I mostly agree with you, especially on the “really dangerous religion is organized religion exerting power beyond spiritual matters”. And 1905 lawmakers were on that point to, the main goal was to stop catholic church from exerting power, especially in schools.
I personally think that freedom of religion and freedom from religion are the same thing. If your religion cannot be ‘none’, then you have no freedom ‘of’ religion.
I assume otherwise we fully agree and our positions are the same / compatible ? Your last paragraph leaves me uncertain, but I think that there is only one correct answer which is yes, all those people should have their right to wear what they want as long as it does not support or provoke harm to other peoples, which is not the case in any of the examples.
This makes sense, i think you’re right on trying to keep things nuanced, and that the question of how much usage of freedom hurts versus how much not using this freedom hurts.
Though in the case of wearing clothes, i find it very hard to be harmful, even through the bias of mockery. It’s hard to argue that the negative impact of mockery exceeds the negative impact of being forced or prohibited in what you wear. Especially in the case of hijab.
I do think that the argument of mockery/clothes being ‘seen as symbols of oppression’ can even be used as a way to justify repressive laws. If we take the hijab case, there are two main reasons we could ban it : some women are being forced to wear it, and some people are ‘seeing it at a symbol of oppression’. Banning hijab for women forced to wear it may seem good at first, but inevitably ends up dumb when you think about it : it’s treating the symptom rather than the problem (power of religion over people) and in the worst case it even worsen the condition of women (who are then stopped from going to schools, sport competitions or public places where they could precisely get help or tools to treat the problem). So it is only for the people seeing hijab as oppressive that it makes sense to ban it, but this negative impact is obviously very little compared to the harm it makes to religious people. And i get the sense that some people are blending both aspects as one issue to combine one part’s legitimacy with the other part’s adequation to the solution, and get something that seems both logical and legitimate when it is really only one or the other. (at least on the hijab matter nowadays in France, other areas and periods might be a lot different).
I’ve been through your approach of trying to take everything neutrally and with nuances, and I still think that this is the way to go, and that it’s always good to use it a little bit, but as I saw more and more debates, I also got to think it’s important to not give both sides on a matter equal weight for the sake of neutrality, and to insist on the obvious solution when there is one : we might take its obviousness into account in our mind, but it may not be the case for other people, so I like to state it along with nuances.
Now, generally speaking, you’re clearly right that in lot of cases there is no clear answer, and the case of medics refusing to perform an act based on their beliefs is a very interesting one (I would argue for their right to do so as long as there is someone else to make it, even elsewhere or later in some cases, but I can see why you would not, it’s not as clear as the hijab thing for me).
Anyway thanks for bringing nuance and examples