- Joined
- Oct 17, 2006
- Messages
- 59,363
- Reaction score
- 27,049
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Undisclosed
New York schools may close for Muslim holidays
This is the problem with mixing religion and state. If you want your kids celebrating your religious holidays, they can go to religious charter schools - or better yet - don't bring them to school that day. You don't have a right to make everyone else observe your religious events.
Schools in New York, the biggest city in the U.S., might be about to implement shutdowns on certain Muslim holy days, as both mayoral candidates running for City Hall have said they support such a move.
A report in the New York Daily News says that Bill de Blasio, the Democrat, and Joe Lhota, his Republican opponent, believe both Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha should be added to the holiday calendar along with other major religious observations, including Christmas, Good Friday and Rosh Hashanah.
De Blasio, who was speaking in Brooklyn at a campaign event, said the closings should be done out of respect for Islam. The report says an estimated 13% of New York's pupils are Muslim.
However, in other parts of the nation with large Muslim populations, like Dearborn, Mich., some schools do account for Muslim holidays and close the classrooms. Massachusetts and Vermont contain districts that shut schools for some Muslim holidays, and the Washington, D.C., suburb of Montgomery County, Md., is seeing an effort underway to adopt a similar policy.
This is the problem with mixing religion and state. If you want your kids celebrating your religious holidays, they can go to religious charter schools - or better yet - don't bring them to school that day. You don't have a right to make everyone else observe your religious events.