Burka ban

Rev Hellfire

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

I must admit I'm coming around to perhaps thinking that an outright ban is not required, but rather a clarification that entry to both public and private spaces can be done for people who conceal their faces.

Simply making the burka impractical would provide the same desired effect while removing the right for its practitioners to act the martyr.

Eliot Rosewater

I'm religious and support the ban

robindch wrote: »

Yes, because islam started the forcing. The state is simply stepping in to reassert a right that has been forcibly removed.

The right that has, apparently, been infringed upon is the freedom to choose one's own clothing style. The state is not re-asserting that right whatsoever: it is curtailing it. Therein lies the irony of the burqa ban. Supporters claim that forcing a women to dress a certain way is wrong, so their solution is to force them to dress another way.

The principle questions here are: what percentage of burqa wearers are being forced to do wear them? Has anyone actually talked to any burqa wearer to ask if they feel oppressed? (I'm especially interested in that one.) And, if they are oppressed, why isn't a regular anti-domestic abuse avenue pursued?

Eliot Rosewater

I'm religious and support the ban

Rev Hellfire wrote: »

...while removing the right for its practitioners to act the martyr.

Oh, so it's no longer about preventing oppression, but rather about preventing people from practising their religion?

The irony deepens. Organised atheism is seemingly about preventing religions from oppressing people, but here we see a distinctly oppressive tendency within that atheism.

magicbastarder

I'm religious and support the ban

i think there's some confusion about what a secular or pluralist society is and how that's achieved; you don't achieve either by restricting religion, you do it by treating all religions the same - i.e. according no special status to any.

Mark Hamill

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

Moomoo1 wrote: »

my point is that if you read a book and somewhere in the book it says 'you must wear this' and you wear it then that's not the sort of coercion we should be legislating against. What if I don't find a garment demeaning and don't feel dominated? Why should I be prevented from wearing it?

This is not someone just reading a book that says to wear something. This is someone being threatened under pain of torture in hell to wear something.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

But that suggests that she has a free choice to question her preconceptions. But if she does, surely she has a free choice to question the wearing of the burka? So she's not being coerced?

No. It suggest that she will be coerced into questioning her preconceptions because she wont have much choice.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

maybe I am coerced? How do you know? And do I not have free choice to reject the burka anyway, just like you say above at (1)?

As far as I know, there is not a culture somewhere which indoctrinates people into wearing a football kit under pain of torture in hell.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

but it's not allowed to gag you. That's anti-democratic. Democracy is about how free your opponent is to speak.

No-one is stopping these women from saying that they should be wearing the burka. They can say whatever they like.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

precisely. So for all you know the majority of burka wearers would be worse off under the ban?

Society will be better off, and if society is better off, the people in it are better off. They may not like it ot first, but its for their own good. There are parallels to be drawn tothe smoking ban here, and those that opposed it.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

prove it. I say that you will just make their lives a misery and force them into emigrating back to where they came from, and being oppressed there 100 times more.

By your arguments , that will their choice, so who are we to stop them?

Moomoo1 wrote: »

that takes place with all sorts of medical checks and help on hand. Apples and oranges. And many want boxing banned.

Yeah medical checks and help on hand, because we have stepped in and told boxers that even though they have made the free choice to not have safety rules, we as a society are making them law.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

the ban will do nothing about those. It will just radicalise those people further.

Thats a loose loose situation. Those people will radicalise if you just question them.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

you won't drive them to change like that. And should people be driven to change by banning things anyway? Should we not respect their freedom of choice not to be driven to change? Let's enforce our existing laws against violence and denial of freedom, for sure. But at some point you have to trust people to make a free choice of what they want without you telling them what they can or can't want.

You are asking someone who doesn't believe they are making a free choice, should we not respect their choice.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

And don't come back with 'so you want to legalise drugs then'? Wearing a burka is not directly harmful to your health like taking drugs.

Its directly harmful to societies health.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

alcohol is a much worse abuse and yet we allow it. Why? Because people need to be free to abuse themselves up to a certain point. Also, there's not enough of a consensus on burka being abuse, whereas everyone agrees that alcohol is a dangerous drug.

If people can keep that abuse to themsleves, then its of no major concern. But the burka is a political and religious tool, that abuse does not stay individual.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

you did not prove it. It's impossible to prove it. Unless the coercion is physical. You said 'the religious texts say it must be worn, and so that's coercion'. But it's not. By that logic any sort of belief we hold is coercion. By that logic we wouldn't be able to get out of bed because any action will be taken due to some opinion and belief and be coercive.

I didn't say "the religious texts say it must be worn, and so that's coercion" :mad:, i've been saying the exact opposite, the religious text say nothing about the burka, its wahabi fundamentalists who use the burka as a tool of dominance. My logic is that eveything is coercion, but some coercion is necessary because people are fairly stupid and dont hesitate to think on what they do.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

so you did not prove that they are not wearing it willingly, and the burden of proof is always on the people trying to ban things.

The burden of proof is those claiming things outside of the null hypothesis. In this case the null hypothesis has no opinion on the womens free will choice. So I have offered an argument as to why its not free will. You need to to do better than asking for some imaginary definitive proof.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

no. And this legislation won't change them. You address the root, not the symptom.

Without stepping up and just calling bs on their religion, how do you that?

Moomoo1 wrote: »

you are still contradicting yourself. You say 'here are those oppressed people who cannot break away from their indoctrination, so much so that I consider that indoctrination to be coercion'. And then you say 'but if we ban the burka they will all question the indoctrination and break away'. Do you see the problem?

No, because we are coercing them to think. In their indoctrination, they are coerced into not thinking, and no amount of support groups will make the women who dont go to them actually think about what they do. But force to take heed of what they do, and what choice will they have? I'm not saying they will come to the right conclusion, but they will have ot think more about it.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

attacking religion makes it stronger. The Soviet experiment showed that.

Emotive nonsense. One mans attack is another mans polite questioning. There comes a point where we have to call bs on something, regardless of how many people like it.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

apples and oranges again... wearing things does not affect other people in the way you describe.

You missed my point. Read it again, but forget any specific examples:I respect peoples right to make a choice, but I also respect their right to be wrong in that choice and to be prevented from acting out on it.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

and sometimes people make decisions whilst having all the evidence. And you need to respect that, which you do not.

Of course I respect that, its just that in this case, they do not have all the evidence.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

If you want them to have evidence, give them evidence, and then if they still want to wear the garment let them be.

Its not enough to give them the evidence if they dont pay attention to it.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

Listen, you think the way every totalitarian state thought. 'We will do this because people are too stupid to act in their own good.'. No, just no. We've been there and we don't want to go there again.

Every single law and regulation is based on that principle.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

That does not excuse you from respecting people's right to wear the burka. Just like alcohol-related deaths do not excuse you from respecting people's rights to have a drink. And alcohol is so, so much more harmful.

I could go into a huge discussion into the evils of Western imperialism and how we treasure the symbols of that imperialism to this day, but that's off-topic.

I'm noty even sure you are reading what I right anyone. You didn't resopond to a single point I made.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

those beliefs are part of human nature itself. Take them away, restrict them and you go against what people are. You cannot do that.

Emotive bs, again. Cancer is "a part of human nature", war is "a part of human nature" genocide is "a part of human nature". "Human nature" can be massively improved on.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

it's not a chance, it's a certainty, proved again and again in history. You persecute a religious minority and you make them more zealous.

So now we are down to - "dont poke the religions, they bite back"? Society shouldn't let the fear of little minded bigots stop itself from improving itself.

Mark Hamill

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

magicbastarder wrote: »

you've explained your reasoning. i've not seen any proof of your conjectures. as such, i will accord it as much weight as i would any other opinion expressed without proof.

And what sort of proof do you have for your opinion?

magicbastarder wrote: »

if you want to equate dictating behaviour to adults with parenting or schooling practices, fine. i hope you realise what that does to the credibility of your argument?

Lol.

Mark Hamill

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

Rev Hellfire wrote: »

I must admit I'm coming around to perhaps thinking that an outright ban is not required, but rather a clarification that entry to both public and private spaces can be done for people who conceal their faces.

Simply making the burka impractical would provide the same desired effect while removing the right for its practitioners to act the martyr.

Why is it that those who are outright against the burka couldn't come up with such a rational alternative?

Mark Hamill

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

magicbastarder wrote: »

i think there's some confusion about what a secular or pluralist society is and how that's achieved; you don't achieve either by restricting religion, you do it by treating all religions the same - i.e. according no special status to any.

Who is advocating special treatment to any religion?

Eliot Rosewater

I'm religious and support the ban

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Who is advocating special treatment to any religion?

By banning the burka you are treating adherents of Islam differently to how you are treating non-Muslims. Hence, you are giving special treatment to Islam.

cavedave

I'm religious and support the ban

Veiling among Muslim women is modelled as a form of cultural resistance which inhibits the transmission of secular values. Individuals care about opinions of their community members and use veiling to influence these opinions. Our theory predicts that veiling is highest when individuals from highly religious communities interact in highly secular environments. This accounts for puzzling features of the new veiling movement since the 1970s. Though veiling helps retain religious values, we show that bans on veiling aimed at assimilation can be counterproductive. By inducing religious types to segregate in local communities, bans on veiling can lead to increased religiosity.

from here.

So it looks like veils are a way for Muslim women to show they are not part of secular culture. And banning them seems to be counter productive.

magicbastarder

I'm religious and support the ban

Mark Hamill wrote: »

And what sort of proof do you have for your opinion?

which of my statements would you like proof of?
the statement of yours i am questioning is that you claim muslim women cannot freely choose to wear the burka. i have seen nothing from you to support that bar your own judgement. you're couching it in terms of fact; i want to see the information which turns it from opinion into fact.

robindch

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

Wicknight wrote: »

But what "right" is being reasserted?

The right for a woman to choose to wear more or less whatever she wants.

At the moment, and from my experience specifically in islamic countries and with religion in general everywhere, I believe that the women who wear burkas -- as well as the rest of the outfit, but let's not go there! -- do so because they have been coerced into doing so with a variety of subtle and non-subtle means. The degree of choice they have in the matter appears to be minimal to non-existent.

So, the state must choose whether it wants to continue to tolerate this specific instance of religious coercion, or whether it wants to ignore it. In this case, it's chosen to confront it and while there's no doubt that it's a deeply imperfect solution, it's almost certainly better than sitting around and pretending that there's no coercion going on.

There's also a more generic debate which hasn't even started yet about whether the state should discourage, tolerate or encourage memes which are non-beneficial (or parasitic, to use that loaded term). Personally, I'd like the state to start the process of halting the encouragement of them, by stopping their tax breaks, removing control of schools and so on. But that's another debate and another thread.

robindch

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

By banning the burka you are treating adherents of Islam differently to how you are treating non-Muslims. Hence, you are giving special treatment to Islam.

I think you'll find that most if not all of the legislation which has been, or is being considered, speaks just of face-coverings and does not target the burka specifically.

magicbastarder

I'm religious and support the ban

let's not kid ourselves. the law in question is aimed at the burka.

Eliot Rosewater

I'm religious and support the ban

robindch wrote: »

I believe that the women who wear burkas -- as well as the rest of the outfit, but let's not go there! -- do so because they have been coerced into doing so with a variety of subtle and non-subtle means. The degree of choice they have in the matter appears to be minimal to non-existent.

What makes you come to that conclusion?

robindch wrote: »

So, the state must choose whether it wants to continue to tolerate this specific instance of religious coercion, or whether it wants to ignore it.

The solution, in this case, is to remove the supposed coercion of the few (of which I've yet to hear evidence of) with the coercion of everyone. We're going from (apparently) forcing some people to wear the burqa to forcing everyone not to wear it. There is certainly a net increase in oppression.

robindch wrote: »

There's also a more generic debate which hasn't even started yet about whether the state should discourage, tolerate or encourage memes

I think the state should take no stance. I consider both supporting religions (through funding) and oppressing religions (through burqa bans) to be equally wrong.

robindch wrote: »

I think you'll find that most if not all of the legislation which has been, or is being considered, speaks just of face-coverings and does not target the burka specifically.

Ah, now. This debate and this legislation are targeted at Muslims.

robindch

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

magicbastarder wrote: »

let's not kid ourselves. the law in question is aimed at the burka.

Yes. That's because most versions of christianity have moved on from telling men to require "their" women to put bags over their heads.

Though not all have. The Orthodox and distinctly weird "Old Believers" still require women to wear something quite similar to a chador.

robindch

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

What makes you come to that conclusion?

Because I've seen it first hand -- see this post.

Zombrex

robindch wrote: »

The right for a woman to choose to wear more or less whatever she wants.

But choosing to wear "more or less" what she wants is irrelevant. An oppressed Muslim woman is not oppressed because she wears the burka. She wears the burka because she is oppressed.

You are not stopping the oppression, you are simply changing the outcome of it. It now simply becomes She does not wear the burka because is oppressed.

Without actual choice the person is not liberated. With the choice still being made for them they are not liberated. It is like a Muslim man saying to his wife she is free because she can wear any type of burka she wants. That is irrelevant if the only thing she wants to do is not wear a burka.

Even a Muslim woman who does not wish to wear the burka will resent being told she cannot, just like a Muslim woman who wishes to wear the burka will still resent being ordered to by her husband because it is not the burka bit that is the important bit, it is the "ordered to" bit that is the important bit.

As I've said before focusing on the burka is missing the wood for the trees. It is not the burka, it is the order to wear the burka. That is the oppression, the removal of choice and liberty.

Equally it is not removing the burka, it is the order to remove the burka.

A Muslim woman who is genuinely oppressed is sick of being told what to do.

robindch wrote: »

In this case, it's chosen to confront it and while there's no doubt that it's a deeply imperfect solution, it's almost certainly better than sitting around and pretending that there's no coercion going on.

No one is suggesting pretending coercion isn't going on. It is not an either or situation.

A response though that does not liberate Muslim women is not a solution. And this response does not liberate Muslim women. I don't actually accept that anything is better than nothing because in this case the anything simply compounds the view that oppressed Muslim women already have that they are not trusted to make their own decisions.

How can we inspire Muslims to embrace western freedom if we don't apply western freedom to Muslims?

Cú Giobach

I'm religious and support the ban

Mark Hamill wrote;
Thats a different thing entirely to saying that a government never has the right to legislate on something.

yes it is, you are very observant. What is your point????

Mark Hamill wrote;
Can you give me a rational and logical reason to wear the burka? One that shows that they have all the information?

I can see no logical or rational reason to wear such a garment,
I can also see no logical or rational reason for going to mass,
these are my opinions and I do not have the right to ban someone from either of these activities just because to me they seem irrational.

Moomoo1

I'm religious and support the ban

Originally Posted by Moomoo1
My point was that AS LONG AS people's freedoms do not step on the freedoms of others/cause harm to themselves and others they should be allowed.

robindch wrote: »

So, you believe that people should have the freedom to force women to wear burqas?

No, because that freedom you describe 'steps' on the freedoms of others.

Mark Hamill

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

Cú Giobach wrote: »

yes it is, you are very observant. What is your point????

That with your knee jerk emotive posting, you managed to contradict yourself in the space of two posts.

Cú Giobach wrote: »

I can see no logical or rational reason to wear such a garment,
I can also see no logical or rational reason for going to mass,
these are my opinions and I do not have the right to ban someone from either of these activities just because to me they seem irrational.

Society does, if it can show that these things will be danger to society.

Mark Hamill

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

By banning the burka you are treating adherents of Islam differently to how you are treating non-Muslims. Hence, you are giving special treatment to Islam.

The burka isn't being banned, covering your face is being banned. The law in itself is secular. That this effects muslims more than non-muslims is the their fault.

Mark Hamill

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

magicbastarder wrote: »

which of my statements would you like proof of?
the statement of yours i am questioning is that you claim muslim women cannot freely choose to wear the burka. i have seen nothing from you to support that bar your own judgement. you're couching it in terms of fact; i want to see the information which turns it from opinion into fact.

I have said it all already. The burka is from the wahabi uprise in islam, a fundamentalist movement that wants to bring islam backwards to an extreme literal interpretation of the quran in order to drive out the western influences it has seen as unclean. The burka is a tool devised for domination over women, by the patriarchal wahabi leaders (who had/have strong ties with saudi leaders). This has lead to their extremist nonsense being indoctrinated into the heads of kids in school (hence the more extreme things in islam, like the burka, are more commonly seen in the middle east) under the fear of going to hell. Women in these parts of the world can not go outside by themselves or uncovered, under fear of being attacked.
Reading that, how can you say that these women have had a upbringing that encourages healthy skeptism, that these womens have a full grasp of objective logic and rationality? Do you honestly think that these women would make the same choices with regard to the burka if they had have been brought up in the west?

Moomoo1

I'm religious and support the ban

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Society does, if it can show that these things will be danger to society.

but you've repeatedly failed to show that.

our society practices covering of the face sometimes. What if it's cold and you wrap a scarf round your face to keep warm?

Moomoo1

I'm religious and support the ban

Mark Hamill wrote: »

snipped

we are just going round in circles here. You have a number of assumptions which you are unable to justify, and just keep repeating as if they are Gospel. You still haven't shown to me that the burka is harmful to society (how is it harmful to an average white male like me for instance). You still haven't shown that banning the burka would make life better for people wearing it (whereas I gave you a lot of examples of how it would make life hell). You haven't shown that banning the burka will make certain Muslims question its neccessity as opposed to thinking 'islam is under attack let's stick to our traditions' (when any half-decent knowledge of history -eg in the USSR- would suggest that any attack on religion makes its proponents more zealous). You haven't resolved the massive contradiction in your definition of 'choice' - according to you women wearing the burka have no choice about whether to wear it (due to some form or coercion) or not at the moment but will suddenly gain their choice if it's banned (when that same coercion is still there - so pain of torture in hell will magically go away because of this ban?). You haven't resolved the stunning hypocricy of for instance allowing people to drink alcohol (=harming themselves and others) and yet wanting to ban a garment (=no immediate harm to anyone) and the resulting implication that sometimes you have to allow people to do things that you perceive harmful to themselves.

There are many intelligent, educated and informed people who wear the burka. Has it occurred to you that they might be right and you wrong?

All your say is based on conjecture and supposition, and assumption of what certain people feel and think. That's why I stand by my original diagnosis of 'stunning arrogance'

I really do think that all the arguments to ban the burka on the grounds of 'creating more freedom' are spurious. The real reason for wanting the ban is good old Islamophobia - or at least hatred of religion.

Moomoo1

I'm religious and support the ban

Mark Hamill wrote: »

I have said it all already. The burka is from the wahabi uprise in islam, a fundamentalist movement that wants to bring islam backwards to an extreme literal interpretation of the quran in order to drive out the western influences it has seen as unclean. The burka is a tool devised for domination over women, by the patriarchal wahabi leaders (who had/have strong ties with saudi leaders). This has lead to their extremist nonsense being indoctrinated into the heads of kids in school (hence the more extreme things in islam, like the burka, are more commonly seen in the middle east) under the fear of going to hell. Women in these parts of the world can not go outside by themselves or uncovered, under fear of being attacked.
Reading that, how can you say that these women have had a upbringing that encourages healthy skeptism, that these womens have a full grasp of objective logic and rationality? Do you honestly think that these women would make the same choices with regard to the burka if they had have been brought up in the west?

many of those burka-wearing women in our country are white, have been brought up in the west and converted to Islam... many more still whilst being ethnically from Asia were born and brought up in the West.

I'd say that those women have a much more objective view of their predicament and the reasons they chose to wear the burka than you. For the simple reason that they were there and you are speaking from afar.

goingpostal

I'm religious and support the ban

They can wear burkas in our country when I can go to an Islamic country and walk around with a sandwich board in arabic saying "Prophet Muhammad was a whoremaster and a charlatan" without getting stoned to death by a rabid mob.

strobe

I'm religious and support the ban

Moomoo1 wrote: »

many of those burka-wearing women in our country are white, have been brought up in the west and converted to Islam... many more still whilst being ethnically from Asia were born and brought up in the West.

I'd say that those women have a much more objective view of their predicament and the reasons they chose to wear the burka than you. For the simple reason that they were there and you are speaking from afar.

In Ireland? Really? I'd challenge that. Or are you from France Moomoo?

ColmDawson

I'm religious and support the ban

goingpostal wrote: »

They can wear burkas in our country when I can go to an Islamic country and walk around with a sandwich board in arabic saying "Prophet Muhammad was a whoremaster and a charlatan" without getting stoned to death by a rabid mob.

That's not how it works. I've said this before (to barochoc) and I'll say it again: we shouldn't remove freedoms in our country in retaliation against the lack of freedom in other countries.

Moomoo1

I'm non-religious and do not support the ban

Moomoo1 wrote: »

many of those burka-wearing women in our country are white

How do you know