French police going Erdogan over al-niqab?

[merithyn]

Lower class muslim immigrants and their descendants from Algérie and Liban still cannot understand that the only way to be part of French society is too shed anything from before immigrations, starting with religion. The French while having accepted these refugees from their even more crazy brethrens don't actually consider them French. There is only 2 option in French society : Getthoization or Assimilation.

See, I made this point, and Valmy is disappointed in me. You, he agrees with. 

That is not what you said.

ie Different is bad.

[Valmy]

ie Different is bad.

Eh it is more complicated than that, and frankly GF is not entirely right but I was mainly just taking that opportunity to point out that most Muslim immigrants ARE assimilating to great extent. 

I should probably get off this thing for a bit I think being back in class with my short nights is starting to mess with my brain.  I am starting to do more of that thing where I respond too fast without reading closely over what the other poster is saying.

[merithyn]

Eh it is more complicated than that, and frankly GF is not entirely right but I was mainly just taking that opportunity to point out that most Muslim immigrants ARE assimilating to great extent. 

I should probably get off this thing for a bit I think being back in class with my short nights is starting to mess with my brain.  I am starting to do more of that thing where I respond too fast without reading closely over what the other poster is saying.

I still you.

[crazy canuck]

Um rejecting your absurd requirements that go way beyond any standard I have ever heard of before in my life does not prove the absurd hypothesis that all religions fail to distinguish between politics and religion.  I bet they have similarities and differences in how they view the relationship between politics and religion.

Islam has an entire set of laws, which some Muslims believe comprise the only laws a nation or society needs to have.  I don't know of any "Christian" (or Buddhist, or whatever) set of laws about divorce, property rights, inheritance, child custody, criminal trial and punishment, etc, etc.  To imply, however, that "Muslims don't distinguish between politics and religion" is to go too far, however.  Many Muslims believe that the concepts behind Sharia law are valid as moral precepts, but that the law of the land should be secular (and thus recognize a distinction between religion and politics).  Others believe that Sharia should be binding on Muslims but not on non-Muslims, and thus believe in a limited separation between politics and religion.  Others believe Sharia is divine law binding on everyone, and thus reject the separation of politics and religion.

I'd say that it is easy to generalize about a religion from extreme examples while ignoring counter-evidence (see that argument that non-Catholics are magical thinkers while Catholics are not).  It doesn't seem very useful, though.

Agreed.

Although some interesting confusions can arise over the assumptions made about such things.  For example,  irrc In the run up to WWI and the early years of the war, when the British were talking to King Hussein of the Hejaz about supporting his claim to be Caliph if he supported their war effort against the Turks, the British thought they were promising him political control over certain areas of Turkish held lands.  Hussein thought they supported giving him authority over all Muslims as their religious leader.   This caught the British somewhat by surprise since Hussein's understanding conflicted with the support the British were also giving to the House of Saud.

[Sheilbh]

So yeah... I'm wondering what reasoning - absurd or not - Yi is using to arrive at the statement that "Islam cannot distinguish between religion and politics"; then I'm testing the absurdity of the reasoning and the relevance to our discussion regarding the niqab in France by applying it to Christianity and seeing how that shakes out. I'm not particularly wedded to any given definition myself.

I always think it's a sort-of sonderweg theory of Islamism/Islamic terrorism.

[Viking]

Lower class muslim immigrants and their descendants from Algérie and Liban still cannot understand that the only way to be part of French society is too shed anything from before immigrations, starting with religion. The French while having accepted these refugees from their even more crazy brethrens don't actually consider them French. There is only 2 option in French society : Getthoization or Assimilation.

The fact is that many people, given that choice, are likely to choose ghettoization - because people have pride, rightly or wrongly, in their heritage. Being given that choice will make them angry and convince them that "the other" is the enemy.

If you really want to assimilate a people, don't attack that pride.

Look at the experience of Jews as an example. Thousands of years of attacks and (literal) ghetto-ization in Europe failed to assimilate the Jews, in spite of the fact that the Christian Church put considerable resources towards converting them, and the personal rewards of assimilating were great.

In North America, where few could care less about Jews, Jews are in serious danger of disappearing altogether as a group through assimilation.

I think you get it wrong there. Shitloads of jews were assimilated. Not just the crypto-jews like Madeleine Albright. The Ghetto was a tool used by the jews to prevent assimilation, not a tool used by the christians to force assimilation.

[Razgovory]

Uh, no.  Trust Malthus, he knows Jews.

[grumbler]

I think you get it wrong there. Shitloads of jews were assimilated. Not just the crypto-jews like Madeleine Albright. The Ghetto was a tool used by the jews to prevent assimilation, not a tool used by the christians to force assimilation.

  I don't think you read his post carefully enough.  You argue that he got it wrong, and then repeat his exact argument as a "correction."

[Duque de Bragança]

Lower class muslim immigrants and their descendants from Algérie and Liban still cannot understand that the only way to be part of French society is too shed anything from before immigrations, starting with religion. The French while having accepted these refugees from their even more crazy brethrens don't actually consider them French. There is only 2 option in French society : Getthoization or Assimilation.

Lebanon is not actually the best example of trouble-making "lower class" muslim immigrant. The so-called "lower class factor" interestingly really only matters with people from muslim countries who are much more into religion than others be them Catholics, Greek Orthodox or Buddhist/Taoist/Shintoiist/whatever Far East religion. So I'm not quite convinced by the decisive importance of class in successful integration. Culture is more important.

Interestingly enough, some Languishites claim that Greeks and Turks are the same yet they hardly behave the same in secular France. Turks even come from a so-called secular country or one which used to be at least. Guess who are the less integrated ones...

As a matter of fact, the French perception of Lebanesee is quite good, specially with all the Maronites being quite successful businessmen and being a plurality among Lebanese. Shia Lebanese would be second in numbers then Sunni with sizable numbers of Greek Orthodox and Armenian Lebanese (sometimes counted as only Armenians).
Algerians oh yes, with the added problem that many and their families stayed in France despite being pro-independence but were barred by the Algerian FLN dictatorship from going there following power struggles.
Not to mention the Algerian war did not help things.

http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/remi_0765-0752_1993_num_9_1_1052
for the Lebanese immigration in France