Religion has no place in public school
Gunnair @ Mon Jul 11, 2011 5:36 pm
$1:
Tasha Kheiriddin: Religion has no place in public school – and neither does seComments Twitter
It’s rare that I see a photograph that makes my blood roil in anger. Or that leads me to share the opinions of Toronto Star columnist Heather Mallick. But a picture published in Saturday’s Star managed to do both in one afternoon.
The photo depicts a row of girls, sitting in the cafeteria of Valley Park Middle School in Toronto. The row is segregated behind a mass of students who are participating in an Islamic prayer service. The reason the girls in the back are not praying is because – wait for it – they have their period.
One is tempted to say: is this the Middle Ages? Have I stumbled into a time warp, where “unclean” women must be prevented from “defiling” other persons? It’s bad enough that the girls at Valley Park have to enter the cafeteria from the back, while the boys enter from the front, but does the entire school have the right to know they are menstruating?
These aren’t college kids, who are adults or on the verge of adulthood, and can make up their own minds about whether they are comfortable with religious practices which relegate women to the back of the bus. These are impressionable young women, grade 8 students, who are being sent a very clear message: you are second-class citizens to the boys in your school, and third-class at certain times of the month.
As the mother of a little girl who just celebrated her second birthday, the thought that she – or any girl – should be conditioned to believe this makes me physically sick. This is the same type of discrimination against which Canadian soldiers fought in Afghanistan, where, in the name of religion, women were shrouded in burkas and girls forbidden from even going to school. It is the type of thinking which in its most extreme forms justifies female circumcision, honour killings, and men beating their wives.
Now, in a Canadian public school, religious leaders are being allowed to instil the same type of message. At least there are no burkas involved. Yet.
In defence of the school’s practice, Toronto District School Board Education (TDSB) Director Chris Spence stated that “As a public school board, we have a responsibility and an obligation to accommodate faith needs.” But those “faith needs” are a matter of debate.
According to the Muslim Canadian Congress, Friday prayers are not even compulsory. The group also opposes the gender segregation imposed on the children. The MCC is contemplating legal action to force the TDSB to respect the Ontario Education Act, which states, “a board shall not permit any person to conduct religious exercises or to provide instruction that includes religious indoctrination in a particular religion or religious belief in a school.”
This regulation respects the 1988 Ontario Court of Appeal ruling in the case of Zylberberg v. Sudbury Board of Education. The court held that the Lord’s Prayer could no longer be spoken in public schools, on the grounds that it discriminated against students from other faiths, or who had no religion at all. Based on that decision, the current practice at Valley Park violates the rights of not only non-Muslim students, who must give over their cafeteria space to another religion, but Muslim students who don’t share this particular way of practicing Islam.
“Faith needs” should not supersede the right to equality in publicly-funded institutions. In a pluralist society like Canada, parents are free to teach their children whatever beliefs they please – in private and on their own time, however offensive those beliefs might be to others.
It is quite instructive, however, to be made aware of just how offensive some of those beliefs are. I therefore thank the Toronto Star for publishing the photograph of the prayer service at Valley Park Middle School. The picture tells more than a thousand words. It is a wake up call.
.Posted in: Canada, Full Comment Tags: Islam, Muslim Canada Congress, public school, religion, Tasha Kheiriddin, Valley Park middle school .
It’s rare that I see a photograph that makes my blood roil in anger. Or that leads me to share the opinions of Toronto Star columnist Heather Mallick. But a picture published in Saturday’s Star managed to do both in one afternoon.
The photo depicts a row of girls, sitting in the cafeteria of Valley Park Middle School in Toronto. The row is segregated behind a mass of students who are participating in an Islamic prayer service. The reason the girls in the back are not praying is because – wait for it – they have their period.
One is tempted to say: is this the Middle Ages? Have I stumbled into a time warp, where “unclean” women must be prevented from “defiling” other persons? It’s bad enough that the girls at Valley Park have to enter the cafeteria from the back, while the boys enter from the front, but does the entire school have the right to know they are menstruating?
These aren’t college kids, who are adults or on the verge of adulthood, and can make up their own minds about whether they are comfortable with religious practices which relegate women to the back of the bus. These are impressionable young women, grade 8 students, who are being sent a very clear message: you are second-class citizens to the boys in your school, and third-class at certain times of the month.
As the mother of a little girl who just celebrated her second birthday, the thought that she – or any girl – should be conditioned to believe this makes me physically sick. This is the same type of discrimination against which Canadian soldiers fought in Afghanistan, where, in the name of religion, women were shrouded in burkas and girls forbidden from even going to school. It is the type of thinking which in its most extreme forms justifies female circumcision, honour killings, and men beating their wives.
Now, in a Canadian public school, religious leaders are being allowed to instil the same type of message. At least there are no burkas involved. Yet.
In defence of the school’s practice, Toronto District School Board Education (TDSB) Director Chris Spence stated that “As a public school board, we have a responsibility and an obligation to accommodate faith needs.” But those “faith needs” are a matter of debate.
According to the Muslim Canadian Congress, Friday prayers are not even compulsory. The group also opposes the gender segregation imposed on the children. The MCC is contemplating legal action to force the TDSB to respect the Ontario Education Act, which states, “a board shall not permit any person to conduct religious exercises or to provide instruction that includes religious indoctrination in a particular religion or religious belief in a school.”
This regulation respects the 1988 Ontario Court of Appeal ruling in the case of Zylberberg v. Sudbury Board of Education. The court held that the Lord’s Prayer could no longer be spoken in public schools, on the grounds that it discriminated against students from other faiths, or who had no religion at all. Based on that decision, the current practice at Valley Park violates the rights of not only non-Muslim students, who must give over their cafeteria space to another religion, but Muslim students who don’t share this particular way of practicing Islam.
“Faith needs” should not supersede the right to equality in publicly-funded institutions. In a pluralist society like Canada, parents are free to teach their children whatever beliefs they please – in private and on their own time, however offensive those beliefs might be to others.
It is quite instructive, however, to be made aware of just how offensive some of those beliefs are. I therefore thank the Toronto Star for publishing the photograph of the prayer service at Valley Park Middle School. The picture tells more than a thousand words. It is a wake up call.
.Posted in: Canada, Full Comment Tags: Islam, Muslim Canada Congress, public school, religion, Tasha Kheiriddin, Valley Park middle school .
Brenda @ Mon Jul 11, 2011 6:13 pm
$1:
“As a public school board, we have a responsibility and an obligation to accommodate faith needs.”
Why?
ShepherdsDog @ Mon Jul 11, 2011 6:15 pm
Only as part of a social studies program when studying another country or culture.
sandorski @ Mon Jul 11, 2011 7:19 pm
There's a difference between Students practicing their Religion in School and Schools endorsing Religion.
PublicAnimalNo9 @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 7:46 am
As most of you know, I have my religious beliefs. But I do have a problem when the rights of religion supercedes the rights we worked so hard for in this country.
This is the 21st century. By encouraging their backwards ass Middle Ages theocratic, woman-hating bullshit, we are not doing ourselves or the younger generation of Muslims any favours here.
I know we can't start messing about with "degrees" of rights but I do think that freedom of religion should be the least potent of rights. Meaning that in no way, shape or form should any collective religious rights be allowed to supercede the more basic rights of the individual enshrined in our Constitution.
After all, freedom of religion is just that, freedom. But it ain't freedom to the people whose taxes go to that school board. They get to pay for a portion of a public institution to become a part-time mosque.
And before someone tries to label me a "racist" for that last comment, I'd say the exact same thing no matter what religious group was abusing the public school system like that. After all, freedom of religion also means freedom from religion.
ShepherdsDog @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 8:55 am
$1:
And before someone tries to label me a "racist" for that last comment
Oh...don't worry someone will misuse and abuse the term.
martin14 @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 9:27 am
$1:
It’s bad enough that the girls at Valley Park have to enter the cafeteria from the back, while the boys enter from the front,
It should be ILLEGAL in Canada to do this.
little by little, bit by bit.......
watch our country in 20 years..
Zipperfish @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 9:31 am
PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:
As most of you know, I have my religious beliefs. But I do have a problem when the rights of religion supercedes the rights we worked so hard for in this country.
This is the 21st century. By encouraging their backwards ass Middle Ages theocratic, woman-hating bullshit, we are not doing ourselves or the younger generation of Muslims any favours here.
I know we can't start messing about with "degrees" of rights but I do think that freedom of religion should be the least potent of rights. Meaning that in no way, shape or form should any collective religious rights be allowed to supercede the more basic rights of the individual enshrined in our Constitution.
After all, freedom of religion is just that, freedom. But it ain't freedom to the people whose taxes go to that school board. They get to pay for a portion of a public institution to become a part-time mosque.
And before someone tries to label me a "racist" for that last comment, I'd say the exact same thing no matter what religious group was abusing the public school system like that. After all, freedom of religion also means freedom from religion.
This is the 21st century. By encouraging their backwards ass Middle Ages theocratic, woman-hating bullshit, we are not doing ourselves or the younger generation of Muslims any favours here.
I know we can't start messing about with "degrees" of rights but I do think that freedom of religion should be the least potent of rights. Meaning that in no way, shape or form should any collective religious rights be allowed to supercede the more basic rights of the individual enshrined in our Constitution.
After all, freedom of religion is just that, freedom. But it ain't freedom to the people whose taxes go to that school board. They get to pay for a portion of a public institution to become a part-time mosque.
And before someone tries to label me a "racist" for that last comment, I'd say the exact same thing no matter what religious group was abusing the public school system like that. After all, freedom of religion also means freedom from religion.
Just get rid of Freedom of Religion altogether. First of all, ir imparts a special right to those members of the population who happen to be members of Big Religion. My beliefs (as someone not a member of a religion) are subsidiary to Christians, Muslims, Jews, Sikhs, etc.
Second of all, we all have freedom of thought, conscience and belief and a host of other freedoms. What further freedom does Freedom of Religion give except for people to to be able to wear funny hats where ever they feel like it?
martin14 @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 9:40 am
The freedom to oppress others.
Mustang1 @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 9:54 am
The education act does say, "a board shall not permit any person to conduct religious exercises or to provide instruction that includes indoctrination in a particular religion or religious belief in a school." I guess this is heading towards a Charter case.
EyeBrock @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 11:28 am
The bit where menstruating females were singled out and made to sit separate from the other females, who in turn were made to sit behind the boys got me mad. This should not be tolerated in our schools.
Leave this stone age thinking for the mosques and Brampton’s madrassas.
You can't say 'Christmas' but it's ok to separate menstruating teens as 'unclean' in public schools?
PC gone wild. Enough 'accommodation' of feudal edicts in Canada.
And people wonder why Islam is seen as such a backward influence in the West.
andyt @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 11:31 am
Mustang1 Mustang1:
The education act does say, "a board shall not permit any person to conduct religious exercises or to provide instruction that includes indoctrination in a particular religion or religious belief in a school." I guess this is heading towards a Charter case.
I hope so.
BartSimpson @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 11:46 am
The true face of Islam reveals itself to Canada.
Brenda @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 12:03 pm
BartSimpson BartSimpson:
The true face of Islam reveals itself to Canada.
You mean the fact that Muslims stand up against this crap, right?
EyeBrock @ Tue Jul 12, 2011 12:06 pm
The Imam didn't. The school staff didn't. The parent volunteers didn't. The Toronto Public School Board didn't and this separation of females/menstruating females from males happens in every mosque and madrassa in Canada.