Now the swiss ban burqas.

[NotAllThere]

It's not about race. It is whether a Swiss political party was mobilising anti-Islamic feeling by putting forward this inititiative.

Which they clearly were.

I think it's fairly obvious to anyone that plenty of people are in favour of such a ban for reasons other than not liking Muslims or Islam.

[TwoWolves]

I have an Iranian mathematician friend who campaigns against the Burqa. She doesn't have anything nice to say about Islam either. She jokes that only the ugly birds are in favour as it levels the playing field for them.

Stop making it about race.

[NotAllThere]

It was about Islam as many of the more xenophobic Europeans view the religion, and as the populist SVP are heppy to exploit.

Having said that, on balance I was marginally in favour of it, as was my wife. Even though it means agreeing with Polly Toynbee

[jayn200]

Nah. It was targeted at Islam. The SVP have history. It's not a I've off. The vote was very narrowly in favour.

Quite interesting to create a law targeting islam that has nothing to do with islam.

You'd think they would target head coverings which are part of islam and actually impact the muslim population living there if they actually were targeting islam.

[NotAllThere]

I expected it wasn't as clear cut as it seems the Swiss always seem practical about things. They probably just want to avoid people robbing banks and escaping justice through passport control in them.

Nah. It was targeted at Islam. The SVP have history. It's not a one off. The vote was very narrowly in favour.

[vetran]

The last part is due to how useless every single part of the Home Office is.

Quite probably you would have thought someone would have explored the possibility that someone would find a head to toe mask handy to get through passport control or raid a bank.

[SueEllen]

I expected it wasn't as clear cut as it seems the Swiss always seem practical about things. They probably just want to avoid people robbing banks and escaping justice through passport control in them.

The last part is due to how useless every single part of the Home Office is.

[jayn200]

The SVP (Schweizer Volk Partei) have a history of racist political adverts. You can google it. They're the ones who put forward this initiative. TBH, I've never seen anyone wearing a full face veil around here, although rich Saudia Arabians love to shop in Geneva and Zürich.

My daughters voted against it. Bleeding heart millenial liberals that they are.

I full expect that the next carnival (Fasnacht) will have people dressed up in burqas. There's exemptions for carnival, and many of the cliques go in for political satire.

Crazy you would think a liberal would support women's rights above the rights of men who seek to enslave them but i guess modern day liberals have got a lot of tulip backwards these days.

[jayn200]

Amazing. Hope more countries follow suit. Can't believe any rationale human being would put cultural rights above gender equality and women's rights. I definitely don't want to associate with anyone who does.

There are no religious passages that mandate it, covering of the head yes but not the face, that's purely a cultural thing.

Muslims from Turkey, bosnia, and kosova don't wear them anyway and if that's the majority of muslims in switzerland not sure that it will impact any significant population anyway.

These policies are great by the way... when these types of bans are implemented, large percentages of these populations actually do modify what they wear.

[vetran]

The SVP (Schweizer Volk Partei) have a history of racist political adverts. You can google it. They're the ones who put forward this initiative. TBH, I've never seen anyone wearing a full face veil around here, although rich Saudia Arabians love to shop in Geneva and Zürich.

My daughters voted against it. Bleeding heart millenial liberals that they are.

I full expect that the next carnival (Fasnacht) will have people dressed up in burqas. There's exemptions for carnival, and many of the cliques go in for political satire.

I expected it wasn't as clear cut as it seems the Swiss always seem practical about things. They probably just want to avoid people robbing banks and escaping justice through passport control in them.

[NotAllThere]

The SVP (Schweizer Volk Partei) have a history of racist political adverts. You can google it. They're the ones who put forward this initiative. TBH, I've never seen anyone wearing a full face veil around here, although rich Saudia Arabians love to shop in Geneva and Zürich.

My daughters voted against it. Bleeding heart millenial liberals that they are.

I full expect that the next carnival (Fasnacht) will have people dressed up in burqas. There's exemptions for carnival, and many of the cliques go in for political satire.

[vetran]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...-public-places

Campaign ads it paid for showed a woman wearing a niqab and sunglasses alongside the slogan: “Stop extremism! Yes to the veil ban.”

Wowser makes us apparently "xenophobic" Brits look tame.

Muslims make up around 5% of the Swiss population of 8.6 million, or about 390,000 people, most of whom have their roots in Turkey, Bosnia and Kosovo.

The referendum outcome means Switzerland will follow France, which banned wearing a full face veil in public in 2011. Full or partial bans on wearing face coverings in public are also in place in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark and the Netherlands.