There’s a row brewing in a UK school over those “purity” rings used by evangelical Christian groups to signify a promise of sexual abstinence until marriage. Given this government’s obsessive bowing to artificial multiculturalism and subservience; dhimmitude, even; to various religious groups, the current spat is hardly surprising.
But the decision by one of the country’s top state schools to ban American-style ‘purity rings’ – increasingly worn by Christian teenagers to symbolise a pledge not to have sex before marriage – has prompted not just a standoff with local parents, but a debate over religious expression and sex education.
Let’s put aside for a moment the reasoning behind this abstinence teaching. Let’s just take it as Mr and Mrs Playfoot have; a religious expression. After all, this is what it is – an overt symbol of a religious promise and, as such, is harmless. As harmless as the hijab or the turban or the bangle or the kippah. If you allow one; you should, to be reasonable; allow the lot, as the Playfoots point out (somewhat obviously):
There are Muslim girls in the school who are allowed to wear the headcovering, although that isn’t part of the school uniform, and Sikh girls who are allowed the wear the bangle although that isn’t part of the uniform. It’s a discriminatory policy.
They are right, it is discriminatory. It would seem that Muslims, Sikhs or any minority religion may ignore school uniform rules, but Christianity is to be treated differently. Sorry, but no, not good enough. Rules if imposed, must apply to all. It is bad enough that we have religious indoctrination in state schools. It is bad enough that our government seeks to allow more faith schools, thereby furthering the indoctrination of impressionable minds; but this stand-off the outcome of mixing educational establishments with religious belief. There are myriad of belief systems out there. Each with their own rituals and symbols and each seeks to be taken seriously – and, worse, “respected”.
There is a more sensible approach. It is an approach that is logical and reasonable and it is only 22 miles away across the English Channel. A complete embargo on all religious symbols in state schools. School is a place to be educated, not indoctrinated. It is a place to learn, not flout one’s religious belief. The place for that is the home, church, mosque, temple or synagogue. If we adopted the French position on this, the Playfoots would have nothing to complain about. It doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t though…
“There is a more sensible approach. It is an approach that is logical and reasonable and it is only 22 miles away across the English Channel. A complete embargo on all religious symbols in state schools.
There is a more a sensible approach still – a complete embargo on state schools.
School is a place to be educated, not indoctrinated. If only. State schools, even if explicitly secular, nonetheless attempt to imbue a distinct set of values. These values, surprise, surprise, tend to support the status quo in the state which provides the given education. This is overtly acknowledged by the inclusion of citizenship on the UK national curriculum, but it occurs in all subjects and all systems of state education. Indeed, a distinction has been drawn between the manifest curriculum and the implicit curriculum in all schooling.
There are many arguments against the provision of state education in its current form, of which the above is only one. If we can arrange our lives so as to make it possible, and we’ve a couple of years yet to make the necessary changes, my partner and I will be home schooling our daughter…
Reading this in the Observer, I could not help wondering why the issue was in the national press. Surely the issue relates to the policy of a particular school, and so should appear (if anywhere) in a newspaper local to the area.
Or does the demos look for the setting of a national and centralised policy, against the wishes of those who, like me, hold subsidiarity in high regard.
Best regards
You’re absolutely right: the French approach is logical and consistent: it simply bans all religiosity (in whatever form) from all state matters, whilst, importantly, guaranteeing the same religious freedoms we enjoy here.
But then we forget that France suffered under the yoke of a terribly repressive state religion (Catholicism), and its secularism id rooted in overthrowing this de facto theocracy. Britain almost suffered the same fate but C of E never quite gained the complete upper hand, thank G-d! British fairly half-hearted secularism has the drawback that we have to witness the rise of faith schools, which will encourage various ethnic-religious groups to entrench themselves in self-chosen ghettos, from cradle to grave.
Will there come a day when a British PM closes a speech with the words “God bless England”?
Comments here seem to indicate viewing how bad is the banning the wearing of (quasi-)religious artefacts as different in state schools from non-state schools. I think I go along with that, at least to the extent that the schools in question were not “given” to the state by religious foundations (mostly Christian), and subject to certain restrictive covenents.
However, the issue here looks to be more the inconsistency of the ban. That is within a single school.
Best regards
The nub of my argument is the inconsistency. You should either ban the lot or allow the lot; to do otherwise is to discriminate. It is happening in a state school. The reason that I mentioned the French system is that a ban on all religious symbols across the state school system would avoid this in its entirety. It is for much the same reason that I support the idea of a uniform policy. Children attend school for the purpose of education – this type of argument is an unnecessary distraction.
Notice also, that the governors have resorted to the usual bastion of petty officials everywhere when their tyranny is challenged; they invoke the “health and safety” excuse.
Privately owned schools are another matter, particularly if they are faith schools…