- cross-posted to:
- canada@lemmy.ca
- cross-posted to:
- canada@lemmy.ca
You must log in or register to comment.
I agree that everything else on the list was shit, but Quebec… banning religious symbols for public sector workers honestly sounds like a good idea to me as long as it’s fairly applied. If they use it to disproportionately target muslims or something and allow Christian shit, then yea I’d agree it’s bad - but a blanket ban on religion while you’re representing the government sounds great to me.
Any government banning any tax break for religion gets my vote forever.
It unfairly targets religious headdresses.
That is not unfair.
You work for the government, you can’t show religious involvement, any at all. Separation of church and state as such. If your religion doesn’t allow you to be without religious clothes or artefacts then maybe you shouldn’t work for the government.
Can I ask why?
I’ve heard some people argue it’s because religious views can conflict with a job, but if that’s the case, the issue is the employee’s not doing their job not their religion. Lots of beliefs can conflict with a job, and if that’s the case, a person has to decide whether they want to keep their job or not.
Another argument is that simply the presentation of religious symbols in public is offensive to some, but that seems to be an extreme version of “Safe Spaces” while just skipping over tonnes of preceding steps.
Also, it seems convenient the whiter the religion, the less likely their are to require their worshipers to wear expressions of faith. On the other hand, religions like Islam and Sikhism that just happen to be practiced by more brown people require outward expressions of their faith. So a Christian who is super faithful, goes to mass daily and spends all their free time in prayer can work for the government as long as they keep their cross under their shirt, while a Sikh who might not be all that religious has to decide if they want to risk being shunned from their community.
P.S. Separation of church and state means those organizations shouldn’t influence each other, not that individuals can only be involved in one or the other.
Because frankly, religions are made up nonsense. I stopped believing in Santa Claus with I was 8 or so. Why are there still adults believing in magical sky beings? More importantly, why do we all act as if this is normal, actually still the norm, and all agree that it’s something untouchable even when it’s clearly evil and not for the betterment of humanity?
Seriously, if you think about it for even a second, it makes no sense. What does make sense is that religions are widely and pretty much exclusively used by those in charge to control those that follow the religion.
The church of the flying spaghetti monster (FSM) exists for a reason: It shows how easy it is to make up some nonsense and fly with it. You want to allow religious clothes? Then you have to allow me to wear a spaghetti strainer on my head as it’s the official wear for followers of FSM.
What, you don’t allow it because FMA is made up nonsense? Well, I got bad news for you… Christianity is also made up, same as Islam, same as Scientology, same as Hinduism, same as all religions. If you start looking at religions you can see how one influences the next, and so on… The stories of Jesus and Horus are really very similar.
Simple fact: there is exactly zero scientific evidence that any supernatural person or entity exists, there is tonnes of evidence that we have all made it up, and continue to believe in it for… Reasons?
And yes, religion always exerts its influence. Merely displaying religious wear is to show what you think and want. Do you think I’d be able to have a free discussion about human rights for women with a government official wearing a burka?
So with all that in mind, do I have to sit and look at your religious wear because you somehow failed to grow up? How far should we let that go? I’ve seen multiple arguments that Muslim women should be allowed to wear burkas. Are you going to sit at a government office in front of somebody you can’t even see because she is 100% covered, even the eyes? Should we allow it a step further, allow that in class rooms (yes, I’ve seen cases for that too)? How about then the next step where they will demand that they can only interact with women because their god demands it?
You might think that these are edge cases but that is what’s att he core of this issue. If you allow one, you HAVE to allow all. I say: allow none. If you wan tto work for the government, if you want to work at a school, you wear and express no religion, period. It’s the easy and fair solution. Again, if your religion doesn’t allow you, that’s on your religion, not your government.
And if you allow your fantasy wear, then you have to allow mine too, or start defining what religion is real and what not and I would LOVE to see that debate…
Oh man, reading your comment just gave me 90s vibes. That was the peak when atheism was quite controversial. Nowadays, it is a bit weird if someone does practice a religion. Religious beliefs are not an innate trait, but a choice, at least in the West. We should be actively discouraging people from being religious in the same way we discourage misogyny, racism, etc. I’m very uncomfortable with some of the comments in this thread that suggest that discouraging the wearing of religious symbols is some form of crypto-racism. Religion is a completely different category and we need to be able to criticize it harshly and relentlessly without the suggestion that it is a type of racism.
Just because you’re wearing a turban or hijab for your religion doesn’t mean you can’t work a government job.
Exactly.
You just have to take it off.
If you don’t, you’ll also have to allow full burkhas, and sorry, not sorry, that is so far over the line that the line becomes a dot.
If you’re stuck in believing faerytales, that’s fine, to each their own poison, but you don’t get to display it in government positions. Or school positions, for that matter.
Given the Quebec flag is covered in Christian symbols and still flies at government buildings, no it’s not being applied fairly.
The fleur de lys is religious?
In addition to what @Openopenopenopen@lemmy.world said, if you look at the fleurs-de-lis wikipedia article, there’s a whole section titled “Religion and art”.
There is an argument that, “The Fleurdelisé is more cultural than religious,” but separating those two is extremely difficult. IMHO, it’s pretty ethnocentric to think symbols like that have become so ingrained in our culture that they are no longer religious, while assuming symbols like hijab are purely religious.
