Danish Conservatives Call for Burqa Ban

[ray245]

How does that differ from people's family trying to pressure girls from wearing more revealing clothes and all that? I mean if a person wants to be a nudist and stop wearing clothes in public (if it is legal), it is likely that their families would still apply social pressure to prevent them from doing it.

I suppose that there is some cultural dissonance going on, but you should be aware that the "protective father that criticizes his daughter skimpy clothes" is basically a comedic figure at least in most of Western Europe. The phenomenon probably doesn't exist in Denmark outside of more extreme than usual religious groups.

I'm not saying this is happening in Europe, but saying that if we apply that line of logic universally, this is the same as parents who refuses to allow their sons and daughters to be nude in the public.

[Melchior]

I'm not saying this is happening in Europe, but saying that if we apply that line of logic universally, this is the same as parents who refuses to allow their sons and daughters to be nude in the public.

The reason for that is not raw hatred of human sexuality and enforcement of patriarchal society, though.

[Julhelm]

Personally I do not think that the banning is a good idea, because it does nothing about the root problem; an aggressive program of investigating and punishing (with jail terms and loss of parental rights, not deportation) domestic abuse, since it is arguably involved when woman who would not otherwise want to wear that thing do it.

It's cheaper to simply deport a non-citizen than to keep them in prison, which is something that should be reserved for those who are citizens. You also have to realize that a lot of women actually support misogynic customs like the burqa and FGM because they had it done to them and those cultures aren't exactly known for encouraging progressive thought. So my solution is to help save those that want to be saved and fuck those who don't.

[Tiriol]

Personally I do not think that the banning is a good idea, because it does nothing about the root problem; an aggressive program of investigating and punishing (with jail terms and loss of parental rights, not deportation) domestic abuse, since it is arguably involved when woman who would not otherwise want to wear that thing do it.

It's cheaper to simply deport a non-citizen than to keep them in prison, which is something that should be reserved for those who are citizens. You also have to realize that a lot of women actually support misogynic customs like the burqa and FGM because they had it done to them and those cultures aren't exactly known for encouraging progressive thought. So my solution is to help save those that want to be saved and fuck those who don't.

Yes, it is cheaper. On the other hand, deporting someone because they want to wear a burqa is just a tad bit overkill, don't you think? Especially considering the predecent it would set.

[Julhelm]

Why is it overkill? If they want to adher to primitive tribal values they shouldn't move here to begin with.

[Simon_Jester]

Other than the fact that the Muslim populations in Europe tend to take a salami approach (for example in certain parts of the UK they started by making it so that Muslim police women 'could' where a headscarf while on duty. Then it became all policewomen when they entered a mosque. Now they are pushing for policewomen to have to wear them in Muslim neighborhoods. The next step would obviously be to make policewomen wear a headscarf anytime that a Muslim might see them. And if Policewomen, then all women. I support the politicians in Denmark that are pushing this.

Source for the bolded bit? I haven't heard of any such thing.

Al Arabiya.

Any sources from Britain itself? The fact that a newspaper in Cairo reported it to be true doesn't necessarily mean they got police policies in a country roughly two thousand miles away right.
_______

It does improve the situation for citizens down the line because if the constant influx of new burqa-wearing fundies is stemmed by kicking out those who refuse to adapt before they are made citizens, much more effort can be directed through the public education system on instilling proper values into those who grow up as citizens since they will have a much smaller community of fundies to excert negative pressure on them.

OK. Now this is getting idiotic. First of all, you've completely missed the question of how a sane country justifies deporting its own citizens (to where?) for not following the exact same customs as other citizens in the same country. Can I do the same thing to every other group that does something most of the people in the country don't do or don't want to put up with? Street mimes? Telemarketers? Amish people? Gays? Jews? Where the hell does this line of reasoning STOP?

Second of all, you're now talking about deporting the women themselves for wearing burqas, which is so unjust as to be stupid. You've got women who are wearing tents PURELY because their family will make their life hell if they don't, something that does you no harm whatsoever, and you want to throw them into some hellhole where everyone will harass them the way their family does because of the "crime" of wearing a tent somewhere within a hundred miles of you? Seriously, what the fuck?
________

I don't really give a fuck if that means some families get kicked out because they can't leave incompatible customs behind. Maybe they should consider going to another country then where such customs are accepted.

Could you please define what it means for a country to accept a custom? Remember, at the moment, there is NO LAW against burqas in Denmark. The question is whether there SHOULD be one. Does that mean that burqas are now tolerated in Denmark, or not?

If that does mean that burqas are now tolerated in Denmark (until a law is passed banning them) then your argument is wrong, because it's based on the idea that Denmark does not accept burqas. If the answer to "does my country accept burqas?" can change over a weekend, then you'd have to be completely apeshit insane to think that everyone who disagrees with the country should be expelled from it. People should not be deported over petty bullshit details, and only petty bullshit details can change that fast. Not "cultural values." Any cultural value that can change in a day was nonsense to begin with.

If that doesn't mean that burqas are now tolerated in Denmark, then how the hell do we know where burqas are or aren't accepted? If "not illegal" doesn't equal "accepted," what does equal "accepted"? Do we do a poll, asking all Danes whether they are willing to put up with someone wearing burqas? What happens if/when the poll result comes back saying "yes?"

Whether a country "accepts" burqas is not a magical carved-in-stone thing. It's something a country can make a decision on. And because it's a question that has to be decided and not a Commandment from On High, we can't use the fact that the decision has been made one way to justify making the decision that way. No doing things one way purely because you did them that way yesterday; it doesn't work.

Why is it overkill? If they want to adher to primitive tribal values they shouldn't move here to begin with.

Define "primitive tribal values," please, and explain why they should be illegal.

[Bluewolf]

By Julhelm's logic, wearing a cross around your neck is tribal values as many people in Christianity wear them. I guess we better deport them too.

Though I think Julhlems is pretty much acting like an arrogant and pretentious person at the moment. You can already tell that, instead of just thinking about how religion and society interact, and how it relates to this article; he is jumping on the "Hurr hurr fundie (anyone who adheres to some custom you don't agree with is a fundie remember!) go home!" bandwagon.
Again, how would deportation solve the problem when there are already people who live in Demark who also wear a burqa? On top of that they will have voting power and will have a say.

Oh and on the 3rd world shithole comment. Some of those countries are in between and would not be counted as third world. To say otherwise is a sweeping statement.

[Melchior]

By Julhelm's logic, wearing a cross around your neck is tribal values as many people in Christianity wear them. I guess we better deport them too.

You are wrong, here, if, as I suppose, he is talking about actual tribal values, not "being part of tribe" as a metaphor for "belonging to a group". While the cross is surely a symbol of belonging to a specific group (and a rather gruesome one at that), it says very little about the ideas of the wearer. A burqua says "I oppress women because it's the only way to ensure that my sons are actually mine", the basis of patriarchal society (and hateful, odious tripe, too); it's symbol because of it's function, cross-shaped jewerly, while arguably not very tasteful, is not.

[[R_H]]

By Julhelm's logic, wearing a cross around your neck is tribal values as many people in Christianity wear them. I guess we better deport them too.

Again, people wearing burqas are fucking concealing their faces from the rest of the public, which poses a security problem, and if ski masks are forbidden, contradicts the law. Not to mention they also conceal quite a bit of the wearers' body language.

Oh and on the 3rd world shithole comment. Some of those countries are in between and would not be counted as third world. To say otherwise is a sweeping statement.

Again, Afghanistan, and the North-West Frontier Province. You were saying these two war-torn areas aren't third world?

[Julhelm]

By Julhelm's logic, wearing a cross around your neck is tribal values as many people in Christianity wear them. I guess we better deport them too.

Though I think Julhlems is pretty much acting like an arrogant and pretentious person at the moment. You can already tell that, instead of just thinking about how religion and society interact, and how it relates to this article; he is jumping on the "Hurr hurr fundie (anyone who adheres to some custom you don't agree with is a fundie remember!) go home!" bandwagon.
Again, how would deportation solve the problem when there are already people who live in Demark who also wear a burqa? On top of that they will have voting power and will have a say.

Oh and on the 3rd world shithole comment. Some of those countries are in between and would not be counted as third world. To say otherwise is a sweeping statement.

I'm talking about the burqa, and not the hijab, you raving cuntface. How many non-third world countries are burqas popular in do you think?

[Stuart]

Any sources from Britain itself? The fact that a newspaper in Cairo reported it to be true doesn't necessarily mean they got police policies in a country roughly two thousand miles away right.

HERE you are.

[Simon_Jester]

Thank you. Two questions:

1) My knowledge of Britain leaves a lot to be desired, but isn't the Daily Mail the scandal-mongering paper with low standards of evidence?

2) The report refers to the Avon and Somerset police. Correct me if I'm mistaken, but I don't expect that those police forces set any kind of national policy. Are they widely considered leaders or trend-setters among the British police force?

Now, if I was looking at an article reporting that the London Metropolitan Police were doing the same thing, I'd find that a lot more alarming.

[Stuart]

Thank you. My knowledge of Britain leaves a lot to be desired, but isn't the Daily Mail the scandal-mongering paper with low standards of evidence?

No. It's a tabloid certainly but it's far from being the worst (that honor goes to the Sun, Daily Express and Daily Mirror). However, generalizing on an issue like this is very unwise. It is better practice to look at the article and go by what information is within it, how it is presented and what backing is available. Good material can appear in lousy sources and vice versa. In this case, the article is illustrated and contains quotations from the senior police officers in the force in question. A similar article appears in the Times HERE and I am sure a prolonged google search will throw up additional references. So this one is well substantiated.

The report refers to the Avon and Somerset police. Correct me if I'm mistaken, but I don't expect that those police forces set any kind of national policy. Are they widely considered leaders or trend-setters among the British police force?

There's no such thing. AFAIK the police forces are independent. At most the big city forces tend to be first amongst equals

Now, if I was looking at an article reporting that the London Metropolitan Police were doing the same thing, I'd find that a lot more alarming.

HERE you are. The Met and Thames Valley (probably the first amongst the first amongst equals) issuing hijabs. They're two steps behind Avon and Somerset but they're on the same salami-slicing path.

[Lusankya]

What exactly is the big problem with female police officers wearing headscarves in mosques anyway? It seems to me that entering a minority religion's place of worship would be a relatively tense situation anyway, and that taking steps to reduce that tension would be a prudent thing to do.

[Stark]

Isn't that a fear reaction? Do xyz so that the hair-trigger crazy muslims (who probably don't exist) don't go insane and do... something?

I wonder what this makes the fundies think. 'We are awesome because the cops are so scared of us they ape our backwards customs when they come to speak to us'? lol

[Lusankya]

I dunno. Cops are supposed to do stuff to decrease tension no matter what the situation is. Obviously it would be better if they could just waltz in without worrying about it, but that's what long term public education is for.

I mean, if I go to my Korean friend's house, I'll take my shoes off when I go in the door. Is that a "fear reaction" because I'm following their customs, or is it just being polite？

[Stark]

Oh yeah, it makes sense from a community policing point of view as you said, but if the only people who will care are batshit crazy anyway, is it really helping? If moderate muslims don't give a fuck, is this really supposed to reach the fundamentalists by catering to their backward needs?

Comparing conduct towards people in a personal relationship to how police should act when serving the public is complete balls. Turns out social engineering and policing is a little bit different than I WENT TO A GUYS HOUSE LOL? Taking off shoes = hide your face... somehow, because 'don't get the carpet dirty or scuff the parquet' is the same as 'omg you are a piece of meat stop trying to get raped you disgusting woman'.

[Lusankya]

Oh yeah, it makes sense from a community policing point of view as you said, but if the only people who will care are batshit crazy anyway, is it really helping? If moderate muslims don't give a fuck, is this really supposed to reach the fundamentalists by catering to their backward needs?

Do you have any evidence that it's only the extremists who care? Do you not think that there a whole bunch of moderates who might think that this action demonstrates that the police are willing to communicate with them and so forth?

Comparing conduct towards people in a personal relationship to how police should act when serving the public is complete balls. Turns out social engineering and policing is a little bit different than I WENT TO A GUYS HOUSE LOL? Taking off shoes = hide your face... somehow, because 'don't get the carpet dirty or scuff the parquet' is the same as 'omg you are a piece of meat stop trying to get raped you disgusting woman'.

Turns out a hajib isn't OMG HIDING MY FACE. Who knew?

Fuck, there are problems with Islam, but worrying about a rectangular piece of cloth is entirely the wrong way to deal with it.

[Stark]

Do you have any evidence that it's only the extremists who care? Do you not think that there a whole bunch of moderates who might think that this action demonstrates that the police are willing to communicate with them and so forth?

Learn to read the word 'if'.

Turns out a hajib isn't OMG HIDING MY FACE. Who knew?

Fuck, there are problems with Islam, but worrying about a rectangular piece of cloth is entirely the wrong way to deal with it.

There is a place for the police being respectful to religion (I'm sure they're given a laundry-list of things not to do in temples of all types) just like not walking on graves is a good idea if you want to have a meaningful discussion (like I just fucking said), but conforming to socially repressive ideas because a particular minority is THREAT OF THE DECADE strikes me as daft. I'd be curious if it's part of a deliberate campaign of social engineering aimed at that commuity (ie, undermining extremist leaders or rhetoric by demonstrating cultural sensitivity/not exterminating their ideas/not offending old people who hate women with jobs) or simply more poorly-thought-out 'god don't make the muslims angry' rubbish.

Thanks for abandoning your total red herring, at least. Please explain what the 'problem with islam' is. I have no problem with islam, just socially backward sexist morons wherever they happen to be.

[hongi]

Again, people wearing burqas are fucking concealing their faces from the rest of the public, which poses a security problem, and if ski masks are forbidden, contradicts the law. Not to mention they also conceal quite a bit of the wearers' body language.

Face-concealing headwear isn't banned everywhere in the country. They're trying to ban them everywhere except the home, you understand that? Doesn't it make a metric fuckton more sense to ban them in certain areas where your face needs to be shown (like banks, shops etc) than to ban people wearing them in for example, parks?

[Julhelm]

[quote="Simon_Jester]OK. Now this is getting idiotic. First of all, you've completely missed the question of how a sane country justifies deporting its own citizens (to where?) for not following the exact same customs as other citizens in the same country. Can I do the same thing to every other group that does something most of the people in the country don't do or don't want to put up with? Street mimes? Telemarketers? Amish people? Gays? Jews? Where the hell does this line of reasoning STOP?[/quote]
The issue is not about customs in general. The issue is about legitimizing primitive customs which can then be allowed to freely infect the rest of society. I mean, we're talking about the sort of people who probably think the taliban largely got it right.

Second of all, you're now talking about deporting the women themselves for wearing burqas, which is so unjust as to be stupid. You've got women who are wearing tents PURELY because their family will make their life hell if they don't, something that does you no harm whatsoever, and you want to throw them into some hellhole where everyone will harass them the way their family does because of the "crime" of wearing a tent somewhere within a hundred miles of you? Seriously, what the fuck?

You'd be surprised to know how difficult it is for people to leave idiotic traditions behind if they've been brainwashed enough to accept them. Compare it to how it's not at all uncommon for older women in the northern african region to be largely supportive of FGM.

Could you please define what it means for a country to accept a custom? Remember, at the moment, there is NO LAW against burqas in Denmark. The question is whether there SHOULD be one. Does that mean that burqas are now tolerated in Denmark, or not?

Yes, there should be one. Patriarchy is a blot on mankind that shouldn't be tolerated in modern society. Do you understand how their worldview is fundamentally at odds with the values of equality upon which our society is built? Of course we need a platform from which to combat these kinds of threats to modern values.

If that does mean that burqas are now tolerated in Denmark (until a law is passed banning them) then your argument is wrong, because it's based on the idea that Denmark does not accept burqas. If the answer to "does my country accept burqas?" can change over a weekend, then you'd have to be completely apeshit insane to think that everyone who disagrees with the country should be expelled from it. People should not be deported over petty bullshit details, and only petty bullshit details can change that fast. Not "cultural values." Any cultural value that can change in a day was nonsense to begin with.

If it was tolerated there wouldn't be a reason for the politicians to legislate about it now would there. Or do you honestly think only the politicians are reactionaries and the rest of the population just loves them burqas?

If that doesn't mean that burqas are now tolerated in Denmark, then how the hell do we know where burqas are or aren't accepted? If "not illegal" doesn't equal "accepted," what does equal "accepted"? Do we do a poll, asking all Danes whether they are willing to put up with someone wearing burqas? What happens if/when the poll result comes back saying "yes?"

Do that, because they'll definitely say "NO". The burqa stands for something so fundamentally alien and different from scandinavian norms of gender equality that you'll have a hard time finding anyone who isn't already a semi-taliban to accept it.

Whether a country "accepts" burqas is not a magical carved-in-stone thing. It's something a country can make a decision on. And because it's a question that has to be decided and not a Commandment from On High, we can't use the fact that the decision has been made one way to justify making the decision that way. No doing things one way purely because you did them that way yesterday; it doesn't work.

No it isn't. Either it is at odds with our society's values or it isn't. It is a carved-in-stone thing, and damned well should be. Their culture is a threat to ours and needs to be fought so it can never be allowed to gain a foothold here.

Define "primitive tribal values," please, and explain why they should be illegal.

Because their inherent simplicity makes them attractive for unsecure indiviuals and those who already see themselves as threatened by the government. If we impose this kind of limit of "this far but not further" it makes dealing with the former much easier because we can now limit the degrees of extremism and fundamentalism they are legally allowed to reach. The ideal is a society where everybody follows modern values of equality, is it not?

[hongi]

Yes, there should be one. Patriarchy is a blot on mankind that shouldn't be tolerated in modern society. Do you understand how their worldview is fundamentally at odds with the values of equality upon which our society is built? Of course we need a platform from which to combat these kinds of threats to modern values.

Those 'values of equality' include freedom of expression. Do you want to destroy Western values?

What's the difference between a hijab and a burqa, can you tell me that? After all according to you, both are enforced by a patriarchy. Why stop at Islam? Go for Judaism too, next thing you'll tell me that the religious Jews are making women wear long dresses and long sleeves, want to kick them out? Go for Christianity right after that - the Roman Catholic Church doesn't ordain women, cut through the theological bullshit and you know it's the product of a thousand years of male oppression.

The fact is, you want to enforce your views on other people. Kindly don't.

[ray245]

The issue is not about customs in general. The issue is about legitimizing primitive customs which can then be allowed to freely infect the rest of society. I mean, we're talking about the sort of people who probably think the taliban largely got it right.

How the fuck do you even define primitive custom?

What's the difference between a hijab and a burqa, can you tell me that? After all according to you, both are enforced by a patriarchy. Why stop at Islam? Go for Judaism too, next thing you'll tell me that the religious Jews are making women wear long dresses and long sleeves, want to kick them out?

Forget it, it seems that his applying some sort of double standards to Islam in particular.

You'd be surprised to know how difficult it is for people to leave idiotic traditions behind if they've been brainwashed enough to accept them. Compare it to how it's not at all uncommon for older women in the northern african region to be largely supportive of FGM.

Great, we might as well ban religion itself, due to the fact that how hard it is for people to leave religion behind them.

Do that, because they'll definitely say "NO". The burqa stands for something so fundamentally alien and different from scandinavian norms of gender equality that you'll have a hard time finding anyone who isn't already a semi-taliban to accept it.

WTF? Are you telling me that gender equality is something that is only found in the Scandinavian countries? So you are saying that the burqa should not be banned in nations where it isn't viewed alien?

If this is the case, then you are essentially saying that there is no intrinsic harm to wearing a burqa.

Screw this, your entire argument is nothing more than what Hongi said. That things should be banned just because I don't like it, and likes to apply some sort of double standards when it comes to other religion.

[Julhelm]

Yes, there should be one. Patriarchy is a blot on mankind that shouldn't be tolerated in modern society. Do you understand how their worldview is fundamentally at odds with the values of equality upon which our society is built? Of course we need a platform from which to combat these kinds of threats to modern values.

Those 'values of equality' include freedom of expression. Do you want to destroy Western values?

What's the difference between a hijab and a burqa, can you tell me that? After all according to you, both are enforced by a patriarchy. Why stop at Islam? Go for Judaism too, next thing you'll tell me that the religious Jews are making women wear long dresses and long sleeves, want to kick them out? Go for Christianity right after that - the Roman Catholic Church doesn't ordain women, cut through the theological bullshit and you know it's the product of a thousand years of male oppression.

The fact is, you want to enforce your views on other people. Kindly don't.

That is one hell of a slippery slope fallacy right there.

We already limit freedom of expression for things such as neo-nazism that is deemed a threat to democracy, so I don't see why we cannot do the same for a piece of garb which fills no other purpose than the explicit oppression of women.

And yes, I do want to enforce my views on other people from the middle east who come here, because my nordic views and values are culturally superior to theirs because mine are about 2000 years more evolved and they would benefit from leaving behind their own.

[Julhelm]

How the fuck do you even define primitive custom?

They follow moral guidelines which haven't evolved past the last 2000 years?

Forget it, it seems that his applying some sort of double standards to Islam in particular.

We're not even talking about islam here. The burqa isn't an islamic garb and has been around for far longer than islam ever has. Islam is just used as a vehicle to enforce it because it's the current dominating religion in the area.

Great, we might as well ban religion itself, due to the fact that how hard it is for people to leave religion behind them.

Again, I'm not talking about religion here. I'm talking about traditions. That's a hell of a difference.

WTF? Are you telling me that gender equality is something that is only found in the Scandinavian countries? So you are saying that the burqa should not be banned in nations where it isn't viewed alien?

Learn how to fucking read an english sentence before you reply. I said what the burqa stands for is at odds with scandinavian values of gender equality. I did not say gender equality is exclusive to scandinavia, lol.