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"The ban is on schoolgirls wearing it in school. "
Do we reserve the right of bourgeois schools to impose a dress code on its
students?
That runs counter to free self expression on the part of the students.
When I was going to school girls would be humiliated routinely by principals
who'd measure their skirts to make sure they were long enough. Black students
were forbidden from wearing Afros.Should Amish and Mennonite women be
prohibited from wearing the prayer cap in U.S. schools? Should Sikh students
be prohibited from keeping a kirpan with them?
The right to a public education trumps these from the point of view of uniting
the working class. To demand otherwise is to force these kids into private
religious schools or to identify more strongly with reactionary religious
forces in their communities as the protector of their ethnic and religious
rights.
I think the NPA is to be commended to publicly and forthrightly challenge the
reactionary anti-Muslim wave in France. This sentiment is an expression of the
bourgeoisie to divide the working class.
As for the rights of the women involved, they should have the right to wear
what they like, as they prefer. They should not be forced by the state to
choose between their ethnic traditions and public education.
Adam Richmond
San Francisco
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