Segacs's World I Know

Posts Tagged ‘france’

Paris wants to ban SUVs.

Why does this not surprise me? A Civic owner myself, I don’t have any particular use for SUVs. They’re big, they’re clunky, they use a ton of gas. Not exactly my cup of tea.

But something tells me that banning them – especially in Europe, where most people already sensibly drive smaller cars than they do here in North America – is less about practicality and more about politics. Somehow, SUVs have joined McDonald’s and, well, Israel, as symbols of the hated capitalist-American-imperialist ideology that the socialists love to hate. Especially in France. After all, why else pick on SUVs and not, say, minivans or commercial vehicles?

Yep, good ol’ France, as expected, overwhelmingly backed the ban of religious symbols from the classroom, thus endorsing what is arguably one of the best candidates for prominence on dumblaws.com:

France’s National Assembly voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to banish religious emblems from state schools, a measure meant to keep tensions between Muslim and Jewish minorities out of public classrooms.

Deputies voted 494 to 36 to ban Muslim headscarves, Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses and to expel pupils who insisted on wearing them. It will not apply to private schools.

[ . . . ]

“What is at issue here is the clear affirmation that public school is a place for learning and not for militant activity or proselytism,” Assembly Speaker Jean-Louis Debre said.

Er, no, what is at issue here is whether the public school system will actually deal with racism and militant activity, or whether it will just sweep it under the carpet. All this law will do is force Muslim girls out of the public system and into private Madrassas, where they will lose the opportunity to have a secular education. All this will do is force the militant wing of Islam underground in France, and insult all the mainstream Muslims by telling them that their symbol of faith is really a symbol of “militant activity”.

France is attempting to solve a serious problem by pretending it doesn’t exist, and we all know how well that works.

France is maybe the most prominent example in the media these days on total idiocy about the concept of freedom of religion… but there are other, smaller-scale examples closer to home.

Today’s Gazette had two stories. One was about a zoning dispute for a mosque in DDO:

Many prayers have been said at 241 Anselme-Lavigne Blvd. in the 15 years the building has had a religious function, but for the current Muslim occupants, the D.D.O. address is proving to be more of a curse than a blessing.

The Canadian Islamic Centre Al-Jamieh bought the property in December 2001 and has been fighting the borough for the right to stay ever since.

The dispute became public in fall 2002 when the borough changed the site’s zoning from residential to institutional, with the aim of moving out the mosque and putting in a day care.

Meanwhile, a group of Orthodox Jews is battling their condo association for the right to build succahs on their balconies:

Several religious organizations will side with five families as they argue that a condo rule barring them from putting huts on their balconies for about a week each year to celebrate a fall religious festival contravenes the Charter of Rights.

The case is considered one of the most significant in the court’s winter session because the outcome could determine whether private contracts can override the charter and human-rights legislation.

These two cases are quite different, of course. The first is yet another example of cities using every iota of red tape and zoning regulation at their disposal to prevent religious centres or houses of worship. I haven’t heard too many large-scale protests against churches, but a synagogue in Outremont is in an ongoing battle to expand, and the mosque in question in DDO used to be a conservative synagogue, which also went through its share of problems with the city. It seems people can only tolerate freedom of religion as long as religions other than their own are being practiced privately in a home, not publicly.

In the second case, I suppose a condo association should be allowed to have by-laws for certain things. But personal politics and petty squabbles usually play more of a role in those condo meeting votes than common sense. On the one hand, a communal succah for the building seems reasonable. But on the other hand, I’m willing to bet that the opposition to the balcony succahs has more to do with childish power jockeying than with any real concerns. Again back to Outremont, the worst case of this that I can recollect recently was a group of citizens lobbying to prevent the large Orthodox Jewish community in the area from putting up an eruv – a small, basically invisible wire that would encircle the area, allowing the religious inside it to “carry” things like baby strollers on the Sabbath. It wouldn’t have harmed anyone. In fact, there’s an eruv in Dollard but I only know about it by having been told. Nobody would notice. And yet, petty squabbles.

The concept of freedom of religion is an interesting one. It guarantees people the right to practice their religious beliefs without harassment. And it also guarantees freedom from religion to those who don’t wish to participate. That means no school prayers in public schools, no forced public worship of any kind, and basically that the government butts out. But it also means that if people want to wear symbols of faith or observe rituals, they should be free to do so, as long as they don’t compel anyone else to. If a Jewish child wants to bring Passover lunches to school for eight days every year, nobody should force him to eat bread. If a Muslim girl wants to wear a hijab to school, nobody should force her not to… assuming that nobody forced her to wear it in the first place, of course.

But how far does the public responsibility extend to ensure that people can practice their religion? Is a city obliged to rezone land to allow houses of worship to be built? Is a condo association obliged to allow succahs? What if I claimed that my own religion required me to play loud music at 2am every night and dance around in tap shoes. Would a landlord be denied the right to evict me for disturbing the neighbours?

The tricky thing about religion is that there’s no clear-cut line between legitimate, recognized religions and fringe ones. Who’s to say that a small group with 20 followers is any less entitled to the protection of the Charter of Rights than a religion with millions of adherents? What about different ideas on how a religion ought to be observed? If a Reform rabbi testified that a succah wasn’t really needed, but an Orthodox rabbi disagreed, who does the judge have to listen to? And how far is the public required to go to be accommodating? Rezoning land to build a mosque is one thing, but is a public place required to actually build and provide the prayer facilities, as student groups in some universities are claiming?

Obviously, there are no clear answers. But in these cases, we should ask ourselves about the intent of the people seking to block something. Are they doing it out of xenophobia or out of a legitimate concern? When a Sikh boy was denied the right to bring a kirpan to school, perhaps the parents who lobbied so hard against him were denying this boy’s freedom of religion and perhaps they were overreacting, but the bottom line was that their concern stemmed from the legitimate desire to protect their children against a perceived threat of a large knife being present in a classroom in the hands of a fellow student. But I suspect that the motives of the few DDO residents complaining about the mosque are not as honest. At the end of the day, I think it’s about making an honest effort to accommodate one another, to a reasonable degree. Unfortunately, the people involved in such squabbles are rarely reasonable or accommodating… and then you end up with news items like these.

… Et stupidité:

President Jacques Chirac called on Wednesday for a law banning Muslim headscarves, Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses from French state schools.

“In all conscience, I consider that the wearing of dress or symbols which conspicuously show religious affiliation should be banned in schools,” he said in a televised speech on the long controversy over the role of religion in French public life.

“For that, a law is necessary,” he added, urging parliament to pass legislation for the new school year in September 2004.

Great solution there, Jacques – let’s pretend racism doesn’t exist by covering it up and banning it. Sure.

I wonder why anything the French government does surprises me anymore. This sure doesn’t:

Syria’s drive for a U.N. resolution condemning an Israeli air raid on its territory stalled in the Security Council for another day on Wednesday as Damascus looked for possible compromise with a divided Europe.

All four of the council’s European Union states — France, Britain, Spain and Germany — have signaled Syria that its draft resolution had to be more balanced to win their support.

But while Britain was insisting, along with Washington, that the resolution must condemn Saturday’s deadly suicide bombing in Haifa, Israel, to win its vote, France was making no such demand, diplomats said.

After all, it was only a bunch of Jews who were murdered. Why should France concern itself?

The reaction from the Arab world to the U.S. veto of a UN security council resolution calling for Israel to stop threatening to expel Arafat was fairly typical:

Arab League:Amr Moussa, secretary-general of the Arab League, said he hoped the veto doesn’t mean the United States supports Israeli policies “which are opposed by the whole world.”

Egypt:“The pretext saying that the draft resolution was unbalanced is baseless,” Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher said Wednesday. Maher echoed concern Israel might see the vote as a license to go after Arafat. He said that if nations don’t pressure Israel to desist from its “provocative and aggressive” policies, it would show the international community’s “powerlessness.”

Syria: Syria’s UN Ambassador Fayssal Mekdad expressed regret at the veto, calling it “extremely regrettable” and warning that it “will antagonize the feeling of Arabs in the region.

The Palestinians:“Clearly this is not a neutral position,” Ziad Abu Amr, a member of the outgoing Palestinian Cabinet, said. Senior Arafat adviser Nabil Abu Rdeneh told reporters the veto could jeopardize the U.S-backed “road map” for Mideast peace. The vote “is a real encouragement for the Israelis to continue their escalation,” he said. Nasser Al-Kidwa, the Palestinian UN observer, said the United States lost its credibility as an honest broker and warned that “serious consequences may follow.”

(It seems that “honest broker” has been translated as someone who condemns both sides of a dispute equally, regardless of who is at fault. That’s like a parent being criticized for grounding only one child and not both, when the grounded kid crashed the car and the non-grounded one brought home straight As.)

Jordan: In Jordan, the opposition Muslim Brotherhood said it was not surprised at the U.S. veto because “the Zionist lobby … controls the American policy in the Middle East.”

Oh, and I suppose we should include France: France said it regretted that the UN resolution on Israel didn’t pass. The resolution “had a balanced message that we believed could bring a consensus,” Cecile Pozzo di Borgo, the French Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, said in Paris.

Balanced??? I think Israel is making a political blunder by threatening to expel Arafat, but that doesn’t make the proposed UN resolution any more balanced:

The rejected draft resolution would have demanded “that Israel, the occupying power, desist from any act of deportation and to cease any threat to the safety of the elected president of the Palestinian Authority.”

It would have condemned Israel’s targeted assassinations of militant leaders and Palestinian suicide bombings, “all of which caused enormous suffering and many innocent victims.” It would also have called for a cessation of “all acts of terrorism, provocation, incitement and destruction.”

In other words, yet another UN condemnation of Israel without any mention of Palestinian terror. Sure, France, that looks balanced all right.

The UN seems to believe that a simple “majority rule” decides the difference between right and wrong. If the Arab nations and the Europeans gang up on Israel, then it must be okay, because they’re outvoting the US. More votes, more right? Only in a morally bankrupt world where right and wrong no longer exist. Unfortunately, this is increasingly the world where we live.

France claims: “No proof” that Hamas and Islamic Jihad are terror groups:

France voices objections to placing Hamas and Islamic Jihad on the European Union’s list of terror organizations, ynet reported Monday.

Diplomatic advisor to President Chirac, Maurice Gourdault-Montagne, is quoted to have said to the Israeli ambassador in France, Nissim Zvilli, that there is no proof that these two organizations are terror groups. “If we find that Hamas and Islamic Jihad are indeed terror groups opposed to peace, we may have to change the EU’s stand,” said Gourdault-Montagne. “However, we mustn’t limit ourselves to one, clear cut, position.”

Let’s recap, shall we? Hundreds of suicide attacks launched by these groups. Thousands of innocent civilians murdered by them in cold blood. The first line of their charters stating an unequivocal opposition to peace.

“No proof”??? What on earth more could France possibly need?

Speaking of the French, the coverage of the cease-fire collapse in the Mideast according to Le Monde is very telling in explaining France’s attitudes towards Israel.

The entire article only mentions the suicide bombing that killed 20 and injured over 80, once – and in the sixth paragraph, in a single sentence (without any mention of the children killed and wounded). The focus was on Israel’s “odious crime” (the article quotes Mahmoud Abbas in a sub-header) in its assassination of Ismail Abou Chanab, the Hamas terrorist responsible for the attack. The article presents Abu Chanab in a sympathetic light, as though it was an obituary, and clearly points the finger at Israel for “only giving the Palestinian Authority 24 hours” to react to terrorism before sending in the IDF. As if 36 hours would have made any difference . . . or 48 hours . . . or a week or a year, for that matter:

Mahmoud Abbas, le premier ministre palestinien, a été informé de l’assassinat d’Ismail Abou Chanab alors qu’il était en discussion avec John Wolf, l’émissaire américain chargé de la mise en application de la “feuille de route”, le plan de paix international, qui venait de rentrer précipitamment de Washington en raison de la tournure prise par les évènements. “C’est un crime odieux qui sape nos plans d’action contre les activistes palestiniens”, a regretté Mahmoud Abbas.

La veille, son gouvernement avait décidé de contrer le Hamas et le Djihad islamique, après l’attentat meurtrier de Jérusalem, mardi 19 août, qui a causé la mort de vingt personnes, blessant une centaine d’autres. Il restait à mettre au point certaines finalités en accord avec Yasser Arafat. Comme le dit un responsable palestinien, “le gouvernement de Sharon ne nous a même pas laissé 24 heures pour prouver le sérieux de nos intentions. Il a saboté nos plans et rendu un très mauvais service à Abou Mazen”, le surnom de Mahmoud Abbas. Et cela d’autant plus qu’Ismail Abou Chanab avait été l’un des interlocuteurs privilégiés du premier ministre lorsqu’il s’était agi d’instaurer la trève.

Abbas “decided to act against terrorism”??? Yet another example of Le Monde parroting Palestinian propaganda as fact, without bothering to provide any context whatsoever. No wonder the French hate Israel, if they believe articles like this one.

The heat wave in Europe has cost over ten thousand lives in France alone:

The French funeral directors association said 10,416 had died during the first three weeks of August because of the heat wave and projected the death toll for the month from the heat wave would be 13,632.

The French government admitted Thursday as many as 10,000 people may have died in the heat wave.

Ten thousand. That’s an incredibly staggering figure. How to even contemplate it, let alone explain it? And the fact that this is happening in a supposedly modern, Westernized country with plenty of water and medical care makes it all the the worse. How could the health authorities have been so slow to react?

The Eiffel Tower is on fire. No word yet on the cause.

Update: It appears that the cause was electrical. The blaze was put out and it seems nobody was hurt.