Women lose out, regardless of religion
- From: Alan Ferris <hairy.ferrit@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 11 Mar 2009 09:25:02 +0000
Women lose out, regardless of religion
Mar 11, 2009 04:30 AM
Antonia Zerbisias
http://www.thestar.com/living/article/599953
Yesterday, a reader emailed me a "terrorism awareness" video titled
"The Violent Oppression of Women in Islam."
It depicts the now much-publicized horrors of repressive regimes and
tribal ways in Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan ? in order to justify
invasions and war for oil, territory and other material gain on the
broken backs of women who are stoned, whipped, beheaded, mutilated and
murdered "for honour."
Never mind that none of these swivel chair soldiers gave a rat's ass
about women's rights in these and other places ? including our
"friends'' and "allies'' Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait ?
before George W. Bush's so-called "war on terror."
It took female journalists such as Canada's Sally Armstrong, then
editor of Homemakers magazine, and filmmaker Shelley Saywell to put
out the word.
And still, the cry goes out, whenever these pajamahadeen want to
attack Islam, where are the feminists? Where are the moderate Muslims
to denounce these heinous crimes?
Yes, well, it's been that kind of week, again, in the world of women.
In Iran, eight women now face death by stoning, a torturous form of
execution that can last half an hour or more.
This is especially discriminatory not only because women have fewer
rights to begin with ? and therefore are more likely to be found
guilty of "crimes" ? but also because they get buried deeper in the
ground for the stoning than men do, with less chance of escape.
You see, if you can get out of the hole they dig for you, you can make
a clean getaway.
Also this week, in Saudi Arabia, a 75-year-old Syrian woman has been
sentenced to 40 lashes, four months imprisonment and deportation for
unlawful contact with two young men reportedly delivering bread to
her.
Women there, you see, are legally "chattel," like furniture and
livestock, and may not mingle with unrelated men without the presence
of a male family member.
But before you whip yourself into a lather over all that, here's a
little-known fact from UNICEF: Every year, 500,000 women die in
childbirth, mostly because they have no choice, no contraception, and
no access to reproductive medicine.
Thanks to the dictates of the Vatican, many of these women are
Catholic.
Case in point: In Brazil last week, the doctors who performed an
abortion on a 9-year-old girl who was pregnant with twins after years
of "alleged" sexual abuse by her stepfather, were, along with the
child's mother, excommunicated.
The rapist remains a good Catholic, according to the Vatican.
"It is a sad case, but the real problem is that the twins conceived
were two innocent persons, who had the right to live and could not be
eliminated," Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re told the Italian daily La
Stampa.
"Life must always be protected."
Never mind that the life of a child, whose body would not bear one
fetus, let alone two, was at stake. Never mind the emotional and
physical trauma she has already, and would have in future, endured.
Never mind that, as she told authorities, she had been abused, along
with her disabled sister, since the age of 6.
According to the Church, she is but a mere fetus colony who, by the
way, could not have used contraception even if she wanted to because,
the Pope says nope to that, too.
Said Saint Augustine: "Any woman who acts in such a way that she
cannot give birth to as many children as she is capable of, makes
herself guilty of that many murders."
So where are the moderate Roman Catholics to denounce these heinous
crimes?
No wonder International Women's Day this year rated only 23 hours.
--
Ferrit
()'.'.'()
( (T) )
( ) . ( )
(")_(")
"The right to be let alone is indeed the beginning of all freedom"
Supreme Court Justice William Orville Douglas
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