Muslim families in Winnipeg want children excused from

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If.muslims can opt out of PE, how come those with autism can't? There have been threads here in the past about how many on thd spectrum must endure the ridicule and bullying in PE just so they can graduate but someone can yell Allah Akbhar and get a free pass. If an autistic person can't opt out then why should the muslim? At least the muslim can have an all male or female class to accomodate if they can't opt out....there are no provisions for those on the spectrum.....If a muslim gets bullied everyone rallies behind them but if an autistic is mistreated, nobody bats an eye or cares.
Either they make it an option for everyone regardless if you are muslim, hindu, autistic, nt, or whatever else or make it mandatory for everyone

Autism is now a religion?

Muslims (with or with out the Allah Akbhar 'yell') have mores in their religion, Jehovah's Witnesses have somewhat the same mores and practices as Muslims. Try living around Mormons and you will see they have somewhat the same cultural conventions. Do you have those documented practices in your religion or beliefs? Then perhaps you qualify for an opt out of PE.

But being Autistic is not a religion/belief system.

what country are you nattering on about? Why are you talking about religion of the people you are not appreciative of and then talk about politics? What is it, religion or politics?

That's right, it's not. It's something you're born with, part of your physiology like having two feet and not something you chose or could have chosen. People can change religion or choose a religion if they are free to do so and thus perhaps religion should not be afforded the same protections against debate and criticism or other accommodation beyond those which we afford to race or disability or sexual orientation.

For example, you don't get to opt out of gym class just because you're white or black or whatever. Likewise, nobody is allowed to cut your head off or burn you at the stake just because you pointed out some inconsistencies or inadequacies in someone's religion.

English is a communication tool. We learn it so that we can communicate more effectively with one another. That is the perfectly good reason why it is compulsory. PE (in theory) builds physical fitness and encourages team-work. THAT is fairly understandable as a compulsory lesson, because a reasonable standard of fitness helps us to stay alive and not be grotesque lardies....but then these people didn't say they wouldn't let their kids do PE..they just aren't comfortable with MIXED PE lessons. After a certain level, our PE lessons stopped being mixed a great deal anyway and we never had "mixed" changing facilities, not since little school, so I can't see how it is that big of a jump. IT IS NOT A BIG DEAL so get off your right-wing hobby horse.

Knock it off with the reductio absurdum. Music lessons being optional is NOT the same as letting kids choose when they want to go to school.

1) Muslims are not simply crying Allah Akbar to get out of lessons. They do have to provably BE Muslims. There is a little more to it than speaking in foreign tongues.

2) They aren't dodging PE because they get ridiculed or because its hard. They aren't dodging it at all. They are asking for un-mixed lessons. The UK used to have WHOLE SCHOOLS dedicated to one gender or the other. Mixing them up appears to have made no difference to the nature of their learning.

3) Again, it isn't about bullying. It's about modesty and the mixing of genders. Islam requires a degree more physical modesty than modern-day western civilisation generally expects. This DOES have a parallel with the uber-shy and private autistic kids not wanting to get undressed in front of others. But in that area we should be in agreement, not getting mardy about it. Neither autistic nor Muslim wants to compromise their modesty. That is A SIMILARITY not a difference. And its not like Muslims are actually GETTING this special treatment, because if they were, they wouldn't still be asking for it.

4) PE and physical fitness affects you whether you like it or not. Maybe if more Autistics were on the rugby team, they wouldn't GET beaten up? By avoiding PE you end up a scrawny little stringbag who is even more of a target. My own son gets treated with kid gloves by his school because he's on the spectrum, and physically he's a pathetic individual with poor health. I didn't enjoy PE either, but I'm a much healthier individual for doing it, and substantially more able to perform physical tasks and protect myself.

5) Hindus find the Cow sacred. Should they be forced to eat beef when it is on the school menu, because everyone else is eating it? Muslims consider Pork tainted, should we force them to eat sausages when they appear on the menu? I seem to recall that there was a whole mutiny in India caused in part by attempts to force people to do things they considered unseemly by their religion. Or maybe we should MAKE vegetarians eat BOTH meats because dammit everyone else has to eat their veg?

These requests: Single sex PE lessons and an option to ignore Music lessons are not collapsing our society, they are not an attack on our way of live, or an erosion of our culture or any of the other ridiculous rubbish people spout. It is not the unstoppable tide of Islam. It is no more than a slight adjustment in timetabling. Its also ridiculous that a forum of people who spend most of their time demanding understanding because of their neurology should be so ignorant about understanding others. But then that appears to be a common failing in the autistic community.

Islam does not forbid music. And who mentioned that music lessons involve girls? Wanting to be out of Music lessons has nothing to do with girls. LOTS of lessons involve girls and nobody mentioned those. The lesson they DID mention that involves girls was the one that involves wearing less clothing around the opposite sex. Hmm, maybe if PE lessons didn't involve pubescent boys chasing around after pubescent young women in gym clothes there might be a bit more learning going on? I know I wasn't paying much attention to my teachers when the Hockey class jiggled past. There is also something to be said for a degree more modesty in general. Maybe then our town-centres wouldn't be full of turkey-flesh balancing on stilts in a belt and nothing else every Saturday if people thought a little more modestly. Hell, some of my favourite garments involve almost no skin on show at all!.

So what if Muslims find most western music unacceptable? There is a crap-load of western music that westerners find unacceptable. There is a load more that Christians find unacceptable for almost exactly the same reasons. There is certainly plenty I find nauseating.

Oh, and the Muezzin and other similar eastern musical forms have been very successfully mixed into several tracks to great effect. I can think of one track by one of my favourite bands that uses it wonderfully as a counter-point to an outstanding bass-line. As I said, Music is not forbidden in Islam, and those who say it is haven't read the rules properly, which is the root cause of a great deal of the problem.

Better still, convert public schooling to private schooling.

ruveyn

But they are forcing nothing upon the school board. They are not waging a campaign to have physical education cancelled, merely to excuse their children from it.

Who is in charge of a child's education, the child's parents or the government? At the end of the day, in this country, in the United States and in Britain it is the parents. And rightly so.

WrongPlanet Rules

Religion turns into politics when Islam protesters are holding signs saying "British soldiers burn in hell" and "massacre those who insult Muslim". And its labelled their right, as its their freedom of expression, but if it was the other way round, it would be unnaceptable.

Pointing out that you have a "kind" is a personal attack? I thought you were all about "your people" and how their culture is being destroyed by the evil Muslim hordes? Surely you WANT to be associated with unsullied White Christian Anglo-Saxon culture and all its purity? They are YOUR FOLK. Where is your solidarity?

Agreed.

So why did an English guy get rejected from a job, because he couldn't speak Polish? Mixed lessons, whats wrong with that, what happened to equality? I guess people just play the equality card when it suits. Well get off your hypocrisy horse, mixed changing facilities and mixed PE lessons, are two complete different things. All this left wing hypocrisy and double standards, then making out right wing always means bad, reminds me of a quote.

"Many of us believe that wrongs aren't wrong if it's done by nice people like ourselves."

Yet the goverment is in charge of their cash flow in a lot of cases.

So what kind was she placing "ME" as?