Switzerland: Muslim students must shake teacher's hand

[Bollocks]

And they are here, instead of me being in their culture. Why should it go their way instead of mine, when it all happens in my culture/place?

Yes, its true, but it certainly doesn't deserve an economical sanction and it certainly should not be supported by the law.

[Azadina]

Yeah, but we are talking about first world countries, hell even here in southamerica is just common sense to let people be themselves as long as they are respecting local customs and not breaking the law.

And as handshaking seems to be local custom, not doing it is not respecting that custom. And when they've targeted women specifically with the refusal, it's discrimination and breaks the law too. So how was it ok again?

[Bollocks]

Do students in South America get away with disrespecting teachers?

No they don't, but they aren't economically sanctioned by it and the punishment is certainly within the legal code.

And? Public schools are part of the government.

That's the thing, public schools should not be forcing traditions to other people. Students are not legally forced to sing the national anthem, and atheists are not forced to preach to our god, they have that freedom.

[Granyala]

Yes, its true, but it certainly doesn't deserve an economical sanction and it certainly should not be supported by the law.

Absolutely it should!

In their country it is okay to be disrespectful against a scantily clad women. Their culture, their rules.
In ours it is not okay. They need to treat a women with the same degree of respect, no matter how distasteful or flimsy her clothing is.

The moment they are here, whether they are guests, asylum seekers or citizens, our rules and our laws apply to them and they MUST be enforced.

If I go to the beach and slap a random bikini wearing woman on her rear and call her a slut, I am in BIG trouble.
Same should apply to muslims. No "special deal" or "kid gloves" because "their culture" bullshit.

[ranzino]

Then integration of the parents failed on a massive scale.

The citizenship process is halted and the asylum application reviewed, says OP. Fat chance they will never become citizens of switzerland...and deported soon.

[nonameelf]

Rome was a dictatorial empire with no respect for human rights.


The party wanting to force an action will always lose.
You want to force them to shake hands, not going to happen.
People here might want to force you to kiss, not going to happen.


And we all know what happens next.
The school will be sued, the school will lose.

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Sue them for discrimination and get laughed at by the judge?

So, they should just give up and let them be outright sexist and grow up to be ostracized from work environments because employers won't want to deal with that shit leading them to be unproductive members of society?

That's the thing, public schools should not be forcing traditions to other people. Students are not legally forced to sing the national anthem, and atheists are not forced to preach to our god, they have that freedom.

The point of school is to prepare people to be productive members of society. People who are outright sexist are not going to be productive members of society.

The citizenship process is halted and the asylum application reviewed, says OP. Fat chance they will never become citizens of switzerland...and deported soon.

Probably. Switzerland has much higher standards for asylum seekers than the rest of Europe.

[PassingBy]

ok, none of those are comparable.

Also, its not a universal cultural thing to shake hands.

If they want to impose sharia law thats an issue, and its rightly resisted and not allowed. So whats the issue?

Seems its a case of lets have a go at muslims over trivial issues because we all want to be racist right now.....

Not having a gay parade is not a universal cultural thing either, but you still won't try to do it in the Emirates will you?
Or not naming a teddy bear Muhammad for that matter, but that teacher from England still got the stick for it, if I recall correctly.

Also while we're at it - not shaking hands with anyone might be considered just a position (while i still think that school has a right to enforce this tradition), but not shaking hands with women specifically, slightly different story here, right?

And once again - those two boys are not forced to go to that school. Their family was not brought to Switzerland against their will. They came there while understanding that they will have to follow laws and rules of Switzerland. They had an option to stay in their country, or go to, for example, Turkey where I am sure there is no such tradition. But they chose Switzerland, and now they are refusing to honor the traditions that Swiss people, and Swiss government find important.

Who are we to give advice to the Swiss on this one? It is their country and their choice. In the end Switzerland is the country with one of the highest level of democracy, since quite a lot of important things there are decided by direct votes of citizens.

[Azadina]

Sue them for discrimination and get laughed at by the judge?

Just as if you sued someone stealing few candybars from you. Doesn't mean that you didn't break the law.

[Granyala]

Do you have any idea how ironic your post is?

I do not.

But go on, elaborate on how suspending our customs and rules for the sake of some backwater strangers is to our collective benefit...

[RyanEX]

You can force people to adapt to the law, that involves gender equality and all the laws that prevent female abuse, and you can teach them to respect females. But it certainly should not be forced upon people.

In this case it has to be. Again, i reiterate.

These boys come from a culture where they've been told and taught that it's THEIR RIGHT to treat women as objects. That's not okay. That part of their culture has to be tossed out if they want to live elsewhere. They're not being told they can't keep their language. Or that they have to eat pork.

But treating women like objects is something that cann't be allowed and if they won't conform then they should get the boot.

[nonameelf]

For the 'discrimination' claim to work, you need to prove that they intended to treat you worse.
You'd lose on that.

Um, that's exactly what they're doing. They're shaking hands with male teachers, but refusing to do the same with female teachers...

[Granyala]

For the 'discrimination' claim to work, you need to prove that they intended to treat you worse.
You'd lose on that.

They shook male teachers hands no problem. They only refused to show the same respect to a female.

Their behavior already proved the discrimination.

[RyanEX]

Look at all you guys acting like you suddenly care very deeply about the extremely important cultural practice of shaking hands, just so you can bitch about "dem muslims".

I have nothing against muslims. My beef is refugees thinking that the countries they're fleeing too have to treat them special.

[Azadina]

For the 'discrimination' claim to work, you need to prove that they intended to treat you worse.
You'd lose on that.

Nope, already would have won, since they targeted women specifically with it.

Look at all you guys acting like you suddenly care very deeply about the extremely important cultural practice of shaking hands, just so you can bitch about "dem muslims".

The point is more about discriminating against women. That needs to go.

[nonameelf]

Look at all you guys acting like you suddenly care very deeply about the extremely important cultural practice of shaking hands, just so you can bitch about "dem muslims".

Um, the article even states that Swiss muslim groups say there's no religious justification for not shaking women's hands. Clearly this isn't bashing all muslims, but nice try.

[Granyala]

Look at all you guys acting like you suddenly care very deeply about the extremely important cultural practice of shaking hands, just so you can bitch about "dem muslims".

Not really all that fussed out about this specific example myself (German, we don't have the handshake rule here) but it shows their general attitude of "our culture >>> yours" which is the real core of the entire problem when analyzing the behavior of muslim extremists.

Cultures should be treated equal, but when I am a guest in a host country I need to accept that they do stuff differently and adapt.

[Bollocks]

Any law IS forced on people.
Otherwise it would not be a law, it would be a "guideline" or a "suggestion".

Yes, thats what I said. Laws should be enforced not traditions.

[nonameelf]

Again: Intent to treat someone worse.
It doesn't work here.

Right, specifically targeting women to disrespect them by not shaking hands is totally not discrimination.

[Ilir]

They shook male teachers hands no problem. They only refused to show the same respect to a female.

Their behavior already proved the discrimination.

It has nothing to do with thinking they are below them tho. Same rule apply to women not shaking hand to men.

So I have to say, I live in switzerland since i was born (my parents are not swiss) and I am muslim. The "don't shake hands" is kinda silly, we don't do that in my family even tho my parents are really religious.

So, I don't shake hands with anyone. It has nothing to do with my religion tho, but more about the fact that I hate touching others (I don't touch anything someone else has touched, even my parents). And I don't want their bacteries. I never had any issues with that, well just with one black teacher because he thought i was only not shaking hands with him. I explained to him and all was fine.

Keep in mind that Switzerland is mostly xenophobic, europhobic and really right sided. While I do agree that anyone should do their best to respect their host country's culture... this ruling is tainted by islamophobia. And this ruling is quite stupid to say the least, forcing someone to shake hands is like so dumb.

[Granyala]

Yes, thats what I said. Laws should be enforced not traditions.

At what point does a tradition become an unwritten law though?

Stuff isn't exactly as black and white and clear cut as we all like it to be. If it were, we wouldn't need lawyers and judges.