Having your period? Then go to the back of the class and sit by yourself

[Breathe]

I am allowed my opinion, am I not?
Now, anything constructive to add, besides a facepalm, or are we done here?

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I am allowed my opinion, am I not?

Yes, even when I find it to be condescending.

 

[Breathe]

Yes, even when I find it to be condescending.

That is fine, then.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I see... you're all for religious obligations, until those obligations take a form you're uncomfortable with.

The fact that they're obligated to pray is something you're sensitive to... but the fact that their religious tradition (I say it that way because from what I can tell, there's nothing explicit in the Quran about this sort of thing) obligates them to have a prayer area where men and women are separated, that's where you draw the line?

If you're going to provide a space for religious activity, you have to be willing to deal with everything that comes with it. If you can't do that, then you have no business providing a space for religious activity.

Or, in another way of looking at it, if you're going to do something in a secular public school, you have to be willing to deal with everything that comes with it. If the school provides space for the activity, it's well within the rights of the school to set rules on how the space can and can't be used. It's up to the individual practitioners to decide whether their needs can be accommodated.

And as for where the line should be drawn, I think a good starting point would be the overarching policies of the school board. In the case of the Toronto District School Board, they have policies mandating things like equal treatment on the basis of gender, inclusiveness to all students, and strict rules about admission of visitors onto school property for non-school-related business. Since we're talking about an activity involving students of the school occuring on school property during school hours, I see no reason to set aside any of them in this case.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

The options are pretty straight forward:

deny Muslims the opportunity to worship as Muslims,

interfere with their opportunity to worship as Muslims, or

enable the ability to worship as Muslims.​

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Simply, I do not feel that if there is no doctrinal support for women sitting at the back of congregation, then cultural customs do not necessarily need to be practised in such a hard-and-fast way.

Religious practices =/= Cultural practices

Frankly, if we're going to demand a reasonable basis for a particular religious practice before it's accommodated in a public school, then we can exclude most (all?) religious expression in one fell swoop.

But remember our recent discussion where I talked about how it's a bad thing for secular governments to be ruling on the validity of religious practices? This is a good example of that.

We disagreed about how the forms of religious expression you felt strongly about should be accommodated. If you think it's right for you to rule that a Muslim's religious expression in a secular public school shouldn't be allowed, then you open the door for me to rule in the same way about the propriety of Sikh religious expression in the same sorts of settings.

Is this Pandora's Box one that you're comfortable with opening?

 

[croak]

As far as I have been told by the local imam, Muslim females do not pray during menstruation. I have no idea why this is, though. From what I have heard (but do not buy) it is to make it easier on the menstruating woman as 'she is more liable to feel weak' or something.

I feel that schools should encourage the multi-faith room to be mixed gendered: no women and men on opposite sides or women at the back or anything.

From my knowledge, menstruating women cannot pray because it makes them ritually impure. There is a ritual bath of sorts that people take before prayer, and many things can nullify it, including, say, using the toilet. A menstruating woman can never stay clean, in that sense.

As for dividing men and women, I think that's more tradition than anything... a very strong one at that. I do recall reading how the mosque in Prophet Muhammad's time had no divisions between men and women. However, I think that women did pray behind men (I could be wrong). The reasoning, as far as I know, is that looking a woman's rear end can be mighty distracting.

As for this story, the Muslim girls on their period are not being forced not to take part, other than as a spiritual sanction. I don't see the problem. The division of boys and girls, on the other hand, doesn't have much of a basis, as far as I know.

 

[Breathe]

If you think it's right for you to rule that a Muslim's religious expression in a secular public school shouldn't be allowed, then you open the door for me to rule in the same way about the propriety of Sikh religious expression in the same sorts of settings.

Kindly read again what I said, because this is not it.

My issue was cultural practices being made as religion, not religious ones.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

The options are pretty straight forward:

deny Muslims the opportunity to worship as Muslims,

interfere with their opportunity to worship as Muslims, or

enable the ability to worship as Muslims.
​

That's a simplistic approach to this situation.

As I touched on in another thread about this, Friday prayers can be accommodated by taking it into account when setting the school's lunch hour, which is something the school would have to set anyhow.

There is a mosque near the school within walking distance. With the right choice of lunch hour and taking into account the variation in noon and sunset times for Toronto, the Friday prayer obligation can be accommodated outside of class time at the local mosque for the entire school year. At the times of year when dismissal is too close to sunset, a lunch hour at the late end of the normal range would still provide enough time for any student who wants to do it to walk to the mosque, pray, and return before the start of afternoon classes.

With a bit of forethought on the part of the school, there would be absolutely no reason why religious accommodation would have to conflict with any school policy.

 

[Breathe]

From my knowledge, menstruating women cannot pray because it makes them ritually impure. There is a ritual bath of sorts that people take before prayer, and many things can nullify it, including, say, using the toilet. A menstruating woman can never stay clean, in that sense.

As for dividing boys and girls, I think that's more tradition than anything... a very strong one at that. I do recall reading how the mosque in Prophet Muhammad's time had no divisions between men and women. However, I think that women did pray behind men (I could be wrong). The reasoning, as far as I know, is that looking a woman's rear end can be mighty distracting.

As for this story, the Muslim girls on their period are not being forced not to take part, other than as a spiritual sanction. I don't see the problem. The division of boys and girls, on the other hand, doesn't have much of a basis, as far as I know.

Yeah, exactly.


Although it seems like I must be speaking in tongues around here, considering how often people claim I have said something I have not.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Kindly read again what I said, because this is not it.

My issue was cultural practices being made as religion, not religious ones.

And in the process, you decreed that gender division in Muslim prayer is not a religious practice... just as I said.

 

[Breathe]

And in the process, you decreed that gender division in Muslim prayer is not a religious practice... just as I said.

I said I do not believe there is any basis in it, and if there is no religious basis in something, it doesn't need to be treated as such.

Nothing more.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I said I do not believe there is any basis in it, and if there is no religious basis in something, it doesn't need to be treated as such.

Nothing more.

Again: if you're going to demand that religious practices have to have a proper basis before they're allowed in school, then we can prohibit all of them.

 

[Breathe]

Again: if you're going to demand that religious practices have to have a proper basis before they're allowed in school, then we can prohibit all of them.

I disagree, although this is going in circles.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

As I touched on in another thread about this, Friday prayers can be accommodated ...

Yep ... out of sight, out of mind. Your answer is brilliant: if we push them all off campus, there will be no "back of the class".

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Yep ... out of sight, out of mind. Your answer is brilliant: if we push them all off campus, there will be no "back of the class".

Students can leave the school on their lunch break anyhow. What they do off school grounds is their own business... as evidenced by the ubiquitous gaggle of students smoking on the sidewalk, inches over the property line, in front of most high schools around here.

The school's concern in all this was truancy: too many Muslim students were skipping class to go to the mosque on Friday afternoons. Well, the simple way to deal with this is to allow them to go to the mosque without skipping class.

Just as the school's anti-smoking policies don't apply to students off school grounds, the school's equality policies don't apply to students in a nearby mosque.

However, when an activity is brought onto school property and happens with the tacit approval of the school administration, the administration has a responsibility for the activity and a duty to ensure that school board policies are enforced.

 

[FlyingTeaPot]

Its simple. If theses schools want to do this sort of stuff, do it without taxpayer money. Hell, they are free to do what they want, just not with taxpayer money. Remove the source of income for these people and see how fast they change their policy. Money trumps religion every time.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Its simple. If theses schools want to do this sort of stuff, do it without taxpayer money. Hell, they are free to do what they want, just not with taxpayer money. Remove the source of income for these people and see how fast they change their policy. Money trumps religion every time.

It's a public school, owned by the government and administered by the local secular school board. Even if a group of Muslim parents (or any parents) put together the money to pay for it themselves, it's not for sale.

 

[FlyingTeaPot]

It's a public school, owned by the government and administered by the local secular school board. Even if a group of Muslim parents (or any parents) put together the money to pay for it themselves, it's not for sale.

that is what I said. Taxpayer money went into the school.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

that is what I said. Taxpayer money went into the school.

Ah. Okay.

When you talked about "removing their source of income", I thought you were suggesting cutting the school loose from the public board and leaving the Muslim parents to fund it on its own.