France is Simply Saying Non to the Abayah

[The Grand Nudger]

It's more an issue of whether or not the religious have made it a sticking point. There's nothing intrinsically unchristian about short skirts..or specifically christian about long ones - they made it a thing - for an example this side of the pond. If france says you cant do a thing, and you do the thing, then you're sideways with the law - well crafted or otherwise.

It's not even, when you think about it, france doing something as an initiator, they're not in control of what people choose to employ as a religious identification. It's a response (arguably a reactionary one) to what other people are doing, how other people are identifying and employing those items.

Say we banned overt displays of crosses as a consequence of banning religious symbolism in public schools, and people started sending their kids to school with jesus fish to get around it. I think we might realize that the christians are not being oppressed in the sense that we're all likely to agree is garbage, they're finding ways to game regulations that they wholeheartedly expect to bind other people - because that's what people do. Whatever we think about other issues, related or otherwise, I think it's important to recognize such priveledge seeking behavior as the first salvo in a theocratic volley. That the law must protect but not bind them, while binding and not protecting others.

I think that clothing laws are ridiculous, but if we're going to have them, there will not be a muslim exception, an islamist carveout... to them. They can cry rivers of salty tears. I remain completely unmoved by their wardrobe based plight. I reserve the right to change my mind when I find them shoulder to shoulder with me advocating for my daughters being able to wear tank tops because it's fucking hot. So, you know, other side of the heat death of the universe.