Burqa Furor Stirs Debate in France
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- current89
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more from News:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/01/world/europe/01france.html
PARIS — It is a measure of France’s confusion about Islam and its own Muslim citizens that in the political furor here over “banning the burqa,” as the argument goes, the garment at issue is not really the burqa at all, but the niqab.A burqa is the all-enveloping cloak, often blue, with a woven grill over the eyes, that many Afghan women wear, and it is almost never seen in France. The niqab, often black, leaves the eyes uncovered.
Still, a movement against it that started with a Communist mayor near Lyon has gotten traction within France’s ruling center-right party, which claims to be defending French values, and among many on the left, who say they are defending women’s rights. A parliamentary commission will soon meet to investigate whether to ban the burqa — in other words, any cloak that covers most of the face.
The debate is indicative of the deep ambivalence about social customs among even a small minority of France’s Muslim citizens, and of the signal fear that France’s principles of citizens’ rights, equality and secularism are being undermined.
French discomfort with organized religion, dating from the 1789 revolution and the disestablishment of the Roman Catholic Church, is aggravated by these foreign customs, which are associated in the Western mind with repression of women.
end of excerpt
Source: The New York Times Online
What do you think about the ban on the niqab? Is it freeing Islamic women from repression?
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jubal
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Burn your burqas and your bras.....hahahahaha
FK the Burqa!!!!
- 5 months ago
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jubal
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samthesixth
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Ladies, burn your burqa! None but ourselves can free our minds.
- 5 months ago
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samthesixth
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JohnA
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Semantics
- 5 months ago
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JohnA
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jh64487
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ok, on the one hand, it's totally illegal to indoctrinate your kids into a cult, or to use violence to keep someone in your religion. the burqa absolutely is repression of women.
but...i mean...it's their choice. . gah!
of course, i'm also coming at this from the american "boiling pot" mentality. maybe the truth is they need to adjust to france's customs if they want to live in france. when in rome...
- 5 months ago
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jh64487
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BullDogg
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So they tell you to put clothes on in Cannes, but take clothes off in Paris? I think they are a little backward in their thinking. Seriously though, I don't think anyone should be able to tell you how to dress... except for your mom.
- 5 months ago
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BullDogg
