myata

And of all people you always know for sure who is being coerced and who is not?

Should we ignore a man who beats his wife because she is an adult and consents to it? Can a woman really give her concent to wearing a viel if she risks being beaten if she refuses? I'm sorry to say that but you're making no sense. How could wearing something / anything have any resemblance to physical violence?

But... if an adult person decides to wear a veil in full conciense and consent, would you still have any reason to think that they're wrong? It must be that you know something about this world they don't.

I'm not sure you can read right ... OK .., again: can you point to the place in your own post where a service was refused based on the religion of the customer?

So you mean to say that you understand their reasons for wearing a veil better than themselves?

No, but you're just plain wrong even though it was your own post. Nowhere in did it mention that they refuse service exclusively to heterosexual Catholics (i.e. discrimination on the basis of religion). Their problem is with a particular product. BTW weren't it one of you guys recently advocating the right of public officials to refuse service to the people of certain sexual orientation? Talk about hypocrisy, but somehow I'm not surprised.

Oh we've been through this so many times. And who's there, pray, to tell us lowly ones, what is "the real purpose" of everything?

I actually agree with you and yet ... it's probably way more likely that an employer, all other factors equal, would accommodate a religious belief much more readily than an equivalent individual one. Maybe we aren't just there yet.

I don't quite understand your concern. Wouldn't it be like refusing to rent a hall for same sex marriage?

You're assuming that one particular communication standard (open face) is true (or dominant) for all people. That's not logical, and as the example shows, not necessarily true. Tribal chief may exhibit the same concerns as highly honorable Jack Straw. Another point is that a persons who desires to wear a veil can ask the same question: if/how does it interfere with her ability to communicate? If it's simply a matter of preference of the official, then these questions should be asked: what personal preferences public officials should be allowed to bring into their public functions; and what if personal preferences of a certain official deny someone the same opportunities that are available to others?

In this CBC report, Jack Straw "asks muslim women to remove their veil" while visiting him. I can certainly see when it would be a justified measure e.g. for security. But as a personal preference, "for comfort" of a public official? What if someone else felt more comfort if their visitors removed their clothes? (I can certainly see how some visitors would be discomforted equally by either request). What's this "comfort" thing anyway? Aren't they supposed to be paid in proportion to the thickness of their skin?

Obviously you keep missing the point I've elaborated in several posts and this will be my last one. There's a big difference between shooting a dog and barging into an inhabited apartment building throwing around hand grenades and spraying the place with bullets from machine gun. If anyone other than criminal were to be hurt, there will be investigation and if it determines that reasonable force was exceeded, the responsible will be brought to the court and end up in jail. Not to say that the force applied will be measured against the offence, arresting a petty thief being held to a different standard of reasonable force than armed and dangerous criminal.

I believe it was SC (Supreme Court not Sec Council) that put forward a concept of "reasonable accommodation" which, as far as I understand it, means that a requirement of a religious belief should be allowed as long as there's no reasonable expectation of harm resulting from it. I wonder if the same would apply to the concsientous individual belief. I'm not sure if / what coursts have decided with respect to various dress codes dictated by religions. But to me it would appear logical, in the line of one of the previous posts, to extend this protection to any conscientous belief, whether of a formal religion or not. From that point of view, not wearing a tie should be absolutely equivalent to wearing a turban, burka, or any other religion dictated gear, as long as it can be demonstrated that it's a deeply held conscientous belief rather than a prank.

OK, but would that change if several people sharing this "belief" came together and established "a church"? I'd like to understand what exactly differentiates a religion from any essential personal belief to allow it to qualify for additional freedoms that everyone else isn't entitled to?

The same argument can be used w.r.t e.g. police arresting a criminal. Things may turn out different ways. Yet, there's pretty good understanding on what constitutes reasonable force. It should also be a concept of any reasonable justice system. Resolution in question and the entire UN/SC based structure simply does not qualify as such so there's little point to argue here. There's no court, no law and no recourse to justice. The only thing what's left is a perception of great misuse of military force for political purposes that is and will be shared by many, giving it a well deserved place in the international hall of (in)fame next to Hiroshima and Vietnam.

Should deeply and firmly held individual beliefs fall under protection of the freedom of religion clause in the Charter? Including e.g. atheism? E.g. if someone had a firm belief that wearing a tie is morally wrong, shouldn't the bank they're employed at find reasonable accommodation for that? If not, why?

OK that speaks volumes in favour of your argument. Would anyone (including the leader of the organization that granted the mandate in question) who thinks that the actions of the coalition were in fact, illegal, qualify as an "idiot"? No, kerry and the swarms of lawyers, nor what they think does not matter as long as there's no ligitimate venue to bring their arguments forward and have them weighed against the opposition and the law. And deal out punishment if needed.

There's (or there should be) also a consideration of what constitutes reasonable force to achieve the goals of the resolution. This is always the case with the authorities in civilized countries and I don't see why it should be different on the internation scene. Even if one has the authority to use force, it should be in proportion to the offence and the goals. In an individual oversteps the limits of authority or reasonable defence, they can be criminally liable. The same argument logically applies to countries, and whether it's written in any paperwork or not, any reasonbly thinking human understands what's happening.

I think that to criticise someone's sexual orientation is simply an enourmously stupid thing to do. Just like to criticise someone for being short or ugly. Or to criticise someone else for being Muslim (or Catholic) or etc. Yet as long as it's done with "love" (sarcasm intended) and no incitation of violence, it shouldn't be criminal. Just stupid. Now, we'll have to see if the govt really indends to bring up legislation to explicitly protect non criminal but stupid behaviour from criminal prosection. To me it wouldn't look like a very smart act but who knows.

All is nice and simple in the binary world, but if it were so in the real life we wouldn't bother with triffles like reasonable defence, rules, procedures and SIU investigations. Every time the police had to make an arrest, they'd just blow the place apart and comfort those who survived with accounts of how wicked and worthy of punishment the removed criminal used to be. Now what we have your word for it, I can indeed go to sleep in peace.

I think you quite missed the point. "Whatever action necessary" does not necessarily means a full invasion resulting in thousands deaths. Just as in the example with police, there must be some test of what should be considered a reasonable force given the offence (i.e., proportionality of response). The other important argument is whether first resolution was in fact intended to be mandate to use force in the first place, as already was mentioned. I still think this incident did a lot of damage to the credibility of the SC, but it's hard to tell exactly how much until something similar happens (hopefully, later than sooner). My take would be that non-aligned powers (China, Russia, maybe France and some non-permanent members) will be lot less likely to agree to giving carte-blanche mandates for use of force.

So you're admitting they were never found? Whatever it takes. Still not the reason to blow apart entire country. Of course this is irrelevant in this case. There were many many nasty people US were more than happy to deal with. Just being nasty doesn't seem to be and is not a legal reason for prosecution. Again, you're quoting the original declaration which led to the inspections which, according to the report you yourself have referenced were making certain progress and most importantly did not produce any evidence of WMD nor immediate danger of Saddam hanging to some. I'll have to ask my question again: in this particular situation, with no immediate danger and inspections making slow progress, were the actions of the coalition within the limits of reasonable legal action, either enforcement of the resolution or self-defence? That is the question I'd like to be examined in the court of law because bouncing around yes it is - no it's not here in this thread would hardly mean much.

But the same considerations didn't prevent us from connecting the dots in a similar case, why I wonder?

obsessive cyclical thinking ... yawn

Ignatief or Rae for me means automatic Green Party vote for as long as they're in the offce. I sincerely hope that the two "second echelone" contenders - Kennedy & Dion would find some kind of a compromise solution to combine their votes and break ahead of the leading pair. It's quite funny though how they nearly 100% complementary to two each other - if only there was a way to "fuse" them together, if not in one individual, then at least in the post of Liberal leader?