Having read about the Our Lady of the Angels fire, in that case, the nuns and their students were TRAPPED in said rooms, and unable to escape. They couldn’t DO anything else, and to keep the children from panicking, they tried to lead them in prayer. Some children tried jumping from windows, and were severely injured-and even then not everyone in those rooms survived. There was the case of two survivors who ended up meeting in the hospital after the fire, and they eventually started dating and were married. To this day, I believe, the woman is still disabled as a result of her injuries when she jumped out the window.
Look, it’s one thing to say it reminds you of it, but the nuns didn’t tell the children to pray rather than escape, as you made it sound. They told them to pray because they were trapped and frightened. That actually sounds like a good idea-keep them calm, rather than freaking out.
Now, as for the OP, this woman is a grade-A moron. Especially since you’re teaching young kids-they’re going to need to be able to read facial expressions, and see you clearly. I would have a hard time trusting someone if I couldn’t read her face.
And some very little kids might even be frightened.
Like jjimm, I’ve seen and heard this woman being interviewed and I agree she is full of shit. Whan challenged about the Q’ran and its lack of veil-related teachings she replied that was not the correct interpretation. The problem here is that no non-Muslim can effectively question the Q’ran and the way different Muslims understand it, or choose to interpret it. Also, consider this:
I don’t know how many Muslim women live in the UK, and how many of those wear the veil. However, a percentage of veil-wearers, however small, will be engaged in criminal activity of one kind or another. If criminals are going around wearing veils the chances of identifying them are less than good.
I do not suggest that the streets of the UK are plagued by women in veils mugging passers-by and robbing banks. Or worse. But the fact remains that the features of a veil wearer cannot be captured on CCTV and cannot be described by witnesses in the same way that those of a non veil wearer can.
I do not suggest either that legislation should be implemented to ban the veil. At this stage in the culture clash the consequences would be unthinkable. Yet while the current situation exists there is a section of the population of the UK, however small, who can conduct illicit activities with more impunity than others.
I have to agree with the Eleanor. It was clearly implied in your statement
"MilTan --that is just sick. And it reminds me of that famous fire in Chicago-in a Catholic school-**where the nuns just told the kids to stay at their desks and pray.
**
Gee, at least with the nuns, both genders died. "
(emphasis mine) that thes enuns in a similar fashion to the Saudi police. The use of “just told the kids to stay at their desks and pray” makes a bold assertion that the nuns chose to use religion instead of saving lives. It was disingenuous at best. For the sake of logical, reasonable and truthful arguing, please retract the statement. I understand if you may not have known all the details, it happens to us all.
Well, maybe because somebody with sideburns is still identifiable, someone with a veil isn’t.
Here in the Netherlands we have a little thing called the identification obligation, everybody is required to supply police officers with a valid identification.
How on earth can they check to see if you are the same person if you wear a veil, or worse a Burkha?
This has nothing to do with religious discrimination, no matter how much you want it to.
Oh, and since this is the pit, you PC-loving piece of meat !!
Thank you, Lissa and Guin…I was too tired last night to articulate myself as well as you guys did. I also think it would be a good idea for eleanor to retract her statement, for the reasons you say, as well as for the sake of those poor nuns, who I really do not think deserve to be have blamed (even implied) for what happened, as they did the best they could under tragic circumstances.
Maybe you didn’t read the post I was responding to (and I don’t blame you, given its quality), but it was very precisely making this an issue of cultural integration, and trying to make out that the issue at hand was not merely this woman’s ability to do her job properly, but the alleged intransigence of an entire fallaciously-lumped-together group.
And maybe you didn’t read the rest of my post (shameful, given its quality), but you will notice that I specifically made the exact point you repeated at me, i.e. that this is a question of practicality, not culture or religion. I am not the one who decided to make this into a question of religious generalities, and I was very specifically arguing against such a move.
I made my comment re reading for comprehension general because you were the second poster to attriubte inferences to my posts in this thread that were not intended.
I wasn’t really (when I posted) looking at each story for particulars or analogies. “that Catholic school fire” popped into my head and I posted about it-thinking only of it being kids who died and it being tied to religion. So, I apologize for not researching more, but I stand by what I said. I used the word, “remind”-not “this is just like”, not “see where other religions do horrible things in the name of faith”. I read MilTan’s link about the Muslim girls and it reminded me of the Angels story. You can see how much I remembered of the Angels tragedy-I couldn’t even remember the name of the school.
Have you never had a conversation where an issue is brought up and a member of the group says, hey-that reminds me of X? And people say, yes, it does. And then someone else says, wait a minute, X wasn’t like that because of Y, and the first person says, well, I meant in terms of surface details, like kids/religion/fire. That’s all it was. Yes, if i had thought more about it, I would have seen the differences-in that, Sarafeena you are absolutely correct.
But I don’t see why I should apologize for an opinion or retract a post in the Pit that offends someone or is factually incorrect(?) Is this what is done now? I have said I was wrong-I dont’ see the need to go further. I don’t agree that Sarafeena’s comprehended me “perfectly”. So, we disagree.
Sorry, OP, for the hijack.
If it’s stupid, why are these women doing it, assuming they are as smart as you?
So you don’t think it would be better if they didn’t veil now?
No, you’re just someone who thinks that her good intentions count. As usual, you want to have an opinion but not be held responsible for it. You want to make statements which you disclaim as being inflammatory, then get your panties in a twist when somebody challenges you.
So? If she chooses to live that way, it’s her confinement to deal with. Many women live under oppressive regimes they do not choose, and I’m not talking about them. The subject of this thread is someone who wears it voluntarily, and I assume all your comments about “stupid” are directed at women who choose to live in this way.
You can’t have it both ways, eleanor. You don’t like that some women choose to live in a way that makes them unequal to men in your eyes. You say you don’t think they should have to stop; in eleanorland saying something is stupid isn’t the same as saying it should stop, apparently. You think it’s stupid, impractical, and so on. Yet you say you don’t think they’re stupid or brainwashed. So, why are they choosing it?
Maybe the problem is not with the readers of your post, then…maybe the problem is that you are not making your intended point clear. I only mention this because at least 4 people misunderstood what you were apparently trying to say about the Our Lady of Angels fire, and it seems that someone else misconstrued something else you were trying to say.
I think that, as Lissa points out, a strong case could be made that you were drawing a comparison to the REASON the children were kept inside. Mentioning the fact that they were nuns, and told the children to pray, certainly implies that religion had something to do with the nuns’ actions.
Yes, I have had conversations like that, but in normal conversation, one would have the chance to say, “well, that is really not the same situation, because…”, and then have the person tell me that this is not what they meant. See, just like what actually happened in this thread!
Please understand, I am not asking you to apologize to me for offending me (you didn’t)…I am asking you to retract it on behalf of the nuns, who I felt were somewhat slandered with your off-the-cuff remark. They were real people, who I believe also lost their lives in that tragic fire. But of course, this is the Pit, and I guess they are as open to criticism as anyone. (I’m not sure if factual incorrectness without retraction is a Pit feature…I have not noticed this before, but maybe I am missing something.)
As far as comprehending you goes, I comprehended what you said in your post. I did not comprehend what you left out of your post, as I am not a mind reader.
Do you adhere to your social and/or religious customs just because you want to get along? I’m sure this is true of some people, but it’s true across the board, not just with Muslim women. How is it not an insult to their intelligence or willpower to suggest that they simply can’t be choosing this life for the same reasons you have chosen yours? Their cultural backgrounds may influence them, but again, the same is true of anyone else.
I want to be clear: I think that perhaps a valid argument can be made against veiling. However, it simply can’t be made how eleanor wants it made. She wants to call people’s decisions stupid and imply that they couldn’t have been freely made, then turn around and say she has nothing but respect for their ability to make the decision. If you think Muslim women are essentially being brainwashed into their faith, then say that and defend your position. This “Oh, no, they’re just as smart and in control of themselves as I am, they just do this irrational thing which limits them for kicks and I think that’s dumb” bullshit is an example of either intellectual dishonesty or an extremely unclear mind at work.
I spent a lot of time in the lower east side of manhattan growing up so I ran into a lot of hasidic Jews and they can pat little girls on the head like anyone else but they would never take money from my mom, she would have to drop it on the counter and they would leave the reciept on the counter. We just got used to it. I imiagine that if I grew up where women all wore veils, veils wouldn’t seem wierd to me either.
So you believe that your own choices are stupid? Remember, this exchange began because you were defending eleanor’s position that veiling is stupid but Muslim women do it for some reason other than 1. their own free will, 2. someone else’s will, or 3. stupidity. She insists it is none of those reasons, and so do you, apparently.
Now you’re saying that your own choices are made under the same rubrick: not because you actually want to make them, or because someone else is making you make them, or because you’re stupid, but because that’s what everyone else does. Why the hell would you defend doing something stupid because everyone does it? If you honestly believe that your choices are entirely based in wanting to get along, are you not interested in…changing that and getting an opinion of your own?
Come on. Unless you don’t actually believe in free will, I’m not buying that this is coming from a well-thought out position of yours.
I don’t agree that Sarafeena’s comprehended me “perfectly”. So, we disagree.