Conservatives allied with Chancellor Angela Merkel are seeking a ban on Muslim women wearing full-face veils or burqas in schools and universities and while driving in Germany…
Merkel herself has criticized the burqa as incompatible with integration into Germany.
The pedagogical absurdity of faceless people trying to teach faceless people makes schools the obvious first place for a ban (as does the equally obvious danger of people driving around with seriously impaired vision), so it’s no surprise that the German effort to get rid of the hideous burqa starts there.
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UD‘s thoughts on the burqa.
August 19th, 2016 at 9:05AM
This would be fine in the US too, as long as it was a genearalized regulation of conduct — 1. not aimed at a particular religion and 2, having any vaguely rational basis in health, safety, economic etc concerns. An anti-religion animus is always open to proof and sometimes just obvious. So, if the federal, a state or a local government banned little round hats that sit atop the head, they would have some serious “splaining” to do as Lucy might say, imitating her husband. But they need cut native american religions no break with respect to anti-marijuana laws that are evenly applied to all citizens, in the likely absence of proof that their real motive was to frustrate religion. Before the Smith case in 1990, religions were given a little extra slack under the First Amendment than this. My guess is that the recent anti-burkini regulations in Cannes would be toast in the US, as I think they should be. It’s hard to see a rational, religion-neutral reason to forbid women, who want to cover up at the beach, from doing so. So the just shy or personally modest (by their own lights) and the religious are treated alike.
August 19th, 2016 at 9:14AM
“The pedagogical absurdity of faceless people trying to teach faceless people […]”
Yet somehow, alas, online classes thrive…
August 19th, 2016 at 9:19AM
Mondo: You don’t even need to online everything for this wonderful sort of outcome: Think of a class where people are both wearing burqas and encouraged to use computers and other devices. A variant of what I’ve called The Morgue Classroom. Professor Facedown at the PowerPoint mumbles in front of rows of black sheeted people playing on their computers.
August 19th, 2016 at 9:25AM
I agree as to online classes.
A couple of clarifications or corrections to my previous post. First,the drug used in some native American religions was peyote not marijuana and, after the Smith case’s reading, the First Amendment’s religion clauses did not exempt it from a general ban.
Second I think the driving ban might pass muster in the US if burkas really do impair sight in ways that cannot not be fixed by tailoring. The campus ban is much more problematical. It would be almost impossible to justify sufficiently as to students outside of class, and probably unlikely to be justified even in the case of teachers in the classroom. You’d need tons of data on the impairment of learning, given the likelihood that such a ban is designed in neutral terms but in fact aimed at a particular religion.
August 19th, 2016 at 9:27AM
Greg: I agree with you on the anti-burkini stuff. But I do think there are rational health-related concerns about the burqa, which deprives the permanently benighted wearer of the crucial benefits of sunlight.
August 19th, 2016 at 9:28AM
SPF infinity.
August 19th, 2016 at 9:41AM
Yup.
August 19th, 2016 at 2:10PM
Maybe I’m out to lunch on this burqa deal, but my local liquor store proprietor, who’s almost surely a Muslim, has no problem with a hand-lettered “no hoodies, no masks, etc.” sign taped to the door. Locally, “no hoodies” means hoodies tied to largely conceal the face.
Would it bust anyone up, whether Martian or Muslim, to make some modest accommodation in dress to conform to some reasonable requests made by people within their host countries?
August 19th, 2016 at 2:49PM
Jack —
The relevant constitutional limits do not apply to non governmental actors such as your liquor store owner, though the 1964 Civil Rights Act may well apply. As to just decorum, in a crazy quilt country, like this what are reasonable limits? I do admit to occasionally wishing some psychedelic-looking guy next to me at dinner had a better grip on “smart casual.” I wonder about the demure woman in the designer top with the never-used (appendix like) hoodie gets her Smirnoff.
August 19th, 2016 at 3:00PM
Sorry Jack, missed the conceal the face proviso the first time through your post.