This one may make your head hurt. From a court in New South Wales:
A MUSLIM woman sentenced to six months’ jail for making a deliberately false statement that a racist policeman tried to forcibly remove her burka has been freed on appeal.
Judge Clive Jeffreys said he was not satisfied beyond reasonable doubt it was Carnita Matthews, a 47-year-old Muslim woman from Woodbine, NSW, who accused the police of racism…
Fair enough. So why aren’t you sure it was Mrs. Matthews?
. . . because the person who handed in the complaint to police was wearing a burka at the time.
To reach the level of proof of identity to prove the case, it appears Mrs Matthews would have been required to identify herself by lifting her burka at the police station to prove her identity – which is what started the uproar in the first case.
So, if I follow correctly, we can never establish the identity of the woman who falsely accused the police of demanding she remove her burka because to establish her identity the police would have to demand she remove her burka thereby rendering her false accusation true.
As to what Mrs. Matthews looks like in or out of her burka, I’m none the wiser. She was flanked by a phalanx of young Muslim men who prevented anyone getting a look at her.
Mrs Matthew’s lawyer Stephen Hopper defended them, saying: “They are obviously happy with the result and are expressing it in a way that is culturally appropriate to them”.
. . . by yelling “Allahu Akbar!” and attacking cameramen. You can’t get more “culturally appropriate” than that.
"...by yelling “Allahu Akbar!” and attacking cameramen. You can’t get more “culturally appropriate” than that."
That's culturally appropriate for English Muslims. For French Muslims the appropriate manner of expression is torching hundreds of cars.
Maybe it's just their way of 'celebrating diversity'.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseStephen Hopper ???
This sounds like the plot of the rubbish Canadian movie Passchendaele where all evil rests at the foot of Maj Harper from Alberta.
Apparently the name of the character was a coincidence and had nothing to do with Prime Minister Stephen Harper from Alberta.
Was Paul Gross, Jeanette MacDonald or Nelson Eddy seen in the vicinity of the Veils?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSometimes I think the only way to end this foolish madness is for all of us - men, women, children - Christians, Jews, Hindus - to insist on wearing Burkas, especially while getting photo I.D's, going through airport security and shopping in self-service stores. The resulting chaos would serve the politically-correct appeasers of radical Islam right.
These constant demands for Muslim special rights reminds me of a really aggressive bad driver weaving in-and-out of traffic at high speeds: It only works if all the other drivers behave themselves and follow predictable rules.
I fear this problem of radical Islamic bullies demanding 'rights' that are not allowed to other religions is only going to get much worse. By some estimates, over 100,000 Christians were killed around the world in the last year or so, for practicing their religion.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWell here in Utah a man did manage to get away with kidnapping and child rape for several months by forcing his victim, Elizabeth Smart, to walk around in a veil. He was even confronted by a policeman (in the city library, of all places) who ultimately relented in his demand that he have her remove the veil.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHere is the citation to back up that claim:
"Massimo Introvigne, a human rights representative for the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, has told an OSCE meeting in Bodollo, Hungary, that 105,000 people are killed every year because of their Christian faith."
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhat, no firing of weopons into the air?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis seems like it creates an incredibly damaging precedent.
Now police are going to have to take any complaint handed in by a person wearing a burka and advise her that it is not legally binding because they can't identify her.
How can anything a Muslim woman signs be binding after this?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis might be a feature rather than a bug as far as the Shaira-supporters are concerned.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThumb print?
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"He said he had been told that there was nothing in Muslim culture or religion that stopped women from identifiying themselves in certain circumstances."
Of course there isn't. Just like the claim that Islam forbids any depiction of Mohammad, this controversy was dreamt up by some imam who wanted to stir the pot, and encouraged by idiot liberals who are desperate to suck up to them.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWearing the veil was a custom of Arabia that preceded Mohammed (peanut butter up his)by many centuries. The Talmud, written centuries before the invention of Islam, makes reference to this practise.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis is true. In the Persian historical context, images of Muhammad were frequent. One of my textbooks from graduate school has an image of Muhammad as the frontispiece. It's a 1986 publication (Armajani and Ricks, Middle East: Past and Present 2nd ed.) Where's the outrage?
Wearing the full burka is another cultural tradition that has very little historical merit. It came to the middle east from south Asia in the last century.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBullies
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf refraining from firing AK-47s was not their own idea, then whatever prevented them from doing so was prima facie evidence of anti-Islamic imperialism.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt is interesting, is it not, that the cultures where obscuring individual characteristics via clothing/cloaks/burkas/etc. etc. are de rigeur are also the societies where the rights of individuals are so circumscribed. IF you want a nation of sheep, make them all dress alike. The Chinese did it with Mao jackets, and the Islamic societies do it with the burka. Beyond that, it is a natural, unbiased, and taught-by-experience reality of our society that we are suspicious of people who wear masks and hide their faces because that's what crooks and bad people do in order to get away with their crimes.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTonto = Out
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseLone Ranger = (Back) In
This story could easily cut the other direction - a woman unable to press an accusation for harassment because her religious customs prevent her from revealing her identity. I would expect that procedures could be followed to accommodate this, and the other way also.
But, to the point of the post, there is nothing post-modern at all about this story. Now, if she claimed that that identity was inherently subjective such that true, value-free revelation was impossible...that would be post-modern.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseKafkaesque comedic gold?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI am pretty sure even the strictest burqa-wearers are willing to show their faces to other women.
If they refuse even to do that you have to think they are being deliberately provocative.
This is aside from the issue of whether even that is sufficient.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTechnology marches on, fingerprints and retina patterns would work to establish consistent id. Not yet nearly as convenient as matching a photo with a face, but for a fair number of applications they'd be workable.
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