I am often amazed at the claims that so-called experts make, even in a court of law. For example, the government of Ontario recently defended its policy that Sikhs riding motorcycles should wear helmets (not a requirement in BC or Manitoba) by claming that turbans would unravel in the breeze, thus posing a risk to other motorists.
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Born to be wild |
… the Crown declared that an expert it had hired proved that turbans unravel rapidly in 100 km/h winds. The Crown’s test had been carried out by a professional engineer who purchased a mannequin head, mounted it on a stick and then placed the assemblage in a wind tunnel. [Link]
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p>Say what? Turbans unravel at 60 mph? Have they ever seen a Sardar riding a motorcycle? Or riding a roller coaster? Or even sticking his head out of a moving vehicle? The paag stays on tight my friend.
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p>To test this claim, the plaintiff, Baljinder Badesha of Brampton (can you say that 10 times fast?), tried to replicate the study. He drove down the Cayuga Speedway at … gasp, 110 kmh. Did his turban unravel and flutter into the wind like a wayward plastic bag? Ummm … no. It was fit to be tied.
Mr. Hutchison [Baljinder Singh’s lawyer] was unable to find a documented case anywhere in the world where a Sikh motorcyclist’s turban had unravelled. Skeptical, he persuaded the OHRC to authorize its own test. After he confronted the Crown with the dramatically different test result, prosecutors conceded that their engineer had grossly miscalculated the force of the wind he had generated to batter the imitation head, Mr. Hutchison said.
In fact, the device had been subjected to a 300 km/h wind. [Link]
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p>That’s right – they used 180 mph winds in their test, more of a gale than the stiff breeze you get at 60mph. And even so, I’m not entirely convinced. I’ll bet if they used a real person with a real turban going 180 mph, it might still stay on. But in any case, given that driving at 300 kmh is illegal, the point is moot.
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p>So now the Crown is switching arguments. Instead of defending this policy in terms of the danger to others that turbans pose (those huge swooping turbans flying around the freeway, covering up windshields!) they’re arguing that helmetless motorcycle riders will cost the taxpayers more:
… its main argument is now based on increased costs to the health system, should helmetless Sikh motorcycle riders end up suffering head injuries. [Link]
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p>The problem is that if you accept this argument, why are they allowing anybody to ride on a motorcycle at all, given that it’s far riskier than driving a car. In fact, they should only allow people to drive safe, slow, sober sedans like the Ambassador.
…a study … concluded that, assuming half of all Sikh motorcyclists wear turbans, the increase in serious injuries would be between .43 and 2.83 Sikh riders a year.
The study also projected that medical treatment for traumatic brain injuries would … [lead to] a .00005-per-cent overall increase in the province’s annual health-care budget.
Mr. Hutchison told the court that the province already licenses motorcycle riders in spite of the fact that they have far more accidents than automobile drivers. “Clearly, the decision to allow motorcycles to be used at all recognizes and accepts a significant degree of risk and concomitant social cost,” he said. [Link]
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p>I realize that Canada is not a very libertarian country, but where they draw the line between acceptable risk (riding a motorcycle vs. riding in a car) and unacceptable risk (riding a motorcycle with a turban vs. riding a motorcycle with a helmet) is clearly determined by social preferences rather than public health. You can’t be penny wise and pound foolish and then say you’re acting out of frugality, it wont wash.
And that’s fine. But that’s a discretionary accommodation, not something companies are expected to give.
Just to be clear, I am not suggesting that religious people should not given any accomodations. I am however pointing out the fact that as religions proliferate in the United States, it might not be possible to accomodate all sincerely held beliefs. I have worked in this area and it can get very problematic.
For example: A workplace has 100 employees. 5 of them are Muslims. – The Muslims want to get prayer breaks during their 12-8 shifts and in the summer, you have 3 prayers which fall in those 8 hours so then they want 3 breaks for their prayers. – 2 of the Muslim employees also believe that they should pray immediately when its time to pray (which moves from 1-2 minutes everyday) so they want rolling breaks which change every day. – Its also the month of Ramadan and they want to eat when its time to break their fast which itself moves by around 2 minutes everyday. So they want rolling eating breaks to cover the time. – 2 of the 5 Muslims are women. One of them wears a long flowing jilbab (burqa) and believes that the jilbab is mandatory even though the loose fitting and flowing jilbab violates the OSHA standards as she works on the assembly line. – Plus she will not pray with the other men in the same room so she cant pray in the lunch room. – Also they have now petitioned the Union to include a request for setting up footpaths in the restrooom where they can perform ablution (wuzu) 3 times a day. That cannot be accomodated without tearing down the restrooms. – Once Ramadan ends, its the day of Eid and all 5 Muslim employees want the day off. However 2 of the Muslims are Somali Muslims who celebrate Eid the day Saudi Arabia does while 2 other Muslims want to do it the day the Eid is performed in their native countries while the American Born Muslim wants to do it the day his local Mosque celebrates Eid. This might lead to the 5 Muslims being given 3 different days off for Eid in a span of 3 days.
The other employees are pissed off because of the above accomodations given to Muslims and they are raising hell. The HR will have to become experts on the Sharia to figure out these demands.
The last comment was not based on a hypothetical scenario. In areas where you have large numbers of non-professionals Muslims immigrating and working in factories/warehouses, they have to deal with the above on a daily basis.
If we’re going to do that kind of calculus (the “how much accommodation is too much?” question), then we need to examine the default. The default is either a) atheistic, or b) Christian in the U.S. I don’t really want to open a debate on whether the U.S. is a Christian nation or how many people from religion X you need to tip the scales in favor of an inclusive policy. If you have workers who want to pray 5x/day, let ’em. I know for most of my jobs they add my breaks to my workday (so I don’t work 8 hours + breaks, I am at work for 9 hours, 8 of which are devoted to work and 1 of which is for lunch + two 15-minute breaks). I just think people are eager to throw up their hands and say, “Oh it’s so hard! You minorities make things so hard!” instead of practical alternative solutions.
Slightly unrelated, but I had an employer once who worked us for exactly seven hours and 45 minutes so that he didn’t have to give us breaks and only required us to take 1/2 hr lunch.
Actually, this was a great system for me, because I never cared for the mandatory “you have to stand somewhere, not working, for 15 minutes” break game.
I disagree Camille. I think there is a third route, which is “secular”. It would be disingenuous to conflate it with atheist (not that I think you were doing that). It recognizes that people have different religious beliefs but assumes that those beliefs will be relegated to the private sphere without unreasonable demand for accomodation for all “sincerely held” practices in the public sphere, especially where there is an genuine, demonstrated public purpose to the laws in question.
Admittedly the lines aren’t always clear (and admittedly cultural mores play a role) but I certainly don’t think the answer is to say “oh, okay as long as you personally belive XYZ, you set the rules for what you will and won’t do”. It leads to confusion and also conflict when two sets of sincerely held beliefs conflict (including sincerely held “beliefs” in one area, such as sexual orientation and sincerely held beliefs in another area, such as religion. As another example, atheism is at the extreme end of the spectrum of religious belief in that it rejects any form of divinity. If an atheist sincerely believes (and a number do) that she shouldn’t have to put up with or be exposed to any “voodoo” or “quackery”, how will that conflict be settled? Atheists are obviously a minority compared to the religious–presumably they have the right to impose their “no recognition whatsoever for delusions” beliefs?). The sincerity of the belief goes to establishing whether the claimant is being a frivolous git–not whether society as a whole has to defer to that belief.
I have no doubt that many adherents of religions hold sincere beliefs but there are situations when it is not desirable to accomodate them in a particular society no matter how sincere. And as mentioned before, the reasonable accomodation implies movement by both sides and both sides better be proposing practicable workable solutions–if the claimant in question suggests that its a “my belief’s way or the highway”, (a zero-sum game rather than a win win approach) I think majority resentment and resulting retrenchment will probably carry the day. And yes, while “tyranny of the majority” is undesirable (hence the need for reasonable accomodation of minorities), in my view it’s a hell of a lot MORE desirable than “tyranny of the minority” or “everyone just do their thing as long as they sincerely believe they need to do so”. That perverts the idea of “rule of law” which tries, as much as possible to keep people bound by the same standards, so that there is some certainty that no matter who you are, you will have the same rights AND obligations. Because, as I’m sure we’re all aware, if we really let people do everything they wanted and avoid doing what they didn’t want because of sincerely held beliefs, things would probably get nasty very quickly and I suspect that “minorities” (using what ever classification criteria you desire) would bear the immediate and most lasting brunt of that nastiness.
For crystal clarity, my comments are not coming from a place of lack of respect for Sikhs and are not dependant on the fact that the claimant in question is Sikh.
102 · Pagal_Aadmi_for_debauchery said
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blockquote>Just to be clear, I am not suggesting that religious people should not given any accomodations. I am however pointing out the fact that as religions proliferate in the United States, it might not be possible to accomodate all sincerely held beliefs. I have worked in this area and it can get very problematic.
yaar Paagal, this scenario would make me pagal. I think rituals of religion should be left out of the workplace period-for everyone!. The ultrareligious sometimes get bent way out shape over these issues. Is allah or waheguru or bhagwan gonna be upset if you just prayed in yo’head. I think not! I know, I have a direct line 😉
82 · DJ Drrrty Poonjabi said
You’re right. It isn’t the same. But if it affects you, consider how someone who has spent four years doing this feels. I’ve spent just as many hours (if not more) at SM as I have at work since we started during the Summer of ’04. No longer seeing comments from mutineers I became real life friends with sucks. But I want to address something; it wasn’t a “mass exodus“. It was life. People graduate, change jobs, get married, have kids, fall ill. There have been babies, weddings and illnesses in the bunker as well, over the last 43 months.
I miss Siddhartha and DesiDancer as much as anyone does, but a lot of us are still here and sometimes these comments about “I almost stopped coming here, since everyone great has left”…grate. I didn’t stop blogging because a few of my most beloved commenters left, and I wish that it wouldn’t even cross your minds to stop posting because of it. I know, you said you have mad love for those who are still here. I do, too, since their longevity is extra-amazing, all things considered. That’s why the “It isn’t the same”-refrain bothers me. It will never be the same, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be wonderful.
/James
Nobody really said anything here about the backlash against the sikh community everytime the turban or kirpan issues comes up. All I can say that the sikh’s are not the favorite minority in Canada right now.
Being a religous minority in Canada or the United States in the year 2008 is alot better, then in many other parts of the world.
Here in Vancouver, everytime it’s Diwali or Vaisakhi you will see ad’s in the newspaper from both major polictical parties wishing them happy Diwali or Vaisakhi. Yet when it’s Christmas they instead say happy holidays. Last year I saw story on the News about women was upset that her daughter school would celebrate Diwali but would not celebrate Christmas.
Stuff like cause a backlash against the desi community.
Man, do you live in a Heritage Front compound? This and similar issues do end up creating some general anti-immigrant/multiculturalism resentment but to call it a backlash, particularly against any one group, is really overstating things. It fuels the accomodation debate but i’ve yet to see it become anything specifically anti-sikh or anti-brown.
Also, there is no war on christmas. I can’t believe you’re from Canada. We don’t even get Fox News, where are you coming up with this stuff?
When schools and universities stop organizing their schedules around the Christmas and Easter holidays, then we’ll talk. Christian traditions get seen as “normal” while other groups get seen as demanding “extra”.
What about the weekend? It’s organized around a Christian notion of worship and the need for a sabbath. Why do I have to pay overtime to make people work then? As an employer, I’m discriminated against by Christians!
Stop providing aid and comfort to the terrorists already, will ya?
Ennis, I hope you’re just having fun with this argument–while I can see the logic, if you really bear this as a grievance, it’s the perfect prescription for leading an increasingly miserable life–please, take a deep breath and let it go. . . .
My point is simple – people’s secular solution is plenty religious as is, but they’re unwilling to accommodate a tiny minority largely on symbolic grounds of equity. I find that laughable.
But no, I’m not pissed off at the status quo, just unwilling to take it as somehow fair and equitable and unrelated to its historical antecedents.
It’s funny how that works isn’t it? I agree with your observation and think it is relevant to this discussion. Also, Ennis, there can never be a logical solution to the problem you point out in #112. The idea of secularism is conceptually flawed since is based on the notion that there is a divine world and a mundane world. The truth of this assumption has by no means been established. Instead what has been happening since the notion of secularism was developed, is that people have been drawing the line between religious and mundane in different places at different times through history depending on the power struture. In actual fact it is not easy to establish what properties distinguish the religious from the political or the secular. Since the idea of secularism is conceptually flawed and cannot be relied upon to perfectly resolve the problems it attempts to, i think it is only fair and natural that we go along with the local tradition, which just happens to consist of Sundays and Christmas, etc. It can only lead to chaos if everybody started wanting equal recognition.
That is a solid point, and important to keep in mind–I agree that too many of the anti-Badesha comments on this thread ignore this point. I was warning against spending one’s life trying to de-throne, e.g., Christmas as a national holiday–ain’t gonna happen in our lifetime, anymore than if you moved to Morocco and started agitating against Eid. So some things it’s healthier to accept.
Well, this is where we need to do some difficult line-drawing, since we can’t accomodate all religious demands all the time. I’m close to the line on the helmet issue, but I would certainly think it reasonable to require Sikh soldiers to wear helmets if they’re in combat–you don’t want some guy in your platoon to be easily shot-down if you’re depending on him! And I definitely think female Muslim surgeons should be required to wash/disinfect their forearms before operating! (This latter is apparently now an issue in the UK.)
ente, what would that look like? I ask because France claims that it’s secular, but that’s certainly not what my view of secularism is. The fear re: backlash and tyranny of the majority are experiences that religious minorities ALREADY endure. I seriously doubt that an exemption for a (large) minority community, if dealt with fairly and on a case-by-case basis, would create “tyranny” for the majority.
While things are certainly better today than 50 years ago for non-Christians in the U.S./Canada, we live in a world that is not normatively “default secular” or even “default atheistic.” You argue that religious minorities sticking to their guns breeds contempt — do you really think it doesn’t go the other way as well? By the state adopting rigidity and failing to account for religious minorities when they form legislation, it reifies a sense of unfair standards as well as the “position of faith” among minorities.
While I understand the concept of being “free from religion” as an atheist, outside of proselytization, or the observation of religious holidays as national holidays/events, how does someone’s individual practice severely impinge on that?
I think Amitabh really divided the question well — there are two issues at hand: 1) The case per se, and 2) The role of religious exemptions to laws. I’ll restate my opinion — I think the slippery slope argument, as applied to religion, is misguided. I also think the hyperbole that occasional or specific exemptions somehow undermine the rule of law as a whole are oversimplified and inaccurate. We see plenty of legitimate cases where it works out and society (and the rule of law) are doing just fine.
I basically agree with your points, but cut France some slack. They’re basically in a state of low-grade civil war (Muslim v. Catholic), and only didn’t send in the army to quell the insurrection in the Parisian banlieus b/c they didn’t want to admit, for PR purposes, that they were in a state of civil war. But when you have thousands of attacks on police by Muslim youths, you have to start thinking “outside the box” in terms of how to quell future violence, and “de-religion-ing” public spaces like schools might be a good idea–it might not be–but it should be an option–at the end of the day, saving lives trumps religious expression for most people (me included).
To the social scientists out there: what is the social/political theory or justification for accommodating “sincerely held beliefs” (I’d be happy to get readable references)? Is it to protect rights/guarantee happiness of individuals, or is it to preserve social harmony etc.? Or is to protect rights/guarantee happiness of individuals while simultaneously maximizing some social productivity function? If it is purely to protect rights, why is religion granted special status? Why can’t I, as an atheist, expect my sincerely held beliefs (held by a minority of one – me) to automatically and naturally have equal status in the eyes of the law as far as accommodation? And if it is to protect rights while guaranteeing social productivity, why is it unreasonable to assume that the majority norm will, at the end of the day, guide decisions as to what is acceptable in society, and that you need to achieve some minimum size before your unhappiness affects society detrimentally?
Maybe I am thinking about this all wrong, so I am happy to be corrected.
Here is a link to a credible UK newspaper that says 2500 French police wounded in attacks in the first half of 2006.
I just don’t think banning religious items is an “outside the box” initiative or venture. There are a thousand reasons for why there’s been religious and ethnically slanted violence in Paris, and I think it’s easy to pick the most obvious (religion, color) and then use that as justification for state-sponsored repression.
How is it “fair” and “natural”? The US doesn’t look like chaos to me, even though there is a good deal of religious recognition. Historically, people were afraid of accommodating Catholics because they were so foreign and America was a Protestant country, but that worked out fine. And the Mormons? Have you looked at the LDS? And how about the Jews, Seventh Day Adventists and Jehovah’s Witnesses?
You look at that and see chaos, I look at that and see what makes America great.
It’s the basic (classical) liberal notion that individuals, rather than the state/majority, should be able to have a wide sphere of autonomy, b/c autonomy is valuable/good/rationally non-rejectable. I don’t have specific references at hand at the moment, but see, e.g., Locke, Mill, Rawls, Nozick–for all their differences, they pretty much agree on that.
Yeah, so if it flows from what I describe as preserving rights of individuals, why are some “deeply held beliefs” more important than others?
They aren’t!! So, for example, I should, in a liberal state, be able to drink alcohol and eat pork during the day during Ramadan even though 95% of the population is Muslim, and my interest in eating and drinking is utterly secular.
That’s not true in the least. Why can’t I drink peyote just because I deeply hold that belief? Why can’t I ride without a helmet because I like the wind in my hair?
And, to reiterate, I am not quoting the helmet example because I think that Mr. Badesha shouldn’t ride helmetless, I really think that this is not a serious enough problem for the state to ride roughshod over his personal preferences, but rather mention “the wind in the hair” as an example of an argument that the court would completely brush off as ridiculous.
Also, there is no war on christmas. I can’t believe you’re from Canada. We don’t even get Fox News, where are you coming up with this stuff?
I guess this women was not happy that her kid school in the Vancouver about having a day for diwali, but not christmas. http://www.canada.com/surreynow/news/letters/story.html?id=721d9016-832a-4dc6-b214-b9796da24d60
Camille, you may well be right–I’m suggesting it’s an empirical question–if we want to be fair to the French, they seem to operating on the empirical guess (I doubt there’s any real evidence) that de-religion-ing the public schools will lead to less religious violence (and I don’t think you can deny that what went on in the banlieus was basically religious violence–you didn’t see many poor Catholics or Jews or animists attacking the French police or burning cars). If you accept that religious expression, while an important value, is not an absolute right and can be trumped in some circumstances, then you might want to give the French the benefit of the doubt here. They could have been far nastier, and sent in the army (like the US did in the 60’s, when the National Guard was sent into Detroit, etc. when we had a low-grade civil war going on).
No, no–you are conflating classical liberal theory and the actual US/Canada. Locke, Mill, Rawls & Nozick would, I am confident, allow the peyote-drinking! The US and Canada are, on a global scale, pretty liberal (and damn wealthy and pleasant (on a global scale) b/c of it!), but they in practice have numerous deviations from the theoretical classical liberal state–look at, e.g., the tariffs on rice, oranges, etc. to benefit US farmers, to take one obvious example!
Ok, maybe I wasn’t clear. My original question was about the decision framework for the tradeoffs that do happen in the non-ideal world we live in, and that does not seem to be the classical liberal theory. It is definitely the case that people are inclined to give a wide berth to deeply held beliefs if their provenance is religious, but that is not the case when it isn’t. And as far as I can see, the only rationale is critical mass of a minority.
rob, if you default to religion then you would have to ignore the history of colonialism, immigration policy, the French state’s difficulty in coming up with a coherent and equal naturalization and integration process, etc. For example, you also didn’t see many white Muslims out on the streets. There were many factors at play.
This is like saying that because there were riots in Chicago we should create a different set of rules that limits expression and encumbers people of color without asking “Why were there riots in Chicago?” I hear what you’re saying, but from an empirical standpoint it is hard to quantify how much of state-citizen conflict in France among ethnic/religious communities is driven by poverty, how much by state policy, how much by identification, etc.
I just don’t think that’s true. One is perfectly free (today) to, for example, have gay sex, eat meat on Fridays during Lent, blaspheme Jesus, get divorced, practice Buddhism, etc., even though that’s anathema to (large sectors of) the Christian super-majority. That’s the sense in which the US/Canada are actually pretty liberal. I don’t feel particularly impinged-upon in my day-to-day life by Christianity, even though I’m a Hindu.
if we want to be fair to the French, they seem to operating on the empirical guess (I doubt there’s any real evidence) that de-religion-ing the public schools will lead to less religious violence (and I don’t think you can deny that what went on in the banlieus was basically religious violence–you didn’t see many poor Catholics or Jews or animists attacking the French police or burning cars).
I dont think that Muslim and some non-Muslim African violence in France was religiously motivated. Also the French banning of religious gear in school had nothing to do with the riots and was not really a part of the French debate on the display of religious gear in school.
Its a fact that the majority of rioters were Muslims. However there is no evidence to suggest that the rioting was religiously motivated.
Yes, yes, but these things are intertwined. I.e., why it’s Muslim youths attacking the police has fundamentally a lot to do with colonialism and immigration policy and racism–it’s not just Islam–of course!! But, at the end of the day, we have to realize that France has a huge problem going forward, and if we realize that some of the ideal solutions aren’t politically feasible, we should consider some other possibilities. I guess at the end of the day I’m just not as offended by their crackdown on religious objects in school as you are–I see the religious divide as fostering the violence, and I’m giving them the benefit of the doubt that they’re trying to tamp that divide down, rather than that they’re being jerks by implementing the policy–remember, at the end of the day, you might have the French army going into the banlieus–if a little bit of other measures can head that off, I’m all for it.
Yes, fair enough. I didn’t say it’s religiously motivated. But, if you wanted to explain to a Martian why thousands of French police were injured in attacks, and who was attacking them, you wouldn’t want to say “the poor” or the “political left” or the “political right” if you wanted to be accurate–you would say “Muslim youths”–no?
I did not at all say that all non-religious preferences are superceded by religious beliefs – I realize that the US/Canada are not theocracies (although it is just an accident that sodomy is legal, Lawrence v. Texas would likely have an entirely different result in this court, and Roe v. Wade would probably also get thrown out the window, and a lot of the animosity towards both of these are based in religion). I am talking about the outrage that accrues whenever there is a perception that there might be a limitation imposed upon a belief based in religion: for example, assuming you thought helmet laws were reasonable, would the average person sympathize with an individual who wanted an exemption purely because he deeply felt that the experience wasn’t authentic unless he could feel his hair blowing in the wind?
according to John Gibson:
• In Illinois, state government workers were forbidden from saying the words “Merry Christmas†while at work • In Rhode Island, local officials banned Christians from participating in a public project to decorate the lawn of City Hall • A New Jersey school banned even instrumental versions of traditional Christmas carols • Arizona school officials ruled it unconstitutional for a student to make any reference to the religious history of Christmas in a class project
Rahul, I’m sorry if I’m missing something in your comments, but–yes–there is a lot of sympathy around the world for people who want “a limitation imposed upon a belief based in religion”–look at the spread of legal abortion in the West, gay marriage being legalized in Catholic Spain, nightclubs and drinking in Lebanon, basic history of post-WW I Turkey (I realize they just repealed the anti-hijab rule, but look at the overall trend), what young people in Iran today really do, etc. I really am not seeing your point. To me, religion seem to be on the run/in a defensive crouch–just compare the world today to 1900.
In Illinois, state government workers were forbidden from saying the words “Merry Christmas†while at work
So?
In Rhode Island, local officials banned Christians from participating in a public project to decorate the lawn of City Hall
Decorate in what way? if city hall lawn is going to be decorated, it should have a christian section, a Hindu section, a Muslim section, a Bahai Section, a Wiccan section, a…
A New Jersey school banned even instrumental versions of traditional Christmas carols
So?
Arizona school officials ruled it unconstitutional for a student to make any reference to the religious history of Christmas in a class project
What are the details on this? what were the references for..
How bout the other war on christmas? The one that Bill O’Reilly doesn’t talk about. The one where a religious holiday is turned into a fat man wearing a red suit and fighting to buy that last super zombie toy or whatever is selling at the time.
LOL@John Gibson. The Walter Cronkite of the Right Wing.
120 · Rahul said
see seana shffrin here, who among the new philosopher-lawyers is considered to have come up with a very good account of accommodation, and why states might choose to accommodate sincerely held beliefs as well as discusses harder cases like smokers, drinkers, and violators of helmet laws. one of her papers can be found here. some of ayelet shachar’s work is relevant too. just giving you the references – am exhausted.
Good reference–she is super-smart.
144 · rob said
i just keep on hearing about philosophy students who have massive crushes on her 🙂 she is incredibly articulate, and also a former girl-genius apparently.
I have met her (once) in real life, and she is crazily smart–like, an order of magnitude smarter than the limited number of people I would normally call smart. She gets an argument that takes mere smart people five minutes to lay out in about 5 seconds.
well, if the so-called civil-libertarians did their job, we wouldn’t need gibsonor o’reilly. Here’s another case (from FIRE…i believe nat hetcoff is on the BOD)
In a shameful attack on freedom of religion, the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire (UWEC) has banned resident assistants (RAs) from leading Bible studies in their own dormitories. The university claims the ban is necessary because some students might not feel RAs who lead Bible studies are “approachable.â€
HMF: it the free speech and free excercise clause of the 1st ammendment. the govt can’t ban words like “merry christmas” in the workplace, with the narrow exception if the words interfere with work.
Camille re your post 118 you raise some good questions. I would suggest that secular is very different from atheist. Atheist would prohibit any accomodation, recognition or acknowledgement of religion whatsoever whether in the public or private sphere. There is no god and there is no need to accomodate or recognize any practices except as delusional quirks and to the extent they are based on some sort of mistaken belief in the supernatural, they deserve, at best, contempt. Secular recognizes that spiritiual beliefs including a belief in the supernatural can form a powerful part of people’s lives and also recognizes the right to practice in accordance with those beliefs to the extent that they do not interfere with the public sphere or overarching principles upon which the society is governed. Obviously the definition of “infringing on the public sphere” or those overarching principles vary from society to society (I would hope that in the U.S. and Canada we agree that gender equality is an overarching principle and we are not keen to erode those rights because of someone’s sincere belief that, for example, menstruating women should be kept secluded so that they do not pollute men by their presence “See the Year of Living Biblically”).
And damn straight I believe that an atheist is impacted by the practice of religion. It is a fundamental tenet of atheism that there is no supernatural being or force guiding the universe. For some Sikhs, the requirement that Sikh men wear a turban is perceived as a fundamental tenet of their religion. For some atheists, the requirement that superstition or delusions should not be given any individual or societal respect whatsoever and are in fact dangerous and pathological traits is as fundamental a tenet (witness the accusations that Richard Dawkins is an atheist “fundamentalist”). So yes, you proselytizing in the company lunchroom or on the street corner because your religion tells you to is an infringement on their VERY sincerely held beliefs. So, however, does your demand to be able veil your face when talking to an atheist co-worker because “your religion” demands it. Their belief actively rejects that belief and you are dealing with them and forcing them to defer to your delusion, so you are impinging on their belief system. The reality is that religion is afforded much more respect and accomodation in the public sphere than atheism–secularism doesn’t tell adherents that they are wrong in their beliefs of what their supernatural deity tells them–it just says that in certain circumstances, that belief is ultimately irrelevant and must defer to other objectives and purposes, including the purpose of belonging to a community where not all members share that same spiritual belief.
Again specific exemptions may indeed be fine,depending on the context in question and weighing all the factors. But simply stating that the majority always has a duty to accomodate a minorities belief is very much a slippery slope and, quite frankly a recipe for disaster, as there are a lot of incompatible yet ardently held beliefs out there. As an example, the sincere belief that one must have the right to proselytize to Muslims and convince them that they are following a false religion can run smack up against the sincere belief that any insult to Islam must be dealt with by any means necessary.
But I don’t think anyone is saying otherwise- “case by case” (vs. individual by individual) and “fairly”. Most people in disagreement are just saying that in this case, the restriction appears to be fair and reasonable in light of the stated purpose and demonstrated results and overall objectives of the society. And since you’ve added the further criteria a “large” minority community issue as the qualification for allowing exemptions you are making it about numbers rather than principle and are in fact arguing the government’s point for them in that it is relevant to show that many Sikhs these days actually don’t wear a turban or don’t have a problem with not engaging in activities where the turban is an impediment. It’s only a much smaller contingent of Sikhs who seem hung up about it. Sikhs are a small proportion of the overall Canadian population anyway and using this critera of “large enough” minority slices the minority into even smaller pieces makes the claimants even less justified (i.e. they just don’t have the right numbers of adherents). I don’t think that’s how cases should be decided.
I think I’ve pretty much gone around in circles here making the same points so I’ll bow out of the conversation, but thanks again to all for an interesting discussion.
No, no–this is instructively wrong, however. The “liberal” position (which is held with less than perfect fidelity by most wealthy nations, including ours) is that person A can wear no religious insignia and person B can wear religious insignia. If A finds B offensive, that is a personal matter, but in no way would A be able to claim that B is “forcing [A] to defer to [B’s] delusion.” A can refrain from contracting with B, but that is a personal matter. B is not to be disabled in any (beyond what A thinks) sense just b/c of what A thinks (and, vice-versa).