France to ban female students from wearing abayas in state schools

I'm all for letting people wear whatever they want. What is the harm?

Here in Canada I've seen police officers wearing turbans. Works for me. Nude beaches? Sure thing. I've seen people in my neighborhood wearing Saudi-style niqabs and Afghan-style burqas.

Who am I to tell people what they should or shouldn't wear? How could it be my business?

I'm also for people burning the Qur'an if they so please. Or the bible, or the rainbow flag, or the national flag if that's how they want to protest. Ideas are there to be challenged.

I draw the line at threatening or harming people.

France is a secularist Republic. Freedom of religion is guaranteed but every religious sign is banned in the public space.
- I understand that's how things are, but I don't think that is how they should be. And while I'm an atheist, I also understand many people aren't. Why force my irreligiosity on them?
  So while students should not be indoctrinated on any particular religion in school, I don't see the harm in letting both teachers and students wear whatever they like, including religious symbols.
  In fact, it would be great if we taught all students the basics of multiple world religions in school and let people of different faiths talk to each other about what is important to them.
- Every sign being banned in public? So what about all the crosses on the churches, or the ringing of their bells? What about people wearing crosses and nunns wearing the traditional dress? What about the easter processions in some places?
  Sorry, but claiming that this would be in line with a secular policy doesnt work. It is target against muslims and muslims specifically without any actual bearing on secularism
- Freedom of religion is guaranteed but every religious sign is banned in the public space.
  No it's not! Thousands of people walk around with religious symbols and garnments in public all the time in France.
  Secularism is enforced in government offices and employed people.
- As an American this is difficult to comprehend. I'm feeling culture shock. Maybe the first xenophobia I've experienced in years.
- So racist haha. Very on-brand for France honestly.
It's a smoke screen to get right wing voters on their side once again. Public services in France are in shambles, our education is getting noticeably worse by the decade and this is what these fucks focus on.
- They've been doing this shit for years, though...
- That makes sense. Here in Canada they use similar tactics to distract people from stuff like the astronomical cost of housing, crumbling health care, underfunded education, etc.
- Exactly this, and it's the perfect example of how "progressives" (that aren't really that) enable fascism.
Nude beaches? Sure thing. I
In other words: Nudist "clothing" is banned from the entire public safe very few exceptions.
- In Spain you are allowed to walk around naked on any public spaces, with very few exceptions. It doesn't happen very often in practice, but it's allowed.
I love you
- I love you too 😁
I draw the line at threatening or harming people.
Except these bans are harming people.
Anyone dictating what others can or cannot wear is harming people.
All this "enlightened" centrism bullshit does is enable oppressors.
- The guy you answered was argueing the opposite of what you understood. He said, there should be no prohibition of practices unless they harm people.
- I agree, but there is a somewhat thorny question here: Where does the dictation start?
  Many of these students and their families are being dictated to by Sunni wahabbist imams trained and funded by Saudi oil money, and they actually come from cultures and religious traditions that didn’t give a shit about the abaya in the ‘60s and ‘70s.
- I draw the line at threatening or harming people
  Except these bans are harming people
  Sorry for not being clear in my statement. I mean harming as in: beheading, stoning, bombing, shooting, etc. Not as in hurting their feelings.
  But we agree: nobody should impose on other people what they can or cannot wear, whether it is religious symbols or pirate regalia.
  All this “enlightened” centrism bullshit does is enable oppressors
  Could you please elaborate?

"When you walk into a classroom, you shouldn't be able to identify the pupils' religion just by looking at them,"

Sir I'm sorry but a abaya doesn't prove someone is religious. You can wear one if you so please even if you're not Islam. It's just a dress.

Sure, and you an atheist could wear a cross and speak a prayer every morning. They just usually don't and until we can telepathically determine what someone actually believes such insignia are the best way to show support for religion.
- But the abaya is not a religious symbol, it's literally just a fucking dress like any other, it's just what they wear typically in that part of the world. It's like saying that pants are a christian symbol because all Europeans wear pants, and Europe is majority christian.
- I think saying this largely denies the cultural implications of many religiously associated garments and symbols.
  Most religious symbols are not just that, they’re cultural ones. People adopt them, change them, redefine them. Drawing lines between religion and culture is very difficult so attempting to stop someone dressing some way is just a restriction of freedom, regardless of religion.
But pretty much only devout muslim women wear them. Might as well be a hijab at this point.
That s a good thing actually

You know, the solution to women being told what to wear is not to tell them that they cannot wear it.

I don't agree with this prohibition, and I doubt that it's likely going to achieve much, but if my experience looking at past government restrictions on things that people want to do is predictive of the situation here, it'll mean that someone will sit down and figure out the exact limit that the French government prohibits and then figure out a garment or combination of garments that accomplishes as much of the original aims as possible without crossing whatever specific garment line is there.
I mean, what's a women's garment that does the head and neck? The bonnet?
googles
Hmm. Apparently it actually did have some religious background.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonnet(headgear)
Bonnets remained one of the most common types of headgear worn by women throughout most of the 19th century. Especially for a widow, a bonnet was de rigueur. Silk bonnets, elaborately pleated and ruched, were worn outdoors, or in public places like shops, galleries, churches, and during visits to acquaintances. Women would cover their heads with caps simply to keep their hair from getting dirty and perhaps out of female modesty, again, in European society, based upon the historical teaching of the Christian Bible. In addition, women in wedlock would wear caps and bonnets during the day, to further demonstrate their status as married women.
But, as far as I know, they aren't banned. So someone says "Okay, so people can't wear (religious) abayas, but can wear (secular) trenchcoats? This new garment isn't an abaya. This is a bonnet and trenchcoat." Or, you know, whatever.
- Wanna know why this whole thing isn't about a pupil wearing something that shows their religion? They sure as hell don't ban the kippah, sikhi turban or buddhist and hindu garnments.
  For some reason it only goes after Muslims and there mostly after women with the guise of "protecting them from oppression! ;-)". And it never involves actual talk with the "oppressed" women in question, it's always the assumption, that of course these women can't decide for themself and obviously all are forced to wear such garnments.
  It started with the burqa and niqab but the people in favor of that promised that it's just about the face covering, that there is no reason go after the hijab or similar garnments. Surprise surprise, only a few years later here we are and they still fight against "oppression" by limiting what Muslim women can wear. One would think that fighting oppression really was the goal of these people they would ask for actual support measures like providing education campaigns about personal rights and better support network for women. But no, these people think or pretend that such bans will magically solve the issue without any flanking measures. And that tells you all you need to know about their sincerities regarding this topic. It's not about the girls and women, it never was and never will be.
I don't think this tries to solve that kind of problem.

The problem with religious clothing is that the more people who wear it, the more pressure can be put on children to wear it or stand out/be condemned. It gets worse when the clothing is gender-specific.

It also puts children in a situation where their religious background can be seen from afar, making them Christian/Muslim/Jew etc. first and citizen second, when in a secularised country it should always be the other way round.

It is twice as bad when teachers wear religious clothing, because how can you not wear it if your teacher is wearing it. And when children wear religious clothing and have to defend wearing it, they get into a situation where they may have to defend it and wear it and even be part of peer pressure because there is no way out, you are either pushed from one side or the other and many choose to then rather push themselves.

Religious freedom is a double-edged sword: Freedom to live your religion, but also the freedom to live without religion, and especially children who are brought up in a religious family need the school as a place where religion isn't a thing, so that they have a place to even think about what it feels like to live without it. Religion needs to be a personal choice and only if you have a place to check what it means to be without it you can choose.

If your religion can not give children a place to be without it so they can then freely choose, there is something severely wrong with that religion. Unfortunately I have yet to find a religion that does allow it.

I can understand you thought process buts its more of a Theoretic then this happening in Realf Life in many Families they do not care that much about it.
Kids only wear it if they are Praying or after getting older.
how can you not wear it if your teacher is wearing it
What logic is this? Just make everyone know that a school is a safe space where nobody is made to wear or not wear anything unless it's offensive (such as profane, racist or too revealing).
- Because a teacher is a role model and if your teacher is a role model for religion in a place that should be the one place free from it, then that's not working.
  School can only be a safe place for children to take a breath from a religious background if religion stays completely out of it.
  You think it can be a safe space when the girl gets told by its parents "look the teacher is wearing this, so you need too" even if the teacher isn't saying it?
  Unfortunately religious clothing isn't just clothing like every other and religions of this world (not just one specific) are not about safe spaces, they want to be everywhere and they want to occupy school too. A secular country can not allow that.
- You want uniforms?
- Problem is, the "unless" part is different for everyone. Lot of people find religious stuff offensive, while the revealing stuff not.

I did not know what an abaya is, but it did not matter to know this is a stupid ban. Just let people wear whatever the fuck they want to wear.

The thing is some children do not have a say in the clothes they get. Those children still deserve the same conditions in school
- If that were genuinely the motivation and it would be handled with the appropriate nuance, I could get behind that. But as it stands, this is saying, for completely arbitrary reasons, you can't wear your clothing that you wear all the time, the clothing you're likely comfortable in.
- And they just won't be able to get these school conditions, the same way that they can't play club sports and that Muslim moms can't volunteer for school trips.

So much for freedom of religion.

"When you walk into a classroom, you shouldn't be able to identify the pupils' religion just by looking at them,"

What a dumb fucking reason. Really, that's the best he could come up with? Why not? What's so bad about knowing someone's religion, when they are obviously not shy about it?

I get banning religious symbols from schools, because the institutes themselves are supposed to be non-religious (seperation of state and church and so on), but if the students themselves want to express their religion, let them.

French laicite is not freedom of religion, as the Anglosphere would understand it. (Which makes their insistence that it's just the direct translation of "secularism" frustrating.) It's a consistent effort to make religion every individual's private business.
Compare fucking. You can do whatever you want with whoever you want. Just not on a street corner. Other people don't want to deal with that.
I don't personally endorse this approach, for a variety of reasons, but you have to understand it to condemn it.
- That's very interesting, I didn't know that.
  I wasn't talking about Frances interpretation though, as I'm obviously not well informed on that. I was more thinking about the EU commitment to freedom of religion as stated in the "EU Guidelines on the promotion and protection of freedom of religion or belief", in which all EU member states commit to protijg the freedom of religion in the EU (and even outside if possible, see OSCE).
  Just as a small excerpt:
  (b) the freedom to manifest one's religion or belief, individually or in community with others, in public or private, through worship, observance, practice and teaching.
  This includes the duty to rescind discriminatory legislation, implement legislation that protects freedom of religion or belief, and halt official practices that cause discrimination, as well as to protect people from discrimination by state and other influential actors, whether religious or non-religious
  So the state has a responsibility to protect the freedom of religion, within it's territory.
School is a special place. Religion must not get in
- Said every authoritarian ever. So you don't believe in freedom of religion and being able to express that?
Before being muslim you are French. Disallowing any religious symbols allow people to bond easily because they are not blocked by religion.
They can see something else at school, it allows them to widen their perspective. Either, since childhood, the only thing they’ll do is practice a religion their parents have forced unto them.
After high school, I see no problems about showing your religious symbols because normally at this point of your life, you are educated about a lot of things and able to choose for yourself…
- Sorry to burst your bubble, but people in other countries (like Germany) where they are allowed to display religious symbols are able to bond just fine. If you can't "bond" with someone because they're wearing a cross on a chain or cover their head with religious clothing, that sounds like a you-issue. Regardless of why they practice their religion, it's not up to you or the state to tell them how to practice it. Sure some are forced into it by their parents, but banning religious symbols in schools isn't going to fix that. What it does do however, is stop students from practicing a religion they freely chose.
  This law is made by people who are intimidated by things they don't understand and that probably have their roots in racism and islamophobia.
- That's nationalist at best. Why is French more important than Muslim? Because they write the laws? Doesn't that seem a little unfair?
  I hate organized religion, but I don't give a shit what someone does if it doesn't hurt anyone else. I also hate authoritarianism that limits people's options and attempts to force then into some sort of cultural hegymony.
  In the Americas (both he us and Canada), we forces native Americans to attend schools to attempt to remove their culture and make them "American." This has generally been viewed as a horrible atrocity. Hopefully France doesn't attempt to follow the mistakes of history.
Probably not the reason, but don't you remember how many assholes were at school? You express anything at all about yourself and you are open to attack.
- Don't worry kids, the school attacked you so that other kids wouldn't be able to.
- So you bar people from expressing their religion so they don't get bullied? Absolute gigabrain move.
  "Should we punish the bullies? Maybe take measures so the teachers know how to better deal with conflict? No. Let's punish the kids getting bullied by taking away their right to express their religion. Surely the bullies won't find anything else to bully these kids."
This is why not
"Secularism means the freedom to emancipate oneself through school," Mr Attal told TF1
Seems pretty reasonable to me.
- Yes the freedom to do so. You should be free to NOT do that though. You should be free from pressure in both directions.

France has enforced a strict ban on religious signs at schools since the 19th Century, including Christian symbols such as large crosses, in an effort to curb any Catholic influence from public education.

It has been updating the law over the years to reflect its changing population, which now includes the Muslim headscarf and Jewish kippa, but abayas have not been banned outright.

So going by the article, some religious clothing is outright banned while crosses are allowed as long as they are not large?

All crosses are banned. Totally unacceptable. Source: I'm a 20yo french.
- What about heavy metal band shirts with an upside-down cross on it?
- you forgot the /s

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Students will be banned from wearing abaya, a loose-fitting full-length robe worn by some Muslim women, in France's state-run schools, the education minister has said.

"When you walk into a classroom, you shouldn't be able to identify the pupils' religion just by looking at them," Education Minister Gabriel Attal told France's TF1 TV, adding: "I have decided that the abaya could no longer be worn in schools."

The garment has being increasingly worn in schools, leading to a political divide over them, with right-wing parties pushing for a ban while those on the left have voiced concerns for the rights of Muslim women and girls.

France has enforced a strict ban on religious signs at schools since the 19th Century, including Christian symbols such as large crosses, in an effort to curb any Catholic influence from public education.

The debate on Islamic symbols has intensified since a Chechen refugee beheaded teacher Samuel Paty, who had shown students caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed, near his school in a Paris suburb in 2020.

The announcement is the first major policy decision by Mr Attal, who was appointed France's education minister by President Emmanuel Macron this summer at the age of 34.

The original article contains 388 words, the summary contains 199 words. Saved 49%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

Good. Religion shit has to stop.

kinda, yes, but not through state-enforced bans
- Through what then?
You have to get off the internet mate, none of your arguments ever make it past the edgy 14 year old stage.
- Well you're just being condescending, that's not going to convince anyone either.

Great news for all women and Europe

Is it a bad idea for me, a non-religious person, to wear one in solidarity? (As well as for privacy, sun protection, etc.)

(I do not live in France.)

I fail to see why not. It's just a dress. You shall wear whatever resonates with you.
- It's not just a dress, unfortunately. It's a dress, strongly associated with female oppressive rules of Islam.
I have been in some pagan veiling online circles and have discovered that a lot of non-Muslims use Muslim-style veils and it usually is not considered offensive, so I think that it would be okay for an irreligious person to use one.
- No, I do not. Sorry I didn't say that. Probably an important detail... I'll edit it in.
It's not a bad idea, it's just really useless, especially since you don't even live here. The dresses are pretty though, I used to have one that I wore at home pretty often, as a non-Muslim person in France. It's definitely not a bad thing. It's just a dress.

So many people here either intentionally or not misunderstanding the point...

There's freedom of religion, but not in official governement settings. This is not to infringe on rights, it's just the opposite. Just for your religion you shant get treated differently. This is why you don't get to advertise your religion as a governement employee, nor as a citizen when appealing to the governement. This is exactly the inverse of authorianism, it's a reaction to a state forcing people from a certain religion to wear a distinct mark (star of david) by which they were discrimnated against and eradicated.

Furthermore there should be some norms in place for what can be worn in school. I'm no advocate for uniforms, but dressrules respectful of the institution can be demanded (e.g. not wearing headwear in church or covering ones hair when visiting a mosque)

but dressrules respectful of the institution can be demanded (e.g. not wearing headwear in church or covering ones hair when visiting a mosque)
How is an abaya disrespectful to a school? If anything it's one of the more appropriate kinds of clothing.
France may have banned large crosses from their schools but it is not forbidden afaik to wear necklaces. I did not find an english source, here is a german one with my translation:
In Frankreich herrscht Kopftuchverbot an Schulen
Bereits 1994 trat ein Gesetz in Kraft, dass in Schulen nur noch diskrete - nicht aber auffällige - religiöse Symbole erlaubte. Zehn Jahre später wurden Kopftücher in Schulen vollständig verboten - Kippa und Kreuz nicht. 2010 folgte das Verbot der Vollverschleierung in der Öffentlichkeit.
France bans headscarfs at schools
In 1994 a law was passed that said that only discrete - but not prominent - religious symbols would be allowed. Ten years later headscarfs where banned from schools - while kippa and cross were not. 2010 the ban of the full body veil in public was passed.
https://www.zdf.de/nachrichten/politik/frankreich-verbot-abaya-schulen-100.html
Allowing kippas and crosses while disallowing a dress that is at most a religious gesture not even a concrete symbol is just weird.
- Yeah I regret this topic being made into a value weighting thing. I hate the hypocrisy in the current discussion. Although I also hate how signalling religosity somehow finds a way.
  My point is that the reason behind the policy is pretty solid. The state should be blind to my religion and no-one should get preferrential/or malign treatment because of it.
  Allowing kippas and crosses while disallowing a dress that is at most a religious gesture not even a concrete symbol is just weird
  Sure, all should be banned
- How is an abaya disrespectful to a school?
  any kind of religion is disrespectful to any education facility since they teach exactly the opposite from one another.
To be honest we wear headwear in churches in france now
- Oh. Well whenever I'm in churches in France, it's usually not during service. Then again, it's a bit beside the point.

Good. We don't need more religion interfering with people's life.

Isn't it already illegal in Turkey to wear headscarfs in some places to help preserve secularism? I think that's a good move

Another step towards criminalizing Muslims. They are a convenient scapegoat for the fascists and libs to channel the anger and hate away from themselves and towards marginalized groups.

No, like already pointed out, in France, Religion has no place in schools. This has nothing directly to do with muslims
- Secularism is not the motivation behind this. If it was, this law would have already been on the books for centuries. But Islamophobia is a great way to get the racist vote right now.
  I you believe this has nothing to do with Muslims, I've got a bridge to sell you.

When authoritarianism collides with securalism

They just want to proove that you don't need religion to be intolerant, closed minded and bigoted.

Good, bodily autonomy ought to be respected only when it aligns with western values 🤡

Much feminism. 🤡

Kipas are banned too. France is a laicist country. You don't like it, you don't have to live there - there are enough religious states out there that let you opres women to your hearts desire.
- there are enough religious states out there that let you opres women to your hearts desire.
  Oppressing, like this very ban? Prohibiting a woman to wear what you don't like is exactly as oppressing as forcing her to wear something. Hiding behind secularism doesn't make it okay, it's still anti-feminist, and paternalistic.
  My point is about the lack of respect for body autonomy, which is binary: either there is or there isn't. Either you own your own body or the state does, which compiles the list of what you can and cannot do with it.

Makes sense. Anyone who needs it probably needs integrate better, or possibly their male relatives.

Yeah, the western value of telling women what they can and cannot wear... In this regard the male relatives you speak off are very well integrated according to this logic.
- You are altering facts. We are not talking about women, we are talking about little girls. Whatever your opinion is, you still have to remember this