France to overhaul secularism teaching to help stop radicalisation
Source: The Guardian
France to overhaul secularism teaching to help stop radicalisation
Education minister says pupils should be taught that separation of church and
state is there to protect them, accusing rightwing politicians of twisting principle
Angelique Chrisafis in Paris
Thursday 21 January 2016 06.00 GMT
The French principle of secularism has been twisted by politicians and so often wrongly used to attack Islam that schoolchildren have been left baffled, the French education minister has warned.
Najat Vallaud-Belkacem told the Guardian that after last years devastating jihadi attacks in Paris, France was overhauling the teaching of secularism and civic values as part of the countrys drive against terrorism and radicalisation.
We have to reappropriate the concept of laïcité (secularism) so we can explain to our young pupils that whatever their faith, they belong to this idea and theyre not excluded. Secularism is not something against them; it protects them, she said.
Since last Januarys attacks on the satirical weekly magazine Charlie Hebdo and a Paris kosher supermarket, when 17 people were killed, and Novembers attacks that killed 130, French schools have taken centre-ground in the nations soul-searching on how young French men could take up guns against their fellow citizens.
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Read more:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/21/france-overhaul-secularism-teaching-anti-radicalisation-paris-attacks