The practice is not religious and thus not protected by Article 25 or 26. Even if it were, it cannot be constitutionally protected; it is a form of torture that results in the permanent dismemberment of a girl-child’s body, leading to long-term psychological and physical suffering, and can result in death. The Court must separate the constitutionality of FGM from issues of religious freedom…

The respondents argue that FGM is “an integral part” of the Bohra religion. This is patently untrue. Even if it were true, no claim of religious freedom can justify a violation of bodily integrity, human dignity, or fundamental rights. Under the SC’s jurisprudence, even if a practice is intrinsic to a religion, it cannot supersede other essential fundamental rights, particularly the right to life. The respondents argue that the right to life is not implicated by FGM as it is voluntary. This is a flawed interpretation, as consent has no bearing on the right to life. And no child can provide informed consent at age seven…

Hope now rests with [the Indian Supreme Court] to expressly reaffirm the grave illegality of this practice.

Maya Nirula

… and now this.

A breakaway radical Christian sect has, in the wake of super-natalist Viktor Orban’s defeat, turned its attention to super-natalist JD Vance, and in particular to his wife’s latest pregnancy. The belief seems to be that Vance’s wife is carrying the Second Coming of Christ, which will mark the end of the world. Crèches featuring the Second Lady cradling her newborn have begun appearing in Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee; and Usha Vancelike variants of Mariolatric shrines can be seen in churches in those states. We’ll keep an eye on developments.

A report claiming the number of young people attending church in England and Wales had skyrocketed has been retracted, after the underlying data was found to be flawed...

The original report claimed to show that 4% of 18-24 year olds surveyed in 2018 told YouGov they were Christian and went to church at least once a month, rising to 16% by 2024…

… [A]cademics [had] questioned the findings, pointing out that the results seemed out of step with other data. Results from the long-running British Social Attitudes Survey, and even the Church of England’s own figures, show a long term decline in church attendance.

Lawyer Marc-André Fabien on behalf of the [Hasidic Jewish] Hamshuchas Hadoirois International Association, which is active in Canada and the U.S., said there can be no secular state in Canada because Canada is a constitutional monarchy that is a parliamentary democracy which derives its authorities from a British sovereign — the King — who gets his power from “divine authority.”

So, he said, “it is unconstitutional for the Canadian parliament and all of its legislatures in the provinces to declare that the state is secular, or lay, without a constitutional amendment.”

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Curious to see Monsieur Fabien defend a regime in which no Catholic, let alone a Jew or a Muslim, can get anywhere near the throne. All praise divine Anglican authority!

Presentations before the Supreme Court continue.

Ol’ UD agrees with this position, of course; yet she’s certainly alive to the argument that it’s not the job of government to police and ban all visible forms of patriarchy.

Quebec however proposes nothing of the sort – it asks only that in public sector locations and among people with public sector, public facing jobs, the hijab (and other visible religious clothes/jewelry) be left at home or put back on when you’re no longer in the classroom or courtroom etc. When you are, in other words, acting as a representative of the government, you ought not be in overt conflict with the government’s official secularism, a form of secularism supported by strong majorities of Quebecers. A NYT commenter from Montreal says it well:

[O]nly certain civil servants in position of authority are banned from wearing religious attire or accessories. The law therefore specifically deals with judges, crown prosecutors, the police and teachers (the short list is attached as an annex to the law). Doctors, nurses, people working at various agencies, all can wear hijabs, crosses, kippah or anything else they want. The law provides that when the power of the state is exercised through an individual working in such capacity, that person must be religious-neutral.

And yes – one crucial ground of civic secularism is human rights/human dignity. Whether France or Quebec, people have correctly perceived that – oh, take your pick – women can’t be priests, women must be hidden, women must be denied access to Torah learning, men thank God daily that He didn’t make them women… It’s not Quebec’s fault that much of Islam (Ultraorthodox Judaism ghettoizes itself so is perceived as less troublesome) makes a lot of noise about the offense to God that is woman. The Afghan Taliban seems able to justify caging its women by reference to religious texts.

So it’s understandable that a seriously secular state looking at ongoing brutal hijab enforcement by Iran’s theocracy etc etc would reasonably conclude that influential forms of religion represent a threat to the equality of men and women. The history of religious abuses of women has understandably sensitized secular states to certain overt religious behaviors within the boundaries of the state.

Anyone who cares about the right of secular states to maintain their sense of what state neutrality means should take some interest in the drama in Ottawa this week. The Court is hearing challenges to Quebec’s existing, and expanding, restrictions on religious garb in certain public sector jobs.

For UD, the matter is plain:

“With public service come responsibilities, among which is refraining from advertising one’s faith,” writes one local commentator. More precisely, another observer asks:

“How would an immigrant of Palestinian origin, contesting a conviction, feel in front of a judge wearing a kippah? Inversely, how would a young driver wearing a kippah feel faced with a policewoman wearing a hijab who just gave him a ticket?” 

Just as importantly, the public realm of a secular state should, by definition, express the state’s secular convictions, which crucially involve the equality of women and men. Burqas (still legal outside of Quebec), and full-body veiling with most of the face veiled, are worn only by women and – scandalously – female children. Muslim boys and men would of course never hide themselves because they are a superior breed, not subject to the strictures which must hide the identity of girls and women.

Myriad forms of gender apartheid remain rampant in many Muslim communities. Recall the history of segregation even in British universities. And it still ain’t over.

For a truly egalitarian polity, public sector restrictions on private faith advertising seem to UD a no-brainer. We’ll see how the Canadian Supreme Court rules.

Problem is that draping much of your face and all of your body – and the faces and bodies of your little girls – under robes and hijabs is already social segregation — self-segregation. You have already decided that public life demands what you call modesty, that babies/girls/women cannot be ethical and pious without withholding their physical being from the world. Further discussion here.

And especially from men. Many of you raise your daughters to feel that they must hide themselves from always-rapacious men. Many of you insist on gender apartheid – girls-only swimming, etc.

Your position represents extremely graphic social segregation; and indeed Quebec’s insistence that at least in certain public-facing jobs you join the egalitarian crowd mirrors the attitude of the majority of the province’s citizens.

You have the effect of demoralizing democracy. Your rock hard faith that women are inferior and must be hidden demoralizes democratic public life. Only a foolish democracy would enthuse about diversity without thinking hard about whether the behavior of any particular group threatens in a significant way its foundational value of human equality.

If your religiosity is such that you cannot occasionally doff a hijab for the sake of the democratic public square, you are living in the wrong social world.

Gevalt.
And Madonna!

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2026/03/08/gop-maga-israel-evangelicals-theology-premillennialism-00818312

Christians needed Jews to return to the homeland of Israel to usher in the second coming of Christ… [T]he belief that modern Israel is a prophetic signpost that faithful Christians are obligated to protect … has weakened… The erosion of premillennial theology weakens a longstanding — if often theologically uncomfortable — foundation of pro-Israel sentiment. The old evangelical alliance was never rooted in liberal pluralism; it was rooted in prophecy. As that prophetic framework recedes, so could also the strange protective logic that once made Israel theologically indispensable to millions of Christians.

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My title? Gog is prominently featured in the piece.

Yes well. A Hasid writes in a Washington Post op/ed that his cult’s broodmares can’t even study the religious tradition that makes them broodmares. In response, a commenter says the obvious – Talibanesque.

… the Texas school system.

Some worries up in Quebec about how Biker Boy blessings might have to get municipal approval if tighter secularism laws get passed.

Wishing does not make it so.

Australia’s decision, yesterday, to refuse entry to a bunch of ISIS adherents (they have to go back to their camp in Syria) has occasioned another round of ISIS bride language. These women aren’t ideologically committed violent fanatics – only men have the brains to be that. No, they put on their white veils or whatever and did the brood mare thing for whatever incomprehensible nonsense Ahmad was spouting…

It’s simply a measure of how far women haven’t come that everyone feels comfortable denigrating these fully paid cult members in this way. I mean FUCK. The one thing these chicks weren’t is anything remotely resembling what anyone in the history of the English language has ever meant by the word BRIDE.

Read what Shamima Begum said attracted her to ISIS. She particularly loved videos of beheadings.

Stop with the bride shit.

The article wins the Most Use Of the Word ‘Pro-Abortion’ award. It’s a great word, conjuring images of the professor at issue loudly cheering on any woman thinking of getting one. GO FOR IT HON!! YEAH!!

I’m sure Capo Rhoades will get his way and succeed in forcing out a voice of dissent. But that’s just one voice, my man. Sixty percent of Catholics favor abortion rights. Got your work cut out for you, huh?