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School uniform
Earlier this week the Court of Appeal ruled that a school discriminated unlawfully against a Muslim pupil by not allowing her to wear traditional Islamic dress.
See (http://www.childrenslegalcentre.com/Homepage.asp?NodeID=89614) for more details of the case and (http://www.muhajabah.com/images/jilbab/gallery.php?directory=.¤tPic=0) for images of the jilbab.
Now, this decision by the CA strikes me as 100% right; it is and should be unlawful to require pupils (or anyone else) to wear clothing that does not allow them to meet their religious obligations. What saddens me greatly is that the Conservative party, instead of welcoming this decision as a victory for individual liberty, is choosing to see it as an attack on the authority of head teachers to decide on school uniform policy.
There's nothing in this case preventing a head teacher from setting a uniform policy, providing it permits pupils to dress in a way consistent with their religions eg. it would be perfectly appropriate to require that a jilbab and headscarf be plain black/navy/grey/green (eg. same colour as the skirts/trousers the other pupils wear), that the socks/stockings/tights worn are an appropriate colour, that she wears plain flat black/brown shoes that cover the toes (a health & safety requirement in schools), that she wears a school blazer/jumper/cardigan over the top of her jilbab if she needs something for warmth, that she has an appropriate coat etc etc.
Perspective people, perspective.
See (http://www.childrenslegalcentre.com/Homepage.asp?NodeID=89614) for more details of the case and (http://www.muhajabah.com/images/jilbab/gallery.php?directory=.¤tPic=0) for images of the jilbab.
Now, this decision by the CA strikes me as 100% right; it is and should be unlawful to require pupils (or anyone else) to wear clothing that does not allow them to meet their religious obligations. What saddens me greatly is that the Conservative party, instead of welcoming this decision as a victory for individual liberty, is choosing to see it as an attack on the authority of head teachers to decide on school uniform policy.
There's nothing in this case preventing a head teacher from setting a uniform policy, providing it permits pupils to dress in a way consistent with their religions eg. it would be perfectly appropriate to require that a jilbab and headscarf be plain black/navy/grey/green (eg. same colour as the skirts/trousers the other pupils wear), that the socks/stockings/tights worn are an appropriate colour, that she wears plain flat black/brown shoes that cover the toes (a health & safety requirement in schools), that she wears a school blazer/jumper/cardigan over the top of her jilbab if she needs something for warmth, that she has an appropriate coat etc etc.
Perspective people, perspective.
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You wrote "setting a uniform policy, providing it permits pupils to dress in a way consistent with their religions" and the point is that the uniform policy that school had *WAS* constistent with that religion, indeed it was fully agreed with local religious leaders and included headscarf, trousers (banned for all girls in my day!) and everything else required to prove 'modesty' in the eyes of her religion.
The appeal was unheld on a close technicality that cannot be left to stand, in that they held that the *student* should have had to agree to the uniform requirement - the uniform and the policy that it should be worn by all pupils itself being acceptable. If a school (or, indeed, any firm in the country that sets a dress code for its staff) has to get the agreement of each individual pupil and member of staff then, clearly, a uniform dress code will not last long. Taken to extreme (and it would appear that this might even apply) what happens when a soldier decides they don't like green camo but want pink camo?
Yes, there is a 'religious' element to the decision - for some value of #religion - but that won't last long if you put it against human rights equivalency tests.
imho, though ...
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I tend to see religion as a very personal thing. If someone feels that her religion requires her to dress in a particular way then that desire should be respected. It's not about what other people think the requirements of that religion are, it's about what the individual concerned believes her God requires her to do.
that the *student* should have had to agree to the uniform requirement
As I understand it, when considering the young women's request to wear a jilbab, the school started from the premise that its uniform policy was there to be obeyed and failed to consider her human rights ie. her right to religious freedom. That's why the CA held the school's decision to be wrong.
or, indeed, any firm in the country that sets a dress code for its staff) has to get the agreement of each individual pupil and member of staff then, clearly, a uniform dress code will not last long.
It's actually very hard to legally introduce a dress code for employees who have previously been allowed to wear what they like -when they object to it. It is a unilateral variation of their terms of employment, so you have to issue them with new contracts. If you're really unlucky they'll all refuse to sign them and you'll be faced with trying to replace them all.
And the point is even clearer with company dress codes - the premise shouldn't be 'This is the dress code and thou shalt comply or work elsewhere', because that kind of policy could easily fall foul of domestic sex/race/(religion when it's intro'd) discrimination legislation. Imagine a policy prohibiting women from wearing trousers and requiring them to wear short skirts and high heels. An employee who argues that such a policy is not compatible with her religion should expect her employer to consider her request starting from the premise that she has a right to not be forced to dress in a manner incompatible with her religion, rather than the premise that 'this is the policy which must be obeyed'.
Taken to extreme (and it would appear that this might even apply) what happens when a soldier decides they don't like green camo but want pink camo?
The armed forces are excluded from the provisions of the HRA. And it's not about likes and dislikes; it's about religious beliefs. I accept that religious beliefs are very individual, but I don't think there's a religion on the planet that requires pink camo and bans green camo!
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The principle that what an individual believes their God requires them to do should take precedence over the rules of the society the individual lives in is a really dodgy one to defend.
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Something like 'to the extent to which conforming to your religious beliefs doesn't affect anyone else and doesn't offend the core values of the society you're living in, your right to practise your religion as you see fit should be defended even if this means that there are minor modifications to normal rules to accommodate your needs'
Yes 'core values' would need to be defined in some sensible way eg. murder, torture, non-discrimination ie. no *forcing* women to wear jilbab/hajibs if they don't want to, no forced marriages, etc. and I can't come up with a good way to define it right now - the Convention rights under the ECHR aren't really broad enough to cover lots of peculiary English values eg. common law, adversarial court system, that you can do anything you like providing the law doesn't say you can't.
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Exactly. I don't see how anyone could take offense at religious dress.
Now, if they find that people are trying to lie and claim their religion requires certain dress because they dislike school uniforms, that's another matter. But I doubt anyone could seriously do that -- a child who wants to wear flashy clothes has no way of citing religious grounds for that, I don't think.
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This is why the schoo gets to specify colour and style - I've seen a lot of very pretty jibabs and other clothing traditionally worn by Muslim women. If the school insists that wearing a jilbab is OK, so long as it's plain black and worn with a plain black headscarf there aren't going to be many girls wearing it merely to get out of wearing the other school uniform options.
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(oh, and I wasn't sure how to request to be on your filters... I took your poll, but I'm not sure if that's how you mean for people to do it.)
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I'd have thought wearing a headscarf, long sleeved blouse, (tie if necessary) and trousers would constitute suitably modest dress, but it's not my religion; some Muslims consider that they must wear a jilbab to comply with the rules and that's entirely their right.
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it ... should be unlawful to require pupils (or anyone else) to wear clothing that does not allow them to meet their religious obligations.
I've just started a religion that requires me to wear high-heeled boots and boxing gloves. And I want to teach at Eton.
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And, in the case of people wanting to work with children/in the healthcare profession etc - where the dress code, for some substantive reason, cannot be adapted to allow someone to comply with their religious obligations, then that would be a good reason for not employing the person in that specific job.
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What if someone who isn't a Muslim wants to wear Muslim dress?
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Then of course there are the people who admit that they have no religion, and therefor their beliefs are less valid those that believe something because it was written in a book approved by the state.
We should either decide that state schools can enforce dress codes and that some people will be offended by it, or that we should do away with uniforms, the alternative is a mess of legislation and legal precedents from the courts deciding what is "valid" and what is not.
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Ah, here we diverge, and this is why you think the Tory party's wrong, because they're actually traditionalist-collectivist on this sort of issue, whereas you're an individualist and think people should be entitled to special tailored treatment from services delivered collectively and for free (a bit of a Blairite position, and not one I hold). Anyway, if it gets my children one-to-one tuition from the state, I'm converting to pagan naturism.
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Ah, that's what it takes, eh? You've always been quite reluctant to convert before..
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Hmm - to a certain extent I expect people to get tailored treatment from publically funded services; though I tend to think that most efforts in this area aren't aimed at the right things eg. what good to me is the right to chose my own surgeon? I don't know anything about the calibre of surgeons and league tables wouldn't help, because the ones with the highest failure rates would be the ones prepared to carry out the riskier operations.
Anyway, if it gets my children one-to-one tuition from the state, I'm converting to pagan naturism.
Oh hush - you'd hardly want to isolate your kids from all the others given the damage that'd do to their social development.
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Furthermore, a child taken care of well by their parents in this manner may end up far more adjusted to human interaction in general then one who spends some much time in an artificial environment like the school system. In the other environments (workplace, family and family friend gatherings) people normally interact despite wide age differences, however at school children are pushed into groups based purely on their age, with on average only 6 months difference on either side. There are many social skills which children would learn faster with more interaction with older children and adults.
All of this does depend of course on how good the parent is at teaching and finding good activities for their child and I'm not sure how any of this fits in with being a pagan naturist :)
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Yes, I'm well aware of the potential benefits of home education, (though it's not something I'd ever feel able to provide to my kids), I certainly don't believe that home education (or indeed state funded individual tuition) always leads to socially damaged adults, however, that's not what
We were arguing about the nature of provision for kids who were pagan naturists - a parent who argues for and gets free individual tuition from the state on these grounds ie. I'm converting to pagan naturism simply in order to give my children a better education (ie. with individual tuition) than the other kids are getting, is unlikely to be the kind of parent committed to ensuring his/her children do interact with a range of other childrean and adults. Moreover, a pagan naturist child is unlikely to be particularly well accepted by other children - kids can be very harsh critics of other kids who don't conform to the norms. Such a child is also likely to be excluded from the range of social activities s/he might otherwise do on the grounds that s/he refuses to wear clothing thus reducing his/her opportunities to interact with non-family members further.