Everyone seems determined not to say what the student’s religion is. The Professor says he guesses that the student is Muslim or Orthodox Jewish. The administration isn’t talking, and neither is the writer.
Well, then, what’s his name on the class list? If it’s Mohammed, then probably he’s not Orthodox Jewish.
I’d also venture a guess that all these people, including the present writer, probably know what his religion is, but they don’t want to say. That also points to his being a Muslim. I doubt whether all these politically correct people would be bothered in the least about riling an Orthodox Jew.
A dharma for one is still a dharma. It's not as if the student is claiming that he needs to be excluded from having his picture taken for an ID card, the purpose of which is to -- strangely enough -- identify people, and exemption from which infringes a valid legal purpose.
If anyone is being "politically correct" here it's the author of the piece, who seems to believe that the imagined slights to women who wouldn't even have known the student was missing are more important than the student's principles, however silly they might be. They're not. Group "feminism" doesn't trump individual rights, even when they're dumb.
Having attended a University in Southern Ontario (namely the University of Guelph), I’m pretty familiar with the reputations that most of the better Ontario schools have (both good and bad). In the case of York, it’s become fairly notorious over the past few years for having become quite anti-semitic (it was the second University to host Israeli Apartheid Week, for example). Essentially, York is a radical muslim hotbed, and is known for that.
Hence, I would bet a twelve-pack of Timmies donuts that the student in question is a follower of Mohammed (pork be upon him).
That's the stupid thing about this story. There weren't any "women's rights" violated.
This isn't like that story about the sex-segregated karate class from a few days ago. He didn't demand that the women be removed from where they were entitled to be. He asked for himself to be placed elsewhere.
There's no "women's right" to compel a male student to belong to their study group when he wants to be elsewhere. The male student's religious rights, whatever they happen to be, are not in conflict with any other rights in this situation.
Instead, the university, then the media, then the whole country flipped out over nothing.