Burqas

Whether Muslims should be allowed to wear burqas in public seems to be the question of the moment. I watched the views of the panel on Question Time for a few minutes last night with a mixture of disdain and disgust. The panellists were split between those who would reintroduce sumptuary laws (does wearing a sack over your head count as sumptuous? Dumptuous perhaps) and those who would ignore the issue.

Obviously I'm against the former, but it has to be said that I do think there's an issue that shouldn't be ignored.

The problem is that there are vast numbers of people who feel threatened and alienated by people parading the streets in what amounts to a disguise. They don't like it.

I don't take any particular view on whether they are right to dislike burqas or not, but the fact is that they are not allowed to express their dislike, even in non-violent or non-agressive ways. People are banned from discriminating against the burqa-wearers. They can't turn them away from their shops and businesses, saying "I'm sorry I'm not serving you while you are wearing a disguise".  Society, in its wisdom, has decreed that these are crimes, and hate crimes to boot.

The ability to discriminate gives the host culture the ability to gently apply a cost to the wearing of burqa. You will probably still get served in the bank, but you might just have to go a bit further to find one that would rather have your money than enforce a burqa-free clientele. You might have to give up swimming because the pool won't take you. Perhaps the garage won't fix your car if you refuse to show your face.

I've blogged before about how the introduction of authoritarian laws often leads to a spiral of authoritarianism, with all sorts of unpleasant spin offs. The anti-discrimination laws are a direct affront to freedom of association and have encouraged emigrants to refuse to integrate and to develop a kind of apartheid, demanding, for example, muslim-women-only swimming sessions. When this cultural apartheid becomes resented by the host culture, politicians respond the only way they know how, with more authoritarianism - banning burqas and so on. This will no doubt be followed by bans on nuns' habits, no doubt in the interests of even-handedness, but just adding to the downward spiral of resentment.

But won't this lead to signs outside guest houses saying "No moslems" or "No burqas"? Possibly it will, and that would be ugly for sure. But the current approach is ugly too and the result, a downward spiral of apartheid and authoritarianism is vile in the extreme. Better to have an ugly approach with a happy ending than more and more ugliness.

Politicians' responses to the problem will lead only to resentment from Moslems banned from wearing burqas (there are apparently some who do so willingly) or from the host culture, forced to accept and deal with people with whom they want no dealings. Politicians can't solve this problem. They can only stand back and allow society to solve it on its own.

Shooting starts in Gaza again

Story here.

Annual changing of the MCB mind

Every year it seems the Moslem Council of Britain changes its collective mind on whether to attend  Holocaust Memorial Day. This year they are not going to attend.

Cue rumpus.

This will just make them look like extremists again.

No-go areas for non-Muslims, and West Midlands police.

I had an interesting debate with Sunny Hundal of Liberal Conspiracy the other day over whether the Bishop of Rochester is a bigot or not.

Sunny took the position that, because Bishop Nazir-Ali had condemned the creation of no-go areas for non-Muslims, but had failed to identify one, he (the Bishop) was a bigot. I found this a bit of a stretch, and pointed Sunny to a report by a former race relations adviser in Bradford which seemed to be saying that such areas did in fact exist.

By strange coincidence today's Telegraph carries a report about two Christian preachers being threatened by police under hate crimes legislation for proselytising in a Muslim area.

The evangelists say they were threatened with arrest for committing a "hate crime" and were told they risked being beaten up if they returned.

Now obviously, this is police doing the enforcing, but, if true, it represents further support for the Bishop's claims.

The outraged among us will notice that this is a further faux pas by West Midlands police, the same force who reported Channel Four to the regulators for making a programme about Islamic extremism. This force looks like it is out of control.

Update:
It may well have been the same officer, Anil Patani, deputy chief constable (security and cohesion), who was responsible for both of these crimes against civil liberties.

Update:
Anil Patani seems to have a colourful past, having sued the police twice - once for overlooking him for promotion and once for promoting him too quickly! Methinks it will be overfast promotion again, the next time round. (See the comments at this link) 

The Arab spring (again)

Abe Greenwald sees signs of liberalism breaking out in many Arab states.

It seems a bit early to draw firm conclusions but there do seem to be some encouraging signs.

Very amusing

If you need cheering up after the last posting, see this at Guido's.

Send an email to the Taliban

If email correspondence with nutters is your thing, this post at the Jawa report has the contact details for the Taliban.

Nearly a good story

Israeli physicist Nir Shaviv wonders if Ramadan's requirement to fast during the hours of daylight would prevent moslems from surviving a polar summer.

This interesting conundrum is rather spoilt by a commenter who points out that the requirement is waived if it would affect the health of the faster. 

Disguises

The Pub Philosopher notes that new guidelines will permit moslem women to appear in court in disguise.

Update:

A little research throws up this judgement from the Court of Appeal, wherein we note that, in the UK, there is no right to confront ones accusers face to face. This is true both under national law and under the European Convention on Human Rights. Under the ECHR, however, the accused has the right

to obtain the attendance and examination of witnesses on his behalf under the same conditions as witnesses against him.

This appears to mean that all defence witnesses could appear in disguise too. While this would even up the playing field, I'm not sure that having all the lawyers and witnesses wearing tatty sacks over their heads is going to add a great deal either to the dignity or the efficacy of the trial.