The French beach ban on Islamic garb has caused controversy over women’s rights and secularism and confusion over what constitutes a burkini (AFP Photo/Raymond Roig).
This whole snarl of nonsense has been one massive facepalm from the beginning. There was absolutely zero reasons for choosing a single type of beach wear and banning it. Hello, racism! And no, none of the supposed “reasons” made a damn bit of sense. Buzzfeed had a very good response to this idiocy. Some people at any beach anywhere will be covered up in one way or another, and it’s never been any sort of big deal. Oh, but Muslim women? No, no, nope. Can’t have that, expose your body for no good reason, or no beach for you!
France’s highest court has suspended a ban on the “burkini” in the town of Villeneuve-Loubet, in a decision likely to lead to the overturn of 30 more such bans in towns across France.
The French League of Human Rights this week asked that the Council of State, a top French court, overturn the ban. The Council of State’s judgment, released Friday afternoon, quashed the earlier ruling of a Nice court that on August 22 said the ban was legal.
The Council of State judgment said that the ban had breached “fundamental freedoms.”
Human rights league lawyer Patrice Spinosi told reporters that the decision should set a precedent, and that other mayors should conform to it, the Associated Press reported.
Amnesty International welcomed the decision, saying in a statement: “By overturning a discriminatory ban that is fueled by and is fueling prejudice and intolerance, today’s decision has drawn an important line in the sand.”
The bans, put in place throughout August by local authorities citing security concerns and issues of cultural cohesion, have been locally decided and enforced, but were backed by French Prime Minister Manuel Valls, who said the burkini was not welcome in France.
I’m having trouble believing this actually had to go to court. Hey, France, when you do this sort of isht, you’re becoming a lot more like Amerikka. Don’t do that.
Full story here.
Shorter burkini ban:
Women shouldn’t be forced to wear a particular item of clothing. They should be forced not to wear a particular item of clothing.
I believe(but haven’t really checked) that most of the coastal areas which implemented the ban — which unfortunately includes the village where I live — are also in one or the other of the two regions (vaguely like a state in the States but with few real powers) that almost elected a Le Penazi in the region elections last year. In both regions, the third-placed candidate stepped aside during the second-round elections so the only two candidates still in the running were someone vaguely sane and a Le Pen (as it happened, the two Le Penazi’s were members of the Le Pen family).
(To the best of my knowledge there are no Le Penazis on the village council; the closest elected Le Penazi I can (vaguely) recall is in a mountain village something like 100km away. On the other hand, the vote in the village for Le Penazis was c.25% (as I recall)…)
Yeah, you would have hoped that Daesh would have to make up propaganda like “in the West armed men force our women to undress”.
As I said on Twitter: France’s strategy to keep Muslims from radicalising looks a lot like the GOP’s to win minority voters.
Oh for feck’s sake, French mayors refuse to lift burkini ban despite court ruling:
According to the article, only two mayors have lifted their bans (in addition to the village which was sued).
Blf, I was reading about that this morning. It looks like some of your politicians are just as stupid as ours.