Multiculturalism dead in Germany (according to Merkel, anyhow!)

Remove all ads!

I agree with that - I assume that witnesses in a court of law had to be identifiable that they were who they claimed to be - at least to the judge and attorneys, even if they wished to conceal their identity from jurors.

 

LKD - This is, of course, the intersection of religion and public institutional policy. Many of us are trying to keep religion within reasonable limits within our public institutions, regarding ALL religion. That has proven very difficult, as your example illustrates. The other side will claim:

1. That the institutions themselves are founded upon the principles of the "established" religion. We can't say "Christian" because many (even at the time of the founding) don't even consider Catholics to be real Christians, just as an example. So we have to carefully qualify the term "Christian principles." Of course, they also ignore that at least to some degree these instutions are crafted after the classical models of Greece and Rome.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thoughts_on_Government

2. The religious freedom crowd, which will claim that the state has no right to stifle or censure their beliefs, no matter if it is a public institution or not. Regardless, these institutions should be left secular, IMO.

 

In Germany that case has not been decided yet. There is no law about it. I have read about witnesses testifying in court in a Burka, but to remove all male audience ... geez, that does too far under German law in my understanding.

However, the case was decided in Austria, whose legal system and law is rather somewhat similar to ours and it was decided against the woman who insisted to appear in court in a Burka.

Anyway, if it was allowed in Germany to appear in court in a Burka, it would be because of freedom of expression of religion under Art.4 GG (of the constitution - which can involve wearing special dress), and most certainly not because of Sharia law.

The only way Sharia law would find its way into German law would be in case of a private international dispute (typically family matters or hereditary disputes). In a marriage under, say, Saudi law for instance, Saudi law would be applicable. So do we have Sharia law in German courts? No. The ordre public demands that no law is being administered in German courts that contradicts our constitutional order. Such 'law that offers less rights and less protection' simply would not be applied.

 

I wish now to address Aldeth's question:

The answer to which is this -- they got pushed out by other forces. I had some Somali students tell me that militias basically walked into their homes and said "get out, this place belongs to us now" and they were forced to flee. Before this time, they were upper class people in Somali society. At least, they sure seem to carry themselves that way. Most Central Africans I teach have a huge respect for their teachers, but the Somalis are different -- they treat instructional staff like hired help. Now if they were paying me --or the school fees -- with their own money I might be a tiny little bit more understanding of such an attitude, but they don't pay for their English training -- the government does. The government also pays their living expenses. So I have to think that their superior attitude is somewhat inappropriate, and that they should damn well be thankful that we are providing them with housing, food, clothing, and education rather than dumping them into mass refugee camps. I'm not usually a "if you don't like it, go back where you came from" sort of fellow, but in the case of the Somalis*, that thought crossed my mind when I hear them bad mouthing Canada or whining that $4000 / month isn't enough to live on. FYI, that's more than I make teaching them**.

I think that when you are being carried by the work sweat of others, it isn't too much for those working to expect a little civility from the freeloaders. I don't expect hugs, kisses, and <editted for non-MUG audiences> but dammit a modicum of respect would be nice!

*Not all the Somali students are like that, to be sure, but on the whole they are a group that is having one helluva time acclimating to Canadian society.

**Not all the students make this much, but the ones with 6 children and "no husband" do -- of course, they do have husbands, but they lie to get more benefits. I was under the impression that the Koran forbade lying, and I don't mind that some people often fall short of their religion's expectations, but then to turn around and yammer about how important your religion is to you and how you need to interrupt clas time to do your prayers and then turn around and rip off the government? It's a little rich.

 

On a somewhat unrelated note, burkar and niqab have very little to do with islam or religion, it is a fairly new addition to the "faith". Saw a documentary about it and Sarkozy for example asked an Egyptian muslim university, one of the oldest and most respected in the world if it was ok to forbid them and the answer was that sure, it shouldn't offend muslims it not part of scripture and that seems to be the prevalent opinion among scholars of islam. It actually appears that this is a western trend, amomg some western muslims most of them converts who desperately try to show off their new faith. Sarkozy had also asked the French security police to try to find out how many women actually covered the faces and the results were shocking, the first search found a few hundred, the second I think found 2000 among the millions of muslims in France and a large majority of these were "western" women who had converted to islam.

Historically the niqab was a unisex garment to protect you from desert sand while riding and only the very very rich wore it. You cannot till the earth wearing a niqab, only rich people could afford to ride and to cover up their women.

 

Yeah, my Somalis are as hardcore fundamentalist as it gets but they merely wear a hijab over their heads -- not one of them wears a full face veil or garment. I truly have no problem with that unless it's in terms of safety at a factory. I don't give a hoot about the headgear other people wear insofar as it's their head!

 

You know, I used to see them around the college campus like that and that was exactly the impression I had. I could never actually prove that that was the case, but it always gave me that feeling. I was in a few classes with them, even one who was an American, older white woman, who was a convert and used to dress all in the black with her face partly covered. Her daughter came in one day with her (and she was completely Western), and commented to the person sitting behind me that her mother was just "showing off." I'm glad you posted that, because it gives me a bit of validation in my feelings about that stuff.

 

I believe that the fact this matter had been brought up provides us with an opportunity to make another loosely-related observation. Do you imagine anyone agreeing to a demand to clear the courtroom of all females, or even taking such an idea into consideration? Everyone would cry gender inequality, including the mainstream liberal media.

It is most unsettling to see that not only are minorities entitled to discriminate (officially, within the public sphere), but also that the said discrimination is deemed acceptable when directed against men.

 

I have to admit that I have a certain weariness towards converts (converts to Islam, 'born agains', but also including freshly minted vegans or non smokers). It's that obnoxious missionary zeal that puts me off.

Runescarred, you make a good point. Had a man said that, under his faith, women are inferior, and that thus woman must not be present when a man is being judged, or that a female judge couldn't judge him, they would have told him to shove his delusions of grandeur up his rear end. Personally, I think that, indeed, the decision by that Canadian court is idiotic. Political correctness at its worst.

 

I think the issue with clothing that covers the entire face is cultural rather than strictly religious. From a few excerpts I read online (though they weren't in the original language, obviously) the only obvious restriction is that women's clothing would have to be modest. So who or what defines just what "modesty" means? I'd say it was the societies in which the religion existed, particularly early on, and the ones now.