Cisnormativity and Christiannormativity at the Strasbourg Court: Reflections on Gender and Religion

Eugenia Relaño Pastor is Assistant Professor in the School of Law, Complutense University, Madrid (Spain), and Cooperation Partner in the Department of Law and Anthropology at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Halle (Germany). [1]

Europe is suffused with Christianity, or at least memories of its past influence.

—Andrew Higgins[2]

Those searching to have their gender legally recognized by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR or Strasbourg Court) and members of religious minorities who pursue equal rights and privileges enjoyed by dominant religious groups may not apparently share much in common. However, the following post sheds light on the similarities in the demands coming from gender and religious minorities. An initial examination unveils three common features shared by gender and religious minorities in searching for effective freedom: (1) the bias embedded in heteronormative laws and traditional church-state relations, (2) the experience of intersectional forms of discrimination, and (3) a self-determination approach to gender and religion.

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Myanmar: No Religious Liberty in an Unequal Milieu

Farzana Mahmood is an advocate of Bangladesh Supreme Court and one of the co-founders and Executive Director of Bangladesh Manobadhikar O Poribesh Andolon Foundation (BAMAPA), an NGO dedicated to uphold and promote the basic human rights and environment rights of the peoples of the Bangladesh

The conditions of religious minorities in Myanmar especially, Christians (6.2 percent, particularly Chin, Kachin, Karen people), Muslims (4.3 percent, Rohingya, Malay), and Hindus (0.5 percent, mainly Burmese Indians) deteriorated with the military coup in 1962. During the successive five brutal decades following the coup, the military exploited the religious and ethnic diversity of the country and ruled by dividing the communities, pitting Buddhists, Christians, and Muslims against each other.

However, with the onset of civilian governments in 2011, the conditions of the religious and ethnic minorities in the country failed to improve. In 2017, more than 750,000 Rohingya Muslim minorities of the Rakhine state fled Myanmar to Bangladesh when the military started destroying and burning houses, killing Rohingyas, and raping their women.

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Freedom of Religion or Belief in Belgium: Some Religions are More Equal than Others

Jelle Creemers coordinates the Institute for the Study of Freedom of Religion or Belief (ISFORB) at the Evangelische Theologische Faculteit, Leuven (Belgium) and is a postdoctoral research fellow of Research Foundation – Flanders (FWO-Vlaanderen).

So-called “Western” nations are not the usual suspects of intrusions into religious liberty. The reason seems obvious: legislation and policies which protect freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) are typically well embedded in and very compatible with strongly secularized contexts with a high appreciation of individual freedom and human rights—typical character traits of said “Western” nations.

While severe intrusions of FoRB involving state-sanctioned use of force are infrequent, there is sufficient reason to also keep a close eye on these nations.

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