Reply #28: That's right. [View All]

I am.

Religion has no place, IMHO, in the public schools. That means no overt display of religious paraphernalia. If the student and/or his/her parents don't like that -- if they attach more importance to their personal expression of faith than to the secular society as a whole -- then I believe they should put their child in a private, religious school.

If they believe that it is against their religion for their daughter to expose her hair in public, then do they also believe it is against their religion for their child to see other students' exposed hair? Will they then tell the school board "You must force other students to cover their hair lest my child be corrupted"?

I am obviously in the persecuted minority here, but that's fine. I'm not backing down.

Discreet expressions of religious faith -- from male circumcision to the wearing of a crucifix around one's neck -- are fine. But to me, the wearing of a hijab or yarmulke is the same as posting the ten commandments in the school room: it's a proclamation that the person believes their faith sets them apart.

Back in the 60s (which I remember very well) there were great upheavals in the Roman Catholic Church over the secularization of nuns' habits. The rationale that finally won out was that the traditional habits were carry-overs from medieval times when the religious either kept to themselves in their cloisters or they walked among the laity IN THE SAME GARB (The tonsure was a dead giveaway, however.) so as not to seem distinct from the rest of god's children. Over the centuries, however, the habit became, well, not to punnify, but it became a habit, and as such it made women religious look out of place, separate, not of this world. To make the women religious more welcome in the world at large, they modernized their garb, some more than others.

What the hijab and, yes, the yarmulke say is that "I am different from you, I want to be different, and I want to be different because I see myself, even unconsciously, as better than you. My faith is better than yours, my god is better than yours, my culture is better than yours. I do not want to become like you."

Now, this is only my opinion, and as I've acknowledged, I am in the distinct minority here. Be that as it may, I still believe (shades of John Auschwitzkroft) no overt religious symbols belong or should be permitted in public schools.

Tansy Gold, iconoclast