Boreal

Boys in the Front, Girls to the Back

In the Islamic world women's unequal status is affirmed everyday during prayers and now more and more in Canadian schools, in Ontario in particular. That is about to change.

Public schools in Ontario have been, for  some time, allowing Muslims to hold prayer services on school property, such as the cafeteria at Valley Park Middle School (Toronto District School Board) in the following picture.

In the photograph boys are in the front, girls in the back separated by benches. Females cannot worship in front of males for that would annul the male's prayers.

Narrated Aisha:

The things which annul the prayers were mentioned before me. They said, "Prayer is annulled by a dog, a donkey and a woman (if they pass in front of the praying people)."

I said, "You have made us (i.e. women) dogs.

I saw the Prophet praying while I used to lie in my bed between him and the Qibla. Whenever I was in need of something, I would slip away for I disliked to face him."

Bukhari 9.490

Aisha said [to Muhammad]: "You have made us equal to the dogs and the asses."

Muslim 4:1039

And still further back are girls who are not praying. There is no point. It's their time of the month. Allah will not listen to females who are menstruating and expects them to be kept as far away as possible from those worshipping his Almightiness.

Narrated Um Atiya:

We were ordered to bring out our menstruating women and veiled women in the religious gatherings and invocation of Muslims on the two Id festivals. These menstruating women were to keep away from their Musalla (open space outside a mosque mainly used for praying).

Bukhari 8.347

Prayers in Islam are not about asking for favours or intervention—those are supplications and are a totally different thing—but worshipping Allah by uttering verses in Arabic which usually leaves the uninitiated oblivious to what is being said. In a period of approximately a year, observant Sunnis will have prayed the entire Koran and repeating the most hate-filled, sadistic scriptures ever imagined and less sanguine sacred writings such as verses that demand they do not associate with those who are the target of much the hatred, Jews and Christians, as they wish to corrupt them. It should be enough that we tolerate the spewing of hatred in houses of worship and leave our schools out of it.

When God chose a merchant to deliver his ultimate message on how He wanted to be worshipped, He chose well. It is Muhammad who invented what amounts to a non-stop commercial that is akin to religious theatre that are his instructions on how to perform the mandated prayers.

Islamists would like to stage this play/commercial everywhere, not only in purpose-built buildings such as mosques, but in private and public schools ostensibly devoted to protecting students from religious propaganda. The Supreme of Canada has now given them carte blanche to do so.  

In March 28, 2024 the Supreme Court ruled that, not only public schools boards must bow to the demands of a religion that does not recognize the separation of Church and State but private nondenominational schools as well. This was after two Muslim students deliberately enrolled in such a school then appealed the school’s decision to stand by its Charter and not make an exception for the uber religion and provide them with “a space to pray.”

61:9 It is He Who sent His Messenger forth with the guidance and the religion of truth, to make it triumph over every religion.

The Supreme Court interpreted the Canadian Charter of Rights’ guarantee of freedom of religion as being preponderant to any other rights even what many people believed was a right to be free from religion that the ostensibly secular public school system made possible.

With its far-reaching decision, the Court not only betrayed the wishes of a majority of Canadians but of a significant minority of Muslim Canadians as well. In a 2016 Environics' Survey of Muslims in Canada, 25 percent said NO when asked “"Should Muslims in Canada have the right to pray in public schools?”

The Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Charter is a tremendous victory for Islam with the Court’s explicit recognition that religion can be omnipresent and there is nothing the State can do about it. The State must yield to the Church where the two come into conflict. On the bright side, it does provide a path to a less bloody triumph of the irrational by allowing Islam more leeway to persuade by example instead of by the sword.

English Canada applauded the ruling while the leadership of the majority French-speaking proving of Québec declared it would use the Charter’s notwithstanding clause and continue to deny space for prayers in its public school system. Education Minister Bernard Drainville issued a directive to that effect, prohibiting the presence of prayer spaces in elementary and high schools. The Minister said anyone could always "pray silently." But of course, there are few, if any reward points for such prayers.

Prayers are not only expected to be said out loud for Allah to hear them and parcel out the points but first you must perform wudu if you want Him to lend an ear.

Left is a poster found in washrooms at the School of Engineering of the University of Quebec which states (my translation): "Washing of feet in sinks is prohibited."*

The Supreme Court’s calamitous prayer decision is bound to cause further demands and further disruptions in a once trusted refuge from the bombardment of the word of God which will now be heard in the classroom next door, in the hall and assembly areas. Even in washrooms where believers will shout the required In the Name of God the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful before starting their wudu session and ending with a declaration about their faith and their separateness.

I testify that there is no god but Allah, and I also testify that Muhammad is His servant and messenger.

O Allah, make me among those who seek repentance and make me among those who purify themselves.

They are also bound to be asked by the perplexed why they are washing their feet in the sink, blowing water out of their nose, cleaning out their ears etc. only be lectured about god and worship. It will also become the subject of conversation outside the lavatory and outside whatever room Muhammad’s prayer choreography is performed as the marketing genius intended.

Should anyone object to performing wudu in washrooms in schools expect the next demand to be the right for believers to wash their feet and hair, clean their nostrils and ear canal etc. in school sinks before prayer or to be provided with the type of wudu facilities found in mosques which "typically consists of an open square washroom with a drain in the middle and taps on each side of the room"^Wiki.

This of course will not be a problem for the province of Québec which will not even entertain the thought as the sign makes abundantly clear. An example for the world if we hope to have a chance of at least mitigating the triumph of the irrational.

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* In 2006, a human rights complaint was filed with the Quebec Human Rights Commission (Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse) asking the Commission to find fault with the School of Engineering of the University of Quebec (l'École de technologie supérieure) for denying Muslims the right to wash their feet in the school's public washroom sinks, and that signs prohibiting such activities was a slight against Muslims. The complainants were particularly indignant about the pictogram showing a pair a feet in a sink.

The director of the school gave the following reason for authorizing the solidly anchored sign (my translation):

Employees and students had complained that the bathrooms were a mess after the ritual washing of feet before prayer. I even had to intervene to stop someone from washing his feet in the sink, he already had one foot in the sink … posters that requested that the room be kept clean routinely disappeared which is why I authorised a plaque with the pictogram to be screwed to the wall.

The school argued that the interdiction against washing your feet in a public sink was a question of health (hygiene) and safety and the Commission agreed. For many (including yours truly) that came as somewhat of a surprise considering that human rights commissions and courts across Canada have been bending over backwards to accommodate even the most archaic religious traditions e.g. The Kirpan Decision.

The Commission not only agreed that washing one’s feet in a public washroom sink was a health issue, but that the pictogram which made this clear to even those who could not read French or were illiterate, was not meant to discriminate against any group.

From Blacks to Females to the Back

Viola Desmond made history and will now be the first woman, apart from the queen, to be prominently featured on a banknote for standing up against a bigoted policy of blacks to the back in public cinemas in Nova Scotia.

People in Toronto trampled on pages of the Koran partly in protest against females being herded to the back of whatever room they find themselves in to be lectured to by male students during school hours on school property on the revered opinions of a misogynous man and the equally demeaning observations as to their flawed character he conveyed from a deity with the same mindset.

It is forbidden for a female to lead the believers in prayer or deliver the Friday khutba, i.e. sermon if even one man is present, no matter his qualifications or mental acuity. An inferior cannot lecture a superior as to the ways of God.

The Friday sermon is a milestone of a week of prayer, and its significance cannot be underestimated. I will let Uzza of Remembering Uzza fame explain.

Uzza: By accommodating prayers and Friday worship within the secular school system, the West made a mockery of a secular education. Everyone within ear shot was exposed to the bombardment of the word of God and to the Islamist’s credo articulated by Al-Qaeda: "Any study beside that of the Quran is a distraction, except the Hadith and jurisprudence in the religion. Knowledge is what He narrated to us, and anything other than that is the whispering of the Satan."

Archie: That, and angels as beheaders at the battle of Badr is enough to convince me that Islam has it backwards. Either devils are the good guys or, if you believe in the nonsense of what you call revealed truths, the Koran is the work of the Devil to make angels, and all that is good, bad.

Gerry: Timothy Findley made more or less the same argument in Not Wanted on the Voyage, about the devils and their leader Lucifer being the good guys who lost the battle with the bad guys, Yahweh’s angels, which is why there is so much misery in the world. He died an old celebrated author. But I doubt you will live to a ripe old age, Archie, if you say the same thing about the Koran having it backwards.

Archie: I know. Findley was lucky to live at a time before freedom of expression had to be god-friendly “or else.”

Bob: Don’t you mean Satan-friendly?

Archie: Shut up!

Uzza: It does not matter, Archie. What matters is that the believers not only succeeded in getting governments to enforce, to use your expression, “god-friendly freedom of expression,” but to make everywhere welcoming of God including what had previously been a god-free zone, the secular public school. In doing so, it downgraded reason in favour of dogma, thereby making its eventual triumph over reason a foregone conclusion.

Gerry: Whitney Houston said it best in song: “Teach your children well and let them lead the way”. But we didn’t do that, did we; teach them well?

Uzza: From an Islamist's point of view, we did very well!

...

Bob: Bob: Prayers are prayers. Big deal! I still don’t understand what saying prayers in school have to do with believers wanting to take the unbelievers' heads off.

Uzza: In Islam they are a big deal for the believers and should be an even bigger deal for unbelievers, for the prayers are mainly about them including killing them. Prayers in Islam involve repeating verses from the Koran that reek of hatred for unbelievers and which appear on almost every page of what is a short holy book, by holy book standards, at about 1/10 the size in words of the Bible. You are about to be literally smothered by a religion that tolerates no equal and you do not even know the significance of its most basic rituals: the daily prayers and the Friday sermon. 

Bob: Sorry I asked.

Gerry: What about the sermon?

Uzza: The sermon can be in whatever language.

Gerry: At least that part everyone can understand.

Uzza: Not always. Remember the Alamo?

Bob: Uzza, you've had too much to drink.

Uzza: “Remember the Alamo” was a way of reminding people about why they should hate the Mexicans during Texas' fight for independence from Mexico. It meant something to those who understood what the cry was all about and nothing to those who knew nothing about the famous battle.

Gerry: [getting Uzza's drift] But the believers won the battle of Badr?

Uzza: It does not matter. If I say "Remember Badr" or even more evocative battles to come where Jews and Christians are the targets, I am reminding those who know their Koran who they should hate and who they must subdue, if not behead, when the opportunity arises and they are at their mercy.

Gerry: How do you stop the Friday school sermon preachers from using expressions whose message of hate and invitation to murder in Allah’s Cause is so cleverly camouflaged?

Uzza: [raising her voice] EASY! DON'T ALLOW RELIGION IN SCHOOLS!

Archie: A bit late for that, isn't it?

Uzza: A secular education free from the bombardment of the word of God was our only hope of undoing the damage done at home. Instead, we made sure the damage was permanent.

Archie: How?

Uzza: The Friday sermon can be a source of diabolic inspiration and a confidence booster for those in the know, but it is Islamic prayers in schools which do the most damage by reinforcing a child’s confidence in the revealed truths he or she read or mouthed under the not-always-gentle tutelage of his or her mother^. Revealed truths are reason’s opposite; they cannot coexist. One must triumph over the other. By allowing prayers in schools supposedly dedicated to teaching children to think for themselves, we facilitated the triumph of dogma over reason.

With activists petitioning school boards and being granted the right for children who submit to the Will of Allah to congregate for prayers on school property during school hours, children of parents who believe in the equality of the sexes can only hope that their sons and daughters, after witnessing this abasing spectacle and hearing that it is all part of God's plan as revealed in the Koran, will resist the urge to be part of the Almighty's design.

Just as in the time of Viola Desmond, governments at all levels are siding with the bigots, with discrimination based on one's sex for all to see replacing discrimination based on the colour of one's skin.

Bernard Payeur

Updated June 30, 2024

The Escalating Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Kids