Other Good Morals and Secularism

[Upton O Goode]

So not too long ago, a Muslim woman in France was forced to remove part of her clothing due to a ruling in Cannes. This ruling stated that "Access to beaches and for swimming is banned to any person wearing improper clothes that are not respectful of good morals and secularism", and "Beachwear which ostentatiously displays religious affiliation, when France and places of worship are currently the target of terrorist attacks, is liable to create risks of disrupting public order". 


I wanted to start a little discussion here (and yes, I know, I may be inviting disaster); what do we think about "good morals and secularism"? Just that one phrase. While I don't mind the discussion revolving around this incident or mentioning other related issues, I wanted to focus on that one little notion.

 

[Swindle]

I mean, secularism is fine. When religion is the state religion it can lead to dire consequences when it comes to freedom of thought/speech and education.

Good morals, though? In this context, I don't really see them. This is just an anti-Muslim ruling in a (literally) vain attempt to...you know, I'm not sure what they expect this to solve. It's clearly discriminatory, so the reasoning is obvious, but I'm not so sure how women not wearing burkinis on the beach will at all help the terrorist attacks taking place in France.

I wonder how long it will ultimately take people to realize that increasing tensions will only exacerbate things, not help them. In my terms I think good morals involves exercising compassion and good will with everyone, be it a human or non-human, and the silly reactionary policies coming out as a result of terrorist attacks is just a terrible continuation of the cycle of hate and killing to me. 

 

 

[Grey]

To address that line, 'good morals and secularism,' I'm just gonna say I'm a nihilist.  As far as I see it, morality is emotionally derived from a blend of tradition and sentimentality - what feels right sculpted by ambient cultural influences and social pressures. What might pass for universal morals overlap with good ethics and since the motivating factor behind most moral behaviours is fear of punishment there are surely circumstances under which those no longer apply. So depending on your own context, secularism may be inherently immoral or simply prone to immorality, but that achieves precisely as much as my opinion of the humidity here.


Ideally in a secular society you have an ethical framework derived from logical examination of evidence, driven by compassion and empathy - although being results driven in the long term seems to result in something indistinguishable from a compassionate intent. As an example, rehabilitative justice systems just work better than retributive ones, and do so while preserving human dignity and wellbeing. 


As for the specific case of France's anti-burkini law, it's wholly unethical. It's populist scapegoating which, in addition to being just vile in its cruelty and myopia, demonstrably will not yield positive results for anyone. Frankly, it's hard not to perceive it as misogynistic on top of the obvious religious and racial discrimination, using those latter prejudices to find an acceptable target for the former.


Do you have an opinion, @Tarquin ? You've probably only got another twelve hours before someone starts screaming about making America great again so we might as well get what polite discussion we can now.

 

[Upton O Goode]

@Grey I certainly do have an opinion, though I intend to keep it to myself so the topic is less about debating me and more about people expressing their own opinion.

 

[Grey]

Oh, I didn't intend to debate you. Just thought you might want to share your perspective as well. I didn't mean to suggest you had an obligation to do so.

 

[Lenasaurus]

Tl;dr: the issue isn't with secularism, but with a government's interventionism. Anything else is splitting hairs.


So sorry to invade a few hours ahead of schedule @Grey, but may I chime in? I am a moderate in terms of American politics (so I guess I'm a fascist here, as opposed to an octogenarian with my liberal friends, or an anarchist at my parents' dinner table), and equivocate with an intensity similar to one's involuntary need to breathe, so please bear with me.


I respectfully disagree with @Swindle, secularism isn't blameless here, it is no different or any less-abusable a leveraging point than religion or anything else. It is an excuse, something inert being used to justify an action.


This burqini thing is a (sad, stupid, poorly-executed, wasteful, cruel) well-intentioned misplay, by my reading.  It is an absurd reductionism of 'religion bad'  (in fact, this sort of ridiculous behavior is the kind of thing preppers and Bible-clingers worry will happen to them, so don't say it can't happen!) that could only be executed ham-handedly, and was.


As for the solution? Consider a library. At the library you can have a "dangerous" book like say the Anarchist's Cookbook. This is a book that ostensibly you could use to make a pipe bomb. Actually if you're clever enough you could even make a problem with the encyclopedia and a walk through the grocery store, but that's besides the point. It has no positive contribution, the Anarchist's Cookbook much more easily and much less productively (or whatever other argument you want to make for it being 'bad') exists as a potential threat than as anything else, so I really like to use it as an example because we still keep it in the library. We don't make librarians interview people when they take it out, we just give it to them.


Why?


Because librarians have other shit to do! It is impractical and detrimental to the library's mission to do otherwise. They don't want less books, less book-searchers, or have the funding for a surveillance wing. I think when you're talking about any concept, whether it's secularity, religiosity, morality, or anything else, you need to keep in mind goals and limitations like that - if you can't trust people like the library does (they're mostly harmless and worth trusting) then you're going to shoot yourself in the foot. This really doesn't work well with government because if government is giving you something it has cost and efficacy issues, and if a government is taking away something it's a tyranny, right?

 

[RatFlail]

"Good morals and secularism" is worth a philosophy textbook by itself, but I'll focus on how it relates to the burqini. Secularism itself is a rejection of letting religious ideas shape your behavior, so the burqini is against secularism.


As for morals, it is possible for secular entities to have morals based on innate human empathy (which has been scientifically proven for the majority of people) and on an unspoken social contract. Perhaps the moral that has been broken is the disguise of identity and emotions, since the burkini likely hides the face. Or it could be drawing attention to your rejection of fraterniti by emphasizing your cultural difference.


Now, whether the state itself has the right to impose secularism is a completely different argument. My home country (the U.S.) has a flexible prohibition on imposing secularism, but there's exceptions to that policy and of course the policy gets broken on occasion. Other countries have varying degrees of tolerance dependent on history and cultural needs. China, for example, likely would have a large problem with independence movements if they allowed the freedom that exists in the U.S. Religious freedom is a shared value in U.S. culture, which undercuts most calls for rebellion by religious demagogues.


France, due to its peculiar history, has imposed secular "Frenchness" for a long time. This incident isn't too surprising, considering they also ban crosses in schools. I'm not a fan of the policy, but it is not my country.

 

[Swindle]

After looking at what secularism actually means (and not what I thought it meant, which was just a lack of a state religion), I'd agree with you @Lenasaurus. I'm pretty much against any tool that the state could use to deny people their freedom of self-determination (you know, so long as it doesn't hurt others), so that was a sad, embarrassing misunderstanding on my part. 

 

[Lenasaurus]

Totally understandable, @swindle - I apologize if I tend to be a little defensive about faith: no one should be saying it is perfect, but I think that sometimes we get very lazy about our standards when we start bashing it. Glad my brittle reaction gave you the chance to learn a new word!

 

[RatFlail]

Yeah, pluralism is usually preferable to secularism, and it's easy to get them mixed up, especially with the ignorance in the standard U.S. newsroom. The government should operate in a secular manner with regard to its own decisions. That includes agents of the government, who should step down if they can't abide their office.


However, society and laws should be pluralistic except for certain societal and ethical norms. The exact definition of those norms is debatable. It's even possible for them to vary over time or by cultural development.


Much of Europe is not pluralistic, and it is the one place that they lag behind culturally. Of course, most of the world isn't pluralistic, either.

 

[SilverSkyWolf]

Stoping a woman wearing burkini isn't going to do any good, in fact it's going to give terrorists and excuse to bomb places making the French become even more anti Muslim it's a spiral of decline. Only a tiny proportion of Muslims are terriosts so why should you do anything to all the innocent Muslims. What if the woman wearing the burkini was white? Would have the police have acted differently if it was a white Muslim and not someone from Arab descent? If so somethings not right.