If you listen carefully you can hear the sound of the improbably named M. Stasi dumping a French government-sponsored truckload of excrement onto the vast whirring turbine blades of a Concorde jet engine. (Don’t forget to check out the Beeb’s unfortunate misspelling of “discreet”.)
11Dec03 — 1
I understand the secular argument very well, but this is not what this issue in france is about. This is just blatant prejudice masquerading as principle.
“Secularism is the separation of church and state, but it is also the respect of differences”
OK, I can take that, but how does this apply to personal choices about the things we wear!? It’s seems ok to wear a che guevara T-shirt, or a figure-hugging number with ‘fcuk’ across the front, or all that gothic shite and body piercings. All of which are an affront to my own sensibilities, but I live with that. I can’t think of many things that any of us do that are actually value-free. Which is why I have every right to be suspicious of this european obsession with a 40″ square piece of cloth that some Muslims women may choose to wear. I say this as wearer of what Mr stasi 🙂 would probably consider an ostentatiously religious beard. But why ban it? I’m with the liberal principle of not banning anything unless there is a damn good reason for it and I don’t think patronising european fantasies like this qualifies:
“A lot of Muslims girls say that they wear the headscarf freely. But in fact when you look at it carefully you will see that they are in some cases, in fact in most cases, motivated by religious fundamentalists and if you give them just a bit of a finger they will eat up you arm to the elbow. So we have to be strict and very adamant – and say that this is the way things are in france” jacques myard MP
Anyway, you going to the office CHRIST-mas party? 🙂
W