That’s what a friend of mine said about the recent burqa ban passed in France. As a social liberal, my immediate reaction to this mandate is that it’s not right. But fine, if the French government wants to eliminate religious paraphernalia in public places, then the Star of David and religious crosses should be banned, as well. However, the rationale behind the law is that the French government considers the burqa to be a display of gender inequality as opposed to religious and looks at this as a way of helping to promote gender equality amongst Muslim immigrants. I can agree with the gender inequality aspect, but what religion doesn’t have oppressive practices for females?

The way I see it is that these types of laws are audacious. If government is now intervening to ensure that immigrant women have more of even playing field, it should first make sure that French citizens are leading by example, right? Well, the 2010 Gender Gap study published by the World Economic Forum shows that France has gone from 18th to 46th place, mostly because of the lack of women in high-ranking government positions. So, I think the Sarkozy administration should start promoting gender equality in-house before trying to fix other communities. What’s also tricky about this type of legislation is it can be a slippery slope. Will it stop at the burqa, or will it continue into other aspects of the Muslim religion? Moreover, will the government also look to expand into non-Muslim religions?

What I also find interesting is that while this law has overwhelming support by the French public, a Pew poll found that 2 out of 3 Americans are against it. I think that’s a reflection of Americans’ aversion to letting government dictate too much of their personal lives. Even with all the anti-Muslim rhetoric that’s getting a lot of media time these days, Americans have their limits when it comes to government involvement.

While I can understand where my friend is coming from, until there is more consistency and clarity in France’s decisions regarding religious freedoms, I can’t get behind this. What are your thoughts on the burqa ban?

To live anywhere in the world today and be against equality because of race or color is like living in Alaska and being against snow. ~William Faulkner

I’ve been very sad to hear about the intolerance that’s been going on in the states lately. Last week, I wrote about how being black in Venezuela has worked to my advantage in terms of crime. While there was a bit of humor to the topic, I don’t think that anyone being mistreated because of their race or ethnicity is a laughing matter.

Many of the expats here in Caracas have been asking me what the he** is going on over in the US. Why are Americans all of a sudden becoming even more intolerant? I’m not going to pretend to know the exact reason the US is seeing a surge in people being a lot more vocal about their racism. What I do know is that they’ve been given a huge stage to put on a show. And who’s providing this stage…the American media.

My theory is that there were always racist and intolerant Americans. However, there was a time (post Civil Rights Movement) when it became taboo to openly express their views on people who are different, so you almost forgot they existed. The only places they ventured to spout racial epithets were their own homes or places where like-minded people congregated. On a national level, we tried to uplift our conversations and reverting to the use of racial slurs was considered politically incorrect.

Somehow, around the time we elected the first mixed-race president, the standards shifted. So now it’s common place for media outlets to give a lot of airtime to the minority of Americans harboring a lot of hate for immigrants, homosexuals, blacks, Muslims, etc. Unfortunately, some of us have become desensitized quickly to hearing such ignorance and anger in the mainstream media. Next thing you know, we’ll be seeing television series with similar themes disguised as comedy.

I hope that before we erode any more of the progress that has been made in the last 40+ years, we’ll start to self-police and expect more from each other, as well as journalists. In the interim, I will continue to teach my children that race is irrelevant and harboring hate will destroy their souls.

N.B. The title of this post is a quote from an unknown author.