Comments on: Muslim Parents Sue Greek Orthodox School for Banning Head Scarves

By: Boonton

Boonton — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 16:59:34 +0000

I believe Orthodox Jewish women do also have the same understanding but ‘solve’ the problem by using wigs, which many may not notice in casual encounters.

To me it does sound cultural. The religious belief is to be modest, but modesty is relative to culture and context. An easy way to see this, imagine a woman wearing a bathing suit to class….quite a few heads will turn even it’s one that would be very low key on the shore.

By: peg

peg — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 14:08:09 +0000

“A hijab is not cultural it is in fact religious. It is to cover a women’s beauty i.e her hair.”

Maybe this is part of the problem—different cultural values. I appreciate modesty and see it as a strength. I hope some of the Moslem girls’ modesty will rub off on the rest. But I do not think Westerners generally think of women’s hair or beauty the same way. It’s not just a lack of understanding but also a different point of view.

By: Boonton

Boonton — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 11:50:06 +0000

I would say then an effort would have to be made to reasonably attempt to calculate the cost of the religious education from the total education provided and scale the voucher accordingly. This might simply be a symbolic gesture in some cases but an important one IMO. Most religious schools would come out favorably in this respect as they have made it very easy to sell their services to non-members of their religion by emphasizing their secular benefits.

By: pentamom

pentamom — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 22:22:17 +0000

Boonton, to what does that last comment apply? If to mine, what is the same thing as what? The establishment of a single state church, clearly and explicitly forbidden by the first amendment, is “the same thing as” giving money to a wide variety of religiously based schools (including many based in clearly conflicting religions) to allow them participate in the public education process? Really?

By: Boonton

Boonton — Sat, 12 Jan 2013 18:43:32 +0000

Same thing, try to imagine what would happen if the US Congress announced some mainline, middle of the road Protestant denomination would be the ‘Church of the United States’ and would receive a very small, PBS sized stipand from the taxpayers.

By: Marina

Marina — Sat, 12 Jan 2013 15:53:05 +0000

Boonton, your comments do not apply to the British situation – which has a very complex history regarding public schooling and faith schools.
Put succinctly, the majority of schools were affiliated with religion until early 20th Century, and state schooling did not really exist. When it was introduced to some extent in 1902 – the majority of denominational schools were accommodated for. Then true state run education (we mean something different when we say public schooling) was only really established in 1948. In both cases, the main providers of education had been churches and charitable bodies. The state sought to utilise their buildings and their workforce to establish schooling for all. Therefore accommodations were made and the legacy lives with us.
I believe the US is a totally different situation both historically and constitutionally with regard to the place of religion in schools. This is a legacy we are left with in the UK, and even attempting to unpick it would be time-consuming, costly and controversial.
What studies have shown is that faith schools tend to do well because the parents are committed and there is a clear school identity and ethos. The same is true of purely secular schools, like the one I teach in in London, where committed parents, good teaching and a clear ethos make an outstanding school.

By: Iftikhar Ahmad

Iftikhar Ahmad — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 22:06:43 +0000

A hijab is not cultural it is in fact religious. It is to cover a women’s beauty i.e her hair.

Muslims are always facing a backlash for everything they do. If a Sikh man can wear his turban to be a guard for the Queen, why can’t this school allow pupils to wear a piece of cloth to cover their hair. It is a religious symbol and the sooner everyone accepts its stay in this country, the better. No point fighting the inevitable. And yet images of the holy mother Mary show her covering her head. I wonder if she enrolled in this school they would treat her the same? I would much prefer to see young girls wearing modest clothes than the mini skirts of an excuse of school uniform they are made to wear. All these comments about her having to enrol in an Islamic school sound very ignorant to me. Isn’t it better that they are trying to integrate and co-exist with people from other backgrounds and religious beliefs, without having to give up on their own? The only way to live together is to learn from each other. The school should practice tolerance and be reasonable. It is not unreasonable to allow the child to wear a headscarf if her parents feel very strongly. Surely she is there to be educated…everything else should be secondary.

What nonsense by the governing body , hundreds and hundreds of UK primary schools allow Muslim girls to wear hijab as part of their uniform, and why not, it’s neat and tidy – and stops the poor girls from catching nits from their peers!. And surprise surprise the sky hasn’t fallen down yet. And moreover in the interests of a united society in the future I would far rather see Muslim girls being educated in mainstream schools wearing hijab rather than being sent to religious schools because the mainstream schools are inventing petty rules that exclude them and divide them from the society that they are going to be living in and…

By: pentamom

pentamom — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 19:25:26 +0000

“A strict barrier between public and religious” might be a popular folk concept in America, but it is not a legally established one. I think you’re referring to non-establishment of religion, which is far narrower in scope that creating a barrier between everything public and everything religious.

By: Boonton

Boonton — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 16:57:18 +0000

Well many European countries do not have the US idea of a strict barrier between public and religious. They have freedom of religion but at the same time ‘official’ state churches leading to the line getting blurred. A taxpayer who doesn’t share the faith has literally no right to complain because the system is set up with some faiths as ‘preferred’ and all the rest not. Granted this violation of freedom may be pretty soft as in the case of the UK but in other cases it can bite pretty hard such as in Greece or Russia.

By: pentamom

pentamom — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 15:11:44 +0000

Boonton — good point about it being among the better schools. I recall now that such things are common in many countries of the world — the kids are sent to what are considered the best available schools.

Not sure this bears in any way on any claim of the ACLU, since British law with respect to religious practice is entirely distinct from American. The First Amendment guarantees free exercise and non-establishment, period, and there’s no provision for vacating it depending on where the check is cut.