Not sure what I think about this. On one hand, making citizenship conditional on physical contact with a stranger seems kind of dodgy. On the other, we’re always told we shouldn’t tolerate intolerance. On the third hand, it’s a shame @ZPG_Zealot was banned and isn’t around to give her opinion…
I saw this story recently and very briefly wondered whether it was to be believed or not. Decided it was too ridiculous to pursue whichever way it turned out. I mean honestly, neither side has much in the way of a good argument for its position.
I’d say that at the very least, it seems a bit ungrateful to be unwilling to shake a hand that one time with the representative of the nation who’s granting you their citizenship, which they are under NO obligation to do. And it’s a fundamental social convention in Germany, not Lebanon, where that guy’s from.
I’m generally of the opinion that if you’re getting citizenship somewhere else and planning to live your life there, you have an obligation to try and become that other nationality as much as is feasible. Learn the language, abide by the social norms, dress, behavior, speech, etc… It seems extremely… impolite, or maybe selfish to go get citizenship somewhere else and then continue to live your life like you did wherever you came from. I mean, if that guy wants to act Lebanese, he should have stayed in Lebanon. But if he’s going to live in Germany, he needs to learn to act German, handshakes and all.
And FWIW, Denmark has the same rule- no handshake, no citizenship.
This is a bizarro story, but I lean slightly in favor of the man here.
Suppose that it were a German custom to eat pork and drink beer as a gesture of…I dunno, “get to know you” or politeness. And Muslims objected to eating pork. Would we consider him as ridiculous?
It is a rather absurd requirement for citizenship for something that ought to be based off of test-passing and civics knowledge.
I’m not the least bit tolerant of this kind of religious nuttery. But it’s not like shaking hands is some foreign concept in Lebanon. The guy is obviously a zealot of the dumbest kind. However, it does seem like pretty shaky ground on which to deny citizenship. Especially in a time of a pandemic.
Can I put in a hypothetical as well? What if you had to give a blowjob to the person naturalizing you? How would you like that??
Spit or swallow?
The Germans don’t owe that guy squat. If he doesn’t want to toe the line, whatever line they choose, then they have every right to tell him to go pound sand.
I’d be OK with spitting. But, swallowing? That’s as bad as being forced to eat pork and drink beer, a totally reasonable hypothetical.
I was not dictating German immigration policy. Clearly they can do what they like. All I said was that neither side has the winning argument here.
The thing that’s ridiculous is supposing that this is remotely analagous.
I don’t know if I agree with the ruling, but obviously (as the ruling stated) it depends entirely on him being willing to shake hands with a man, but not a woman. In other words - it’s not the shaking hands part that’s the principal element here, it’s the misogyny. It’s a question of discerning his reason for not being willing to shake her hand.
According to the article, not shaking hands is a sign of being a fundamentalist nutter, and they’re not interested in letting them in as German citizens.
Seems reasonable to me. I have to figure there’s more to it than this article indicates, otherwise Denmark, which is widely regarded as a tolerant and reasonable place, wouldn’t have implemented the exact same policy.
I think your information may be a tad out of date there…
Let’s suppose that it wasn’t about religion or culture, but rather, that a man just happened to be intensely OCD germophobic and didn’t want to shake hands. Would that still be grounds for rejecting citizenship?
For clarification, I do think the man is nutty, it’s just that I don’t think a handshake should be a hill for the German officials to die on. They should just shrug, roll eyes, and move on.
You’d have to convince me that ‘will not shake hands’ is an effective test for preventing fundamentalist nuttery.
This isn’t even a new story. Pissing off the bureaucrat who has the power to sign off (or not!) that you are well-integrated into society and therefore eligible for citizenship is an excellent way to get your application denied in many countries, not just Germany.
Here’s some more information that I gleamed from Reddit. IF you speak German, here’s the actual judgement
It wasn’t “just” refusing a handshake, According to the judgement he also avoided clear answers to the questions how he views bodily punishment for infidelity in marriage or amputation for theft. Instead he just stated that “God is merciful” and he “doesn’t live in a country where those exist”.
To the question whether Sharia law should be introduced in Germany, he replied that the German people would have to decide whether to do that. When informed that the core parts of Sharia, family and marriage laws are subject to Sura 4,34 (Men are caretakers of women. Rightous woman are obedient" [shortened] , and thus incompatible with core principles of the German constitutional order, he avoided a clear answer by stating that “before God, men and women are equal”.
To the question how he views that according to Islamic canon the prophet Mohammed consummated marriage with a nine year old girl, he replied that “in some countries girls are more mature than, for example, in Norway”.
So the judgement wasn’t “just” for the handshake, but an overall conclusion that he held views hostile to the German free and democratic constitutional order and thus couldn’t become a citizen.
Here’s the text in the article that I’m talking about:
The Administrative Court of Baden-Württemberg (VGH) ruled that someone who rejects a handshake due to a “fundamentalist conception of culture and values” because they see women as “a danger of sexual temptation” was thereby rejecting “integration into German living conditions.”
Seems like about as good of a limbo stick as any other, if you’re concerned with keeping religious extremists out of your country.
It sure doesn’t sound like it:
AIUI, it’s like this:
- Man refuses to shake hands with an official because she’s a woman. He would have shaken hands with a man in the same position. He specifically says he promised his wife he woudln’t shake hands with a woman.
- Germany says fuck off, you can’t discriminate like that in official business.
- Man says, “Okay, fine, I won’t shake hands with men anymore either, happy now?”
- Germany says fuck off, this all started because of your sexist behavior, you can’t retroactively change your reasons.
I’m pretty okay with Germany’s decision, given the man’s stated reason for not shaking hands in the first place.