These Secular Days

[tcpip]

I have dived into several secular related projects in the past several days. The first was speaking at the Sunday Assembly, a friendly godless congregation of people who like "church activities" but without a diety. My presentation ws Everyone Should Be Secular which, of course, is a rhetorical statement because everyone is secular. The issue is whether they are a secularist or support secularism - which is carefully distinguished from atheism, which many assume.

A practical example of how state atheism, effectively a type of theocracy, differs from liberal secularism, is the issue of the recent (failed) ban of the burkini in France. A debate with a former union leader (whom I discovered is perhaps not so good at cognitive flexibility) led to my writing an article for the Isocracy Network, Burkinis, Bigotry, and Beyond, which has received a very good response on Facebook and has been crossposted on the LJ community talk_politics.

"Let's be blunt about it. If you support the burkini ban, you're not a feminist or a secularist, you're a misogynistic bigot."

Tuesday was also the AGM of the University of Melbourne Secular Society. As a staff member, I am extremely sensitive of my degree of involvement in the club and try not too heavily involved, whilst at the same time wanting to assist and encourage, because they really are doing a valuable job. On being asked by the president I took on the heady role of returning officer, and that really is as far as I'm prepared to go.

Following on from this, I've arranged a meeting of the Victorian Secular Lobby has a meeting at Parliament on September 13th with Harriet Sing, MLC on The Future of the Safe Schools Programme (FB event). On September 17th, I've organised a meeting of the Isocracy Network on Paths to Marriage Equality (FB event) with speakers from Equal Love. This Sunday I'm speaking at the Melbourne Unitarian Church on Changing Definitions of 'Marriage' : Past, Present, and Future. Are we detecting a theme yet?

Comments

[helvetica]

You have written a really excellent article on the burkini. I enjoyed reading it a lot, thank you for sharing. This especially rang out to me :

The Minister continues "It is not just the business of those women who wear it, because it is the symbol of a political project that is hostile to diversity and women's emancipation"

What a ridiculous thing to say that what a woman wears is not her business. As a woman, I am outraged. As a human being I am so disappointed!

[tcpip]

It is just bizarre, indeed infuriating, to think that the Minister for Women's Rights would come out at say such a thing. But this is what happens when you concentrate your politics on something might mean, rather than what it is.

[heartonsnow]

This is a subject where I usually jump in at the deep end, but I have been more cautious since I began to study PPE.

It is a bit of a minefield and makes my head spin. In supporting Muslim women to choose what to wear, one can also be supporting oppression, as it may not be personal choice........................

In the UK this issue is further confused by the fact that we do not have a large Muslim population and those that cover their bodies are a very small minority of a small minority so the press really do make a mountain out of a molehill. This causes social division where there was none.

[tcpip]

> In supporting Muslim women to choose what to wear, one can also be supporting oppression, as it may not be personal choice.<

Indeed, which is why I address the need for support services for people who step outside cultural or religious expectations and pressures from their peers. But legislation when prevents choice really is oppression, as opposed to the possibility of oppression.

[heartonsnow]

Peer pressure is bad enough let alone state oppression!

[zenicurean.livejournal.com]

It's fascinating to me that prime minister Valls has defended the burkini bans despite the Conseil d'État ruling them illegal. It's a sad commentary on the French political climate that even Socialists feel the need to wade into this bog for their votes.

effectively a type of theocracy

Huh. How do you define theocracy in this particular context?

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Rule of law defined by a metaphysical principles. Essentially the ban is saying because the burkini represents a symbol of Islamic oppression of women, then we'll ban the symbol. Hence I raise the question of what does it mean when an atheist man wears one?

[zenicurean.livejournal.com]

Hm. I think I'd employ different phraseology. Then again, it doesn't really matter -- I think we're broadly on the same page about both the substance of what's going on and about why the burkini bans are a bad idea. (It would appear that Nice has finally been compelled to suspend its ban.)

[drcuriosity]

An interesting thought occurred to me this evening: in New Zealand, the last major terrorist act that occurred here was perpetrated by French people in wetsuits.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

If they were Australian designed wetsuits we have a 100% correlation!