Quebec Separatists Challenge Canadian Tolerance with Proposed Islamic-Headscarf Ban

It is a common self-deprecating joke of Canadians that their country had the opportunity to enjoy French cuisine, American industry, and British traditions, but unfortunately got stuck with American traditions, French industry, and British cuisine.  Like many such jokes, there’s some truth to it.  But now at least one corner of Canada is amending that list by indulging in a particularly French form of religious bigotry as well.  On September 10th, timed for the eve of the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, lawmakers from Quebec’s ruling separatist party, the Parti Québécois (P.Q.), announced a push for a law banning Islamic religious garb—following a trend in many parts of Europe, most notoriously France.

Quebec

The proposed law, as part of the party’s so-called “Charter of Quebec Values,” would forbid any specifically religious clothing to be worn by public servants while on the job.  (Elected officials would be exempt.)  Religious symbols that could no longer be worn include Muslim headscarves, Sikh turbans, Jewish yarmulkes, and “large” Christian crucifixes.  (How large is not defined—Jews do not seem to be able to sneak past the law with really really small yarmulkes—but this follows the language in similar French legislation.)  Though the law has no chance of passing, the proposal offers a taste of what kind of place Quebec would be to live in if it ever really separated from Canada.

Nor is it only Muslims who would be affected ...

Similar legislation is already in play in France, where, as in the rest of Europe, there are fewer constitutional protections of free expression than in Canada (where such a law, if passed, will surely be knocked down the first time it is tested in court).  Though it is ostensibly neutral—it pertains to all such religious symbols—everyone understands that such policies are designed to target Muslims.  Before 2001 and the cresting of anti-Muslim prejudice, no one was seriously worried about the disruptive societal effects of wearing large crosses (which few French do anyway); nor was there any kind of a widespread panic over nuns’ habits.  Last year, the French president at the time, Nicolas Sarkozy—who rose to power on a campaign promise to “powerhose the scum out of the ghettoes”—suddenly decided in the 2012 election season (as reported in this blog at the time) that it was necessary to crack down on animal cruelty among halal butchers (halal being the Islamic equivalent of Jewish kosher dietary rules).  Sarkozy was even such an animal sentimentalist that he took time away from his busy schedule of authorizing baton-swinging police raids on Gypsy encampments to tour halal butcheries and tut-tut over the nastiness of it all.  He did everything but pose for the camera with a quivering lamb in his arms and whisper in its ear that he would protect it from the big bad mullahs.  Everyone, of course, understood that he was playing to the Marine Le Pen vote, not the Brigitte Bardot one.  (He lost, thankfully.)

Nicolas Sarkozy, born-again animal-rights champion

The P.Q. is doing the same thing.  Such laws will never pass Canadian constitutional muster—and the P.Q. does not have enough of a majority in the provincial assembly to push through laws on its own—but the separatist party’s leader, Pauline Marois, is pandering to ignorant xenophobes and preying on fears of terrorism to revive sagging poll numbers in the face of apathy on the question of secession from Canada, the party’s raison d’être.  (See an earlier article from this blog on language politics in Quebec.)

As one might expect, civil-rights groups and Muslim organizations in Quebec are up in arms.  Jewish groups are not happy either.  (Jews and Muslims each make up between 1% and 2% of the population of Quebec, which is about 84% Roman Catholic and about 6% non-religious.)

Pauline Marois looks down her nose at minorities.

Earlier this year, Marois backed a rule barring Sikhs from wearing turbans while playing soccer, on so-called safety grounds.  The International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) promptly struck down the rule—not the only time that Québécois cultural chauvinism has run afoul of more tolerant international bodies.  (Sikhs, though numerous on Canada’s on West Coast, barely register demographically in Quebec, numbering only about 8,000.)  Marois’s government has also been accused of intentionally scheduling 2016 elections to coincide with Rosh Hashanah, and thus suppress Montreal’s mostly anti-separatist Jewish vote.

Proudly Sikh, proudly Québécois, proudly Canadian—something Pauline Marois can’t get her head around

Opposition parties have reacted angrily to the P.Q.’s moves.  Thomas Mulcair, leader of the New Democratic Party (N.D.P.), said, “We’re categorical in rejecting this,” adding that such discrimination is “intolerable in our society.”  But this is part of the plan.  The P.Q.’s narrow-minded electoral base already scorns Anglophone liberals as contemptibly tolerant of minorities.

Within the separatist camp, there has been discord over the P.Q. proposal.  One federal Bloc Québécois member of parliament, Maria Mourani, spoke out strongly against the religious-garb ban.  But within days she was ejected from her party because of so-called irreconcilable ideological differences with the party line.  Mourani, a Lebanese-Canadian born in Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), who has in the past been outspoken on such issues as Tibet (as reported in this blog), will now sit as an independent.

Maria Mourani (left), excommunicated for her tolerance

But how much of a danger to society, and to the ruling party, are Muslims really?  Ironically, at her victory rally after winning office almost exactly a year ago, Marois survived a probable assassination attempt (as reported at the time in this blog) when a gun-toting lunatic was arrested after killing one person and wounding another; police think he may have been gunning for Marois next.  Who was this killer?  Was he an immigrant jihadist?  A turban-wearing Sikh terrorist?  Nope—the gunman, Richard Henry Bain, an Anglophone fishing-lodge owner from northern Quebec, is a born-again Christian who (as reported here) told media after his arrest, “I’m a Christian soldier, and we will never surrender to fight the evil separatists.  I fight for freedom, democracy, justice, and to speak one’s mother tongue.”  He said Jesus Christ had told him to embark on his shooting spree.  Gee, and he wasn’t even wearing a “large crucifix” to warn people that he was a nut.  You just never can tell who the problem people will be, can you?

Richard Henry Bain, who murders for Jesus (not covered by pending legislation)

[For those who are wondering, yes, this blog is tied in with my forthcoming book, a sort of encyclopedic atlas to be published by Auslander and Fox under the title Let’s Split! A Complete Guide to Separatist Movements, Independence Struggles, Breakaway Republics, Rebel Provinces, Pseudostates, Puppet States, Tribal Fiefdoms, Micronations, and Do-It-Yourself Countries, from Chiapas to Chechnya and Tibet to Texas.  The book, which contains dozens of maps and over 500 flags, is now in the layout phase and should be on shelves, and available on Amazon, by early fall 2014.  I will be keeping readers posted of further publication news.  Meanwhile, please “like” the book (even though you haven’t read it yet) on Facebook.]

The Islamic Republic of Belgium?

Belgian Muslim women protesting a head-scarf ban

If you thought the ascendancy of Flemish secessionists in Antwerp’s municipal election on October 14th (reported at the time in this blog) was a worrying challenge to Belgium’s identity, you may be even more alarmed by the statements being made by two Belgian Muslims who won local town-council seats in Brussels.

Redouane Ahrouch (left) and Lhoucine Aït Jeddig (right)

The two, Lhoucine Aït Jeddig and Redouane Ahrouch, now hold seats representing districts in Brussels, Belgium’s cosmopolitan, multicultural capital, and say that they seek, in the long run, to establish a Belgian Islamic state ruled by shari’a (Islamic law).  Members of the tiny Islam Party, the two told a press conference on October 25th, “Islam is compatible with the laws of the Belgian people.  As elected Muslims, we embrace the Qur’an.  We consider Islam a universal religion.”  They pointed out that Islamic culture made European civilization possible (an arguable point, since Europe was lifted out of the Dark Ages partly by returning Crusaders importing products of Arab civilization such as mathematics, chemistry, astronomy, and the university system), and they say their short-term goals are limited to bringing halal meals to cafeterias, recognizing Muslim holidays, and allowing the hijab to be worn in public.

Map showing density of Muslim population in different European countries.
If Catalonia were independent, it would be colored dark green, like France and Belgium.

Wait a minute—yes, American readers, you read correctly: Belgium has laws dictating which religious clothing people are allowed to wear?  Yeeup: as in other “civilized” countries, such as the Netherlands, Germany, France, Switzerland, etc., Belgium has laws restricting all sorts of peaceful forms of religious expression, dictating how religious minorities are allowed to dress or what their houses of worship are allowed to look like.  If Catholic-dominated governments in Europe imposed restrictions like that on Protestants or vice versa, there would be civil war.  But anti-Muslim legislation is socially acceptable in modern Europe.  And Islamophobia is largely responsible for radical fascist political movements like France’s National Front surging into mainstream politics for the first time since the Second World War.  (Some of that has been discussed in this blog, such as new legal restrictions on infant circumcision in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria—an initiative which also tucks anti-Semitist agendas inside a more-acceptable Islamophobia.)  It is mainly because of the National Front, for example, that France’s former president, Nicolas Sarkozy, was elected on campaign promises to “powerhose the scum out of the ghettoes”—and why he led an intolerant campaign against halal butcheries (halal is the Muslim equivalent of Jewish kosher dietary rules) when his popularity faltered earlier this year (as discussed in this blog at the time).  Maybe, after all, Europe is still in need of a bit of enlightenment from the Muslim world.  One wonders how western Europeans that favor such persecution of religious minorities think themselves superior to societies where, say, people are required to dress modestly, rather than, as in much of Europe, being forbidden to.  (And, mind you, European laws, like laws everywhere, also require women, and men, to dress modestly; they just define that differently.)

Members of the far-right Flemish-separatist political party Vlaams Belang holding an anti-Mulsim rally

Let’s not take these points too far, though: Ahrouch’s other envisioned improvements to Belgian society have included executions, child marriage, restrictions on divorce, and the segregation of the sexes in all public places.  Medieval Arabs may have (by being invaded) delivered some forms of civilization to Europe, but some (not all) Muslim immigrants in Europe are bringing poisonous ideas and customs with them.  (Do I need to mention female circumcision?)

A Belgian cartoonist’s paranoid view of history.
(By the way, shouldn’t it show an American kicking the Nazi out of Belgium?)

Brussels’ two new councilmen have not a shred of hope of introducing any aspects of shari’a in Belgium, a country which has, you know, a constitution and stuff like that.  Muslims—most of them with ancestry in Morocco, Algeria, or Turkey—make up 30-35% of Brussels’ population, but only 6-9% of Belgium as a whole.

Maybe, however, their illiberal proposals can provoke a discussion that will bring both cultures toward a more moderate middle ground.

Probably not, actually, but it’s a nice thought.

[For those who are wondering, yes, this blog is tied in with my forthcoming book, a sort of encyclopedic atlas to be published by Litwin Books under the title Let’s Split! A Complete Guide to Separatist Movements and Aspirant Nations, from Abkhazia to Zanzibar.  (That is shorter than the previous working title.)  The book, which contains 46 maps and 554 flags (or, more accurately, 554 flag images), will be on shelves and available on Amazon on March 1, 2015.  I will be keeping readers posted of further publication news.  Meanwhile, please “like” the book (even though you haven’t read it yet) on Facebook and see this special announcement for more information on the book.]

Toulouse Shooting Spree Deepens France’s Divisions

The shooting spree at a Jewish school in Toulouse, France, this week and then the revelation that the gunman, who was eventually killed in a police stand-off, was a Muslim named Mohammed Merah came as terrible news to nearly everyone.  To Jews in France and worldwide, the confirmation of the suspicions that the killings of three children and a rabbi were motivated by radical Islam and anti-Semitism must have been sickening.  To Muslims in France, the news meant that soon there would probably be a backlash against France’s Muslim minority, already the targets of widespread prejudice.  For anyone in France, of any heritage, that values peace, tolerance, pluralism, and understanding between religious and cultural groups, this was a tragedy afflicting not only the families of the victims but the society as a whole.  But there was one group in France that had reason to celebrate the news that these heinous acts could be put under the heading of “Islamic terrorism”: the campaign team working to re-elect Nicolas Sarkozy in next week’s presidential elections.

Location of Toulouse, France

For months, Sarkozy had been polling badly against his Socialist oppenent, François Hollande.  Then, earlier this month, he decided to take a different tack.  Hollande was capturing the center, so the only place Sarkozy had to go to find new votes was on the far right.  He began engaging in angry, anti-immigrant, nationalistic rhetoric that is traditionally the trademark of the anti-Semitic, racist, neo-fascist National Front party.  For Sarkozy, who sailed to the presidency in 2007 on a campaign promise to “power-hose the scum out of the ghettoes,” this strategy was quite congenial to him.  First, he threatened to withdraw France from the European Union’s passport-free zone if Italy did not shut the door more firmly on refugees from Libya, Syria, and elsewhere amid the ongoing Arab Spring revolutions.  Next (as reported on in this blog last week), Sarkozy whipped up anti-Muslim feeling with a shamefully disingenuous concocted scandal over French butchers selling halal meat to non-Muslims.  (Halal is the Muslim equivalent of kosher and requires ritual slaughter of animals that sometimes includes procedures otherwise criminalized as inhumane.  Some butchers in France slaughter all their animals according to halal rules to save the costs of two separate production lines.)  Ah, yes, Sarkozy the long-time animal-rights advocate.  Anyway, it all worked.  Sarkozy’s poll numbers spiked, even exceeding Hollande’s in some surveys.

Nicolas Sarkozy, born-again animal-rights champion

When the Toulouse shootings occurred on March 19th, it must have been a nervous moment for Sarkozy’s reelection campaign.  Would the killer turn out to be some ethnically-French National Front wacko out to kill Jewish children?  Would it be someone who, once caught, would spout hysterical, anti-minority, jingoistic phrases lifted from Sarkozy’s speeches?  No, it was a Muslim.  Whew.

Nicolas Sarkozy

We still know little about Merah.  Raised in France by a single mother from Algeria, he turned to petty crime in his teens, then was exposed to Islamist extremism in prison (as if any more demonstration were needed that disproportionately heavy sentences imposed on Muslim youth in France actually feed terrorism).  Suspicious-looking trips to Pakistan and Afghanistan put him on the United States’ “no fly” list and made him a target of official French surveillance as well.  He bragged of links to al-Qaeda, which may or may not have been just bluster since, if nothing else, he was clearly deeply mentally disturbed.  In any case, the horrors of the shootings (Merah had also killed three French soldiers of Algerian extraction) fit neatly into the prevailing narrative of Sarkozy’s campaign, and increasingly of center-right politics in Europe more generally.  I guarantee the next polls will show Sarkozy ahead.  And he may just win.

Mohammed Merah

At least one European politician tried to change the narrative, but in a regrettably ham-fisted way, and the resulting controversy just adds to the general air of division in European society.  On March 19th, Baroness Ashton of Upholland, an English peeress who is the E.U.’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy—i.e., in one sense, western Europe’s highest-ranking foreign-policy voice—said, “When we think of what happened in Toulouse today, when we remember what happened in Norway a year ago, when we know what is happening in Syria, when we see what is happening in Gaza and different parts of the world—we remember young people and children who lose their lives.”  At one level, those remarks can be read as an attempt to put this Muslim-on-Jewish violence in a wider, human context that transcends specific groups, by invoking Islamophobically motivated Christian-on-Christian violence (Norway), Muslim-on-Muslim violence (Syria), and Jewish-on-Muslim violence (Gaza).  However, Lady Ashton ought to have known better.  The public seized on the implicit equation between Merah’s terrorist, anti-Semitic killing spree and Israeli Defense Forces (I.D.F.) soldiers who inadvertently kill Palestinian children—though usually as a predictable collateral effect of the I.D.F.’s aggressive forays into Palestinian civilian areas (including, earlier this month, as reported in this blog, two Gaza teenagers killed by Israeli bombs aimed at Islamic Jihad assassins).

Baroness Ashton of Upholland.

How do you translate “Open mouth, insert foot” into 27 different languages?

Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s right-wing, hawkish prime minister, was quick to seize on the remarks, condemning what he saw as an equation of “intentional massacre of children and an execution-style killing of an 8-year-old with the I.D.F.’s defensive and surgical actions meant to harm terrorists who use children as human shields.”  Netanyahu was right to pick up on a disturbing undercurrent in Ashton’s remarks, whether intended or not.  Progressive political opinion in Europe (Ashton is from the United Kingdom’s Labour Party) has shifted strongly toward sympathy with Palestine in the past couple decades, and this has nudged awake some dormant anti-Semitism in western Europe and dovetailed with not-so-dormant anti-Semitism in eastern Europe.  Some European politicians, in a kind of diplomatic version of Tourette’s syndrome, just can’t stop themselves from casting every atrocity against Jews anywhere in the “context” of Israeli war crimes against Palestinians—with an unnerving “they’re asking for it” subtext.  Some, sickeningly, even do this when talking about the Holocaust.

Binyamin Netanyahu

Nonetheless, it’s a sad fact that, at a moment when the Israeli Prime Minister should be able to speak to the world as the conscience of the Jewish people on a day of tragedy, he was instead so easily maneuvered into ascending a podium to defend the killing of children.  (Still, if you have to get someone to defend the killing of children, Bibi is definitely the man for the job.  He has lots of practice.)

No one knows what the social and political repercussions of the shootings will eventually be.  The vast majority of Europeans and Middle Easterners regard the crimes as horrifying, inexplicable, and an occasion for mourning, impotent anger, and sad reflection.  But so far, of those who have grabbed the microphone to politicize this tragedy, no one looks good.  No one.

[Also, for those who are wondering, yes, this blog is tied in with a forthcoming book, a sort of encyclopedic atlas to be published by Auslander and Fox under the title Let’s Split! A Complete Guide to Separatist Movements, Independence Struggles, Breakaway Republics, Rebel Provinces, Pseudostates, Puppet States, Tribal Fiefdoms, Micronations, and Do-It-Yourself Countries, from Chiapas to Chechnya and Tibet to Texas.  Look for it in spring 2013.  I will be keeping readers posted of further publication news.]