the "crime" of trusting islamic men

[miriam_e]

Go to Amnesty International's action list, scroll down to "The Girl from al-Qatif" and take the link to embarrass the Saudi government into at least trying to fix their medieval culture.

A 19-year-old woman, known only as "The Girl from al-Qatif," has been sentenced to 200 lashes and a 6-month prison term for being alone in private with a member of the opposite sex who was not an immediate family member. Call on the Saudi authorities to repeal this sentence of flogging.

Why is it that a girl has to cover herself from head to toe and heavily circumscribe her every action, living in constant fear of inflaming the desire of the men around her, while a woman can stroll down the main street of Brisbane wearing nothing but a skimpy bikini and expect to come to no harm? Either men in the West are paragons of virtue, or men in islamic society have become so deeply corrupted by their absolute power over women that it has turned them into vile creatures.

What men in islamic (and fundamentalist christian and hindu) society don't realise is that their control and power over women debases and corrupts them. Yes, the women lose out badly, being abused and dehumanised, but the men lose too; they become monsters and lose the chance to a great future accompanied by women as equals.

Comments

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

Yes, you are a product of your Western upbringing, but that doesn't automatically validate or invalidate your views. I get really worried about the insidious insertion of cultural relativism into conversations these days. The most worrying aspect is that it is often done by the smartest and most aware. The commenter greylock above is a very smart and sensitive guy.

The problem is that we have no difficulty with criticising exactly the same aspects of our own culture, but we are encouraged to somehow consider other cultures off-limits. It comes from a reaction to the horrors perpetrated by cultural imperialism, but we don't have to swing one way or the other. We can hold to the middle road and simply consider intrinsic human rights. It all springs from treat others the way you'd have them treat you. On that basis you can be quite legitimately fearful of islamic and christian and hindu and confucian culture. They are all based upon insane premises and there is little to limit them other than people who understand the simple basis of human rights and who speak up. If we don't speak up then the insanity prevails... there and here.