I haven't been very involved with watching the news lately, but when I heard of this I wanted to know more. It seems like such an absurdity to me that France, a democratic society, can ban women from wearing veils that one Muslim woman, Kenza Drider, explains that the veil for her is, "a submission to God." The women who willingly wear these veils obviously do not feel imprisoned by them as the French president says it does. If these women felt imprisoned by them then why did they protest the law in front of Notre Dame Cathedral? Many of these women were detained for participating in an unauthorized protest. This seems incredibly wrong to me. Do people ever actually get protests authorized?
It seems as if the feelings about the law to people that are not of the Muslim community seem split down the middle. One woman said, "It's not a racist law. It's just a law that is coming from the history of France and so you need to accept it if you want to integrate into France and with French people." While someone else responded to the law with, "We are in France, we are in a democractic country where everyone has the right to do what they want. If they want to wear a veil or go completely nude that's their right." In a democratic society, people have the right to express themselves as they wish, which is why I don't understand why the people who run the government think its okay to tell their people differently. Thought there is a separation of church and state, it seems as though this line is blurred in order to discriminate against Muslims. This isn't the first time a law has happened like this either. In 2004, France banned headscarves and veils in the classroom, another law directed straight at the Muslim community.
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