This trend to demonize Islamic culture is not only apparent in the French republic, but also in Belgium where the home affairs committee of Brussels federal parliament voted unanimously to ban partial or total covering of faces in public places in April 2010. Similarly, several right wing parties in the United Kingdom such as the UKIP and the BNP see the visible presence of veiled muslim women as an attack on their own indigenous and (if we are to believe the rhetoric) apparently ‘superior culture’.
In the case of the French vote what is notable is the fact that socialist and green MP’s were so timid and cowardly in their opposition to the bill, many of whom abstained from voting. There is a sense in which should someone speak out of behalf of Muslim rights (which this ban is a clear infraction of) then they are seen as an apologist for a sort of global Islamic resurgence seeking to impose Islamic ideals through violent means or otherwise. Yet what we too often fail to appreciate (in western secular nations) is that increased national and cultural diversity is the inevitable effect of a process of globalization which sees increased social and economic mobility across borders and where indeed the economies of many European nations rests heavily on the work of migrants to fill the jobs its own citizens have no desire or ability to perform themselves. On the one hand we happily exploit their labour while on the other many consider them as second class citizens. Consider for example in the United Kingdom where immigrant labour was and still is essential to the building and effective running of one of its most beloved and well-respected institutions, the National Health Service.
This scapegoating of religious minorities only adds fuel to the racist rhetoric that sees only instability where there could be harmony, and where cultural difference is obliterated rather than nurtured. Citizens of a nation can retain their own cultural identity on the one hand, but also participate in a debate that forms a national and collective identity. The French ban was the result of a process which aimed at restating or reaffirming a nostalgic French national identity. Sadly, the views of its minority populations were clearly not consulted and if this bill is ratified we will be left in a situation where Muslim women who choose to wear a veil or burqa must either stop doing so, or else not appear in public. This is a clear assault on the human rights of a minority who in an era of a ’war against terror’ often feel the nationalistic backlash which accompanies such misguided characterisations of global conflicts. Similarly for those who argue the case that banning these veils will be a victory for women’s rights, I would argue that actually the effect of this bill would be to make these women fearful of even going out in public, dammed if they choose to wear a veil (by the government) and dammed again (by their own religious traditions) if they don’t. Far from being a victory for women, this will be a regressive step, and Amnesty International has argued that it may set a ‘very dangerous precedent.’
The liberal constitutional governments of the western world operate with a sense of moral superiority. All too often as is the case in Iraq and Afghanistan we have attempted through military means to export our own system as the most modern, the most democratic and the most progressive form of governance. Yet the actions of the French and Belgium parliaments to persecute a cultural minority is surely more reminiscent of a dictatorial and oppressive regime. Our own secular way of life which firmly separates out religion from the State has lent acceptability to the idea that in separation we can denigrate and degrade other cultures who have exactly the same rights as anyone else. If we are to redeem ourselves from this travesty of secular thinking we need to accept that religious and cultural differences between people are a fact of modern life, and if we are to promote cohesion and harmony in society we would be better placed to make this diversity part of our collective identity, not something to be derided. For now let us all hope that this bill does not become law and if, in the case it succeeds, opposition from both the European Union, and the French population is sufficiently vocal to overturn what would be a great error of judgment and which would act only to persecute and divide.
Posted on July 15, 2010
comments