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December 17, 2006
UK: Muslims Condemn School's Political Correctness
With a Hat Tip to Marc at USS Neverdock, a story how the politically correct desire not to "offend" has exposed the ignorance abounding at a British place of learning. The Burnley Citizen reports that Walter Street Primary School in Brierfield, Lancashire, has dropped the term "Virgin Mary" from its Christmas cards this year.
The school has a 90% majority of Muslim pupils, and the head teacher, Sarah Watson, thought the move would be necessary to "tread a line between two faiths....We mention the birth of Jesus, but we cut reference to the Virgin Mary to just Mary because Muslims believe Jesus was a prophet, not the son of God."
The move has exposed how little Ms Watson knows of the religion of her pupils' families. And in her desire to be patronizing towards Muslims in this manner, she has been condemned by Muslims.
The Koran has an entire Sura (Number 19, "Maryam") dedicated to Mary, in which it asserts that she is a Virgin. Once she conceives, she gives birth to Christ under a date palm, which drops its fruit for her to eat. In some Arab countries, a woman who has given birth is traditionally given three dates to eat.
Anjum Anwar, who heads Lancashire's Forum of Faiths and is education co-ordinator of the Lancashire Council of Mosques, said: "This is absurd and offensive. The Virgin Mary is covered extensively in a chapter of the Koran and Muslims believe Jesus, praise be upon him, was born from an immaculate conception. The Virgin Mary is also considered a role model. Muslims don't want to see Christmas diluted. The intentions may well be good but it is a Christian festival and should be celebrated accordingly."
Last month, Muslims from the Christian Muslim Forum delivered a savage attack upon politically correct town councils in Britain who have tried to excise mentions of Christmas. In 1998, the city council at Birmingham in the Midlands decided to call its Christmas festivities "Winterval".
The Royal Mail has issued this year's Christmas stamps with no reference to Christmas at all. The Christian Muslim Forum, a grouping of Muslim and Christian leaders, condemned the secularisation of Christmas. Muslim representatives claimed that by removing Christmas references from Christmas, "extremists" would blame Muslims.
One school in Rotherham decided that in order to have its Muslim pupils (20% of the total) to enjoy a Christmas dinner with non-Muslim children, 100% of the pupils would have to eat halal chicken. The Oakwood School had thought the move would be a gesture of sharing, unaware that many people in Britain find halal methods of slaughtering (where a creature's throat is slit and the blood slowly drained) barbaric.
One parent explained: "It has really rocked my boat because I feel my culture is being stolen away from me. I have no objection to halal meat being on the menu so long as there is a choice of traditional Christmas fare. Our culture and religion are being trampled on and it is not right."
The school eventually backed down, and agreed to have optional halal chicken and traditional turkey with all the trimmings.
Britain's efforts to be politically correct have been enacted in North America. In one recent instance, pandering to suppositions about other people's faiths backfired spectacularly.
When Sasha Cohen, a 22-year old US Olympic medal winning ice skater was recently performing, a choir was ordered to stop singing. The choir at Rubidoux High School Madrigals in Riverside, California, were singing "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" when they abruptly broke off.
The reason was that Staci Della-Rocco, director of the choir, had been asked not to sing a Christian carol in front of a Jewish performer because he was fearful of a lawsuit. Sasha Cohen was not pleased. Her mother Galina said that Sasha "celebrates everything" at this time. She said her daughter "was stunned. We both thought the voices were just lovely, they were doing such a wonderful job. Christmas carols are part of celebrating the holiday season."
In Toronto, Canada, a Christmas tree was removed from a courthouse lobby in case it offended non-Christians.
Tarek Fatah, founder of the Muslim Canadian Congress said: "It's so stupid. I'm at a loss for words. The judge should take a trip to the rest of the world. Christmas is celebrated by Muslims in many countries - they should ban political correctness, not Christmas trees."
Sometimes excuses for not offending people are suspicious, such as a decision by the Royal Bank of Scotland, which has banned all Christmas decorations in its offices and branches, because it claims these are threats to Health and Safety, or "Elf and Safety" as Christmas safety regulations have been dubbed.
Muslims seem more prepared to encourage traditional Christmas than politically correct non-Muslims, who would rather chuck their own traditions away in favor of the supposed sensibilities of others.
In Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, Muslims have spoken up against the bland exhortations in the town and Aylesbury Vale district for people to have "Season's Greetings" among the Christmas lights. Only the Friars Square Shopping Centre in Kingsbury Square actually displays the words 'Merry Christmas.' Christmas lights began as a tradition, because of Christmas. To deny this seems shallow and on the part of the council, an exercise in secular commercialism.
Politicians in Britain, such as Gordon Brown, and also John Reid, the Home Secretary, have objected to the secular messages. John Reid said he was "sick and tired" of political correctness which means that Christmas cannot be called "Christmas".
The US store chain Walmart had in recent years wanted to stop its staff wishing customers a "Merry Christmas", substituting instead "Happy Holidays". Last year, the store was condemned for promoting Hannukah and the entirely fictitious pseudo-Gambian festival of "Kwanzaa" but not Christmas.
This fall, when the company announced to a convening of 7,000 store managers that it intended to refer to Christmas "early and often", the hall erupted with cheers.
In Warwick, New York State, a school has been threatened with a lawsuit for its plans to have its annual fund-raiser, called "Breakfast with Santa". A parent, with an attitude so politically correct that one could describe it as deranged, has said that the proposed visit of Santa Claus would offend non-Christians.
A poll in the United States has shown that 95% of Americans found nothing offensive in the term "Merry Christmas". However, the same poll showed that 46% were offended by the term "Happy Holidays".
Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at December 17, 2006 5:41 PM
Comments
Liberals are so righteous. Everybody should believe what they believe and those who don't are bigots and racists. It's really futile trying to reason with them.
Posted by: John Sobieski ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.westernresistance.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at December 17, 2006 8:08 PM
Writing from Canada, I can give the additional information that the judge who ordered the removal of the tree was a good Christian by the name of Cohen.
Posted by: seeteufel at December 18, 2006 12:23 AM
I work for Royal Mail, and every year we get complaints about the stamps and what they represent or don't represent - the current stamps do show the non-religious images of Christmas, Christmas Tree, Reindeer, Snowman & Santa Claus (?). Last year the stamps showed the Madonna & Child as seen by artists from all over the world, and still complaints came. The common factor is that people will always find something wrong in the depiction of Christmas, and usually a lot are offended, not for themselves, but for others. Political correctness as we can see, involves groups or people deciding what they think is best for others, without actually asking. It actually ends up offending almost everybody.
Posted by: PedroJD at December 18, 2006 10:15 AM
"The school has a 90% majority of Muslim pupils"
how long til england becomes saudi arabia n. 2?
Posted by: StillFedUp at December 18, 2006 2:23 PM
Christmas is a Christian holiday. In the US and many other countries it has become de-facto the seasonal holiday, but if you turn it into the "holiday for everybody" then it will lose its Christian meaning. Christmas does not negate Muslim teachings, but it does go against the core of Judaism. Similarly, a Muslim saying that Mohammed supercedes Jesus offends the core of Christian tradition.
A Jew doesn't have to celebrate everything in order to be sensitive to the fact that they live in a predominantly Christian country. Jews in the US do not expect everybody around them to stop singing Christmas songs just because they don't celebrate it.
Posted by: Esther at December 18, 2006 5:32 PM
many people in Britain find halal methods of slaughtering (where a creature's throat is slit and the blood slowly drained) barbaric.
So does our Law. It is illegal to slaughter animals in this way but an exception was made for Kosher and Halal food to serve minorities.................but an exemption from our LAW is now being used to serve mainstream markets and supplant those non-halal butchers who conform to EU Law.
This is a breach of Competitive Tendering and a blatant disregard of Laws on Slaughter which should be enforced 100%
Posted by: Voyager at December 19, 2006 2:26 AM
Can I just point out that RBS haven't "Banned Christmas decorations" at all - in fact there's a very fetching xmas tree in my lift lobby with tartan decorations (proud of its Scottish roots RBS are). There was a memo that came around asking people not to stand on chairs to hang decorations from the roof and not to put tinsel around monitors (both reasonably sensible I thought) but certainy no blanket ban on decorations. Crimes against taste are alive and well at RBS
Posted by: Dracunculus at December 19, 2006 3:33 AM
Hi Dracunculus -
From the source it did say "offices". I may have overstepped the lines by assuming it also meant "branches". My bad.
Thanks for pointing it out.
Posted by: Giraldus Cambrensis at December 19, 2006 4:23 AM
Halal meat is expressly forbidden to Sikhs.
How are the sikhs now to be compensated?
Posted by: hutchrun at December 19, 2006 6:27 AM
Writing from Canada, I would like to remind all
readers that the judge who made this decision was
a good Christian by the name of Cohen.
Posted by: seeteufel at December 19, 2006 11:43 PM
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