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Dogs banned from transport - and worse
#1
A worrying trend is developing of dogs being banned from public transport (even with a guide dog!), from walking a dog in a park near persons of a certain religion and even from owning a dog!

See http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...board.html
and
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...areas.html
and
http://www.animals24-7.org/2014/07/15/pi...inst-dogs/
and
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=268_1345407238

Tolerance seems to be rapidly disappearing on all sides.

The Muslim Council of Great Britain has counselled tolerance - which is good - but sadly there are others who do not agree and want to take things much further.

I respect the right of people to hold to a particular religion if they feel the need for it, but not at the cost of limiting the freedom of others. In the case of a disabled person with a guide dog being refused transport, even my tolerance runs short.
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#2
Appalling news LPC. I've met many humans I thought should have been banned from public places *wink*, but that mindset is inappropriate, right?!
Most service dogs [and dogs in general] are more well behaved, cleaner, and more considerate than a lot of people I've encountered.
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mypetsonparade.com
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#3
Multi-culturalism should bring tolerance and acceptance of that other culture's belief system. Many female Westerners who don't hold the same belief system of certain countries in the East, for example, when visiting that country, mainly have the politeness to don head-gear....wear long trousers, not walk about in bikini tops, and whatever else to show respect.

So it seems only fair that those of a different belief system, when in a 'western' country, should accept the culture of that country with some gracefulness. After all, they have been given paid work here (or benefits) and have not been discriminated against because of their race or religion.

In my opinion it works both ways. And these new trends are unbalanced.

This is actually quite silly in my opinion, as for those who believe that contact with dogs is 'unclean'....all they have to do is have a change of clothes and a wash-cloth in their locker, in order to meet the requirements for their next prayers. And some work places have full shower/bathroom facilities. It only takes 5 minutes to have a complete shower!

That's what country vets do anyway, when they have been attending to the backside of a cow one minute, and are expected to eat lunch with a colleague the next!

But then of course, country vets have some grit and are not usually self-pitying.


This quote from the Imam, From 'Trouw' 2.2. 2012 (on the 3rd link above) is absolutely correct. This is Islamic law about animals, and how to act when contacting dogs:

“Animals, including dogs, should be treated with love and respect. Only when you pray, for which you must be absolutely clean, are you not allowed to touch them.”

By the way, if it is too inflammatory and may 'upset someone'.....delete my comment at your leisure, my esteemed colleagues here on ALWF!
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#4
I have no intention of deleting your comment.

This is a very disturbing trend. There are actually two trends. One is a ban on service dogs. It took years to gain service dog rights and now it seems that we must fight for them again.

The other issue is dogs vs. religion. If you take a job in the public sector(bus driver) you have to let the public ride your bus. If you have beliefs that prevent contact with animals then you need to take a job in a place where you will not have animal contact.

This could get ugly before it is resolved.

I will say one thing about prayer. Perhaps it would be better to focus on cleanliness of spirit before prayer than a less important detail like physical dirt. There are many good reasons for being dirty and I don't think they offend God.
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Catherine

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#5
Excellent posts, AF, Tobi and Catherine. I can't add anything much to what you have written. As Catherine says, it looks like the guide dog issue in particular will have to be fought all over again, but from a different angle. It is disturbing that in the case of the bus driver who left a blind person with his guide dog at the bus stop, refusing to take them further, the matter was "dealt with internally", but no action was taken. "Dealt with internally" in organisation language means "discussed by a manager with the employee", not any form of disciplinary action. In other words, the employee may well do the same again.

Tobi, what you wrote was very fair. No-one, but no-one, is going to delete what you have written! Catherine, I would agree with you totally that God, the Creator of souls, the Universal Power of Love, call it what one likes, would much prefer that our actions and thoughts help others for good, rather than concentrating on self (me, me, me) and ritual purity. What good is ritual purity if one's actions leave a blind person stranded?

To take a Christian example, although there are lots of examples in other religions (including Islam), the Pharisees strongly criticised Jesus for healing people on the sabbath day, when they said no work of any kind - even healing! - should be done. His view, however, was that doing good was far more important than blindly following ritualistic rules.
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#6
(01-01-2015, 10:06 PM)LPC Wrote: To take a Christian example, although there are lots of examples in other religions (including Islam), the Pharisees strongly criticised Jesus for healing people on the sabbath day, when they said no work of any kind - even healing! - should be done. His view, however, was that doing good was far more important than blindly following ritualistic rules.

I know, LPC, that's why I quite like Him. He didn't mess about.

But even in the Bible, dogs get a bad deal generally....they are outside the City Walls, along with murderers, whores....etc (forgotten the exact quotation) I think those must have been the scavenging 'street dogs' of the time, who survived on waste thrown into garbage pits and worse....in the valley of Gehenna....(the general trash-place where unspeakable things were dumped.)
poor sods.
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#7
It seems stray dogs scavenging in garbage dumps is an old problem, one that we should have fixed by now.

LPC, those were the examples I was thinking about. When you obsess about external rules instead of charity then it is all about you and not about the prayer. I firmly believe that charity(kindness) towards others(human or animal) is of a higher priority that a rule about food or work or cleanliness rituals. Clearly Jesus felt the same way.

The guide dog/service dog issue has always been tenuous. They won rights, but there is a lot of misunderstanding about the work of service dogs so their rights are not secure. If people only knew how much good dogs do they would be given special seats on any bus, any where, any time.

I hope the people monitoring this issue are on top of things.
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Catherine

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