European Court Wants Everyone Into the Pool

Muslim girls can be required to participate in swimming classes alongside boys despite their parents’ religious objections, according to the European Court of Human Rights. The outcome would have been the opposite in most U.S. jurisdictions, which have emphasized students’ rights ever since Jehovah’s Witnesses were exempted from the Pledge of Allegiance during World War II. The decision made this week marks the very different situation in contemporary Europe, where children’s interests are contrasted with their parents’ rights, and the schools’ goal of “integration” is getting special weight amid a wave of Muslim immigration.

The case, Osmanoǧlu and Kocabaş v. Switzerland, involved a couple, Swiss citizens of Turkish origin, who did not want their pre-teen daughters to participate in mandatory swim classes with boys. The parents acknowledged that as a strict matter of Islamic law, the prepubescent girls weren’t bound by modesty rules. But they said that as a matter of religious practice, they wanted the girls exempted.