France Bans Burqa

[Andara Bledin]

AP article about Saturday's protest

France has outlawed any face covering, targeting the Muslim practice. In 2004 they banned the headscarves in classrooms, and now they've gone after the facial coverings.

Of course, the fallout for this is that Lady Gaga won't be able to wear her outlandish fashions while visiting France, which will be a blow to French fashion blogs everywhere.

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[Nyoibo]

Yup, because the whole 300 or so muslim women in france that actually wear the veils are such a threat to Frances secular way of life.

Now I'm waiting for winter and every woman who has her scarfe over her face to keep warm gets issued with a fine for hiding her face.

[fireheart17]

Yup, because the whole 300 or so muslim women in france that actually wear the veils are such a threat to Frances secular way of life.

Now I'm waiting for winter and every woman who has her scarfe over her face to keep warm gets issued with a fine for hiding her face.

Might have to wait a while they're currently hitting spring while we're getting random weather out the wazoo down here.

[HYHYBT]

My understanding is that the problem isn't so much that there's danger from the women wearing that type of veil out of religious practice as it is that it makes the wearer unidentifiable. Anyone can put one on.

It's the same basic idea as convenience stores at Halloween barring people in masks from the store.

Whether it's right or not is another matter.

[Gravekeeper]

Honestly, both sides are kind of jackasses on this one albeit for different reasons. I can see where France is coming from, and to be bluntly honest, their house their rules. You don't move to another country than demand its government and culture conform to yours. However, banning just the headscarf in classrooms? What the was the justification behind that one? Did they classify it as a hat then just wedge it in to tick people off?

[Rapscallion]

They were justifying it under banning all religion in schools - making people remove crucifixes and the like if memory serves. The general opinion was that they did it to piss off the muslims, though.

My experience of the French in politics has been along the lines of "We're all going to get along famously and be nice, but on our terms and nobody else's." There's a huge current of xenophobia there. The EU briefings were only able to be given out in French for long enough before they grudgingly allowed them in ... was it German as well? They really didn't want English to be used as they knew everyone else spoke it, and they didn't want that to eclipse their language.

They're almost as insane as us.

Rapscallion

[Gravekeeper]

They were justifying it under banning all religion in schools - making people remove crucifixes and the like if memory serves. The general opinion was that they did it to piss off the muslims, though.

Yeah, that sounds more like its just to stick it in the face of Muslims and nothing else, really. A headscarf is a far cry from a crucifix. Unless people we're wearing crucifix hats? ;p

[Rapscallion]

Memories are dredging up from the opinion pieces of the time. The koran just instructs men and women to dress modestly as far as I'm aware, and what that means depends on interpretation. There's no religious requirement to wear a burka or hijab, but there's a requirement to be modest. Modesty to the French may be a full bathing suit on the beach instead of a bikini, but to the muslim world it's quite different.

Effectively, they claimed that tribal garb was a religious symbol, when it's a more tenuous link than that. However, as many muslims regard it as a religious garb then the link is strengthened once more.

As you might expect, expats (ex patriots) tend to band together with others they identify with - Brits do it in sunny climes, often upon retirement. A move against them is perceived as an attack on all and they react strongly. I seem to remember there were marches in France about this. Of course, this meant a counter-reaction, which this is probably part of. However, from what I understand the Brit expats tend to blend far better into the local area than many other groups.

I think there's a problem in that a group with a strong cultural identity moved to France, which already has a strong cultural identity, and they have no problem with defending that in law or practice. I'm not sure if they still have it, but French television had a maximum quota of foreign produced content a while back, and it wasn't huge. French people traditionally took holidays within the boundaries of France. It's very insular.

It's a major clash of cultures. The immigrants from the east are seen more and more as invaders, and they're not doing things in a French way. The French are very protective.

I very much suspect that if the immigrants had spoken French exclusively and gone into typical French garb then there wouldn't have been any problem. However, is that a reasonable requirement?

Rapscallion

[daleduke17]

. You don't move to another country than demand its government and culture conform to yours.

Unless you are moving to the United States, then you do. :/

But, on topic: I'm just waiting to see how many idiots say this violates the Constitutional Freedom of Religion.

[Rapscallion]

Unless you are moving to the United States, then you do. :/

May look that way. Quite frankly, what people are usually content to do is do their own thing in peace and let you do your own thing. The media publicises the wackos claiming that their way is right and that they should take over.

But, on topic: I'm just waiting to see how many idiots say this violates the Constitutional Freedom of Religion.

In France, not that many I would guess.

If it happened in the US, there'd be hell on.

Rapscallion

[Greenday]

Stuff

Rapscallion

You know, that stuff reminds me a lot of Mexican immigrants right about now...

[Rapscallion]

I'm interested - in what way?

See, what I see from islamic immigrants is that the majority are just seeking a better life after fleeing from the third-world shitholes they came from. I can't really blame them for that. The first generation, the immigrants, are usually more set in their ways due to, I guess, fear of the new country. They don't know all the laws and customs, and stick with what they know. Their children usually get a bit more of an education in the culture from mingling with others and they're often the ones who see the benefit in offering their particular cuisine to a country unfamiliar with it. They can speak two languages and are usually there with a higher work ethic as they've seen their parents struggle in the few jobs they were able to hold down due to language barriers, in much the same way that me watching my parents has shown me that I really don't want to go into debt.

There are a few shitheads in the group, ones that try and tell everyone that they should bow down to allah or face exploding children - you know the sort. Since it's a fairly religious culture, there's a swell of sympathy towards that sentiment as it's all they've known and they've been instructed from youth to submit to the will of the mullahs etc. However, without that sort of influence the general population are pretty normal people. They eat, shit, need an umbrella when it's raining. That sort of thing. Their umbrella may be a different colour, and their food may taste pretty awesome, but they have the same basic needs.

Sure, there will be some areas where the cultures will clash, but a couple more generations and more give-and-take and things will even out.

I've had no real experience of the Mexican immigration situation, but from what I can tell it's more the case of crap economics on one side of the border and opportunities on the other side. "Do I want to stay in my homeland and watch my children grow up without opportunities, or do I want to jump a wall and give them a better chance?" I don't see any religious conflict in there as the primary religion in Mexico is Catholicism (I reserve the right to be wrong here) and there are plenty of Catholic churches in the US. I rather doubt there are religious figures telling the Mexican poor to invade with people.

Is it just the economic migrant situation you find similar?

Rapscallion

[Andara Bledin]

Is it just the economic migrant situation you find similar?

It could be more of the cultural invasion. Of the various ethnicities that attended my high school, only one seemed to feel the need to have cultural pride groups, and they had at least 3. Plus, their groups were quite exclusionary, for some reason - if you weren't one of them, you weren't welcome. And then they wondered why the rest of us didn't like them. >_>

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[linguist]

You don't move to another country than demand its government and culture conform to yours.

And what of those Muslims who are natural born French citizens and choose to wear the niqab or burqa? They're also being targeted by this bigoted legislation.

If France is truly concerned about security, as I keep hearing, they need to ban all manner of facial coverings: burqa, niqab, hoodies, large hats, sunglasses, long hair, scarves, medical masks (for those who are immune compromised), and so on. Hell, even a big smile can throw off facial recognition technology. However, I don't forsee any of those other things being banned, which makes it pretty clear that this legislation is being targeted directly at Muslims.

[Rapscallion]

It could be more of the cultural invasion. Of the various ethnicities that attended my high school, only one seemed to feel the need to have cultural pride groups, and they had at least 3. Plus, their groups were quite exclusionary, for some reason - if you weren't one of them, you weren't welcome. And then they wondered why the rest of us didn't like them. >_>

^-.-^

I was more thinking along the lines of whether any Mexicans had tried to claim that they should culturally invade, which has happened with a very few muslim extremists. Otherwise, it's just simply people seeing a better standard of living and going for it.

Rapscallion