"Women's Freedom of Religion; Covered Up" by Stella

Canada encourages multiculturalism and is very accepting of all beliefs and religions. They tend to embrace their cultural diversity and therefore are very culturally mixed. In many ways, Quebec is usually left to govern itself. This is because Canada has a federal government, meaning local governments can govern themselves. Another example of a federal government is the USA. The US states can make their own laws. For this reason, Quebec can make its own laws, but its new law still caused a lot of issues for Canada.

Quebec has recently passed a law dealing with face coverings on public transit, emergency service, hospitals and public work. The new law, Bill 62, is called the Religious Neutrality Bill, and its basic premise is that public workers should not be displaying their religion at work. Justice Prime Minister Stephanie Valee addressed the law further, saying “You can see my face and I can see yours.” The law bans all facial coverings even, as Valee said, sunglasses. Valee declared that this law is not targeting Muslim women, but that does happen to be a side-effect of the law. It says that faces should not be covered in these situations. Justice Minister Stephanie Vallee declared, “As long as the service is being rendered, the face should be uncovered.”

To address both sides of the issue we must understand the reason this law was made. The problem is the difficulty in identifying threats that could be hidden under face coverings. Those who made this law claimed that it was instated in the interest of public safety. It applies to both people receiving and providing public services and is mainly for the purpose of ensuring that people use their own ID.

Muslim women wear niqabs and burqas out of religious obligation, choosing to use this as a show of their faith. They see their facial coverings as a show of modesty, and therefore their face and hair being visible is a very private thing. As Bill 62 seems to directly target Muslim women wearing the niqab and burka, the law caused many protests. The government was accused of purposely targeting Muslim women that already had been subject to racism, threats, and violence. One Muslim group brought a case against the new law claiming that it violated the Canadian and Quebec constitutions. These constitutions say that everyone has the right to freedom of religion. Soon after the law was passed, Vallée addressed the public again, explaining the law further. She said, “No one will be thrown off public transit, denied emergency healthcare or be chased out of a public library”. Recent surveys have shown that most women are open to lifting their facial covering briefly for identification purposes if it is necessary and they are asked.





Justice Minister Stephanie Vallee further explained that women will need to show their face for photo ID, but not need to walk around with their faces showing. This means that the initial outrage at this law has been considered and met with a solution, and now this law is acceptable to most everyone.