Should France Ban Head Scarves?

Last year, when France stood up against the war in Iraq, many Muslims saw the country as a protector of their faith. Now a simple square of fabric is tarnishing that image. Last week the French cabinet approved a new bill that would ban religious symbols from state schools.

Though the proposed law, which is expected to pass easily, would forbid students from wearing Jewish yarmulkes and large crucifixes, its main purpose is to stop the increasing use of the hijab, or head scarf, among Muslim schoolgirls.

Muslims in France and around the world are demonstrating against the law — and France. At Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque, Sheik Ikrimah Sabri addressed France in tones usually reserved for America, declaring that the ban "amounts to a declaration of war against Islam." In Iran, former President Ali Akbar Rafsanjani accused Chirac of "insulting the feelings of 1.5 billion Muslims."

But what's the view from ground zero of this debate? TIME asked two state-school teachers to make their cases for and against the ban.

YES
THERESE DUPLAIX, Principal of the Lycée Turgot, Paris
Why do we need a law banning religious symbols in schools? For me it is a question of preserving the republic and its democratic and secular tradition. And it needs defending: I remember about 10 years ago, in a high school in Seine-St. Denis, north of Paris, when three 16-year-old girls started wearing Islamic scarves under the influence of a male Moroccan classmate. I had to explain to him that their scarves were disturbing the class, and that if he didn't get the girls to remove them he would be expelled. He agreed, but he said: "In 10 years, it will be we who tell you what to do." We can't allow that prediction to be fulfilled.

In my present school, where about a quarter of the students are of North African origin and another quarter are Jewish, the young girls who put on their head scarves before leaving the building tell me privately that they are a means of protection. Without them, they say, some people would consider them "easy" and they would be "prey to insult." Last year I accused a student of proselytizing because he brought religious writings to school and suggested to other students that they pray for good grades. After students gave me a petition supporting their "unjustly accused" classmate, I spent an hour and a half in the class explaining the principles of secularism. At the disciplinary commission, the student agreed in writing to respect the rules set forth, but two weeks later he was expelled for brutality. He didn't understand the rules of society.

My teachers of history, geography and science have had students object to lessons that, they say, go against their religious convictions. It's difficult to make some students come in for Friday- evening or Saturday-morning classes, because of the Jewish sabbath. I and many of my colleagues believe no religious manifestation should be allowed to interfere with school schedules — for the good of the students.