57.7percent of Swiss citizens have voted to disallow the building of minarets. Minaretsare those stern cylindrical structures intrinsic to Islamic architecture, and theyare usually attached to mosques -- places of worship where Muslimscommune with Allah, and presumably complain about Swiss intolerance.
Actually,a correction. Not 57.7 percent of the Swiss, but 57.7 percent of thoseindividuals who cared enough about the issue to actually submit a propositionon it one way or the other. In short, individuals who had a vested interest ineither standing for minarets (pun intended), or a point to make by opposingthem.
Thenay-voters may of course have had several passable reasons for opposingminarets. As far as structures go, minarets are not very neutral – possiblymaking them passé in the land of socio-political ambivalence. Perhaps it is agender issue, with the neo-feminists swinging the vote. Minaretscan be so patriarchal -- almost phallic, really.
Perhapsit was concern for zoning laws. With their no-nonsense search for altitude andcarefully construed domes, there is no mistaking a minarets’ sense of physicalpurpose. And if Florence can have strict zoning laws to preserveheritage, why should those erstwhile Swiss cantonments be less deserving?
Perhapsit was aesthetics. The Swiss felt that importing design cues from the desertsof Saudi Arabia might instill Geneva with too abrupt a sense of surrealistjuxtaposition. Yet to balk at surrealism, in a land that invented the cuckooclock and juxtaposed it with expertise in dark chocolate, is a bit much.
All arguablereasons. But the ban against minarets is for none of the above. It is rather ashot across Muslim immigrant bows, telling them their presence is notappreciated. The posters published by the Swiss People’s Party to popularise their stance showed a veiled woman with a backdrop of minarets, imposed on a colonized Swissflag.
In the contextof a Europe creeping towards old bad habits of intolerance, with a ban of veilsin France, right wing anti-immigrant parties gaining strength in Denmark andBelgium, a xenophobic Northern League part of Berlusconi’s coalition and cartoons of questionable humour coming out of Denmark, there is a pastiche of confrontation and marginalization -- with Muslims the Continent's newresented underclass. Fascism has found a happy home in Europe before, and thereare days when it appears contemporary Europe suffers nostalgia for that odioushouse guest.
In counterpoint, severalMuslim countries have laws that make the Swiss look benign. In Saudi Arabia,synagogues and churches are outlawed. Other faiths are banned from operating inIslam’s birthplace. In Pakistan, the Christian minority is discriminated against constitutionally. But is Saudi Arabia, with its curious mix of suspicion,self-pity and bellicose intolerance a country anyone would want to emulate?Especially if one happened to be Europe’s oldest democracy?
The Swiss havecarefully folded their habit of neutrality and put it away. They have taken astand – finally. It is unfortunate that this newfound sense of social purposereeks of xenophobia and discrimination. It is a counter-revolution against aMuslim revolution that never occurred. Muslims in Switzerland are mostly from secular Turkish and Bosnianheritages and have assimilated reasonably well. They do not spontaneously combust, andtend to avoid conflict. The Swiss system of mass democracy may be veryegalitarian. But it would be nice if the Swiss could do something constructive with it --such as galvanizing it to crack down on those absurd bird-regurgitating clocks.