dialamah

Yes, perhaps the article you first read had a more anti-Islam slant than the OP's article. Not telling an untruth, but not giving the whole story either. I was surprised too and suspect its more of a thing in the North or where they haven't interacted as much outside their own community.

https://www.ictinc.ca/blog/handshakes-and-aboriginal-peoples She didn't shake the women's hands either. She treated both genders the same, so no discrimination.

There is a town in Michigan where only practicing Christians are allowed to buy or inherit real estate. The bylaw has been around since the 1940s, first passed to prevent Jews from buying, and was strengethened in 1986. Non-Christians can rent. The bylaw is being challenged in Court. Although this bylaw is clealy discriminatory, my initial reaction is its ok in this context. If a group of people want to create their own community, they should be allowed to do so. But I thought I would put it out here to hear other thoughts. The article is a good read, btw, as it highlights the issues people are facing as the population has grown more progressive but the bylaw has not.

She had applied for a job as an phone or video interpreter, not sales. She would not even have been meeting people in person so the handshake wasn't remotely necessary to the job.

Alternatively, most Canadians support immigration so politicians aren't scared of being called racist, they're scared of losing votes. When a survey comes along showing that most Canadians do not support immigration, politicians will immediately change their stance.

Interesting question. Some people refuse to shake hands because they are afraid of germs, others because they are just generally uncomfortable with touching, perhaps due to social anxiety or autism. Aboriginal people also do not shake hands. I have myself declined a handshake due to having a cold. Do we need a pamphlet to deal with the "cultural dissonance" of these other examples in order to acommodate, or would this be a special thing because this story is about a Muslim person?

Well said, I agree.

I understand what you mean. Many people are religious and religion influences what they think and how they behave. But that doesn't mean one can simply assume that a disliked decision made by a religious person was coerced.

1. In Canada, it is not the victim who decides if or what charges are laid. 2. Physical or sexual assault is not equivalent to a face covering. 3. People who assault others should be charged, even if its just tugging off their yarmulke or hijab. I am not against legal plural marriages as long as it is a choice made by adult participants. In Canada, plural marriage is illegal. I don't see any reason why it should be illegal, probably because I do know several polyamourus couples. I think an 18-year-old marrying a 47-year-old is yucky, whether its his first and only wife, or wife number 3. But if the law considers her an adult and that is her choice, then my discomfort with it is not justification for removing her choice to marry who she wants to. Do you think the government should be in the business of reducing individual freedoms? Dictating to adults what they can or cannot wear in public, who they can and cannot marry?

True. And if the State decides to ban burkas and niqabs, then they will. I still don't have to think its justified. Unjust laws are passed a lot; in Canada they are often followed by apologies decades later.

Probably. And if it had been a Muslim, it would have been heavily and breathlessly declared a sign of the threat of the evil Muslims.

Really? So your statement below, implying my opinion is deluded and irrational because it happens to be different than yours is ok, but returning the slur isn't? Go figure! "I guess we're all free to delude ourselves but to assert face covering as amounting to progressive accommodation is so 'unwoke' as to make rational beings cringe."

I didn't think you'd watch it. Anyone who did would be happy to use it to support a ban on burqas/niqabs. Nonetheless, it puts your simple-minded parrotting of extreme rhetoric in context and makes a much better criticism of modern Islam than you could ever hope to do.

Here is someone who has read the Quran, and unlike you, understands it and can put the verse you have quoted into historical and modern context.

Good article and makes some very salient points. What I don't get is why its on CBC, given the assurances found on this forum that the CBC is merely a left-wing mouth piece.

I have always thought that if someone wanted to send terrorists to Canada, it would be a lot easier to do so through a temporary Visa program than through the immigration process. Someone mentioned that these Saudi youth would be able to take "Canada's democratic" values back to SA if they were allowed to stay. Seriously, the elite of SA society, here as visitors for just a short time, are going to be so impressed with Canada that they'll go back and try to make changes? Sure, its possible, but unlikely. Sisi was educated in the West, but Egypt certainly hasn't made much progress towards Western style freedoms since he took power. I think it's much more likely that those who choose to come here to live will be the ones who disseminate information back home and help support change in those countries.

I am also aware of that, as are at least some of the women who choose to wear them. There is no religious requirement for many things people do in the name of religion, but that rarely seems to stop them so ultimately its a pointless argument. Oddly, women actually seem to want the choice to wear something you don't like. They don't seem to agree that its uncomfortable or oppressive. Zeena is 17. She lives in a bustling Islamic community on the outskirts of Leeds. She is ambitious, driven and adamant that within ten years, she’ll be a surgeon for the NHS. She is also the first woman in her family to wear the niqab. “Yes, it represents something I believe in – but it isn’t the only thing I believe in,” she told me. ----------- When my daughter was five, she asked me, ‘Mummy, why don’t other ladies cover their faces?’ I remember it well, as it was the first time she had questioned anything to do with the way I dressed. I told her that the way ladies dress is the least important part of what makes them human. She’s a teenager now and annoying as ever – but wise beyond her years! She has chosen not to wear the burqa. --------- I wear it [the burqa] in public, but I can’t even begin to describe the feelings and emotions I felt with every step down that street. It made me feel so empowered as a woman knowing I get to choose what is seen of me. I’d like to wear it more often. --------- I can easily acknowledge that not all women wear the burka out of choice, or that the choice isn't at least partly influenced by the wider society, whether its peer pressure or opposition to anti-Muslim sentiment expressed in Western nations. Still don't see a justification for the government to pass laws dictating what women wear.

Yup. That is true. I don't like those things either, but as I have said ... I do not believe there is enough proof of "forced" wearing to justify a law against them.

Yes, Islam is a religion. I don't think 5 year old girls should be wearing hijab; third time in last couple of days I have mentioned opposition to young girls and hijabs. To be consistent, I suppose I must object to the little white things very young Sikh boys wear in lieu of turbans. But for some reason I am not as concerned about that. Are you?

He ain't the only one who is mysteriously inconsistent; who knew Trudeau Derangement Syndrome would make Muslim refugees virtual terrorists and Saudi Arabian Muslims welcome in Canada.

I believe the increase in hijab wearing is definitely related to that. I suspect a lot of the young women who wear hijab do not even attend Mosque regularly, if the remainder of their outfit is anything to go by. It reminds me of what I saw in Egypt when I was there - form hugging clothes on young women wearing hijab. If modesty is what is supposed to be represented by the hijab, the clothing certainly contradicted that message. As anti-Muslim sentiment grows in Western countries based on claims that Muslims know are not true, an hijab is an easy way of identifying each other while perhaps also thumbing their nose at those who denigrate Islam and Muslims. If we learned to ignore hijabs, I suspect that the trend would be less women wearing them. I think a Burka and niqab are more due to religious belief than a political statement, though certainly that is also part of it if the purported rise in sales after attacks on Muslims is any indication. The overall lack of social support for face covering in most countries of the world, aside from Saudi Arabia, means that these women really are going against the norm and that is not uncommon among people who are very devout. Overwhelmingly, though, any individual woman's reason is unknowable. To say that we should outlaw a practice because some women might be forced, or because it reflects misogyny ignores the women who choose it as well as those women who have had to fight family in order to be allowed to wear it. If, as the links I posted suggest, face veiling is most often the woman's choice - then perhaps our assumptions need to be checked before we make laws based on those assumptions. Or perhaps, like black people who can refer to each other as " ", or women who call each other "bitch", the goal is to remove the stigma and negativity of face-coverings, to truly make it a woman's choice and not a man's. Not saying that is the goal, merely presenting a different interpretation. I see it as championing "choice". Even though there are some aspects of burkas/niqabs that I agree are troubling, to me they are not certain enough, nor is the trend widespread enough, to justify using laws to remove the choice women may want to make to cover their entire body. That the other side constantly characterizes this as championing "misogyny" because "they aren't Christians" is ridiculous. I think if we're going to legally dictate women's clothing based on the patriarchal religious belief, we should have to include certain extreme Christian groups as well. Perhaps. But if a woman knows face coverings are not directed by her God or her Prophet and must fight her family to wear one, shouldn't that be her choice in a free society? Indeed, in this country at least, we are free to delude ourselves and follow whatever practices we want - short of those currently deemed illegal. To assert that a law banning face veils is (or would be) based on caring about female equality and not merely government pandering to bigots is so "unwoke" as to make rational beings cringe.

Yes they can, and they do. "Charter rights are not absolute" is a different conversation than "niqabs or burkas should not be allowed in Canada". I believe I have already acknowledged more than once that the Government can implement laws that limit people's freedom.

Religious belief. People in most Muslim majority countries do not like face coverings, and many also think women should be able to choose what they wear, suggesting that social pressure to wear face coverings is considerably less than Westerners assume. The hijab is the preferred "look". From a Canadian survey. The women interviewed were generally young and the vast majority had chosen to wear the niqab on their own, often despite the protests of family.

Or the Nun's habit, the robes worn by Buddhists, barristers and judges, the dresses and bonnets worn by Mennonites, the vestments worn by clerics, the turbans worn by Sikhs. Mocking people for what they wear is exactly what sophisticated, advanced and intelligent people do.

Yup, thats an argument for sure. But earlier I mentioned that I would support an age-related limitation on hijabs, burkas and niqabs, partly because of health issues and also the issue of family pressure. Its pretty arrogant of you, btw, to decide that no woman would choose to do something you neither like nor understand and that therefore she must be doing it against her will even if she doesn't know it.