Denmark bans the Islamic veil - Covering up gets harder to do

[Standing Wolf]

I don't see how a veil ban would pass constitutional muster here in the US. I'm uncomfortable with the whole ban-the-veil-thing, particularly b/c of the constitutional free exercise clause. It would be a strict scrutiny analysis, I think. Rights apply to all, my friends.

Oh, there's no way it would survive the courts here in the U.S....although I'm quite certain that the legislatures of a number of states would be willing to pass such legislation anyway, just to pander. I'm wondering how many who think the Danes got this one right believe that it should also be adopted here. It's ironic how many folks will lecture you all day about how "there is no right not to be offended" - yet if something offends them, they want the authorities to get involved forthwith.

[Major Lambda]

Denmark bans the Islamic veil - Covering up gets harder to do across Europe and Africa. Evidently not pleased with the pace at which the country’s large Muslim population — more than 5 percent of the Danish nation — is being absorbed by the body politic, Denmark has banned the wearing of face veils in public, effective this month. The bill does not specifically target face veils, but declares that “anyone who wears a garment that hides the face in public will be punished with a fine.”


https://www.washingtontimes.com/news...-islamic-veil/

Attachment 24109

Bad guys overseas were wearing them, and doing a terror attack. This is probably why.



"Of course, there’s nothing to stop men wearing burqas. Indeed, when FactCheck asked UKIP what evidence was behind its burqa ban policy, a party official cited “one small anecdotal example from years ago,” that happened in Yemen. He said that soldiers were fired at by a man dressed in a burqa, who had a machine gun hidden under his clothes."

https://www.channel4.com/news/factch...-terror-threat


"Or that of Mustaf Jama, the Somali asylum seeker who killed PC Sharon Beshenivsky in 2005 before fleeing Britain dressed in a niqab, using his sister’s passport?"

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukn...ation-bid.html




Major Lambda

[Peter1469]

I am conflicted on this one. On principle, I don't like the idea of forcing people to comply with an arbitrary standard of dress. On the other hand, there is no question that this fundamentalist Muslim style of dress is being used by criminals/terrorists to conceal their identities and bombs. In western society, on the street and in other regular public spaces, covering ones face attracts suspicion, primarily because it is associated with crime. In fact, many cities are now using cameras and facial recognition software to identify criminals more readily.

Additionally, nonverbal in-person communication among human beings to a large degree involves facial expressions, so being unable to see someone's face or even their eyes does make people uncomfortable, not just from a cultural perspective but at a primal level. Furthermore, as a female, I find the notion of obliviating a woman's most basic identity in order to relieve men of temptation, utterly obnoxious and a form of subjugation.

The larger question posed in this thread is one of cultural accommodation. I would ask then, if instead of Muslim women shrouded from head to toe in burkas, we were talking about people from cultures who don't believe in wearing any clothing (given the appropriate climate) would we object to requiring people to cover up?

The SAS has successfully used the burka to infiltrate jihadist compounds to cause much chaos and death.

[Peter1469]

I don't see how a veil ban would pass constitutional muster here in the US. I'm uncomfortable with the whole ban-the-veil-thing, particularly b/c of the constitutional free exercise clause. It would be a strict scrutiny analysis, I think. Rights apply to all, my friends.

I agree. The answer is to stop accepting immigrants / migrants who have no desire to assimilate into our culture.

[Standing Wolf]

I agree. The answer is to stop accepting immigrants / migrants who have no desire to assimilate into our culture.

"Our culture"? Which one of the countless very different clothing styles that one sees every day best represents or illustrates "our culture"? Is how someone dresses really such a huge deal to you? And what is next on the conformity hit list? Banning the speaking of "foreign" languages? (Never know what those people are plotting to do if we can't understand them.)