Burka ban

donegalfella wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

He is not misrepresenting the situation. They do not have a choice. Even if they did, I would happily take the rights away from thousands of women to cover their face in public if it means one woman who doesn't have to.

Human Rights Watch wrote:

The primary impact of legislation of this kind would be to confine these women to their homes, rather than to liberate them

This, to be honest, has been the only salient point I have seen in the debate, and it is the only point that makes me question the efficacy of the law. It is generally accepted that the burqa, even if voluntarily worn by some women, is a misogynistic cult practise that is 'cultural' in the same sense that the Magdalene laundries were 'cultural'. Because of this, we know that women who are forced to wear the burqa will probably be imprisoned by their husbands. This is also a horrible form of abuse, but one that is difficult to combat, especially when the women think it is what they deserve.

You might "think" and "believe" that there are no women who wear the full Islamic veil for reasons of religious observance and/or sexual modesty—but female attire among other conservative, religious communities, such as nuns, orthodox Jews, the Amish, and so on, would suggest that many women do make such choices. The Islamic full veil is merely a slightly more extreme manifestation.

What makes the burqa abhorrent is the face is covered, and there is no equivalent male attire. Even if the burqa below the face consisted of casual jeans and a comfy shirt, it would still be a disgusting practise as long as the head is covered. The only parallel I can think of in other conservative groups is the breast-deforming dresses some women were forced to wear.

^
Is the argument now is that they should have a 'right' to put a bag on their heads? And that they've lost that right? Sounds incredibly disingenuous to me.
They can still cover up to such an extent that it preserves their 'modesty'.
So the only issue is that they can't put something on their head? Is that really a huge problem and is this really depriving them of something essential to religion? Sounds like a lot of posturing to me.

irishconvert wrote: »

Well if the ban comes in I will personally wear a bag over my head and march up and down O'Connell street. I expect everyone who truely supports freedom and democracy to join me, no matter what their the religious beliefs are.

as would I. First they came for the Muslims and I did nothing because I wasn't a Muslim.

Seriously considering donating money to the fund that French guy wants to set up to pay the fines of women caught wearing the burka on French streets. Together we shall overcome.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

As for the fundamental political reason for the debate, that reason is a hatred of Islam and anyone different by white Europeans.

You are a racist. You constant trying to boil our argument down to our "white european hatred" of Islam just betrays your own racist opinions of white europeans. We cannot possibly have a real political or social reason for wanting to ban the burka, we cant possibly be sincere in our efforts in trying to fight back against the misgynistic barbarian culture that is enfringing on ours, it has to be that we dont like "dem der darkies". Tell me, if we really did just hate the muslims, why hasn't anyone here called for the niqab or hijab or head scarf to be banned?

Moomoo1 wrote: »

Which is a special case of an age-old trick: during times of crisis the Establishment tries to divert attention from the way it totally screwed things up by focusing on some small minority and rabble-rousing in order to divert attention from the really important issues of the day (like the economy). So the crisis-fueled public indignation instead of pointing at the people responsible for the crisis gets pointed on the said minority, which has its rights curtailed to the (media-sponsored) roar of the public approval, as the sheep are delighted even though their own life situations didn't improve one little bit.

Some actions are made to stop things getting worse, as opposed to make things better.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

re: the niqab etc: just a matter of time. If things get worse economically the government and the media will take every chance to beat down on a vulnerable minority and present it as 'look we are taking action against those evil Muslims' (whilst average living conditions in the country take a nosedive).

as for your opinions, I've no doubt they are sincere. You and the others have convinced themselves that they are fighting oppression and injustice when in fact they are fighting people who are different, and who freely choose to be different. And you made up a logical framework to back up your beliefs, to justify it to yourself as much as to me.

Your entire defense to our arguments is now that we are racists. And eveything you write now is a justification for that. You ignore what people have said, how Robindch has described his time in Islamic countries, how I told you that my girlfriend (of nearly two years) is muslim. You cant accept that we have looked at this rationally and recognised it for what it is. And your own accusations just betrays your own racism.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

just look at the language you are using: 'mysoginistic barbarian culture infringing on ours'. That's straight out of 'scaremongering of dummies' manual that they no doubt employ in government propaganda departments: full of assumptions and half-truths.

Its an accurate description of the loons that came up with the burka, the same loons who advocate beating wives, who advocate eye-for-eye revenge in legal cases, who want to punish apostasy with death and whose practises lead to girls being stoned to death for being raped.

Moomoo1 wrote: »

this ban will make things worse

Doing nothing will make things worse. Even if it does nothing to help the women who wear the burka now, it is a drawing of a line in the sand, it is an attempt to stop the encroaching of some of the horrible aspects of humanity from arriving and dominating our culture.

Originally Posted by Moomoo1
[...] who freely choose [...]

robindch wrote: »

I think this is where you're tripping up.

People here have a choice about what religion to follow and how strictly to follow their religion. That's the difference between us and the middle east: we do not FORCE people to do certain things to do with religion.

In the Muslim world a woman who refuses to wear certain religious garments, conform to certain religious practices can in many situations be in grave danger - both from the law and from the community. Here this is not the case: even if her family go after her the state can go to certain lengths to protect her, and that is why in the West wearing the burka becomes a choice. People like you want to take away that choice, which is what I am opposing.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

I have explained time and time again where the burka came from and Robin has given first hand examples of countries run by the very people who instigated it and support it. These societies are almost irrevocably damaged, they have an unbelievably long way to get back to the modern world (where they where, only 40-50 years ago-see those pictures posted a few pages back). Society is damaged by any mass acceptace of bad ideas, be it misgonystic religions, homeopathy or the media MMR hoax and you need to come up with a response better than "Lalala, I dont believe you".

so it's the burka that damaged all those societies? Really? Silly me, and I thought it was a backward tribal culture amplified by extreme poverty and inequality. There is a clear line between the extreme human rights abuses in those countries and the burka: it's flawed logic to say 'if lots of people wear the burka in Ireland then we'll start stoning people and cutting hands off'. One doesn't follow from the other.

the burka - on its own - is harmless to our society. The important freedom to preserve is the freedom to wear what you like: if you set the precedent by saying 'you cannot wear the burka' who's to say that someone down the line won't continue that precedent by saying 'you must wear the burka'?

Mark Hamill wrote: »

More of the emotive nonsense. How do you deal with a religion that is threatening you? Do you just bend over backwards out of fear of retaliation? So after we give in on the burka, what else do we give in on? How about we make our own women wear the burka, for fear of insulting islam? Lets bring sharia in as part of irish law, hell lets replace irish law with sharia law, dont want to insult islam. Because any half decent knowledge of these islamic fundamentalist countries will show, just being non-muslim is an attack on their religion, and as any half decent knowledge of discussions with muslims (or any damn theist) will show, using reason logic is too.

threatening us... how?

what do you mean 'give in'? Who says we are going to bring in sharia law, except you? So allowing people freedom of what to wear leads to bringing in sharia law? Surely you can see that's false? And even supposing there is this evil organisation determined to make Ireland a country with sharia law: surely banning the burka will just play in their hands and make them more determined to reach their goals?

You still haven't addressed the USSR example in which it was clearly seen how attacking religion makes its followers more and more zealous.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

I never said that these women would magically get the choice once the burka is banned, I said that they would have to think about the choice, as they wont be able not to. Some women may never be helped by this, they may be too far gone to listen to reason.

so you advocate placing people into an irresolvable conflict between their religion and the state. Giving them the choice between having a criminal record and (in their eyes) going to hell. Do you not think that's exceptionally cruel?

Mark Hamill wrote: »

A) who says I dont think alcohol should be banned?
People dont drink alcohol under the threat of hell
C) People drinknig alcohol arent showing an unquestioned superseeding obediance to an external unelected power base over their own countries power base.

you are missing the point. The point being is that you have to allow people to do certain things that you might perceive as harmful. And surely wearing a garment is one such thing? It harms no one bar the wearer... and doesn't harm the wearer's health.

I don't post here as you see, I post in personal and relationship issues. And the damage alcohol does to people's lives and to those around them is unreal, many times more than the burka. In all sorts of different ways. But on the other hand we can't ban it, because many people do drink responsibly and enjoy it, and we have to let people have some sort of freedom. Same logic goes for the burka, except for the fact the 'damage' it does is far far smaller.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

And there have been many intelligent and educated people who believe that the world is 6000 years old. Their are such things as confirmational bias and selective reasoning. All people, intelligent or otherwise are capable of suffering from ignoring that facts they dont like.

Most of those intelligent people lived before it was conclusively proven that the world was older. You can only judge a situation based on the information you've got.

Point is, you don't KNOW that those people ignored the facts. Maybe they saw the facts and still made the decision they did. You simply don't have the information to make the decision for them.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

BS and you know it. This constant calling of everyone who wants to ban the burka islamophobia is just its own form of racism.

as sherlock holmes said, if you exclude all the possibilities, then what remains must be the truth. I've excluded all the possibilities except plain old islamophobia.