Critics decried the [2018] law as discriminatory, but Denmark viewed it for what it truly is: a defence of secular values, civic participation, and national identity.
Now the ban has been expanded to schools and universities.
Civic life depends on visibility, communication, and engagement. Classrooms are not private spaces—they are the arenas where citizens learn to interact, debate, and participate. Full-face coverings obstruct all of that.
It is confusing to people when the freest, best countries in the world ban face-coverings. One of the reasons these countries are the best is that they ban face-coverings.
Secularism is non-negotiable. Public institutions, particularly schools, must be neutral spaces. Clothing that isolates or excludes individuals from shared norms compromises that neutrality... Visibility is not oppression—it is the foundation of civic life.
These themes are playing out right now in the political and legal wranging in Canada over proudly secular Quebec’s insistence on some controls over things like burqas and hijabs. This blog is firmly (as you well know if you read me) in the secular camp, and will follow the Canadian story closely.