Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
From the website of France 24:
A French businessman has set up a fund to pay fines for women who wear Islamic veils or the burqa in public “in whatever country in the world that bans women from doing so”.
Rachid Nekkaz, 38, a real-estate businessman based in Paris, travelled to Belgium on Wednesday to pay 100 euros for two women fined in the first case in the country since the law was adopted there.
“I’m in favour of a law to convict a husband who forces a women to wear the niqab and who forces her to stay at home. But I’m also for a law that lets these women move freely in the streets, because freedom of movement, just like any freedom, is the most fundamental thing in a democracy, ” Nekkaz told reporters outside the courtroom in Belgium.
The same day, he paid a 75 euro fine for a woman in the north-eastern French town of Roubaix.
“I am calling for civil disobedience,” he told FRANCE 24. “I am telling women to not be afraid to go out wearing their veils. And by paying the fines, I am neutering the law, rendering it inefficient and pointless, showing that it doesn’t work. It is a humiliation for the politicians.”
Monsieur Nekkaz, pest or hero?
Over to the Ricochetoise.
(H/t to Stephen Schmalhofer.)
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Jul '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
I have just set up a fund to aid in the criminal defense of any person that rips the burkha off a woman in public. End the symbol of slavery now!!
Jun '10
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
He's not my hero because I think the veils are obnoxious and misogynistic and women who submit to this attire have themselves to blame for their circumstances. They also may be doing exactly as they please and if so, good for them. To those women, this man is a hero. I admire his strength of conviction. He is putting his money where his mouth is, so to speak, without doing harm. Except the harm that may be done by allowing a segment of society to have their faces hidden in public. That is, I suppose, the reason for the law. In this country it might be possible to accuse the gentleman of interferring with a police officer, because he is enabling the breaking of the law. I have no idea about how that works in France. Overall this is a pretty mixed bag.
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
A few months ago, in Bangladesh, a young girl of 14 was beaten and raped. According to the savage irrationality that is Sharia, she was judged to be guilty of having an affair with a married man, the sentence of which was 101 lashes for her,…not the rapist. This child, who was walking from her room to an outdoor toilet when she was abducted, beaten and raped, collapsed after 70 lashes, and died. The official autopsy declared her death a suicide.
Let Mr. Nekkaz go and rescue girls like young Hena. Let him raise some sand over the women who are stoned under Sharia law. This little pimple of a man goes to France and says, "I am telling women to not be afraid to go out wearing their veils," as an act of philanthropy and valor? Let him go to the belly of the beast and tell women not to be afraid to go out without a veil, or drive a car, or to simply exist without fear of mutilation, rape, or murder. Until then, let's recognize his charity for the Grade A, USDA Approved horse squeeze that it is.
Mar '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
Hold on a minute there, Pilgrim, read what the man says about the personal freedom of voluntarily wearing the burkha in public.
The man's standing on principle, and protecting the freedom of others protects his own freedom and the freedom of us all. There's a line here, and we must be sure upon which side we fall.
Mar '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
In his own way, I think that's what he just did.
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
I think I read Peter's post in haste, and wrote in haste. Evidently, Nekkaz lives in France and travelled to Belgium to make a stand. My bad. But I stand by the larger point that if he wants to do something about women's rights, he should take his money and hop a plane to Saudi Arabia, Iran, or any number of countries where failing to wear the prescribed gear can bring catastrophic results, and where being assaulted is itself a crime punishable by death. Flitting around Europe worrying about veils seems more of an effort to capture the spotlight than anything else.
Mar '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
I respecfully disagree. Europe isn't (yet) under sharia law; there's a tradition of individual liberty which we inherited from Europe which needs nurturing there if it isn't to be extinguished altogether. That's where Western culture must make its stand. Of course the treatment of women in the Middle East is ghastly, this film and others showing stonings need to be as widely distributed as possible to make it plain what we're up against. However, if M. Nekkaz is serious when he says that one's appearance in public, if not compelled, is an individual right, I will stand by him, for he is right.
Edited on Aug 30, 2011 at 12:15pmJul '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
Illiniguy, he is veiling his argument with freedom and liberty. I read that quote and was even more disgusted at his lies and deceit in his quest for legalized misogyny .
He might well have said," I'm not in favor of placing black people in chains involuntarily but those who choose to go around in shackles attached to a masters buggy...."
These women are indoctrinated to be as dogs to their men and the concept of "choice" is not taught to them at all.
Mar '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
It's not about these individual women and what they wear in public, because if that is their choice, it's none of our concern. How Islam treats women is another discussion altogether. I suggest that you start by reading "The Bookseller of Kabul" if you want a first hand account of how women are treated in tribal societies.
What we're talking about here is the right of the State to determine the motivations of its individual citizens based on their appearance. What is that but the pathway to tyranny?
Oct '10
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
Taking up residence in a host country means one abides by the laws, period.
Certain identification methods as a driving lisc. require photos. Seems some folk have avoided paying traffic fines as they could not be identified due to the covering.
It is also a security issue, but to say that makes you a racist. Sorry, Muslim is not a race.
Mar '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
There's no such thing as an ill-advised law? This law doesn't get to the root of the problem, it's merely a cosmetic effort to make it appear that something is being done about a much more dire condition.
Edited on Aug 30, 2011 at 12:26pmJul '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
A religious cult leader with hundreds of wives between the ages of 15 and 30. All of them bred for the purpose of servitude and told nothing else. So do the 18 yr olds qualify as having choice. I suppose about as much as any koolaid drinker in jonestown did.
May '10
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
When Claire conceded that the security argument against the burqa was weak, that, among other things, convinced me that this measure was a foolish one. The Doha debate on this issue demonstrates why this ban will be counterproductive.
Mar '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
Are you talking about Warren Jeffs?
May '10
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
And so Muslim women who, we are told, are harassed by their overbearing husbands will be assisted by the French state via confiscatory penalties for wearing an article of clothing. It strains credulity.
Jul '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
Ah God bless his coma riddled soul, I was just alluding to that type of character. I was also comparing polygamist cult children to Muslim females in terms of the indoctrination from birth as second class humans. How much burkha wearing is "choice"
In the end, the undoing of that religions oppressiveness will need to come from the women who reject the indentured servitude but France is trying to force the issue through social legislation which is how they do everything. The nation that is always one war behind in its strategy is taking a shot across the bow at the giant cultural tidal wave that spells the doom of France as we know it.
Oct '10
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
Illiniguy
There's no such thing as an ill-advised law? This law doesn't get to the root of the problem, it's merely a cosmetic effort to make it appear that something is being done about a much more dire condition. · Aug 30 at 12:25pm
Edited on Aug 30 at 12:26 pm
Sadly, ill advised laws do abound. The PC culture and Multi Culturalism is a fearfull beast that politicians do want not to address. After a time any given culture will discover it was not as elastic as proposed..
Mar '11
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
DocJay: Ah God bless his coma riddled soul, I was just alluding to that type of character. I was also comparing polygamist cult children to Muslim females in terms of the indoctrination from birth as second class humans. How much burkha wearing is "choice"
In the end, the undoing of that religions oppressiveness will need to come from the women who reject the indentured servitude but France is trying to force the issue through social legislation which is how they do everything.
Does one reject indentured servitude by submitting to a different form of compulsion? And if the State can prohibit this, what can't it prohibit?
May '10
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
Why must we let the perfect be the enemy of the good? So Mr. Nekkaz is of no use to us unless he's swashbuckling in Bangladesh, rescuing young women from the depredations of a sadist legal system? What will he do, break them out of jail?
Edited on Aug 30, 2011 at 1:18pmMay '10
Re: Burqa Fines in France: Picking Up the Tab
I've never seen such an eager willingness to levy fines upon an already marginalized minority for having committed no violent crime from people bitterly opposed to levying taxes on billionaires. Be consistent.