Welcome To Islam: Check Your Women's Rights At The Door
Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury writes at Hudson New York:
A girl named Hena, age 14, was murdered by local Sharia Committee at Shariatpur in the southern part of Bangladesh. The daughter of poor farmer named Darbesh Kha, Hena was forcefully abducted and raped on January 30, 2011 during late at night by Mahbub, age 40. During this abuse, villagers arrived in response to the cries of Hena. At the same time, the imam of the local mosque, a man named Mofiz Uddin, and a few teachers of Madrassa [Koranic School] led by Saiful Islam, also arrived; instead of taking any action against the rapist, the Muslim clergymen took Hena inside the Madrassa and locked her in a room. The following day, the same imam and some of members of the Sharia Committee in the village sat for a trial of Hena on charges of "immoral sexuality" before marriage. Later the committee decided to punish Hena with 200 lashes, and took financial penalty of only TK. 10,000 [US$ 150] from the rapist.During the lashing, Hena became unconscious; when she was rushed to the nearby village hospital, the attending doctors declared her dead.
After lodging a murder case with the local police station, a few influential members of the local mosque committee, as well as Sharia Law Committee, are telling members of media that Hena was involved in "immoral activities," and the villagers caught her red-handed while she was having physical relations with a villager; and that later the Sharia Law Committee punished Hena for such anti-Islamic and immoral activities. They denied admitting that Hena died during being lashed. Further, a few political leaders in the area are frantically trying to save the rapist and the members of the Sharia Law Committee.
Robert Spencer explains how rape is punished -- that is, how it works so the victim is punished, not the rapist, under Islam:
Accusations of adultery against Muhammad's favorite wife, Aisha, and Muhammad's desire to exonerate her brought about the requirement that four male Muslim witnesses must be produced in order to establish a crime of adultery or other sexual indiscretions: "Why did they not produce four witnesses? Since they produce not witnesses, they verily are liars in the sight of Allah" (Qur'an 24:13; see also 24:4 and Bukhari, vol. 3, book 52, no. 2661).Aisha's own word counted for nothing to establish the falsity of the accusations against her -- so to this day Islamic law restricts the validity of a woman's testimony, particularly in cases involving sexual immorality. Says the Qur'an: "Call in two male witnesses from among you, but if two men cannot be found, then one man and two women whom you judge fit to act as witnesses; so that if either of them commit an error, the other will remember" (2:282). And Islamic legal theorists have restricted women's testimony even farther, limiting it to, in the words of one Muslim legal manual, "cases involving property, or transactions dealing with property, such as sales" ('Umdat al-Salik, o24.8). Otherwise only men can testify.
Consequently, it is even today virtually impossible to prove rape in lands that follow these Sharia provisions. As long as men deny the charge and there are no witnesses, they get off scot-free, because the victim's account is inadmissible. Even worse, if a woman cannot produce four male witnesses, she may end up incriminating herself simply by making the charge: she has by charging a man with rape made an admission of adultery. That accounts for the grim fact that, according to the Muslim feminist group Sisters in Islam, as many as seventy-five percent of the women in prison in Pakistan are, in fact, behind bars for the crime of being a victim of rape.
"as many as seventy-five percent of the women in prison in Pakistan are, in fact, behind bars for the crime of being a victim of rape".....and as many as seventy-five percent of the men behind bars or bankrupt because of rape charges in USA are victims of false claims of rape
Redrajesh at February 3, 2011 12:52 AM
Look, I'm a big defender of men's rights, but come on...if you're going to post a claim like that here, you'll need to post some way of substantiating it.
By the way, I'm for those who do make false accusations doing the prison time the victim of their false accusation would.
Amy Alkon at February 3, 2011 6:51 AM
Coming to Egypt anytime now.
nuzltr2 at February 3, 2011 7:41 AM
I spent a while yesterday reading about the Islamic Revolution in Iran. (Most of it took place a couple years before I was born.) Is that what's going to happen in Egypt? Aren't all of these people who are- in theory- protesting a "corrupt dictator" paving the way for an islamist takeover?
Aren't there a lot of people in Iran who would rather have the Shah back? (Yeah, yeah, the Shah is dead, but you know what I mean.)
ahw at February 3, 2011 7:58 AM
Welcome To Islam: Check Your Women's Rights At The Door
Given that women are considered chattel in Islam, I'm not sure what rights you were expecting?
I R A Darth Aggie at February 3, 2011 8:42 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2011/02/03/welcome_to_isla_1.html#comment-1836082">comment from I R A Darth AggieDarth, it's a message to those who think Islam is a "religion of peace," and who believe the claims that it's good for women.
Amy Alkon
at February 3, 2011 8:52 AM
I can't imagine any of this. If this was done to my own daughter, ther perp wouldn't live past sunset. But then I don't presume the issue of my own body is chattel. She is a person in herself, AND she is also a part of me as my child.
Leave it to them to decide that an accusation brought by political opponents of Muhammed, somehow apply to refuting a proof in fact by a woman who has been raped.
And we should allow sharia law anywhere in the west because we need to be culturally sensitive? Should we allow human sacrifice too?
OI, I just don' have the words...
SwissArmyD at February 3, 2011 9:37 AM
Wow, Amy's first comment was from a muslim, didn't know muslims were allowed to visit sites like this. Go blow yourself up Redrajesh
ronc at February 3, 2011 11:13 AM
@ronc - Please stop further display of your incapability to decipher a persons religion from his/her name. I am a Hindu and not a Muslim
@Amy - Even this article does not really substantiate the claim that "as many as seventy-five percent of the women in prison in Pakistan are, in fact, behind bars for the crime of being a victim of rape". That is pretty much a blank statement with no substantiation.
I know you are all for true equality and against false claims of rape and paternity fraud. But the author of this article gives one side of the picture of islamic countries and most likely the solution which this author is proposing is to follow the american/english/european/white world system. Fortunately, you have probably not included all that thanks to the fact that you are one of the few decent women around. But most people after reading your post would immediately jump to the conclusion that the solution to this problem is to imitate the american system which is probably one of the crappiest things that can be done.
Redrajesh at February 3, 2011 9:53 PM
@Amy - And just because you are for true equality and against false claims of rape and paternity fraud does not change the ground reality of the crap that men in America face right from their childhood. It just gives men some hope that there are some decent women around, but also makes the men resign to the fact that those decent women are pretty much powerless to stop the feminist sisterhood
Redrajesh at February 3, 2011 9:57 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2011/02/03/welcome_to_isla_1.html#comment-1836382">comment from RedrajeshBut most people after reading your post would immediately jump to the conclusion that the solution to this problem is to imitate the american system which is probably one of the crappiest things that can be done.
Innocent until proven guilty, etc., seem far better than the standards anywhere else.
Furthermore, do you think it's likely that women in Pakistan are robbing banks, etc.? In a Muslim country, what do you think women are in prison for? I've read and continue to read a great deal on Islam and Muslim countries and the treatment of women in them is simply barbaric - as per the Quran and Hadith.
Amy Alkon
at February 3, 2011 10:23 PM
"Innocent until proven guilty" - of course that is better - provided it is applied to all, but the american system applies that principle only to women and it applies the opposite to the men. And of course, the american system says even if women are guilty, their act is justified because they feel oppressed by the fact that men are oppressing them in their imagination ala mary winkler, amber cummings and countless more women who have got away with murder. For women - "innocent until proven guilty" and For men - "guilty until proven innocent" is definitely not a better standard.
In Islamic society, treatment of all people who are weak is barbaric and not just the women. Even the men in Islam do not rob banks unless they are backed by the powerful guys. The normal street vendor in Pakistan does not rob a bank out of his own free will and when bank robberies happen, people know which ganglord/tribal leader is responsible for it, just that they cannot do anything about it because nobody will come forward as a witness for fear of being killed especially if the witness is a man. And men are also stoned to death and have their eyes gouged out and their hands chopped off in Islam. This happens when those men who were not politically powerful get on the wrong side of the powerful people voluntarily/involuntarily irrespective of whether the powerful person is a man or the wife/daughter of a powerful man. When a powerful guy suspects his wife of having an affair, he not only kills the wife, but also the guy who he suspects of having an affair with her without bothering to prove it. Or the powerful guy will claim that his wife was having an affair with the weak guy even if he knows that no affair was going on just to have an opportunity to kill the weak guy. The wife just becomes a pawn in this case and the powerful guy might just show he is being gracious by pardoning her. It is just a system of might is right and is not specifically directed against women. And men are also sexually assaulted, but probably mostly by men. It is just that all the cases where men are at the receiving end are completely ignored by the biased media as usual.
Of course, this does not change the reality that women do not have choices in Islam and cannot imagine running their own businesses or being employed in senior positions on their own merit. But at the same time, the american system has its own major flaws in its treatment of men which make it no better than the islamic system in its treatment of women. Changing the system completely to the american system would just change the victims of sexual crime from women to men.
Redrajesh at February 4, 2011 5:18 AM
Stop posting the same comment numerous times. I've now deleted duplicates of your post above 10 or more times, and I'm tired of it. One or two duplicate comments is an accident and no big deal...I'll delete them. Posting numerous times...it's not working for me. I have work to do and I can't be monitoring your comments to see that they don't appear another 10 times. If they do, I'll ban your IP.
Islam is a barbaric religion and way of life.
the american system applies that principle only to women and it applies the opposite to the men.
Oh, come on. There's injustice -- and I'm appalled by the Winkler case -- but our system is the best there is. The abuses in our system, save for wrongfully accused in death penalty cases (which I'm against), are correctable by law.
In Islam, Allah and the Quran are law.
Thanks, I'll take America.
Amy Alkon at February 4, 2011 7:11 AM
Redrajesh your slightly mistaken, in america your are assumed legally innocent until proven guilty, unless the case revolves around sex, then the public doesnt really seem to care about innocence or gulit.
And in those cases even women defendants are sucked under in the hysteria.
lujlp at February 4, 2011 5:51 PM
It looks like your site does not like google chrome because when I post a comment using chrome, it just shows an error but the comment has been posted. I don't remember trying to submit 10 times, but the fact is that things were timing out or the browser tab was just hung each time I pressed submit or preview.
"The abuses in our system, save for wrongfully accused in death penalty cases (which I'm against), are correctable by law" - try telling that to Mathew Winklers parents..things can move, but currently they seem pretty hopeless for men and there will be a few million more innocent casualties before things get any better....basically the point is this...if america can preach about abuses in the islamic world, the islamic world has equal arsenal to convince its citizens about why the american system is bad for them and it does not even have to try too hard to convince them. Basically, this is a situation of people in glass houses throwing stones. A guy who has faced the horrors of the american system may actually prefer the islamic system as it will set him free from fear of the girl next door or the woman in the shopping mall and he may actually be willing to trade fear of the mullah and his goons for fear of all the women around him including those he works with
Redrajesh at February 7, 2011 2:31 AM
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