Minarets in Switzerland

It’s difficult to find anything humorous or ironic in Switzerland’s decision to change their constitution to ban the construction of new minarets in any of their cantons.  Crooked Timber has an intelligent insight.   But overall it’s an appalling and worrying precedent.  It’s targeted discrimination against a religious minority.  As Doug Saunders in the Globe & Mail observes, “Even as European human-rights courts began attempts to block the Swiss amendment Monday, extremist politicians across Europe were examining their countries’ laws to see if a similar referendum could be accomplished.”  Emboldening bigots and re-writing the facts of religious behaviour (there are only 4 minarets now in Switzerland, and none of the communities espouse sharia law) is worrisome.  Using laws for your own insecurity is shown historically to never work.