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I have a piece in today's Times on Friday's High Court action by Lydia Playfoot. Here's an extract:
The claim of religious significance should not, in a secular school, privilege a hajib over a silver ring or over a T-shirt proclaiming “I’m a stud”. All are simply forms of self-expression, and it is not relevant which is religious.
We have been here before. Last year Shabina Begum claimed that she should be able to wear a hajib at school because of her faith. The House of Lords correctly held that no such right existed.
Both these cases are, at root, the same. They stem from the dangerous belief that self-described religiously observant behaviour should, for that reason alone, be granted special status in secular areas.
But we do not live in a theocracy. We live in a democracy in which all sorts of differing beliefs share public space. That works only if all claims to special treatment through religion are held in the same regard – as being entirely without merit. I should no more be allowed to behave as I wish because I claim that my religion – the Finchley Church of Pollard Observants – compels me to than should Miss Proudfoot be able to wear her silver ring.