Abolish office of religious freedom: Anthony Furey

2016/03/07 Leave a comment

Interesting that the call to disband the office is coming from the Toronto Sun which generally supported the previous government:

It really does look like the office is just multicultural pandering, letting various religious groups – and they’re well-represented on the office’s 23 member advisory committee – feel the government is going to bat for them around the world.

It’s not exactly a “Canada first” endeavour, is it? I’m rather uncomfortable with us encouraging religious leaders into thinking their priorities are automatically Canadian policy priorities.

It’s even in the mandate: “The office will promote freedom of religion or belief as a Canadian foreign policy priority.”

A good and true sentiment, but a priority? No thanks. Canada’s foreign priorities should be about geopolitical stability with a view to our economy and security interests. If religious freedom becomes a secondary goal in these ventures then fine, but it shouldn’t be a standalone one.

However Garnett Genuis, Conservative MP for Sherwood Park-Fort Saskatchewan, believes the office is doing good work and hopes the Liberals keep it.

“Religious persecution is increasing and there are religious undertones to a lot of conflicts that exist in the world today,” he told me in a phone interview.

“If you believe the government should be involved in development assistance to some point, this is a very effective way for the government to be contributing to global harmony,” Genuis adds. “It helps to elevate our reputation as a country that takes human rights seriously and is willing to put its money where its mouth is.”

If these activities are priorities for the government, they shouldn’t be undertaken by a secondary office, but directly championed by the foreign affairs minister. And if they’re not that important, then leave them to the NGOs. There’s really no compelling reason for the Liberals to maintain this office.

Source: Abolish office of religious freedom | Furey | Columnists | Opinion | Toronto Sun

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Why do so many jihadis have engineering degrees?

2016/03/02 Leave a comment

Long but interesting article on why so many radicalized individuals have an engineering background:

That takes Hertog and Gambetta (the researchers who conducted the study)  to the thorny question of “mindsets for extremists.” Different types of people are attracted to different kinds of extremism—engineers mostly on one side, social scientists and humanities grads on the other—and the authors went in search of traits found in both secular and jihadi extremists as well as among engineers. Three stand out among conservatives in general in recent psychological research: disgust (or the felt need to keep one’s environment pure, which can underpin everything from homophobia to xenophobia); the “need for cognitive closure” (a preference for order and certainty that can support authoritarianism); a very high in-group/out-group distinction.

These are present in particularly high concentration among Nazis and Salafists alike, while European surveys show engineers to be consistently more conservative than other students: moderately right-wing, anti-immigration and tough on crime. Whether the discipline makes the man—it’s worth noting engineering, like the virtually women-free world of right-wing extremists, is male-dominated—or the man seeks the discipline, Hertog is not prepared to say, but the correlation is undeniable. And so is what it points to: contrary to what seems obvious, religious faith does not so much drive Islamist terror as provide its cover.

Why do so many jihadis have engineering degrees?

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Douglas Todd: Divorce, Shariah and gold coins

2016/03/02 Leave a comment

 I always find Todd’s articles of interest and this one is no exception:

Lawyer Zahra Jenab often comes face to face with couples embroiled in acidic disputes over a small fortune in gold.The West Vancouver family lawyer, who was born in Iran and raised in Canada, works frequently with ex-partners wrangling over thousands of gold coins, which may or may not have been given by the husband in a dowry under Islamic Shariah law.

Canadian courts are increasingly being called upon to rule on religious laws of the Middle East and Asia. But they’re finding it tricky to distribute family property across nations and in an era when dowries contain symbolic promises of Qur’ans along with valuable coins.

Jenab has made her way through hundreds of trans-national divorces in which Canadian family law clashes with traditions from Iran, Egypt, Pakistan, East Africa and East Asia, and her desk is piled with yellow case files.

When separating immigrant women and men ask her why their divorces can’t follow the rules of their old country, Jenab has to tell them: “Because we’re in Canada, now.”

Estranged couples can be devastated when they discover the religious laws of their homelands don’t apply in Canada.

“My heart often breaks for the suffering couple,” Jenab said. “But the driving issue is Shariah property law.”

As trans-national divorce increasingly falls under the scrutiny of Canadian judges, the decisions they’re making about what Shariah says about the distribution of property are “all over the map,” Jenab said.

Unfortunately, an expert witness on Shariah has not emerged to guide Canada’s courts.

The focus of many trans-national divorces in Canada is the often-considerable dowry, sometimes known as a mahr or meher, which is customary in most countries containing the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims.

“The dowry is financial security for the female. It is the man’s promise to provide finances, often in gold. It can be claimed by her at any time.”

When discord tears apart the bonds of matrimony, as it often does in all cultures, conflicts over often-unwritten promises about dowries can become intense.

In some countries where Shariah is enshrined, Jenab says, men can be arrested for not providing the dowry when the wife demands it.

…Property rights are also often not equal in many Muslim countries, where males are favoured.

Trans-national divorces, as a result, are often complicated when spouses work, or hold property, in their country of origin. “That makes the fair division of property hard to enforce.”

Many of Jenab’s clients, women and men, end up wanting both the benefits of Canada’s relatively equal family law and the advantages of their traditional religious culture.

They’re often stunned or angry, she said, when they learn Canadian family law — including the ideal of parents sharing joint custody of children — doesn’t line up with their religious customs.

“It’s difficult to see families struggle as they move out of their marriages, especially the children,” Jenab said. “That’s why I try to talk everyone down from taking a scorched-earth approach.”

http://www.vancouversun.com/opinion/columnists/douglas+todd+clash+cultures+divorce+shariah+gold/11753275/story.html

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India’s Extremists Turn on Left-Wing College Kids – The Daily Beast

2016/02/23 Leave a comment

Hindu extremism:

Change is inevitable. Change is constant. The world is changing, and so is India. But ever since The Donald Trump of India, aka Narendra Modi, and his militant right-wing Hindutva Party came to power, India is fast becoming a nightmare for its women and minorities, its Dalits and Harijans, its LGBT community, and yes, all lovers of good medium-rare steaks and juicy burgers.

There are scholars who will argue that the self-proclaimed “benign land of gentle chants and a thousand ‘Namaste’” has always been excessively hostile and extremely violent to the non-conforming.  History shows that India’s ruling elite more or less eradicated its Buddhist population (Indian folk lore often claims that they merely tricked the Buddhists into converting). Nonetheless, the division of the former Indus Valley Civilization, the formation of modern India, was on a pledge of plurality and on secular values. The Indian National Flag is tricolored, emphasizing its inclusiveness of all peoples and faiths. Therefore the accelerated return to the unbearable intolerance of alternative views and liberal values is disturbing.

For Kanhaiya Kumar, the student body president at Jawaharlal Nehru University, February 9, 2016 started perhaps like any other. But later that day he made a fatal mistake, in a speech at a protest rally at JNU—India’s Berkeley—wherein he criticized Modi and the Hindutva party, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Three days after his speech, Kanhaiya was arrested on charges of sedition. While being escorted by the police to the court, he was attacked and beaten up twice, according to Indian media—initially by a mob of lawyers, and then again a second time by a ‘man in dark glasses’ when he was being kept in a room at the court before the hearing. Later, Kumar was refused bail.

I understand that some might wonder how a person, under the watchful eye of the media and heavy police escort, can get beaten up on court premises. Well, please keep in mind that this is India; strange things always occur at Indian courts. On Dec 6, 1992, the Hindutva thugs demolished the Babri Mosque in the town of Ayodhya, on grounds that it stood on the exact spot where an Indian God, Ram, was born. The Supreme Court, while acknowledging the lack of evidence that the mosque stood on the spot where Ram was born—and while also acknowledging that there were multiple other locations in the town of Ayodhya with superior claims, let alone multiple other towns in India that had better claims as Ram’s birthplace than Ayodhya—still ruled in favor of the Hindutva position. Given the state of Indian courts, the two back-to-back beatings that Kanhaiya received is just par for the course. To an outsider this might appear bizarre, but to people in India, this is simply expected.

Source: India’s Extremists Turn on Left-Wing College Kids – The Daily Beast

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Belgium, Christianity and Islam: In and around Brussels, the practice of Islam is outstripping Christianity | The Economist

2016/02/22 Leave a comment

Interesting article regarding religion in Belgium and the implications of greater religiosity among Muslims:

All that is part of the background to a study of religious attitudes among Francophone Belgians, conducted by the Observatory of Religion and Secularism, a helpful resource for the study of faith in Europe.  Respondents came in equal numbers from Wallonia, the country’s Gallic-oriented south, and the Francophone majority in Brussels.

The pollsters were surprised by how many respondents still professed some attachment to a religion. Among all respondents, 20% called themselves practising Catholics and 43% non-practising Catholics; 6% were practising Muslims and 1% non-practising Muslims. With other religions accounting for a few points each, that left 26% who called themselves atheist or agnostic. Jean-Philippe Schreiber, a professor of religous studies who co-commissioned the poll, said a remarkably high number of Belgians “claimed a religious identity” even if it did not affect their behaviour much. That certainly applied to loosely affiliated Catholics; and it might also be true that not every respondent who identified with Islam actually prayed and fasted as the rules lay down.

Then turn to Brussels, some parts of which host large communities of Moroccan and Turkish immigrants, mostly from religiously conservative regions of those countries. Among respondents in the city, practising Catholics amounted to 12% and non-practising ones to 28%. Some 19% were active Muslims and another 4% were of Muslim identity without practising the faith. The atheist/agnostic camp came to 30%.

Among all respondents, levels of active adherence to Catholicism seemed to diminish dramatically with age, while the practice of Islam increased correspondingly. Thus among respondents aged 55 and over, practising Catholics amounted to 30% and practising Muslims to less than 1%; but among those aged between 18 and 34, active adherence to Islam (14%) exceeded the practice of Catholicism (12%). Admittedly the sample (600 people in all) is small. But if this trend continues, practitioners of Islam may soon comfortably exceed devout Catholics not just in cosmopolitan Brussels, as is the case already, but across the whole of Belgium’s southern half.

The pollsters are struck by the fact that many Belgians retain a cultural loyalty to the Catholic faith. albeit a diminishing one. The percentage of avowedly “practising Catholics” far exceeds the numbers who actually turn up at mass, as any cleric will confirm. But one thing is pretty clear. If anything holds Belgium together through its third century of existence, Catholicism will not be the glue.

Source: Belgium, Christianity and Islam: In and around Brussels, the practice of Islam is outstripping Christianity | The Economist

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ICYMI: The Interview: Crime author Ausma Zehanat Khan’s unique lens on Islam

2016/02/19 Leave a comment

Worth reading, have selected the quote below on the contrast between Canada and the USA:

Q: Do you wear a headscarf?

A: I don’t. No one can visibly identify me as a Muslim woman until the moment that I choose to identify myself, so there is a certain level of protection with that—which is not to say that everybody that I encounter is filled with anti-Muslim hatred, just that there are certain situations where you are aware of it. When I’m in Toronto, and I’m out in public with friends, or my husband, I dress any way I want. Sometimes, as when I’ve just been praying, I will still have my scarf on, and I’ll go out and never think twice about it. I don’t feel the pressure of looks or judgment.

But there have been many, many times here where I’ve felt that; that we’re attracting notice. So we’re careful. We don’t talk about issues in public, certainly not when we’re going to the airport. [laughs] We’re careful about what kind of books we have in public. When I want to pray inside my house, I draw my blinds. Those kinds of small accommodations are because you realize that people have heard negative things about Muslims and associate all Muslims with jihadists, and they’re wary and suspicious of them. And I’ve heard about Islamophobic incidents and attacks, so I’m wary and suspicious of other people, so it’s mutually reinforcing—even when I’m sure the majority of people don’t have those attitudes, just as the vast majority of Muslims are not jihadists. It’s a really sad state of affairs.

Source: The Interview: Crime author Ausma Zehanat Khan’s unique lens on Islam

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Canadian women give birth to children of ISIS fighters

2016/02/17 Leave a comment

No real surprise here that Canada is not exempt from this trend of some women living in the West, hard as it is to understand why, both objectively and from their families’ perspective.

Decisions have consequences, as other accounts of women who have traveled to Iraq and Syria have found out (‘There’s no way back now’: For female ISIL members, Syria is one-way journey).

These studies are helpful to highlight this (fortunately small) trend, and more important, inform counter-extremism strategies:

Canadian women are helping to grow the so-called Islamic State.

According to researchers at the University of Waterloo, three Canadian women have given birth to children of ISIS fighters, while another two are pregnant. The new details are part of a larger study following foreign fighters who flee to Syria and Iraq. The women travelled separately over the past two years, leaving their families back home devastated.

“They’re quite worried about what is going to happen to their daughter, but also their grandchild,” said Amarnath Amarasingam, a co-lead author of the study. “For most of the parents, I think there’s kind of a double reaction. First they’re kind of happy a grandchild is involved, but at the same time, they’re quite devastated that a child was born into a war zone, to somebody they’ve never met.”

Amarasingam said the women are between the ages of 19 and 22, and are from British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec. Families agreed to speak to the research team with the promise that specific personal details would be kept confidential. “Because there are so few Canadian women that have gone over, it will be quite obvious… who they are, if I talk (specifically) about where they are from.”

The researcher also said the challenges these women face are quite obvious. Although they have a place to live, it is difficult to find basic supplies like clothing and diapers. Some of the families back in Canada are keen to help their daughters, but are afraid of the legal consequences.

“If you were to send diapers to Syria, I don’t know if that contributes to real support of a terrorist organization, but it does rest on very shaky legal ground, in terms of what you’re allowed to send to a place like Raqqa,” said Amarasingam.

Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said this is “obviously a very disturbing development,” and recommitted to opening a national counter-radicalization office.

“We will be moving forward shortly, as rapidly as we can, on the creation of this new office for community outreach and counter radicalization,” said Goodale.

“I’m concerned with every dimension about this type of problem, it runs contrary to everything Canada stands for, in terms of values in the world,” he added.

The creation of a new office was part of a mandate letter from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to the public safety minister late last year. The Liberals aren’t saying yet if funding for the office will be included in the upcoming budget, but there are signs this program will be a priority.

Amarasingam said the challenges these women face become more complex because of their age. “These girls are very young,” he added, “they don’t have much experience in how to raise children, but they’re also raising these children under circumstances many others don’t have to worry about.”

Source: Canadian women give birth to children of ISIS fighters | CTV News

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‘We respect Islam and gay people’ …UK: The gay teacher transforming a Muslim school

2016/02/16 Leave a comment

Sharp contrast to some of those opposed to the new Ontario sex education curriculum and their fears that it undermined parent values, as well as a good example of school-parent relationships:

It took one complaint from a parent “as a Christian” to undo all Andrew Moffat’s work teaching children respect for people of different sexual orientation. A meeting of 40 parents followed with calls for an apology and the removal of books he had used in lessons.

Above all, the parents objected that he had told children he was gay. Moffat felt he could no longer continue and resigned. Far from retreating to a safe haven, however, he crossed Birmingham to take up an even greater challenge: assistant headteacher at Parkfield Community school, where 98.9% of pupils are from Muslim families.

The award-winning school is in the heart of a devout area where three inquiries have been held into the alleged “Trojan horse” plot by hardline Muslim governors to take over state schools, though Parkfield was not affected.

That was two years ago. With the backing of Hazel Pulley, the headteacher, Moffat went on to introduce a No Outsiders policy promoting diversity at the 770-pupil school, where 23 nationalities are represented. That includes welcoming people of any race, colour or religion and those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender.

A gay teacher teaching gay rights to pupils from a faith that believes homosexuality is a sin, punishable by death in some countries? It doesn’t seem possible and yet the school’s Muslim parents appear to have accepted that children can be taught about Britain’s anti-discrimination laws without undermining their religious beliefs. Learning from his unhappy experience at his previous school, Moffat has been careful to centre the policy around the Equality Act 2010, to first gain the support of the governing body, and to keep parents fully informed, inviting them in to see the books that would be used.

Now he has published a handbook about creating an ethos where everyone is welcome, regardless of differences: No Outsiders in Our School: Teaching the Equality Act in Primary Schools.

Moffat felt he had no alternative but to leave his previous school: “I knew I was letting down any pupil who might in years to come identify as LGBT and remember what had happened to me – if you ‘come out’ you risk a backlash and having to disappear. I was worried about that but in the end I decided that leaving was right for me and the school.

“It was a very difficult time and I was quite damaged by the experience. However, it gave me the opportunity to pick myself up and start again, learning from mistakes. There was no point in going to an area where it would be an easy task. I had to go where I might meet the same challenges in order to find a different way to meet them. I was determined to make LGBT equality a reality in any community. I could not afford to get it wrong a second time.”

Pulley says she appointed Moffat because she already knew of his work, in particular on improving pupil behaviour and on diversity. “I thought his approach was admirable. We already had similar work going on at school but we needed someone to lead it and give all the staff confidence,” she says.

It is possible to teach the law against discrimination in Britain without undermining any religious faith, she says: “Everyone knows we respect Islam here. One parent asked if he could not contradict what the school said. I told him that whatever parents said in the home was their decision but it’s lovely that the children will hear both views.”

The good relationship between governors, teachers and parents has helped, she says, and the fact parents have confidence in the school’s high standards – 97% of 11-year-olds reached or exceeded the expected standard for their age in both maths and English last year.

Last week parents, collecting their children before taking them to madrasas, the religious classes, spoke of their support. The school is “shedding light” on the minds of children, said one mother. Parents’ initial response had been “How dare they? How can the government make this law?” But their anger had abated once they learned more about the approach, they said.

“If they don’t learn about gay, lesbian and transgender people in society from school they will learn it from the outside world and they could hear things like ‘that’s disgusting’. I don’t want that,” said another. “I agree,” said a third. “I’d rather my children hear it at school. When they are at home we teach them that in our culture gay is not allowed but we respect people who are different from us and hope they too will respect us and the boundaries of our religion.”

The parent of a 10-year-old admitted her views differed from her husband’s: “My husband is a strict Muslim and my son asked him about the difference between what the school says and our religion. He did not give him a good reply. My reply was that God has created us and he is the only one who can judge us. I have told my son that it wouldn’t matter if he came home to me and said he was gay, you are my son and I will love you no matter what.”

Source: ‘We respect Islam and gay people’ … The gay teacher transforming a Muslim school | Education | The Guardian

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Islam was a religion of love, and the Taj Mahal proves it – The Washington Post

2016/02/15 Leave a comment

Haroon Moghul on the Islam of medieval times:


The sun is seen rising over the Taj Mahal in Agra, India, Nov. 18, 2009. (AP Photo/Gurinder Osan)

The Mughals are of course long gone now, and so is their world. It’s been done in by colonialism, sectarianism, a rush to modernization, and the great cultural distance that has opened up over centuries. But perhaps it’s worth revisiting, even a little bit.

I’m not rosy-eyed about that past. I certainly don’t think medieval monarchy is a model for the modern Muslim world, or any part of the world. These were kings and queens, who came to power through force. But that doesn’t mean they can’t speak to us.

The Mughals and Ottomans were more tolerant than many of their contemporary rivals. They were progressive for their time, and I don’t just mean compared to Muslims. These certainly weren’t secular democracies with any concept of human rights, but they also didn’t force their subjects to change religions.

They also cultivated a culture, rich and dynamic, that easily crossed boundaries, and that left us with world heritage. Instead of destroying the world’s heritage. And at the center of that philosophy was love. It was love that animated Rumi’s poetry; far from being some outlier in the Muslim world, he was a traditionally trained Sunni Muslim scholar, who communicated in unforgettable verse a worldview that most Muslims would have shared.

How else, after all, would you make sense of a God you cannot see, and a relationship that must be exclusive, except through love, which is, like God, invisible but nigh omnipotent, capable of moving men and mountains—no enemy ever unseated Shah Jahan’s empire in his time, but the loss of his love nearly broke the man. That idea of love was enough to animate a Muslim world that was tolerant enough to see Sunni and Shiite married, not mired in enmity.

There’s a reason South Asian Islam is so incredibly diverse and pluralistic—and that openness ran from everyday villagers who mingled across sect and religion all the way up to an emperor and empress, so deeply in love that their romance remains etched upon the face of the world. The interior of the building is adorned with Koranic verses, not only in a fervent wish to see the queen, and the husband who so honored her, sped by God to paradise.

But because love of one’s wife and love of one’s God were not just seen as complementary, but of the same kind; the former was the model for the latter. The Taj Mahal is of course many things to many people. For my beloved wife, it’s an unfair marker to hold a husband to. (I swear I would if I could.) It should also be a monument to Sunni and Shiite harmony, a reminder of a time when the core of the Muslim faith was love: Love of a person for himself, for his family, for his neighbors, for his Prophet, for his God. A time that shall come again. When Islam can be progressive for its time, when we will make the world beautiful, when we can be unapologetically Muslim and shamelessly besotted, because God is beautiful, as Muhammad said, and loves beauty.

Source: Islam was a religion of love, and the Taj Mahal proves it – The Washington Post

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ICYMI: Woman wearing burka denied service in Edmonton shop because of ‘no-mask policy’

2016/02/12 Leave a comment

Will be interesting to see whether a complaint is filed and if so, how will it be handled:

The owner of a north Edmonton shoe repair store says the reason he refused to serve a woman wearing a burka was motivated by safety, not religious or cultural reasons.

“We have a no-mask policy in the store and I certainly cannot discuss any race, religion, politics on the (sales) floor,” said Ryan Vale, owner of Edmonton Shoe Repair in Northgate Centre mall.

The response comes in the wake of accusations from 19-year-old Sarii Ghalab who claimed Vale told her he could not serve her because it goes against his ethical beliefs.

“He blatantly told her not to touch anything in his store and that he will not offer her any service,” Ghalab’s sister wrote in a Reddit post while searching for online advice.

A burka is a traditional dress worn by some Muslim women that covers everything except the eyes.

Ghalab later told CBC News that she tried to deliver flowers to Vale along with a letter explaining the reasons she wears the burka. But she said he simply ushered her out of the store.

Vale said that isn’t the case.

“I certainly did not bring up the issue of race,” said Vale, pointing out a hand-written sign on his counter saying “Please, for security reasons no facial coverings Thank you” as well as another printout saying “For security reasons NO MASKED CUSTOMERS ALLOWED” with a silhouette of a head wearing a balaclava.

“That’s the way it’s always been. I know lots of businesses adhere to that business — strictly a no-mask, veiled mask, policy in the store; for white people, black people, dogs, anything. Please show who you are for safety,” Vale said.

Ghalab said she isn’t looking for retribution (though her sister posted she would file a human rights complaint) and the incident details remain he-said-she-said.

Source: Woman wearing burka denied service in Edmonton shop because of ‘no-mask policy’

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