Islamism at school: "Almost 40% of teachers say they are self-censored"

INTERVIEW

This is one of the lessons of an Ifop poll for

and the Jean Jaurès foundation published on Tuesday, on the eve of the start of the trial of the January 2015 attacks: 26% of French Muslims between 15 and 24 years old "do not express no condemnation of the perpetrators of the attacks ".

A statistic that does not seem to surprise Jean-Pierre Obin, author of the book 

Invited from Europe Soir, the former Inspector of National Education takes stock of the entry of Islamism into school.

>> Find Europe Soir with Julian Bugier in replay and podcast here

Islamism now reaches "primary school"

Tables separated according to religion, girls who skip swimming pool lessons for religious reasons ... 15 years ago, Jean-Pierre Obin had already denounced attacks on secularism in schools.

"Things have not improved since then."

According to the latter, the phenomenon now even reaches primary school.

Professors who censor themselves to avoid "incidents"

At a time when freedom of expression is back in the news with the trial of the January 2015 attacks, the specialist points out that "for a teacher, it is the duty of expression that is important, that is - to say his obligation to make the program ".

However, according to an Ifop study, nearly 40% of teachers say they self-censor so as not to create problems with students.

"And in the ZEP, they are more than 50%", he reports.

There would therefore be a majority of teachers who censor a topic in the school program or avoid mentioning an author "because they fear or have had incidents" with their students.

"A combination of political and national education responsibilities" 

But how to explain such a phenomenon?

According to Jean-Pierre Obin, it is a combination of responsibilities of "political forces, of National Education, the lack of training of teachers, and the lack of courage of the administration symbolized by the doctrine 'especially not of wave'".

But the former inspector also points to the responsibility of the parents of pupils, who will "change their children from establishments to protect them, generating a phenomenon of ghettoization" of the areas affected by the phenomenon.