Pandering to Apartheid
April 20, 2008 by athinkingman
Please bear with me while I attempt to take you on a little journey through murky waters.
Just suppose … just suppose … just suppose that a new disease emerged in this country that caused large, pocked, fleshy growths to appear on the tops of the legs and arms. And just suppose that hundreds of people in your town who developed this disease decided that they wanted to go to the swimming baths on a regular basis. (For information, the large fleshy growths did not weep or emit noxious substances of any kind to infect the water and there was absolutely no danger of contamination.) And just suppose that the hundreds of people from your area who had this disease and who wanted to go swimming felt that they could not do so because they were self-conscious about their bodies and didn’t feel that they could face the inevitable stares and remarks.
If you were the manager of the local swimming pool, how would you respond if a few of them approached you and politely asked if it would be possible for them to use the pool with a session each week just for the afflicted group? What would you say?
I can’t guarantee my response, but I hope it would be something like this. “Well, I have to be careful here because if I start responding to requests like this I may end up being approached by all kinds of groups, but I will see what I can do. You have a genuine case. You have not chosen your disease - it has chosen you. I will look at the pool’s visitor numbers and see if we can find a slot that would cause minimum disruption to our regulars and enable your large group to have unique access.”
Now just suppose that there were people in your area who were perfectly healthy but who believed that if they swam with non-group members they would become contaminated in some way, and who believed that it was evil to expose their bodies and could only bathe wearing particular garments and in the presence of same sex group members. Suppose they came to you and wanted restricted group-member-only swimming sessions, and for each separate gender. What would your response be?
I can’t guarantee my response, and I may be completely wrong about this, but I think it would be something like the following. “I can see that your beliefs are very restrictive for you. However, your beliefs are something that you have chosen to adhere to, and as far as I can see they have no foundation in empirical evidence. If you chose to restrict your lives in this way, that is your choice. Because your imagination has created these restrictive practices, and because they have not be imposed on your by some act of fate (accident, or disease, or birth condition), I cannot allow the fruits of your imagination to interfere with the normal running of this public pool. If I gave in to you, I would logically have to consider requests from anyone who had created equally irrational beliefs about restrictions on bathing. You are, of course, free to build your own private pool for group members.”
David Toube is experiencing great problems trying to go for a swim with his son at Clissold Leisure Centre at Stoke Newington, North London. He turned up one Sunday morning only to find that the pool operated a women only policy on Sunday mornings, mainly to meet the needs of Haredi Jewish women. The effect of this policy is that, for one quarter of the weekend - ordinary families, whose lives are not handicapped by self-imposed religious taboos, are excluded from this publicly funded amenity.
When he complained he was told that the women-only sessions had been rescheduled. He checked on the website and saw no problem with Sunday mornings, so went along the next week, only to be told that he would have to wait until 10:45 as the first session because the first session every Sunday was for Muslim Male Swimming only.
Mr Toube continues:
I couldn’t quite believe that a swimming pool was really institutionalising both gender AND religious segregation. I asked to speak to the Duty Manager. She told me that, really, Muslim Male Swimming was being laid on at peak time. No, it wasn’t just Male Swimming, that happened mostly to be used by Muslim men. There was separate gender segregated swimming that was not religious specific, but on other days. And, apparently, this is a policy insisted on by Hackney Council, which sets the policy for all Hackney pools.
Want to check for yourself? Click here, and select Clissold Leisure Centre, and then look under “session”. You’ll see that one of the sessions is called “General Swimming Muslim Men Only”. As far as I can see, Muslims are the only cultural group who, apparently, require segregation. And Muslim women are not catered for.
How precisely is this to be enforced? If I had insisted that I was a Muslim, and went in for a swim, would they simply insist that I was not?
How was this policy decided upon? As far as I can remember, even the Muslim Council of Britain hasn’t insisted the Muslims must swim separately from non-Muslims. So, who insisted on gender and religious apartheid for Muslims?
According to the Daily Mail, a few days later, Mr Toube spoke to another leisure centre employee who gave an identical story. The employee’s explanation was that it was a requirement of the Muslim religion that Muslims could not swim with non-Muslims.
Mr Toube joked:
I asked him whether Clissold Leisure Centre would institute Whites Only swimming for racists. His answer was that they would if there was sufficient demand.
The swimming sessions for male Muslims were advertised as taking place every Sunday from 8am to 9.30am. Leaflets stipulated:
It is compulsory for the body to be covered between the navel and the knees. Anyone not adhering to the dress code or rules within the pool will not be allowed to swim. All brothers welcome.
A leisure centre spokesman said staff were wrong to refuse entry to Mr Toube.
The member of staff the user spoke with at the time was mistaken when referring to the session as Muslim-only. The men’s modesty session is not a private hire and is, therefore, open to the public. Staff cannot ask your religion on entrance and you won’t be refused entry if you don’t appear to be Muslim.
A spokesman for the Equality and Human Rights Commission said:
Segregating services may amount to unlawful discrimination and could create a sense of unfairness, inadvertently increasing community tension.
In 2006 the Daily Mail reported that Thornley Heath leisure centre in Croydon, London, had set aside one afternoon a week for Muslim swimmers.
The swimming sessions - which are for men only - are held for two hours every week at a leisure centre in London. Non-Muslims may swim during this time but only if they follow the strict dress code of swimming shorts that hide the navel and extend below the knee.
I’m thinking about going off to a peaceful session in the publicly funded local library. My plan is to get rid of the “riff-raff” and have undisturbed access to the computers and books by convincing the local manager that she must put on restricted access sessions for fundamentalist bloggers. We know that our minds are polluted by too many disturbances and we need solitude in order to pursue the divine process of creation.
I am sure she will feel compelled to respect my new religious beliefs and be sympathetic to my request to reintroduce apartheid.
(Sources: Harry’s Place and The Daily Mail)
Oh, dear this is a very difficult one and I think on the whole you have tried to argue the point well. But there are two problems with what you are saying here for me.
The first is the harsh line you take towards people who are, shall we term “religious” for ease here, as this word can embrace any denomination. I know that you think anyone who has a faith must be “self-deluded drongoes”, clearly without a brain or to hold any kind of intelligent life form, but we are a multi-cultural society and if that is so, we have to work in harmony with each other. This must surely mean that we should consider and respect the bathing wishes of those people. Ok, perhaps the way it was organised was wrong, ie, in peak swimming time. perhaps, there should have been more dialogue with the community. I can see that but everyone here needs to be given a fair deal. That brings me to the second point.
As a new and poor swimmer, needing lots of lessons, I don’t have unlimited and unrestricted access to the pool. There are children nights, ladies nights and competitions where the pool is restricted for use, or where you go within the pool. Some bits may be sectioned off. No-one complains about this. We just accept it. But this is not about religion then, so I suppose it is ok and accepted.
Put religion into the equation and we hear words like apartheid etc. I’m afraid, on this occasion, I feel this blog only potentially fuels racial tensions and division, though may I stress athinkingman I know this is not your intention, only to fuel discussion and a healthy debate, which I respect.
I will give this more attention and if I can think of anything else I will add it.
onethoughtfulwoman
You write: but we are a multi-cultural society and if that is so, we have to work in harmony with each other. This must surely mean that we should consider and respect the bathing wishes of those people.
I am quite happy to respect the right of people to believe whatever they want to and to practise that in the privacy of their homes and places of worship. What I object to is the notion that someone can choose to believe something and then have my life interfered with because of that belief. If the belief has an important basis, fine, argue away and let me listen. If it has no rational or empirical basis (”bathing with you pollutes me and showing my arms and legs is evil” ) I profoundly reserve the right to say: “Believe that if you want to, but DON’T impose your will on publicly funded facilities.”
I’m afraid I don’t see that as fuelling racial tension or division. I see it as refusing to accept that the emperor has clothes and would want it to apply to any race or religion or group.
This is, indeed, a tough issue. It’s one of those awkward occasions when religious norms conflict with strikingly different public and social norms. It may be impossible to accommodate both satisfactorily. As far as Athinkingman’s objection, “Believe that if you want to, but DON’T impose your will on publicly funded facilities,” the Muslims are, presumably, part of the tax-paying public. As distasteful as I find much of what they have to say, they have the right to speak and be heard.
Keep us posted on what future developments, if any, come of this and similar situations. I expect that we in the USA may have to deal with some of these things fairly soon.
I do agree with what the chaplain has to say here. They do pay taxes too. While, I disagree with many of their customs, they are still people living over here and paying taxes to use public services. I would have no objection, personally if they wanted their own hour of swimming. Your answer still does not address other circumstances when swmming events may restrict your useage. Do you object to this also then?
I thought I was being a little hard on you with my comments regarding faith etc but I feel my main argument still holds.
I don’t really have a problem with separate sessions for women or for children - to me these are general issues affecting most people. Children need to learn to swim in safety. Most women of all ages and cultures would prefer all female sessions. Neither children nor women had any choice over their respective ages or genders.
However, as soon as you go down the line that because I believe this I am entitled to separate sessions, I really object to that. For me, saying that they pay taxes doesn’t help the matter. I can say: “I pay taxes, I have these beliefs, give me a session!” The issue for me is not the tax, but the reasonableness of the case in the first place. If you choose to restrict your life in various ways (and of course, it is arguable whether religion has been beneficial looking at the whole of history) fine, but don’t then seek to spread that unreasonable restriction and expect me not to protest about it. I have rights too, and I can argue a reasonable case.
Turning out to be quite a little debate this of which I am enjoying very much.
Yes, you do have rights and can argue effectively. However, I don’t understand why this case is so undeserving, appreciating the beliefs of others, even if you do not share them.
The argument whether religion is beneficial is another subject, of which we can have discourse later, if you wish.
I thnk we shall, as always agree to disagree, on this point.
This has been a very informative blog.
When I was at school, we had special sessions at the swimming baths from which the general public was excluded. I doubt whether many people would object to that. I think, then, that the problem is not so much the concept of restricting sessions to particular groups as people’s perceptions of the validity of the groups themselves.
For example, I think if you had closed sessions for people who were fans of Elvis Presley, you would receive a lot of flak whereas having closed sessions for members of a large religious group attracts less flak. It’s all in the mind of the person judging the issue. (The fact that it is public money that funds the swimming pool is more or less a red herring, in my view.)
The whole idea of restricted sessions is ultimately self-defeating, anyway. If Muslims have special sessions then why not Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, Baha’i, etc? Or pregnant women? Or people with disfigurements? Or one-legged train-spotters? In the end you would have more special groups than you could possibly cater for and the system would collapse. You can only do it if demand is low and if demand is low, then why not accept it? It’s not doing much harm and may be bringing joy to some people’s lives.
I’m all for that.
I find the distinction of choice and non-choice an interesting one here. The diseased in your first example did not choose their disease, but they did choose to allow their self-consciousness to affect their decisions. The women you mention in #5 did not choose their gender, but do choose their preference to swim with other women only. In either case, the desire to swim alone is one they have chosen to act on, as did the Muslims you describe.
I think, as One Thoughtful Woman seems to be saying, that at a public pool, any private booking should be treated with the same standards as any other. Whether those standards involve a minimum amount of people participating or a rental fee for securing private use of the pool, the manager of the pool should choose a set of standards that would respond to the desires of the public and the desires of the pool’s owner (if not perfectly adhering to either), then apply those standards consistently.
Segregation and identity go hand in hand. You cannot hold a specific identity and remain universally inclusive, since identity is defined as much by what it excludes as it is by what it includes. No system of public communal origanization exists which includes everyone in its ability to provide services for needs. And it never will. All are compromises based on the needs of the greatest number, with hopefully at least a willingness to recognize the needs of minorities and remain open to possibilities for providing for those needs. But the needs of the few will always be address after the needs of the many are addressed.
Whether or not the identity is imposed initially by external circunstance or chosen internally does not provide an ethical basis for the justification of the identification. Any action that proceeds soley on the basis of that identity is a nearly always a “chioce” regardless of the circumstances motivating the identity. The point you raise about public vs private is an important one, but I do not think you have built your argument on that point clearly. You do not state how many people are being served by the restricted session. One? Six? One Hundred? You only provide information that two have been left unserved. It matters greatly, when considering issues of communal interests.
As a member of a minority with an imposed limitation, I still cannot avocate my interests alone as the basis of my community’s actions.I would certainly fight to achieve equality of basic human rights. The right to vote is no guarantee ythat vote will get me what I want. It only means my choice was heard.
Publicly funded swimming is not a necessity of human rights. The incident you’ve reported is focused on catering to a belief system, something you appear to find objectionable. The fact that several belief systems have been equally catered to seems to indicate there is no particular bias occuring however. Two people have been inconvenienced. It is not a question of “unfairness” of treatment. Since those inconvenienced still retain access through other options, ie a different time schedule. It sounds more like annoyance at not being instantly gratified.
I think for me the issue is about trying to evaluate the reasonableness of a request to interrupt a publicly funded service for all. A request based on a (to me) bizarre and unsubstantiated belief system should be denied. If not, then anyone could claim special access based on anything they cared to come up with.
I hate swimming and if I turned up at a public swimming pool with my children to find it only available for Muslim Men then I would secretly be rather pleased to be able to go straight home again.
However, I agree with you absolutely. People choose to stick to their religious beliefs and follow all the customs and practices associated with those and we should not pander to them in the provision of public services, such as swimming sessions, from which others are as a result excluded. These people are tax payers in the same way that we are and equally they are entitled to swim in the same sessions as everyone else. If they feel they are not able to for reasons associated with their religion then that is their choice.
Personally I do not agree that local tax payers should be excluded from any public swmming sessions. I can see why the over-50s/women/children prefer to swim in special sessions but I don’t think that is a good thing either unless I suppose, a survey of useage shows that the pool would otherwise be largely unused at that particular time of day
Surely the best way round such things is to allow private hire out times for the pool at times of day when it is not otherwise well-used. Then if Muslims wish to club together and hire it out then they can do so in the same way that you can hire the pool for a children’s party.
I am rather intrigued to envisage Silver Tiger’s Elvis Presley fan club swim session. The mind boggles as to what they would all wear!
What an interesting comment box this was.
I did understand your position. I also have a great deal of difficulty with most belief systems referred to as religions. But I would still accept that we each have the right to chose what we believe.
I also understand your questioning the extension of belief systems into a public space. But I have the same questions I’d need answered to agree with you further. What is the actual majority interests of the community in question? What is the ethnic, cultural and economic make up of the users of the facility being question and the community in which it resides? If 40% of the community is Moslem and 40% Jewish, shouldn’t the community address their needs?
I do not believe you can exclude any belief system from public access, unless you exclude them all. I would include atheism as a belief system, however rational it appears to be. Simply on the ethical principle that it does not prove its own point conclusively, it relies instead on another’s inability to conclusively prove theirs. I prefer to say I don’t know something when in fact I don’t.
I’m quite happy for all groups based on belief systems to be denied special access to the pool.
Is the pool arranged by public funds? If so, I find the religious aspect troubling although as an American living not far from you (apparently!) this all does not seem to play out the same in a place lacking church-state separation. Fixing that fixes the problem immediately if it is public funds used to operate (or it could in a more logical era! I admit the public pools in the states are sometimes restricted although not closed completely for the mommy and me classes or otherwise….)
exevangel Yes, the pool is paid for out of public funds. I personally have no objection to particular groups (religious, or otherwise) making separate payments to hire the pool for their own purposes. I just object to the public pool being set aside to pander to the religious scruples of others.