[News] strange happenings of 2015

[Ray]

Switzerland bans the burka under penalty of 10000 dollar fine

http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2015/11/25/switzerland-bans-burqa-women-face-fines-10000/

“Those who want to integrate are welcome irrespective of their religion,” explained Giorgio Ghiringhelli, who wrote the proposal. “But those who rebuff our values and aim to build a parallel society based on religious laws, and want to place it over our society, are not welcome.”

[pwhodges]

Not Switzerland in general; one town (well, canton, actually) there held a referendum which has been held not to be unconstitutional.

[Shamsiel-kun]

Considering the number of people who likely wear a burqa, it's mostly a waste of tax payer money.

For my country, where such a law was also considered before being dismissed as "unconstitutional" because it would only aim at a specific ethnic group, estimates of the number of women wearing a burqa never went over 50 (on a population of 17 million). In the end they settled on a ban on clothing hiding the face - which gets ignored en masse in winter with no consequences whatsoever


*Sigh*:

[url]http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-34930042[/url]

Why are people interested in this clown again?

[Nuclear Lunchbox]

I do not understand the reasoning behind why banning the wearing of an article of clothing doesn't violate one's right to freedom of expression, and why a court would uphold it (as apparently happened in France, which has a similar law); then again, I am from the US, and I don't know if Switzerland and France have such laws. Even if such a law is not an issue, banning burquas seems to be akin to banning any other kind of religious dress, and as problematic; it is unequivocally stating, "We do not welcome the aspects of your religion that are for yourself, if you must publicly display them."

[robersora]

^

It's a quite reactionary step for sure - but right-wing populists are on the rise in all of Europe, so the ruling parties might hope to appease and cater to the right fringes of the electing populous. So I guess the reasoning behind is, that they hope make easy political gain in the bulk of uneducated and conservative fractions of society when banning a piece of clothing that almost nobody wears anyways. But you're right, this turn of events is a concerning first step in terms of limiting personal freedom and downright hypocritical.

In terms of freedom of expression in Europe (I wanted to post it into another discussion, before it was locked, but I guess it might fit into this one as well):
We do not have unlimited freedom of speech, but we have freedom of thought. Rule of thumb: I can think whatever I want, even the most despicable shit imaginable. I can say whatever I want as long as it doesn't cut into the rights of others. I'd be allowed thinking atrocious dehumanizing things, but as soon as I'd go onto the airwaves and call people to act like that, I could get arrested. In fact that's how they get lots of Neonazis behind bars here in Austria.

I kinda like this set of rules, because it implies that I'm not alone here, be considerate, think before I talk and my views are not the most important things on this planet.

[BiQ]

It's not only that inciting violence is banned, in some parts of Europe it is flat out illegal to deny certain historical facts occurrence in public. Yes, it is a criminal act in some European states (most relevantly, in Germany) to try to deny the historical fact of holocaust having happened, whereas in some other places it will only get you branded as a nazi-symphatizing conspiracy theorist. Such things are quite strictly defined though (AFAICT) so I don't really see it as a real problem.

[Gob Hobblin]

The main issue with the burqa in the eyes of the law is concealment of the face. Clearly, you can't have an ID if you have a mask, because there needs to be verification of the ID to the owner. This was somewhat an issue with the hijab (the same reason you aren't supposed to wear a hat when getting an official ID taken), but that's a minor issue when compared to something that conceals the face.

In strict Muslim households, this doesn't matter much as women are not expected to be in the situations where official identification is required. Still, in terms of public safety and security, having anything that can conceal faces, forms, or any other item is generally something that makes people nervous.

[robersora]

^
Well, by that logic, you'd have to prohibit Carnival and Halloween disguises as well. I don't know the law, but it would make a lot more sense to just enable the executive to force people to reveal their face when IDed. Then again, this wouldn't mesh well with protest-people.

[Mr. Tines]

A bit political,

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/nov/25/google-deems-bernie-sanders-economic-plan-phishing/

but then politicians and 419 scammers are both just after your money.

[Bagheera]

^
Well, by that logic, you'd have to prohibit Carnival and Halloween disguises as well.

That's a temporary thing, though, and thus much less of a concern.

I don't know the law, but it would make a lot more sense to just enable the executive to force people to reveal their face when IDed. Then again, this wouldn't mesh well with protest-people.

Right, but if you're looking for someone (on surveillance cameras or whatever) that isn't much help, and you can't just interrogate everyone with a mask. That's an unreasonable violation of basic privacy rights (the 4th Amendment in the U.S., though most places have similar laws on the books in some form).

[TehDonutKing]

I do not understand the reasoning behind why banning the wearing of an article of clothing doesn't violate one's right to freedom of expression, and why a court would uphold it (as apparently happened in France, which has a similar law); then again, I am from the US, and I don't know if Switzerland and France have such laws. Even if such a law is not an issue, banning burquas seems to be akin to banning any other kind of religious dress, and as problematic; it is unequivocally stating, "We do not welcome the aspects of your religion that are for yourself, if you must publicly display them."

I have to agree with this. While i object to forcing women to wear them, if they want to, by all means, let them.

[Ray]

[url]http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-34930042[/url]

Why are people interested in this clown again?

Not defending him. But Biden did the exact same thing about three years ago and nobody batted an eye. In fact, it was even worse because it was a disabled VETERAN.

Also. Fewer and fewer people are voting for you trump! Just shut up already! You're not gonna be president!

[Chuckman]

Trump will be the next president. I sense powerful sorcery in him.

[Ray]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/st-paul-man-kidnapped-teen-sex-dungeon-article-1.2447957

Minnesota man kidnapped 19 year old and raped him for four days.

Please be respectful.

[Ornette]

Man Receives $1 Million Hospital Charge For 5-Day Stay With No Surgery

I actually had to go to a UPMC emergency room once, and was also in-between insurance providers. Was charged over $30k for a CAT scan.

[Mr. Tines]

Only in Australia...

Around 2am on Sunday several police cars rushed to an apartment in the northern suburb of Wollstonecraft, responding to reports of a woman screaming hysterically, a man yelling, “I’m going to kill you, you’re dead”, and furniture being thrown.

A man police described as “out of breath and rather flushed” answered the door and the local area command’s Facebook page documented the exchange that followed.

“Where’s your wife?” an officer asked.

“I don’t have one,” the man replied.

“Where’s your girlfriend?” he pressed.

“I don’t have one,” he said.

Police told the man neighbours had heard the screams, the threats to kill, the dull thud of flung furniture. “Come on mate, what have you done to her?” the officer asked.

Now read on...

[IronEvangelion]

Now read on...

From the country that almost made a song called Waltzing Matilda their national anthem, I expected nothing less.

[Bagheera]

In fairness, Australia does have some terrifying spiders. I'd freak out too, and I'm not even much of an arachnophobe.

[Chuckman]

This is NSFW so I'm not going to use the inline tweet function to link it.

https://twitter.com/stoya/status/670689154498449413?lang=en

O_O

If you don't know who Stoya is that's a porn star's twitter.

[Bagheera]

Ugh. Well, Deen's career is over. Can't imagine anyone in the industry will want to work with someone who'll ignore safewords, and nor should they. Kudos to her for speaking out before someone else got raped by the fucker.