Secularism and political correctness running rampant in Québec

The two main Québécois opposition parties, the nationalist Parti Québécois and the right-of-centre Action Démocratique du Québec have come out in support of a ban on all overtly religious symbols for those working in public service. The ban would include the ever more prevalent hijab (Muslim headscarf), the veil, the turban and the kirpan (a ritual knife carried by adherent Sikhs).

The proposed ban would be an outright attack on Cultural Communities which each year make a bigger and bigger contribution to the economic and demographic growth of the country. Though the parties claim that the ban is in the interests of laicité, the concept of secularism, it should be interpreted for what it is: a bulwark of extremism aimed at the denouncement of cultural differences in what is more and more a vibrant and culturally diverse nation.

Those that support the ban claim that the Quiet Revolution and its subsequent changes to Québécois society should have ousted all signs of religiosity from the public sector, that the country did not fight against the yoke of a militant and pervasive Catholicism just to be confronted with an Islamic upsurge in the country 40 years later.

Nothing could be further from the truth. To many Muslims, the hijab or veil is obligatory on them, and further more a representation of a faith that is deeply important to their very social being and psyche. To ban it would be a tragedy and would exclude many Muslim women from working to help provide the services that so many Québécois rely on.

Leil Bdeir, spokeswoman for Présence musulmane, believes that too many people misinterpret everything. «Laicité, that doesn't mean removing every religious symbol from the public sphere. Laicité, it is preventing the values of one religious group reigning supreme over another, its avoiding privelege of one group over another.» [19.12.09 Cyberpresse]

The question must be asked, what is behind this proposed ban? Is it a commitment to laicité, religious freedom, and secularism, or is it a step in the direction of xenophobia, Islamophobia, and social exclusion?

Libellés : Accommodements raisonnables, Politique, Québec

par Borges à 10:55

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