Some may find comparison with the Saudi mutaween excessive, but
fundamentally, what the enforcers will be doing is not so different.
https://montrealgazette.com/opinion/columnists/martin-patriquin-here-come-quebecs-secularism-enforcers?fbclid=IwAR3oviOqXdZ7nlXQ-KujRmdc8RKXh2gZ3hGCuX7MuZ3wFV-4NODqsZtPFeY
In Saudi Arabia, there is a group of righteous men whose job is to enforce the country’s strict laws regarding dress and gender segregation. Practically speaking, the mutaween, as these men are known, spend much of their time haranguing people for all sorts of alleged crimes, but mostly women for things like visible hair, uncovered faces, unconcealed skin, and painted fingernails and eyelids. Saudi Arabia’s frankly terrifying obsession with how women dress has long been bureaucratized; the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, for whom the mutaween toil, employs some 6,000 people.
As of Sunday, thanks to a series of last-minute amendments shovelled into the already-onerous “laicity law,” Quebec now has its own version of the mutaween. To be sure, the province’s forthcoming secularism enforcers won’t be patrolling Quebec’s streets, beaches and malls, as their focus will be government workplaces, not the public square. And due to the government’s studied opacity on the issue, we aren’t yet sure who they will be. As it stands under the law, affected government ministers can appoint “a person” to verify whether all is kosher in the proverbial ministerial kitchens. Assuming the process is complaints-based, these may well be very busy people indeed.
Some may find comparison with the Saudi mutaween excessive, but fundamentally, what the enforcers will be doing is not so different: policing what people, mostly women, wear on their bodies, with the imprimatur of the government behind them. The potential consequences of this are alarming. Any government worker with “power of authority” — a category into which the government has shoehorned teachers — who refuses to doff religious items can lose their job. Thanks to a grandfather clause, those already wearing these religious objects will be spared, but only if they remain in the same position. A transfer, demotion or promotion means they can no longer display their religiosity. (Inexplicably, they can get a visible tattoo, shave their heads or grow a long beard in accordance with their religion — all still permissible under the law.)
https://montrealgazette.com/opinion/columnists/martin-patriquin-here-come-quebecs-secularism-enforcers?fbclid=IwAR3oviOqXdZ7nlXQ-KujRmdc8RKXh2gZ3hGCuX7MuZ3wFV-4NODqsZtPFeY
In Saudi Arabia, there is a group of righteous men whose job is to enforce the country’s strict laws regarding dress and gender segregation. Practically speaking, the mutaween, as these men are known, spend much of their time haranguing people for all sorts of alleged crimes, but mostly women for things like visible hair, uncovered faces, unconcealed skin, and painted fingernails and eyelids. Saudi Arabia’s frankly terrifying obsession with how women dress has long been bureaucratized; the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, for whom the mutaween toil, employs some 6,000 people.
As of Sunday, thanks to a series of last-minute amendments shovelled into the already-onerous “laicity law,” Quebec now has its own version of the mutaween. To be sure, the province’s forthcoming secularism enforcers won’t be patrolling Quebec’s streets, beaches and malls, as their focus will be government workplaces, not the public square. And due to the government’s studied opacity on the issue, we aren’t yet sure who they will be. As it stands under the law, affected government ministers can appoint “a person” to verify whether all is kosher in the proverbial ministerial kitchens. Assuming the process is complaints-based, these may well be very busy people indeed.
Some may find comparison with the Saudi mutaween excessive, but fundamentally, what the enforcers will be doing is not so different: policing what people, mostly women, wear on their bodies, with the imprimatur of the government behind them. The potential consequences of this are alarming. Any government worker with “power of authority” — a category into which the government has shoehorned teachers — who refuses to doff religious items can lose their job. Thanks to a grandfather clause, those already wearing these religious objects will be spared, but only if they remain in the same position. A transfer, demotion or promotion means they can no longer display their religiosity. (Inexplicably, they can get a visible tattoo, shave their heads or grow a long beard in accordance with their religion — all still permissible under the law.)
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