Why socialists should not support a state ban on hijab (continued)

Socialist Resistance no13 | page 15-16

This is scanned newsprint, not web text. The original PDFs carried no text layer at all, so every word here was read off the page by OCR. Expect dropped opening letters, run-together words and wrong characters. There was no contents page to cut the paper up by, so the articles were found from the size of their headlines: a headline may carry its kicker, and where an article ran beside a boxed panel a few lines of the neighbour can appear. The scanned issue is the authority; this text is here so the words can be found at all.

B HIJAB OU:

n France, the issue has centred on

wearing the hijab in schools, with many

in the main French teachers union (FSU) taking a reactionary stand, in the name of secularism, on the wearing of headscarves by young women pupils. There have already been controversial exclusions from schools.

As atheists, Marxists reject all religious and mystical beliefs, support the separation of church and state, and the creation of a secular state and secular education system.

We oppose religious schools, of which there are many of all confessions in Britain, we object to state subsidies for them, but do not propose to ban them by legal means. But our support for secular institutions does not mean the undemocratic imposition of secuInternational Resistance 16 soclalist resistance February 2004

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