I wish I had never read this,

[flaine]

Looking at the Wikileaks today I ended up on wikipedia "Womens rights in Saudia Arabia".

I am beyond sickened by what I have just read.
Never mind the gender segregation, mutilation and discrimination against girs/women, just check out the section on 'breast feeding sons'

Perversion beyond belief.!!!!

How can these people behave like this.

I am pretty uneducated about what happens under this kind of regime, so yes, I am shocked

are Mn'ers meant to be unshockable ?

In the time of the Prophet Muhammad woman were in general so actively involved in society (fact) and had actual wait for it careers (historical fact) that they used to employ milk mothers or wet nurses to nurse thier babies, what they also did was breast feed each others babies if one mother had a low supply (pre aptimil days), so any two children who have shared milk from the same wet nurse were considered and raised as brother and sister.

The above fatwa I have heard ideas like that being thrown around but they are only ideas and opinion not actual islamic principal

there are no sharia ruled places closest thing today to sharia law is british which was adapted from shariah law in crusade times

Saudi Arabia is a monarch state

Forgive my geo-political error (or whatever it was). However, a country that bases its governing laws on Sharia is 'sharia ruled' in my ignorant view.

... and even that may be incorrect. I was trying to avoid saying 'Muslem' since not all predominantly muslem countries enforce these ridiculous laws.

How weird. But just aristocratic nonsense.

I presume what they can do is simply give a cup of warm cow's milk to said driver/servant and say it is breast milk.

Now they can all mix without offending imaginary.deity Allah.

no a country is governed according to its constitution and the Saudi constitution clearly recognises itself as a monarch state. It is blatantly obvious to the majority of the world that shariah law is not implement in Saudi

I name changed as feeling a bit passionate about shariah law and what it did for the world etc and am bloody fed up of people telling me am oppressed (sips tea)

am off to have an islamic feminism and woman's liberation rant to dh, he will listen its his job

Sharia law developed several hundred years after the death of the Prophet Mohammed in A.D. 632, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. Sharia law outlines strict guidelines for the rights and treatment of women in Muslim countries. Women in Muslim countries such as Pakistan, Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia face varying limitations on their freedom in driving, interaction with men and dress codes. Violation of Sharia laws risks serious punishment or death.

OK, it's from ehow but it's not wrong, is it?

Sounds like hell on earth. Honest to God. It's like the Handmaid's Fucking Tale come to life. Don't even get me started on Yemen.

oppressedmyass, I don't actually understand a word you have typed

which just confirms to me I have no place on this thread

Yes Grace I would completley disagree with that defination of shariah law, in islamic principal sharia law comprises the Quran, the traditions of the the prophet Muhammad and then the needs of the state, and that is why it is something that is always changing to meet the needs of different societies.

Shariah law in its essence does not outline strict guidelines of how woman should be treated and what our rights should be so again I disagree with that point also.

What I will say is that yes we do seperate the genders, yes we do try to discourage sex before marriage, yes we do try to dress modestly but we also teach the principal that 'there is no compulsion in religion', meaning that no one can or should be forced, coerced into doing anything, one thing that is unique to Islam is recognising that religion is a personnel thing a relationship between the individual and thier God no one should have the right to intervene

I alway say God gave us our rights and liberation and then men took them away from us with thier fatwas and opinions and legal rulings etc, we need more muslim woman scholars who can address these issues for us.

What I do know is that as a muslim woman I was given the right to vote, have a career, be educated, own and conduct my own business affairs, the right to a basic orgasm during sex fgs in the 6CE

anyway no point turning this into yet another debate on woman in islam etc

just a few points

Any country that thinks it is ok to flogg a woman who has been raped and impregnanted needs to be nuked to death IMO.

Britain isn't perfect, but by god at least i know i won't get an offical beating for being raped.

"I alway say God gave us our rights and liberation and then men took them away from us with thier fatwas and opinions and legal rulings etc, we need more muslim woman scholars who can address these issues for us."

Ummmm but I can't see many of the woman in Saudi being aloud to get to that stage.

This is a discussion about woman in Saudi, not Muslim woman in general.

If there is 'no compulsion in religion' then surely the women who don't wish to live segregated would be free to mix? And drive?

From my experience and observations, the lives women lead in predominantly muslim nations are to me madness.

It however is little to do with religion per se, both muslim and christian women lead similar lives.

The conditioning begins at birth, the girls have a role to serve the boys a role to do little except reign.

The wife, upon marriage pretty much has her relationship fractured with her own family and the IL take over. The DS don't hear No, and they learn to abuse the mother. The DS will in turn bully their sisters, because they learn it from the father.

This is familial conditioning and societal opression. Religion is used as the stick to beat with. you are not a good christian/muslim girl if you don't do x, y or z.

I have more experience with islam in this context than christianity, but I understand there are a great degree of similarities between the 2 religions. There are many rules, regulations, customs that women have to adhere to.

Not allowing a strange man into her home, not allowing them to look at her. To avoid their gaze and not to engage in conversation with them.

I have heard of a friends MIL sticking her own breast in her GS mouth in order to prevent him from being able to marry into her other DIL family (cousins do marry).

I dislike islam, as I know that in it's initial creation was set up to be a fair and just religion. over time women's rights have been eroded; the religion hijacked and nothing has been done to prevent this happening. IMO it has been allowed to happen to ensure men remain in undeserving power. to make sure that they are able to continue their misogynistic ways without challenge from women.

oppressed upthread says "What I do know is that as a muslim woman I was given the right to vote, have a career, be educated, own and conduct my own business affairs, the right to a basic orgasm during sex fgs in the 6CE"

fine, all well and good, but in many predominantly muslim countries, these rights are being systematically stripped from the women.

I think that it's utterly immaterial the date of the rights granted to women as clearly they do not exist in real terms anymore.

I live every day of my life, being utterly thankful that I was born in a country, a civilisation that really HAS granted me the right to expect equality, the right to speak out, the right to vote, the right to work, to be educated and to divorce, marry, and live how I know to be correct.

While living as a supposedly muslim, albeit foreign W, anytime I left the flat, I was watched, followed, photographed. I had to change my phone number twice as some local lads got hold of it and rang me day and night to try to 'bag' a foreigner. I had to answer the call and wait until the person on the other end spoke, in case it was another chancer. Another statistic, 98% of foreign women in egypt have been sexually harassed.

I would stay indoors for weeks at a time as I literally couldn't bear being outdoors. Initially because H wouldn't take me out, but then out of choice. It was a hellish environment. PLUS, indoors, 'H' reverted to type and piled on the DV and EA.

I am back in the UK for the last 18 mths. I don't get panic attacks from the agoraphobia I suffered so much any more. Hate going out though, really uncomfortable with people I don't know. When I'm out sometimes I just want to run home and hide.

After all this time I still find it almost impossible to meet a male gaze.

Is Oppression is too strong a word? Maybe, because the treatment women in these societies receive is not direct, not conscious, it's ingrained, implied.

Generations of societal abuse and misogyny have created this, in the main, the women literally know no better, and if they do say anything they are accused of not being a good muslim/christian woman.

for women to say this is an acceptable life for them, for their daughters, for the sake of modesty? Do me a favour! They are IMHO suffering from Stockholm Syndrome.

You should read a book called 'Princess'..its about women in Saudi...an appauling book and made me never want to go to that country out of principal....

LittleMissHoHoHoFit - nothing you have described bears any relationship to christianity and women.

She is speaking from experience. I have no reason to think she's a liar. Have you?

Which christian countries are we talking about then, or which christian communities?

LMHF said she was in Egypt. In her post.

GAIAM, hold your horses, I never said she was a liar. I genuinely don't get the connection she is making with Christianity and this treatment of women. She didn't actually say she was in Egypt. She said "I understand there are a great degree of similarities between the 2 religions. There are many rules, regulations, customs that women have to adhere to" and goes on to list a number of these, none of which have anything to do with Christianity.

jumpty "I have more experience with islam in this context than christianity, but I understand there are a great degree of similarities between the 2 religions. There are many rules, regulations, customs that women have to adhere to."

Sorry if you felt that was ambiguous. When you remove the first half of the sentence I wrote I suppose it could be confusing.

Further, I did mean the women of those religious groups, not exactly the religion per se.

"Another statistic, 98% of foreign women in egypt have been sexually harassed" I didn't actually overtly say I lived in Egypt in this post, but I did and those that know me here, know that it's no secret.

Until someone has lived, and I mean LIVED for years in places like Egypt, not popped over for a holiday, not spending a summer, a few months or whatever, I am talking day in, day out for years, they can't possibly understand all the nuances and the extent to which women in these places are controlled.

Egypt has about 10-15% Christian population, but naturally they are poorly treated and marginalised.

Some of the rules I mentioned are below:

"Not allowing a strange man into her home, not allowing them to look at her. To avoid their gaze and not to engage in conversation with them." These for sure are applicable to muslim wives/women/girls. To an extent there are similar expectations for women in christian households too, but I have little direct experience of this.

"I have heard of a friends MIL sticking her own breast in her GS mouth in order to prevent him from being able to marry into her other DIL family (cousins do marry)." My BF married into a Christian family over there. So this MIL is actually Christian.

When I heard this I was horrified, asked 'H' and he confirmed there was a similar custom in Muslim families.

As I stated in my opening text, the conditions under which women live in the ME are largely to do with social pressure, not directly religious.

Neither religion in it's original form advocates the covering of women, or curtailment of her life, activities etc. All of this has been subsequently applied, by those in power, and using religion as the reason why women need to obey. Anyone that threatens to challenge that authority can't actually win, because the Religious Men chuck the Religion card, and cast scorn on the dedication to the religion. My own H has had conversations where he has shown a more liberal attitude and there was panic, You are far from Allah, you must prey, you must do this, that and the other.

IME, I have observed that there is little difference in the day to day lives, expectations of either group of women, but the respective religions are used however to exert pressure to uphold these expectations.

Quite simply, and for the avoidance of confusion over my post: There IS no connection that I am making between Christianity itself or indeed Islam itself and the less than desirable treatment of women.

The treatment of women is nothing to do with either religion, but religion is the stick to beat them to adhere to the will of men who have their own misogynistic and power crazed agendas to protect.

What makes me really angry is how women collude in the oppression of other women, particularly perhaps when it is perpetrated by a mother against her own daughter. For example honour killings where the mother was aware that the male relatives were planning to kill or maim her own child.

I understand that there are ingrained socialised beliefs and behaviours but surely there must be some strong women who can encourage others to speak out and stand up to this oppression. And whose first instinct would be to protect their own child over the 'rights' or 'honour' of their male relations?