Xenophobia
Europe, Politics, Rants November 30th, 2009Der Bau von Minaretten ist verboten.
— Swiss Federal Constitution, Article 72, Paragraph 3
4.
— Total number of existing minarets in Switzerland.
“The construction of minarets is forbidden.”
Rarely has such a short sentence of legislation caused such a stir worldwide. But as small Switzerland is, as powerful is its economic; and in parallel, as short as this addition to the swiss constitution is, as explosive its consequences may be.
An overall of 57% of swiss voters supported this addition, causing reactions from utter disbelief and shock to suggestions to follow this example by right-wing parties all across Europe.
Switzerland has long been known for restrictive immigration policy, reservedness against refugees and generally a good bit of xenophobia among parts of its people. But this decision has caught most of Europe and even Switzerland by surprise. But why? I won´t write about how nonsensical and cynical this referendum is by itself; I assume anybody within their right mind will see that by themselves.
Lets examine this case a bit. It is not merely a new bylaw or regulation; it´s an addition to the constitution, which also guarantees freedom of religion in another part. So together this means, “You´re free to practice whatever religion you want to, but you´re allowed to build architectural religious symbols only if they are christian.” Namely, church towers.
Now compare that to the preface of the swiss constitution:
Im Namen Gottes des Allmächtigen! Das Schweizervolk und die Kantone, in der Verantwortung gegenüber der Schöpfung, im Bestreben, den Bund zu erneuern, um Freiheit und Demokratie, Unabhängigkeit und Frieden in Solidarität und Offenheit gegenüber der Welt zu stärken, im Willen, in gegenseitiger Rücksichtnahme und Achtung ihre Vielfalt in der Einheit zu leben, […] geben sich folgende Verfassung:
“In the name of God the Almighty! The swiss people and the cantons, in responsibility against the Creation, in pursuit to renew the federation, to strengthen freedom and democracy, independence and peace in solidarity and openness against the world, willing to live their diversity in unity in mutual respect and deference, […] are giving themselves the following constitution:”
(my emphasis)
Now let´s see how these two points of view can be integrated in one constitution. This referendum will not only cause great harm to the perception of the country across the world, it will also most certainly cause an internal political turf war of unforeseen dimensions which will hurt the country itself.
The real question for me is: How can a few xenophobic right-wing populist people get a whole country to develop a near-panic against something as innocent as a religious building, and thereby getting said country to act in a manner which discredits them worldwide, to ridicule its own constitution and start a fear/hate-campaign against anything visibly foreign?
Oh, sorry, I forgot. I should know how. I come from Germany.
December 3rd, 2009 at 14:32
Hmm,
Ignoring other issues is difficult with the way this has been reported abroad (I”m always a bit suspicious of what media report retrospectivly).
I see arguments on both sides.
But fundementaly we are arguing for excemption to rules.
For instance lets seperate the practice of faith form it’’s iconography.
This law although “apparently” targetted against a specific faith (from what I have seen written) is actually not it is targeted against one asspect of the iconography (I”m chosing to seperate all symbols of faith from the faith as the two are not the same).
Now there is a secondary issue with this which is, what about building codes and sound polution.
Most church towers around the world where built long before building codes and sound polution legislation.
We see many many arguments as to why wind turbines should not be built based on building codes and sound polution.
Are the arguments any different?
Personaly I think all iconography on the exteria of new buildings should be inline with building codes thus should apply to all new buildings of worship as well.
I have no more wish to see it than I have a flashing neon billboard mounted on top of a house or other building for marketing or esthetic purposes (which is effectivly what iconograhpy is).
The rule should be applied across all faiths without exception.
Likewise bells and other sound polution should be stopped.
We have rules and laws for good reason why should some be excempt on the grounds of “the iconography of faith”?
Which brings forward the issue of retrospective applicability or is history excempt.
If buildings where built befor legislation they are normaly excempt, but not always, some safety codes of practice have no excemptions for the “greater good” of society.
All in all I don”t think that because something relates to faith (any faith) it should be excempt from laws that apply to all other areas of life (effectivly the excemption is a form of hypocracy and can easily be manipulated dishonestly).
It would be like arguing it is okay to build a building excempt from all codes because it “has esthetic appeal to modern artists”.
Unfortunatly the rational side of an argument normally gets hijaked when faith is involved, which from “press reports” appears to be the case with this legislation.
So my vote would be to remove all excemptions for all areas of life, as it makes things more honest and less liable to become a political football.