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French police make woman remove clothing on Nice beach following burkini ban

theguardian.com

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Re: French police make woman remove clothing on Nice beach following burkini ban

#2
This kind of thing is just amazing to me as an American. I'm an atheist, but people have a fundamental right to express their personal values in their dress and practice their religion. France's bans on religious expression in the name of "secularism" are just a different kind of theocracy.

Re: French police make woman remove clothing on Nice beach following burkini ban

#5
Liberty: the ability to freely choose to self-restrict behavior.

Tyranny: restricting behavior due to fear of reprisal.

Please don't mistake one for the other.

That's why Nuns (who can choose to wear garb or nothing at all, at any time) are not equivalent to those forced to wear garb on threat of acid burns for non-compliance.

A society that does not protect those under threat of violence for trivial clothing choice violations cannot claim to love liberty, can it?

Re: French police make woman remove clothing on Nice beach following burkini ban

#6
post #2

This kind of thing is just amazing to me as an American. I'm an atheist, but people have a fundamental right to express their personal values in their dress and practice their religion. France's bans on religious expression in the name of "secularism" are just a different kind of theocracy.

What happens when the "practice of religion" results in the oppression of minority rights (often within the religion itself) or cult like behaviors? Tolerance is an important value but must we be tolerant of extreme intolerance?

Re: French police make woman remove clothing on Nice beach following burkini ban

#7

Black mark against the French. Shame on them.

Shame on who ? I'm French and by no way I support this. There is still death penalty on some US states but I'm not shaming every US citizens. There is only 15 towns concerned by this ban, that's not representative

Re: French police make woman remove clothing on Nice beach following burkini ban

#9
post #6
post #2

This kind of thing is just amazing to me as an American. I'm an atheist, but people have a fundamental right to express their personal values in their dress and practice their religion. France's bans on religious expression in the name of "secularism" are just a different kind of theocracy.

What happens when the "practice of religion" results in the oppression of minority rights (often within the religion itself) or cult like behaviors? Tolerance is an important value but must we be tolerant of extreme intolerance?

If religious practices cause actual harm to other people, that's a reasonable cause for state intervention.

But as far as I can see, this is about people who to wear a certain kind of hat or style of swimsuit. How is that conceivably an actual harm against other people?

Re: French police make woman remove clothing on Nice beach following burkini ban

#10

Liberty: the ability to freely choose to self-restrict behavior. Tyranny: restricting behavior due to fear of reprisal. Please don't mistake one for the other. That's why Nuns (who can choose to wear garb or nothing at all, at any time) are not equivalent to those forced to wear garb on threat of acid burns for non-compliance. A society that does not protect those under threat of violence for trivial clothing choice…

You're implying that the only reason women wear burkinis is the fear of acid attacks and reprisal. You can't know what motivates people to wear burkinis. But the harm there is the acid attacks and threat of reprisal, not the wearing of the burkini—even under this theory, you're bringing the power of the state to bear on the victim. When you make it a police matter, you're also invoking the threat of state violence to restrict behavior due to fear of reprisal.
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