Quebec court’s Bill 21 decision disappointing

The Coalition of Muslim Women is deeply disappointed by the Quebec Court of Appeal’s decision to uphold the province’s controversial Secularism Law that prohibits public sector workers from wearing religious symbols on the job.

The coalition was founded in 2010 as a response to Bill 94, which was the precedent to Bill 21 (Secularism Law), a discriminatory law that limits employment options for religious minorities, whose faith becomes visible due to their faith-based identity markers.

The law disproportionately impacts visible Muslim women wearing a head covering, but it also impacts minorities from other faith traditions, like wearing a turban or kara (Sikhism), kippa (Judaism), cross (Christianity), or Tilak (Hinduism).

The Coalition of Muslim Women has long advocated against systemic racism and Islamophobia that prevents marginalized groups from achieving their full potential, only because of their identities.

The court’s ruling will only further alienate these groups. The fact that the law also strips women of the agency and right to choose is not lost on us. This is essentially a human rights issue, but very much a women’s rights issue too.

We await the next steps, as the case is likely to be appealed in the Supreme Court. We applaud Justice Minister Arif Virani’s affirmation that the federal government would protect the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

We also are relieved to know that at least one group — Ministers of National Assembly (MNAs) — has been exempt from these prohibitions. This leaves the opportunity for more groups to be similarly included, as there can be no hierarchy of rights. Mifrah Abid and Fauzia Mazhar, Coalition of Muslim Women Kitchener-Waterloo