Sikh Front-Line Workers Make Enough Sacrifices. Their Beards Shouldn't Be One.
When the COVID-19 pandemic started, the Sikh community did what we always do. We mobilized. We served free communal meals in the tradition of langar, we provided aid, we even offered up our own spaces for the benefit of public health. This is the Sikh practice of seva, or “selfless service,” in action. Canada is familiar with this type of mobilization from its Sikh community. It is widely recognized and respected — perhaps even expected.
This history of Sikhs serving our nation makes it even harder to watch Canadians praise the erasure of an important facet of the Sikh faith.
It has long been suggested that masks required for medical staff, including the popular N95 model, do not fit bearded individuals. This has been repeated in news coverage of the pandemic, subtly framing the Sikh religious practice of keeping kesh (unshorn hair and beards) as an obstacle to saving lives.
One such example is the story of a Sikh doctor in Montreal who made the personal choice to shave his beard, which must be kept uncut in accordance with his Sikh faith, to wear a face mask required for work with COVID-19 patients. While the Sikh community decried this as an example of the state failing to provide front-line workers with appropriate PPE (personal protective equipment), media paraded Dr. Sanjeet Singh Saluja’s choice as a “sacrifice.”
But he never should have had to make the choice between keeping his faith and serving fellow Canadians.
Focusing on beards as a problem forces a spotlight on Sikh health-care workers. Praising the shaving of Sikh beards draws on the “model minority” label to pressure Sikhs into conforming to Western ideals of what is deemed normal. The discrimination in this should not be understated.
This harmful perception overlooks the fact that there are Sikh health-care workers who have passed “fit tests” wearing masks with beards, and ignores that other factors can determine the fit of a mask, such as the shape of one’s face.
