C'mon France! I am really looking at you guys carrying on that torch of liberty since my country seems to have dropped the ball lately. "Schiller sprach zu Goethe, Steck in dem Arsch die Flöte! Goethe sagte zu Schiller, Mein Arsch ist kein Triller!"
I mean, if I worshipped cabbage heads, would the government deny me marriage if I walked around the house in a cabbage leaf thong?
well, probably, and commit me as well...
But that is just to point out how arbitrary and absurd this seems.
Someone else pointed out that it wasn't based on the Burka, that was the journalist, but on sexual inequality. Ok, here it gets tricky for me. Was she a slave? Or did she choose to live in a religious and or "traditional" family unit?
Is this any different than intrusion into homosexual relations in the US? I've also know secular couples who voluntarily lived in a loving BDSM "master and slave" relationship. Definitely not sexually equal. Would this law sent precedent for such couples, though rare, as well?
I am by no means a libertarian but this seems rather draconian to me.
On the other hand, I understand the arguments of preserving cultural and political integrity based on Enlightenment principles and even a "traditional" family culture, again very rare, can go to the extremes of such things as honor killings. Such things are simply not acceptable.
But the situation seems to be very sticky and this adjudication seems to be on the draconian side. Unless i am totally missing something here. "Schiller sprach zu Goethe, Steck in dem Arsch die Flöte! Goethe sagte zu Schiller, Mein Arsch ist kein Triller!"
And note that neither marriage nor residence are being denied, only nationality. Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères
I fail to see how any of this crap is anything other than polite nationalist racism/essentialism, any more than the German bloodline nonsense, the shameful referendum that got passed in Ireland recently to tighten up the citizenship-by-birth rules that were allegedly being exploited by, oh, hundreds of refugees every year. This is subversion of French anti-clericalism to an agenda of fear of Islam.
Nationalism is by definition essentialist and racist at its heart.
The notion of French nationality that is being used is not racist (A salafist German asking for nationality wouldn't get it) not essentialist (the notion of equality of the sex being certainly new in France over the last 50 years). Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères
I guess I equated marriage with citizenship because I am currently in the same situation. I've lived here four years now and we have an appointment at the Standesamt tomorrow to finalized the marriage paperwork. So this kind of story perks my ears up, especially as an immigrant (albeit from the US) and a future European citizen.
I have noticed in speaking with other immigrants, that I may have had an advantage as an American of European descent over immigrants from other countries. I have just not experienced all the hoops to jump through that others have described. It only took me a couple of minutes to sign the necessary forms to extend my visa without any questions asked, really. For others less fortunate, they really get put through the bureaucratic mill, so to speak.
This story simply reminds me of that. "Schiller sprach zu Goethe, Steck in dem Arsch die Flöte! Goethe sagte zu Schiller, Mein Arsch ist kein Triller!"
But I am sure the Frenchmen and women here will correct me if my impression is incorrect. "Schiller sprach zu Goethe, Steck in dem Arsch die Flöte! Goethe sagte zu Schiller, Mein Arsch ist kein Triller!"
