Kanwar Mahfooz
THE POLITICALLY-CORRECT ARE BECOMING TIRESOME, and the sooner we can slap some sense into their darling little minds, the better. According to Licia Corbella at The Calgary Herald, there is lunacy in Winnipeg. Apparently a number of Islamic families are upset and demanding changes to the Winnipeg public school curriculum to make it more like a fundamentalist madrassa.
About one dozen families who recently immigrated to Canada are demanding that the Louis Riel School Division in Winnipeg excuse their children from music and coed physical education programs for religious reasons.
The families believe that music is un-Islamic - just like the Taliban believe and then imposed on the entire population of Afghanistan - and that physical education classes should be segregated by gender even in the elementary years.
The school division is facing the music in a typically Canadian way - that is, bending itself into a trombone to try to accommodate these demands, even though in Manitoba, and indeed the rest of the country, music and phys. ed are compulsory parts of the curriculum.
Officials say they may try to have the Muslim children do a writing project on music to satisfy the curriculum's requirements. The school officials have apparently consulted the Manitoba Human Rights Commission, and they have also spoken to a member of the Islamic community suggested by those very same Muslim parents.
In any event, the school district is trying to find a way to adapt the curriculum to fit the wishes of these families, rather than these families adapting to fit into the school and Canadian culture.
So, we have these politically-correct aparatchiki in the Winnipeg educational establishment who cannot do enough to get rid of our Canadian social values. Well, Mahfooz Kanwar, a member of the Muslim Canadian Congress, is really upset with these weasels:
"I'd tell them, this is Canada, and in Canada, we teach music and physical education in our schools. If you don't like it, leave. If you want to live under sharia law, go back to the hellhole country you came from or go to another hellhole country that lives under sharia law," said Kanwar, who is a professor emeritus of sociology at Mount Royal University in Calgary.
That might be putting things a little more forcefully than most of us would be comfortable with, but Kanwar says he is tired of hearing about such out-of-tune demands from newcomers to our country. "Immigrants to Canada should adjust to Canada, not the other way around," he argues.
Kanwar, who immigrated to Canada from Pakistan via England and then the United States in 1966, says he used to buy into the "Trudeaupian mosaic, official multiculturalism (nonsense)."
He makes it clear, that like most Canadians, he is pleased and enjoys that Canada has citizens literally from every country and corner in the world, as it has enriched this country immensely. But it's official multiculturalism - the state policy "that entrenches the lie" that all cultures and beliefs are of equal value and of equal validity in Canada that he objects to.
"The fact is, Canada has an enviable culture based on Judeo-Christian values - not Muslim values - with British and French rule of law and traditions and that's why it's better than all of the other places in the world. We are heading down a dangerous path if we allow the idea that sharia law has a place in Canada. It does not. It is completely incompatible with the idea and reality of Canada," says Kanwar, who in the 1970s was the founder and president of the Pakistan-Canada Association and a big fan of official multiculturalism. Kanwar says his views changed when he started listening to the people who joined his group. They badmouthed Canada, weren't interested in knowing Canadians or even in learning one of our official languages. They created cultural ghettos and the Canadian government even helped fund it.
"One day it dawned on me that the reason all of us wanted to move here was going to disappear if we didn't start defending Canada and its fundamental values." That's when Kanwar started speaking out against the dangers of official multiculturalism. He has been doing so for decades.
Well, if Mahfooz can figure it out, what's the problem with the weasels in Winnipeg?
They sure are getting a little nutty in Winnipeg. Isn't that where the judge decided you deserve to be raped if you're not wearing a burka?
ReplyDeletePhys. Ed. is co ed these days? Or are they talking about elementary school? In my day, in high school, phys. Ed. was segregated. And even then, there were accommodations made for a Jehovah Witness girl who couldn't wear the school shorts or shorts of any kind--had to wear all long clothes.
ReplyDeleteFunny how when they talk multi-culti, it's all directed at Muslims.
Funny how when they talk multi-culti, it's all directed at Muslims.
ReplyDeleteSharia does that to people. Capice?
Mahfooz is my hero. Immigrants are wonderful, but accommodation is not.
ReplyDeleteWhat do you care if a few families don't want their children participating in certain classes. It's not like it affects anyone but them.
ReplyDeleteThe muslims who want segregated classes and music forbidden should build their own private schools. We shouldn't be increasing our education costs because some dude doesn't want his six year old girl playing kickball with a six year old boy in the room.
ReplyDeleteAgreed.
But our educational system is not founded on "judeo-christian" values (whatever the hell that means. Those are two separate religions, in case you haven't noticed.)
If we were using "christian" values in our educational system, women wouldn't be allowed to teach and the teachers would still be allowed to beat children (even to death, including by sic'ing lions on them).
There's a lot of misinformation in this post. I suggest you speak to someone at the school division in question. You'll find that this whole episode is much ado about nothing. The kids are all going to phys ed, etc. etc.
ReplyDelete"I'd tell them, this is Canada, and in Canada, we teach music and physical education in our schools."
ReplyDeleteBut surely that's not the point. The point is that music and phys. ed. and co-ed classes are all things we find are good and valuable parts of education. They're not something we should defend because that's what we do in Canada.
If they want their kids to learn Cricket in phys ed, or listen to the zither in music, well that's something we should look at accommodating. We shouldn't insist on baseball and guitars because that's what we do in Cananda
First time I got a death threat was after proposing the banning of the lords prayer in public high school. The note slipped into my locker in what seemed to be a feminine hand said, "i'm a good christian and you should be shot and die". kids are excused from classes for all sorts of reasons. screaming sharia like a parrot in jason kenney's cage at the least provocation doesn't help. orthodox religious peoples are accommodated in our culture. if that means a private school if skipping gym and music is too horrifying for the neighbours then so be it. but spare the howls of outrage for outrageous occasions.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to be excused, you can be excused, just like the Jehovah's Witnesses skip out on the national anthem and green pancakes on St. Patrick's Day.
ReplyDeleteIf you want every tiny school in wherever to hire extra staff so the ten kindergarten girls can have separate phys ed from the ten kindergarten boys ... well ... no.
As pointed out, this is simply a matter of excusing a few students from a few classes or finding alternative ways for them to fulfill course requirements. This is something that is done all the time for any number of reasons. This is hardly a matter of multiculturalism run amok or creeping Sharia law and to pretend otherwise is just silly.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like a lot of hysteria over a few parents wanting their children excused from a couple of (non core) classes.
ReplyDeleteI've seen this described as terrorism. If calmly making a request of the local school board is terrorism, then we have a much bigger security problem in this country than was previously realized.
Jim, if folks think that those few parents are terrorists, they haven't seen a bunch of white Christian (French or English speaking) Quebecers march off the schoolboard, all huffing and puffing that they don't want their kids taking the new ethics and world religion course.
ReplyDelete