State secularism law | What exactly are the opponents of Bill 21 defending?

The return to the debates on Bill 21 in the Court of Appeal brings to the fore the lack of arguments of the critics of the law, as well as the gap which separates their discourse from the reality of religious fundamentalism and its impact on the rights of women and children. At a time when Iranian men and women are fighting for freedom and confronting the theocratic regime of the Mullahs, certain statements are shocking.

In order to challenge article 8 of the law requiring deputies to exercise their functions with their faces uncovered, in other words in order to defend the wearing of the niqab [voile intégral] in the National Assembly, Mr.^e Olga Redko, a lawyer for the National Council of Canadian Muslims and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, argued last Thursday that “religion is an integral part of identity” and therefore a person cannot be asked to remove part of his identity¹.

How can one make such an argument while defending religious freedom? If religion is an identity, then it is no longer a freedom. Moreover, this vision of religion clashes head-on with Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which proclaims the freedom to change religion or belief precisely in the name of freedom of conscience, thought and religion. .

This argument is all the more bewildering when it concerns the niqab. How can one be so blind as to conceive of this prison for women as an identity and not see in it the emblem of the most misogynist Islamist regimes on the planet? To draw a parallel between the veil and the identity of Muslim women is to play into the hands of the Islamists who only want to anchor this idea in the population.

A duty of care on the part of the State

To consider religious symbols as part of one’s identity is religious fundamentalism. To hear the lawyer for Coalition inclusion Québec, “the only purpose of Bill 21 is to take away rights from groups” ^⁠2. No, this law rather gives everyone the right to secular public services. The requirement that teachers be neutral in appearance is precisely intended to provide students with a learning environment free from religious fundamentalism, so that they can exercise their freedom of thought. This is all the more important for young people who experience religious pressures outside of school.

Before worrying about the right of teachers to wear religious symbols, could we prioritize the interests of children?

Yasmine [co-autrice de ce texte] recounts in his book Uncover^⁠3, his tragic childhood in an Islamist family in British Columbia. Among other misfortunes, Yasmine is enrolled in an illegal Muslim school, forced to wear the veil from an early age, then the niqab. She was beaten from the age of 6 for difficulty in memorizing verses from the Koran, or on other occasions for matters of honor. But what is most incomprehensible is the lack of listening and protection on the part of the institutions of the province. Having filed a complaint against her parents for abuse, a judge sends her back to her family after ruling that the use of violence is normal in Muslim culture!

Which culture do we want to promote?

When Perri Ravon, lawyer for the English-Montreal School Board (EMSB), and Julius Grey, representing the Quebec Community Groups Networks, argue that secularism would be contrary to “minority culture” ^⁠4, what culture is it exactly? What about the culture of the thousands of Iranian women who march bareheaded through the streets of Tehran and Montreal, risking their lives, to denounce the application of Islamic laws?

The EMSB lawyer explains in her argument that the English school boards experienced Bill 21 as an affront to their identity and their values. Would it then be a question of promoting the culture of the EMSB? By presenting it as “the culture of the minority”, is the English Montreal School Board conceiving only one culture in its own image?

To confuse “minority culture” with religious fundamentalism is an affront to citizens from elsewhere who ask only to enjoy the same freedoms as everyone else, and secular public services for their children.

Before inventing legal arguments contrary to common sense to defend the wearing of religious symbols by representatives of the State, it would be wiser to think about the protection of children, of all religious faiths, than the absence of secular markers. makes them vulnerable to identity confinement.

3. Yasmine Mohammed, LEVER THE VEIL or How Western progressives promote radical IslamJet Bleu editor, October 2022