold and practice religious beliefs. There is no justification for persons in attendance at non-religious public institutions or events to be made to recite or listen to readings of The Lord's Prayer or other such readings, or for political officials in public proceedings to recite or otherwise promulgate religious material or make references to "god" as if the existence of such an entity is a forgone reality.
"The founders forbade the government from establishing a religion, but they also forbade prohibiting the free practice of religions."
Who in the United States is forbidden to freely practice their religion? No one. Look at the plethora of places of worship in every hamlet, town and state throughout the nation.
The religious can profess and practice their beliefs at home, among family and faith-sharing friends, at the many aforementioned churches, synagogues and temples, etc., or even in public if silently and to themselves. There is no reason to assume or accept that "free practice" of one's religion requires that such practice take place among and be imposed upon others with different (or no) religious beliefs.
Who in the United States is forbidden to freely practice their religion? No one.
Except, of course, Latin Mass preferring Catholics. The FBI and even the Pope is after them. The Pope, of course, is an Argentine communist.
Who in the United States is forbidden to freely practice their religion? No one.
I didn't say they were. It's what you propose.
For example:
I think allowing differentiating clothing...should be prohibited.
There is no reason to accept practice among others with different (or no) religious beliefs.
These are proposals to forbid religious practices that are currently protected by the Constitution.
Can you wear a yellow vest in school?
"'I think allowing differentiating clothing...should be prohibited.'
'There is no reason to accept practice among others with different (or no) religious beliefs.'
"These are proposals to forbid religious practices that are currently protected by the Constitution."
Nope. If a family sends their child to a public school rather than a parochial school, they presumably (or should) understand and accept that their children will be expected to dress and behave according to the school's stated codes of dress and behavior. Their children are still free to practice their religion at home with their families or in their houses of worship or other personal social circumstances.
You edited my second comment above to suit your argument, with the result that it doesn't even make any sense. I said: "There is no reason to assume or accept that 'free practice' of one's religion requires that such practice take place among and be imposed upon others with different (or no) religious beliefs."
One's freedom to practice and express one's faith does not extend to imposing it on others uninvited. (Your right to practice your faith ends at the end of my nose, as it were.) As long as one has access to home, houses of worship, one's inner mind, informal gatherings with others of like mind in spaces they have reserved for such worship or fellowship gatherings, one's freedom of religion is not curtailed.
Under your reasoning, any person of faith should be free to declare, express and impose his or her beliefs anytime, anywhere, among any other group of people, whomever and wherever they may be. Muslims should be allowed to roam into a Christian church or Jewish synagogue or a public school and begin their own prayers in the midst of the Christians and Jews at worship and the school children in class. (One can switch this any which way: Christians intruding upon a mosque or synagogue or Jews intruding upon a church or mosque.)
What if a religion requires its adherents to wear a particular haircut - a tonsure, a mohawk, uncut hair, dreadlocks? They carry that sign of their faith with them all the time. Are you going to require them to cover their heads so you "won't know" what religion they are, or so that you won't be offended by their blatant disregard for your atheism? Or are you going to require them to wear only haircuts that people of any other or no faith might also wear?
Under your reasoning, any person of faith should be free to declare, express and impose his or her beliefs anytime, anywhere, among any other group of people, whomever and wherever they may be.
I don't see how that follows. How is a girl wearing an abaya "imposing" her beliefs on anyone? And in your further example, how is a public school like a mosque?
"What if a religion requires its adherents to wear a particular haircut - a tonsure, a mohawk, uncut hair, dreadlocks? They carry that sign of their faith with them all the time. Are you going to require them to cover their heads so you 'won't know' what religion they are, or so that you won't be offended by their blatant disregard for your atheism? Or are you going to require them to wear only haircuts that people of any other or no faith might also wear?"
It's not about my personal views I'm talking about, (and I don't care if others hold religious views, notwithstanding the irrationality of such beliefs). I'm talking about dress and behavior codes which have long been common--if not universal--in US public schools. I'm referring to "differentiating clothing" (or adornment) that might generate disruption in the orderly running of the school because of other students picking on or bullying, e.g., Jews or Muslims wearing traditional clothing of their country or a particular head dress, (if such is required for the expression of their religion).
My guess is that families so pious they insist their children wear such differentiating attire at all times would probably enroll their children in parochial schools of their respective faiths. However, if such local parochial schools are too expensive, have restrictive enrollment requirements, lack openings for new students, or simply do not exist locally, such that pious families have no choice but to enroll their children in a public school, I think those parents should have to abide with the school's standard dress code. If there are differentiating hair styles that cannot just be "taken on and off," then each school would have to find their own way of dealing with the matter.
Ideally, US public schools should be able to operate well and harmoniously with students from all the world's faiths and cultures wearing and displaying clothing and adornments expressing their respective cultures. However, given the realistic likelihood any obviously minority children would be teased, harassed, and bullied by other students, it is reasonable the schools should be able to impose rules that will protect the minority children from such harassment and to prevent disruption to the orderly running of the school.
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