Valley Park Middle School in Toronto, already under fire for allowing Muslim students to use the cafeteria for Friday prayers, is following Islamic shari’a by having girls on their period sit on their in the back of the room, not partaking in the prayer.
“A school should be a safe space for all children,” objects the website Change.org. “Not a place where 12-year-old girls are treated as second class citizens, and certainly not a place where menstruating girls are ostracized as ‘unclean’ and sent to the back of the ‘prayer-cafeteria’ as third class citizens!”
The brings in a Muslim Imam to lead students in Friday prayers — with boys in front, girls segregated behind them, and menstruating girls sitting in the back, separated by furniture.
Both Canada’s left-wing and right-wing national newspapers have run editorials against the situation. The Toronto District School Board claims they are obligated to provide accommodation for students’ faith needs. Some, however, are asking whether the school is violating the Ontario Education Act and the District’s own gender equity policy.
Furthermore, notes Change.org, the school’s practice has been condemned by the Muslim Canadian Congress, which is threatening legal action, and the Canadian Council of Muslim Women.
MCC founder Tarek Fatah told Change.org that “the Toronto District School Board (is) using tax money to tell girls that they are second-class citizens” because of “white, liberal guilt.” Fatah elaborated: “Deep inside is a racist view that Muslims are not considered equal human beings, and that they can treat women how they want, and it’s nobody else’s concern.”
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