A fellow blogger by the name of TomCat has a site he calls Politics Plus. He covers a variety of topics on the political arena in the US. Some of you may or may not agree with his positions on certain topics but he gets you thinking. He has been doing this series on The Political Right and Left on Religion. Some very thought provoking topics and discussions have ensued because of this topic. One such post had to do with Tolerance. I voiced my opinion on this topic, but having done that. I now find myself faced with something that I am finding terribly troubling, and would be interested in hearing your views on this topic.
In Province of Quebec the FIFA(Federation Internationale de Football Association) has ruled that a young Muslim girl could not wear her hijab while playing soccer. Their ruling is based on their Law #4 which outlines the safety of the players. This law allows the referee to use his or her discretion at the time to determine if it is safe to play. If the offender of the Law doesn't like the referee's' ruling they can take their complaint to the FIFA. You can read more here. The Muslim community are outraged at the FIFA's ruling and are seeking Human Rights Action. I am of mixed feeling on this topic. My first instinct is to agree with the ruling of the FIFA and I base this purely on the fact of personal safety for the girl playing the sport. I have seen my daughters play this game and I have watched how rough it can get out there. The referee makes all the girls take off any necklaces, earrings any jewelry in order to help minimize injury and checks their cleats and if the girls have long hair, their hair must be pulled back. Now I guess a girl could be pulled down by her ponytail but I don't see her getting choked by it as could be the case with the hijab.
Here is a scenario for you. The young girl is running up and down the field with her hijab and the ends of this head scarf are tucked safely into her jersey. She gets checked or tripped and falls and another player tumbles onto her the other player unbeknown to her gets up but the the Muslim girls hijab has gotten caught on the other girl, the girl runs thus choking the the young girl with her own head dress. Playing sports already have their inherent risk why would we want to increase the risk for possible injury? If we know that there is a potential for something to happen should we not be prudent in trying to prevent it? To me its like knowing a car seat will save your child, but you opt not to use one because you believe that it infringes on your child's freedom of being. Personal choice ...right? or wrong? Research has shown car seats save lives but people still chose not to put their child in one. So no one has died yet or been injured as a result of wearing a hijab during a sporting event. Is that what it would take to show that it is not safe?
It's not as though the FIFA just made up this rule, it has always been there. The team and the individual should have known the rules before she attempted to play or she should have sought clarification of the Law #4 before she started playing. Should the FIFA be forced to change their ruling to meet the needs of one Religious group? Should they be forced to over look the safety aspect in order to meet their needs? Are parents of the girls who wear the hijab going to fore go any law suit if their daughter is injured as a result of her wearing her hijab?
What do you think?
18 comments:
I do believe in the freedom of following your religion BUT when it comes to safety, the rules are there and as you said, this girl and her parents should have been aware of that. For another example...underground miners here have to shave off their beards and mustaches so that their safety masks can fit properly...some were saying they had no right to make them shave. It's a very complicated subject and they can't start changing safety rules for the sake of this one or that one's beliefs.
MA, I totally agree with you on the safety issue.
The real issue, however, is forcing a girl or a woman to wear the thing (hijab) in the first place. Or a full body covering, or a veil, or anything that covers up the body in the name of religion for that matter. This is crap and I'm against anything that infringes upon women's rights as human beings. These are fabricated by men. As far as I can tell, most of the troubles and wars in this world are caused by men. And, that would be the day when a man would tell me to cover my hair or my face or my body with ANYTHING, all in the name of religion. (Thank you for allowing me to rant a little.)
This girl should be allowed to play sport but she should also conform to the rules that everybody must abide by.
I'm finished now. (Am I tolerant enough?)
I agree on the issue of everyone has a right to follow their own religious beliefs.
I also feel that she should have known the rules or law #4 before signing up to play this sport. If we change a law for one, aren't we going to have to re-evaluate all laws on individual basis instead of on safety? I think that safety should come first in this case.
And, if I dare go out on a limb here, I sometimes feel that certain religious groups or ethnic groups push an issue to try and force us into fitting in with their lifestyle instead of them trying to fit in with the lifestyle of the country they have chosen to make their home in.
I hope this statement doesn't generate a lot of bad comments for you or ill feelings toward me, but that's how I feel.
Ladies, I am glad you are speaking your minds. We all need to feel that we can do that and have open dialogue on topics such as this. It's only through dialougue that anything positive can happen.
I believe there is more to this issue than meets the eye. But I think the FIFA are trying not to open the flood gets on this one. I truly wish them luck and I am very interested to see what the outcome will be.
Count me in as in agreement with you and the other commenters. Which is more important - your child's safety and life and being able then to practice whatever religion you chose, or your religion at the risk of personal safety and possibly loss of life. To me, the personal safety trumps the religious belief there. Good points too about many of the religious rules (in just about all religions) being made by men for and about women. I hadn't thought of that but it's true.
Well, my feelings about tolerance are well know to RN, but on this issue, I'm going along with the crowd. Freedom of religion is a right. Playing soccer is a privilege, with rules established for the safety of the players. The girl in question has the right to wear her hijab, but if doing so presents a legitimate safety concern, the choice between exercising her right and taking advantage of the privilege is hers. If the issue had been over forbidding her to wear her hijab on the street while walking to a store, that would be a different matter, but in this case, there is no intolerance.
well said TC...thank you for your comment..
While I agree with FIFA on the ruling I must also mention that I have seen a few news pieces on Muslem women playing soccer in the Middle East and they all wear their hijabs.
I agree with pretty much everything said. Mostly I agree that if you move to a new country you have to understand the country will not conform to you and you have to accept that things will not be the same as they were for you in your old country. This is a pet peve of mine. Yes I understand respecting and tolerating other peoples and there traditions I feel this is very very important to do. So why can't they respect the new country they move to and there traditions and rules? I think this is the real question to be asked.
My comment was not meant to be rude or offensive in any way so if I did offend someone I am sorry.
Short answer.. Safety first!
This is a very interesting topic. I value the importance of religion but I also give priority to safety. I think safety is the no.1 consideration in this kind of scenario. I'm sorry that the Muslim community was outraged by the decision. I hope that both parties can somehow come up with a good compromise for the benefit of all.
Talking about child car seat. Sadly, there is no law in the Philippines that obligates people to use child car seats. But when my husband and I had our son, we decided to get a car seat for Yohan because we value his safety very much. Even there is no law that obligates us, we have personally decided to secure our child in the car. We feel better knowing he is safe in his car seat whenever we are travelling.
Thank you for visiting my blog. I appreciate your comment. My husband and I would like to spend as much time as we can as a family so that when we look back over the years, we'll have many great memories to cherish.
Ditto, Tomcat.
I would immediately have said safety first and stood firmly by not allowing the hijab to be woen on the field. Now, that it has been brought up that many women play soccer wearing hijabs, I wonder what the safety statistics really are, though.
Marcia wonders what safety statistics really are. WBP said that women in the middle east play in their hijabs. These are both good points and food for thought.
I'm going to guess that the originators of the safety regulations don't know what the the statistics are and instituted the regulations with the intention of preventing statistics. It may well be that playing in a hijab is as safe as playing without one. However, I bet that those regulations were laid down long before the the possibility of playing in a hijab had ever occurred to anyone. If the Muslim community can demonstrate that playing in a hijab is safe, perhaps they could have presented their evidence and gotten the rule changed. Claiming religious intolerance was the worst approach they could take, because now, they have put the people who set the rules on the defensive.
Thanks, RN. Do I get some quail or herring now? ;-)
TC for you my friend you may dine on mince and plenty of quince.....from the poem The Owl and the pussycat. Again great points made.
I imagine this has a whole lot to do with the school's liability insurance. Because so many people are claiming discrimination, insurance premiums are going sky-high. I don't know how it is in Canada. Knowing this was against the school rules and then hollering that it's unfair is ridiculous.
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I'm tired of having to "Dial One For English" in my own country, so perhaps I'm just a tad bitter! But everyone seems to be whining about something these days...
Safety first, and if she didn't know the rules the coaches should have and it should only have been an issue at the beginning and you conform or you don't play.
I don't know if Isadora Duncan was the only person strangled by her own scarf caught in the wheel of a car, but one is too many and if you can prevent a similar accident on the soccer field, well you should, IMHO.
Regards
jmb
From the article you linked:
The Canadian Council on American-Islam Relations said the Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) was sending a mixed message on its rules, given that its own Web site includes pictures of women wearing the hijab, a scarf that covers the head and neck.
This is the part that troubles me -- and suggests that there's more to this story than just the enforcement of a long-standing safety regulation.
If you have a rule, why do you have a promotional photograph with a girl in a head scarf?
Good point, Curmudgeon, but the article also said: The 11-year-old girl, Asmahan Mansour, was ordered off the field by a Muslim referee during an indoor soccer tournament in the Montreal suburb of Laval, Quebec, on February 25 after refusing to remove her hijab.
I tend to doubt that that ref had anti-Muslim sentiments.
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