Sheila,
According to Reuters and other news sources, the head scarves (and other religious symbols) will be banned from schools if Chirac signs this into law, and he has indicated he will do so. This is going beyond separation of church and state. But congratulatoins on brushing up on your grammar, at least I understood your argument.

Although Louisiana law is based on the Napoleonic code, as opposed to the English common law, people in LA are still afforded ALL of the rights granted under the U.S. Constitution, as well as the U.S. Supreme Court.

Dear Yawn.

I'm genuinely interested, not picking a fight. How is the removal of religious symbols from state institutions different from, say, dropping the words "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance?

(It's usually my typping rather than my grammar, per se, that's at fault- just ask my secretaries)

Hi all,

Although we are straying from my original query regarding the French legal system, I am interested in the headscarves issue, as we have the same situation in the US.

If a Muslim woman wears a headscarf to school, how does that differ from wearing a cross outside one's clothes?

I'll take a shot at your question, Sheila.

The words "under God" in the pledge and "In God we Trust" minted on coins may be viewed as state sponsorship of religion.

Restricting the wearing of headscarves is tantamount to disallowing the practice of one's religion.

Ir, according to the French commission, it doesn't. Nor does wearing a yarmulke.

Responding to the last two posts:

A recognition that there is/was a Creator is not necessarily a religious belief.

I recognize that there are people who insist that there was no Creator, but as an engineer and scientist I can only consider this to be a religious belief.

If wearing a headscarf is not permitted, then any other religious symbols should not be permitted.

>I recognize that there are people who insist that there was no Creator, but as an engineer and scientist I can only consider this to be a religious belief.

If wearing a headscarf is not permitted, then any other religious symbols should not be permitted.<

If atheism is a religion, what's the symbol to be restricted from French schools?

This is scary stuff!

>If atheism is a religion, what's the symbol to be restricted from French schools?<

I should have inserted the parenthetical (and I agree that it is) after the word "religion."

Beachbum has it right. The First Amendment says "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." "Under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance might be considered to violate the Establishment Clause (though the Supreme Court will probably say that it doesn't); banning headscarves would almost certainly violate the Free Exercise Clause.

What about Sultaana Freeman, who sued the Florida DMV because it would not allow her to take her DL photo wearing a birka, with only her eyes showing.

http://www.courttv.com/trials/freeman/052703am_ctv.html

The District Court ruled against her, ruling that the State had a complelling interest promoting public safety, which is served by the ability to identify individuals.

http://www.courttv.com/trials/freema...nveil_ctv.html

Hi beachbum,

Since atheists have no religious symbol, the French would have to ban wearing nothing. This would, of course, be a major problem at nude beaches.

I knew we could get this thread to be travel related.

The difficulty arises when the needs and requirements of the state come into conflict with the needs and requirements of religion.

For example, the state needs and requires to ensure the security of the public; a male Sikh by his religion needs to carry a knife. The solution thus far has been to permit 'symbolic' knives to be carried by male Sikhs when, for example, they are on board aircraft. (****Here is where this issue can arguably relate to travel.****) But the state, not the religion in question, reserves the right as to how best to resolve such conflicts. Many states will refuse to issue passports unless the face of the applicant is visible in the photograph; the argument that a veil must be worn at all times for reasons of religion won't be accepted.

Questions on religious symbols become trickier the further one delves into just what it is the state needs and requires. As for religions, they are notorious for having a lot of in-fighting as to just what it is their holy texts mean and what is needed and required by their followers. The French and other multicultural states could argue that the people need to be unified as citizens, and this in turn requires that religious differences not be emphasized when said citizens appear in public. On the other hand, for one and the same goal of unity, one could argue that this requires that differences SHOULD be emphasized in public, in order that such differences become acceptable to the general populace.

Of one thing I'm certain. People are complicated, and life is messy. Our laws will thus be similarly complicated and messy, always up for argument.

Frankly (no pun intended) the French have quite a dilemma. There is a large and vocal anti-Semitic crowd in France, and now that the gov't has finally turned its attention to its Muslim population, it is doing things that could provoke a backlash. In short, Chirac tried to have it both ways, placating the Muslims and maintaining France's secularism, but that didn't work, and the prospects for racial harmony in France are quite dim -- and given France's history, that's saying <i>quite a lot</i>.

&lt;There is a large and vocal anti-Semitic crowd in France&gt;

I am italian but I've been living in france for several years in the 80s. I know very well that country and I can tell you that France is not at all an &quot;anti-Semitic&quot; country and neither has ever been. Of course you can always find a minority of true anti-semitics, but no more than what you would find in the US.

While it is true that many french collaborated with the Vichy govnmt and the Nazis in WW2, and that they gave away a lots of Jewish families, the reasons are not to be found so much in &quot;antisemitism&quot; but more so in the following two factors:

1- Cowardly: I like the French, but I must say they can be some time very cowards and submissives

2 - Chauvinisme: The most important reason. French have always historically been very Chauvinists, and there fore even if I would not say they are racists, they never really were enthusiastics for strangers and other cultures. What happened with the Jews could have happened with any other religions, races or just foreign populations at that time if the occupying nazis would have required it...

The latest incidents in Sinagogues and jewish cemetery also are not to be confused with antisemitism. France has both the largest Jewish (600.000) and Muslim (5 milions) comunity in Europe. At the time when I was living there, the french people were way more chauvinist against the muslims than against the Jewish people, for the simple fact that the jewish ARE french and therefore perfectly integrated in that culture meanwhile the muslams are mostly arabs and had a lots of problems into adapting in the french culture. (French were also not very frendly with the waves of Italians and spanish immigrations that invated that country in the 19th century till the 1960s...)

Nowadays I must say the French made huge progress and are not any more chauvinists like they used to be, they actually are very open minded with other cultures since it became a multi-cultural country.

You have to understand that all the incidents that happened against jewish symbols lately were committed by Muslims from arabic origins. Also there is hate between arabs and jewish i wouldn't call that anti-semitism since the arabs are semitics people too. Further more the jewish communities that lived for centuries in the Arabs world never met any problems till the 20th century. Arab and Jewish cultures have a lot of common points, almost as much as you can find between Italians and Spanishs. What is happening in Israel is a tragic situation where you don't have &quot;good&quot; and &quot;Bad&quot; guys, but only two populations that are in so many ways very similar and that could have lived peacefully together but for a sad and fatal tragedy are unexpectedly fighting each others...

Thank you, CR

First of all, I have to say that I think that anything that helps us to understand the culture of other countries is travel related. It's always good if we can stay off pejorative and, touch wood, we've managed to do so here.

Having read quite a lot of press about this, I know that the view the French commission is taking is that allowing overt religiosity in state schools might be seen to be state support for religions. And we shouold be clear that this recommendation is not about scarves; it IS about all symbols of religion. I must admit, I am slightly struggling with that. But that is the viewpoint. I think it's true to say that there is nothing in the Koran that requires the wearing of scarves- it's all to do with culture- proper modesty etc. I would stand to be corrected.

I suspect that the same is true of the wearing of the yarmulke, but I make the same caveat. Certainly, as a practising Christian, there is nothing in the Bible that says we have to wear crosses, and the Calvinists around here do not allow cricifixes because they are graven images. Arguably the stuff in gospels about going away quietly to pary on your own could be interpreted as Our Lord's imprecation that we don't flaunt our religion.
(Goodness, this is dangerous..out of politics and into religion and it's not quite breakfast time).

I would also have to say that I'm struggling with the view that belief in a Creator doesn't automatically mean one has a religion.

How, on the other hand, belief that there is no God can be interpreted as a religion I also find baffling.

Since I'm now spending quite a lot of time in France, I have to say that it IS a very secular nation, in a way that would not be recognised in the US. The same is true of most of Europe but I suspect the French are at one end of the scale. Most people profess Christianity if asked, but, at least in the context of organised religion, do little to practice it.


The French, as a nation, remain hugely shocked by Vichy, and I could not imagine the same thing happening again. They are very pragmatic (some might say even unprincipled- see this weekend's collapsed European summit; or the alliances before the First War)in their practice of politics; but I suspect never agin at the expense of their national integrity.


Thanks everyone for making me think about this.

Hi Sheila,

&gt; .... I'm struggling with the view that belief in a Creator doesn't automatically mean one has a religion.

How, on the other hand, belief that there is no God can be interpreted as a religion I also find baffling.&lt;

It has long been suspected, and is now pretty much proved, that the Universe suddenly appeared. Something created the universe.

One needn't have any religious beliefs to accept a Creator, with the caveat that one could be wrong. OTOH, to deny the existence of a Creator takes a leap of faith.

My on-line Websters has this
&quot;Note: Religion, as distinguished from theology, is subjective, designating the feelings and acts of men which relate to God; while theology is objective, and denotes those ideas which man entertains respecting the God whom he worships, ....&quot;. Since denying the existence of God is subjective, aetheism is a religion.

Ira writes:

&quot;It has long been suspected, and is now pretty much proved, that the Universe suddenly appeared. Something created the universe.&quot;

Are you saying that if you accept the theory that the universe &quot;suddenly appeared&quot; that it was created by a &quot;creator?&quot;

Is it not plausible that it's all about science and not some divine intervention/invention/creation?

Dear Mizz Eve,

At this point, the best science can say is that about 12 - 15 billion years ago the universe suddenly came into existence and that there was nothing there before.

It is hard to except that it did it all by itself.

There are some mathematicians who still hold to the idea that the universe has existed since an infinitely long time ago (they use the term infinitely in a mathematical sense) and keeps expanding and collapsing. There is, as best I know, no way to test this hypothesis. That puts us back into the realm of faith.

Actually, I am not sure that the Creator is/was a divine being. I think that we are just a computer game being played by a preadolescent boy.