The French breathed a collective sigh of relief on July 1st when the European Court of Human Rights upheld the country’s 2010 ban on the wearing of full-faced veils in public places. It followed a separate ruling in June by a top French appeals court that a private day-care nursery was within its rights when it sacked an employee who refused to take off her Muslim headscarf at work. In France, such rules generate relatively little controversy. Yet they are often misunderstood in countries where liberal multiculturalism is the established creed. Why are the French so strict about Islamic head coverings?
Read the full article in the Economist
Related stories;
France’s Burqa Ban Upheld By Human Rights Court
Javi / July 8, 2014
Isn’t she pretty??- one for you and the other for me.
What a shame! ¡No pasa nada! they can innovate and get on with life
A fluffy designer scarf to cover hair and save on Chanel Mascara as some do
Or like we do in Europe: http://afroeurope.blogspot.co.uk/2013_02_01_archive.html
(^‿◕)
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Thiru / July 8, 2014
I am completely in agreement with the French view on secularism.
We are living in a modern world and archaic Arabic custom of women covering their faces is not compatible with it.
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Off the Cuff / July 8, 2014
Dear Thiru,
I agree with the French too but not because “We are living in a modern world and archaic Arabic custom of women covering their faces is not compatible with it” as you stated. The reason you give is bigoted.
I agree with them because one persons rights should not infringe on the other persons rights.
This is essentially what the European Court for Human Rights sitting as a Grand Chamber said.
“Where these “rights and freedoms of others” are themselves among those guaranteed by the Convention or the Protocols thereto, it must be accepted that the need to protect them may lead States to restrict other rights or freedoms likewise set forth in the Convention”
Kind Regards,
OTC
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Sunil Dahanayake / July 8, 2014
Is this a man or woman?
Is this a terrrorst/criminal or innocent person?
Sri Lanka should completly ban this “arbisation ” of Sri Lanka.
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Ali Baba Sabry / July 8, 2014
She will scare even the Grease Yakkas.
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Thiru / July 8, 2014
Liberate women and girls from this unfair complete covering up of their god-given beautiful bodies, especially their faces while men go free from such practice.
Instead, get men to behave themselves decently towards women.
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Off the Cuff / July 8, 2014
Dear Thiru,
Re “Instead, get men to behave themselves decently towards women”
Wisdom from the “Rational Scientist” who runs away when his challenges are met.
The European Court of Human Rights sitting as a Grand Chamber says “Where these “rights and freedoms of others” are themselves among those guaranteed by the Convention or the Protocols thereto, it must be accepted that the need to protect them may lead States to restrict other rights or freedoms likewise set forth in the Convention”
Wonder why the Highest Court for Human Rights in Europe did not have the wisdom of Thiru, the Self proclaimed “Rational Scientist”.
Kind Regards,
OTC
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dontcare / February 7, 2015
Are you telling all women to be nude and show their flesh like in the early days???? Are you kidding me???
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Muniyandy / July 8, 2014
I cannot understand the mindset of the Muslim women who fight for the ‘right’ to wear the niqab or full face covering when they are out of their homes.
If Prophet Muhammed had said that all women must wear cast iron chastity belts when they are out on the road or public places, then I suppose all these women will agitate for the ‘freedom’ to wear chastity belts!
Only women with slavish and masochistic tendencies will insist on ‘enjoying’ such ‘privileges’ that subjugate and humiliate them and render them less than human.
Just because somebody said something a thousand years ago, it does not mean that one has to swallow it hook, line and sinker!
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Native Vedda / July 9, 2014
Muniyandy
“I cannot understand the mindset of the Muslim women who fight for the ‘right’ to wear the niqab or full face covering when they are out of their homes.”
The Muslim women don’t trust other Muslim men outside of their homes hence protect themselves from temptation.
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Thondamannar / July 8, 2014
How is she going to eat those (02) Ice cream cones?????
Is she going to bite or lick ????????????when and where she is going to do it?
On the beach or on the rail lines???????
OK guys … keep guessing here
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Native Vedda / July 9, 2014
Thondamannar
Why have you stopped your continuous barrage of Tamil bashing?
I suppose this is indeed Muslim bashing season for you. Are you enjoying it?
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Muhammad / August 1, 2014
THIS IS FREEDOM.. YOU CAN GO NAKED ON ROAD BUT YOU CAN’T COVER FULLY.
YOUR FREE TO LOOK HER BREAST BUT NO FREEDOM OF SPEECH TO COMMENT ABOUT HER BREAST.. IF YOU COMMENT THEN END UP WITH POLICE
YOU CAN LOOK AND ENJOY BUT DON’T TOUCH AND ENJOY..
FREEDOM IS ONLY FOR LOOK..
EVERYBODY KNOWS ABOUT YOUR RELIGION 100% BUT WHEN WE ASK QUESTION.. ANSWER WILL BE.. I DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT IT.. THERE ARE LOT OF THINGS.
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das / August 15, 2014
Actually, you cant naked on roads. Being fully covered is also equally ridiculous.
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Mohamed Azam / January 18, 2015
From The Heart of a Muslim – good one, worth reading!
I was born a Muslim and lived all my life as a follower of Islam.
After the barbaric terrorist attacks done by the hands of my fellow Muslims everywhere on this globe, and after the too many violent acts by Islamists in many parts of the world, I feel responsible as a Muslim and as a human being to speak out and tell the truth to protect the world and Muslims as well from a coming catastrophe and war of civilizations.
I have to admit that our current Islamic teaching creates violence and hatred toward non-Muslims. We Muslims are the ones who need to change. Until now we have accepted polygamy, the beating of women by men, and killing those who convert from Islam to other religions.
We have never had a clear and strong stand against the concept of slavery or wars, to spread our religion and to subjugate others to Islam and force them to pay a humiliating tax called jizia. We ask others to respect our religion while all the time we curse non-Muslims loudly (in Arabic) in our Friday prayers in the mosques.
What message do we convey to our children when we call the Jews “descendants of the pigs and monkeys”? [Yet, both Arabs and Jews are descendants of Ibrahim (Abraham)!] Is this a message of love and peace, or a message of hate?
I have been into [Christian] churches and [Jewish] synagogues where they were praying for Muslims. While all the time, we curse them, and teach our generations to call them “infidels”, and to hate them.
We immediately jump in a ‘knee jerk reflex’ to defend Prophet Mohammad when someone accuses him of being a pedophile while, at the same time, we are proud with the story in our Islamic books that he married a young girl seven years old [Aisha]when he was above 50 years old.
I am sad to say that many, if not most of us, rejoiced in happiness after September 11th and after many other terror attacks.
Muslims denounce these attacks to look good in front of the media, but we condone the Islamic terrorists and sympathise with their cause. Until now our ‘reputable’ top religious authorities have never issued a fatwa or religious statement to proclaim Bin Laden as an apostate, while an author, like Rushdie, was declared an apostate who should be killed according to Islamic Shari’a law just for writing a book criticizing Islam.
Muslims demonstrated to get more religious rights as we did in France to stop the ban on the hijab (head scarf), while we did not demonstrate with such passion and in such numbers against the terrorist murders. It is our absolute silence against the terrorists that gives the energy to these terrorists to continue doing their evil acts.
We Muslims need to stop blaming our problems on others or on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. As a matter of honesty, Israel is the only light of democracy, civilization, and human rights in the whole Middle East .
We kicked out the Jews with no compensation or mercy from most of the Arab countries to make them “Jews-free countries” while Israel accepted more than a million Arabs to live there, have their own nationality, and enjoy their rights as human beings. In Israel , women cannot be beaten legally by men, and any person can change his/her belief system with no fear of being killed by the Islamic law of ‘apostasy,’ while in our Islamic world people do not enjoy any of these rights.
I agree that the ‘Palestinians’ suffer, but they suffer because of their corrupt leaders and not because of Israel .
It is not common to see Arabs who live in Israel leaving to live in the Arab world. On the other hand, we used to see thousands of Palestinians going to work with happiness in Israel , its ‘enemy.’ If Israel treats Arabs badly as some people claim, surely we would have seen the opposite happening.
We Muslims need to admit our problems and face them. Only then we can treat them and start a new era to live in harmony with human mankind. Our religious leaders have to show a clear and very strong stand against polygamy, pedophilia, slavery, killing those who convert from Islam to other religions, beating of women by men, and declaring wars on non-Muslims to spread Islam.
Then, and only then, do we have the right to ask others to respect our religion. The time has come to stop our hypocrisy and say it openly: ‘We Muslims have to change.’
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“I am a Muslim by faith, a Christian by spirit, a Jew by heart, and above all I am a human being.” ~ Dr. Tawfik Hamid.
Dr. Hamid is an Egyptian scholar and author of the article above. The world needs more people like him—ones who have the courage to faceup to reality.
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