Shamima Begum - misogyny at its finest?

[Schmoana]

Just saw the interview on GMB. It has struck me for a long time that there are hundreds of male ISIS fighters who are British citizens who have been allowed back and prosecuted where appropriate, even without grooming being a factor, and having been directly involved in killing. It’s hardly even reported. But this one woman has been vilified by the British people and British media, and made the figurehead of all that is wrong with ISIS. Her British citizenship has been stripped for populism.

Why is this one woman being held to different standards? What is the difference here between her and the hundreds of men who have been accepted back?

I am tired of people saying she willingly got married and supported everything ISIS did - how she didnt express regret! HOW COULD SHE?

Once there she would not have been able to leave or refuse to do anything she was asked to do. She had no choice over who she was married to or allowed to leave the marriage for any reason.

when she was interviewed from the first camp in syria she COULD NOT say how she really felt or say anything against ISIS - she went out of that tent and was surrounded by ISIS supporters who would have killed her and her child.

SHE WAS 15 - GROOMED. Authorities knew her and her friends were being groomed yet didnt tell their families or intervene in time to stop them going and were too late to track them down in turkey.

these girls and their children need to be brought back and given their lives back.

I think it's wrong that she is not allowed back into the country however I think it is the best deterrent for other teens, male or female, not to go to fight for some 'glorious adventure' or whatever. So she is one suffering but stopping many others.

She could be jailed though? or house arrest? or a secure unit?
It is beyond belief that a groomed 15 year old is totally in charge of her actions even after being stuck in an ISIS camp for years. Whereas a 15 year old Greta Thunberg is obviously just a puppet because a 15 year old girl has no knowledge of anything and obviously unable to make her own decisions.

That is the biggest difficulty i have. And unlike a lot of that kind of comparison it absolutely does come from the same people.

Find other, more reputable news sources, OP. And when you’ve found them and read them for a while, practice thinking. Just start with ten minutes a day.

I'm talking about the groomed girls from Rochdale that a poster mentioned upthread. Thanks for your charming response though.

"Those girls in Rochdale" you mean the ones the authorities have continued to let down and abuse? Why would anyone want to come back here when this is what we treat people like

Come back here? I’m guessing it’s a lot better than Syria if you aren’t a terrorist.

So, this country (that she does not call her country), the privilege she was granted freely, education, women's rights and all the other things we take for granted. She threw that away, she dismissed all the good things, the good people she met and betrayed us all. She allegedly committed many inhumane actions and supported others to who were committing horrendous crimes. She LEFT, to seek an oppressive and violent regime that was actively involved in murdering people in her "home" country.

Nothing illegal has happened to her, she still has citizenship of Bangladesh a country that she has not condemned, attacked or committed treason against.

These were HER CHOICES, these are HER CONSEQUENCES.

We have no legal obligation to her, no matter how much a person's heart can bleed for a treasonous terrorist, facts are she is where she is because of choices she made.

At 15, you know that ISIS is a murderous death cult which beheads, drowns, stones and brutally murders non-Muslims and gay people.

To have sympathy with that is abhorrent.

Yes, some men may have talked her into it. But she equally allowed herself to agree with such a regime.

Being vulnerable does not absolve you of guilt. What she facilitated is horrific.

Being the victim of abuse doesn't make it ok.

Being married at 15, groomed and sexually abused is horrific, and it should never have happened. The men who did this should pay.

But that doesn't mean Begum is absolved of any and all guilt. She should also face the consequences of her terrible actions.

Frankly, there are some things that people should be made an example of.

Many criminals are vulnerable people who have had terrible lives and been brought up surrounded by awful people. But no one is suggesting we give them all a hug and a cup of tea and allow them to get on with life as they please.

I always think the race element is ironic when people bring it up. I think she has garnered the sympathy she has because she's Muslim and non-white. People with an agenda hold her up as an example of how virtuous they are, and how much better they are than the people who don't sympathise with her.

Consider Maxine Carr - a victim of domestic abuse who gave her abusive boyfriend a false alibi. She did wrong, but you don't hear people claiming she should have gotten away with it.

No evidence Begum was sexually abused. She loved her husband by all accounts.

Buy what about all the male Isis fighters that have come back to the UK and not been stripped of citizenship?

She doesn't have citizenship of Bangladesh. The government decided she did but Bangladesh said she did not. That is a fairly crucial part of the story.

I just can't give a shit about Shamima Begum tbh. There are so many people more deserving of our time and attention, whether or not you believe she's been hard done by.

I was watching an interview today with an ex forces medic who was advocating for a charity helping people like herself. After four military tours protecting her country from people like Shamima's mates she was discharged with severe PTSD. She ended up living on the streets and eventually attempting suicide due to the dismal support for veterans with PTSD.

I can't worry about people like Shamima whilst people like the aforementioned woman get overlooked. She was talking about her friend losing both his legs from a terrorist bomb and how she watched him bleeding to death whilst lyiing to him that his other friend (dead behind the adjacent curtain) had survived and was OK. Haunting stuff.

She was15, so yes, she was.

She’s a woman and not very pretty or attractive most likely is the reason

Any proof of these 'hundreds of men' who we keep hearing are being accepted back?

Somehow feminists are all responsible for turning men into terrorists. Because obviously, men cannot be held responsible for their own actions, or organise themselves politically; they have to resort to terrorism.

1st rule of misogyny: Women are responsible for what men do.

4th rule of misogyny: Women's opinions are violence against men thus male violence against women is justified.

This link www.ft.com/content/11fd7c00-0790-11ea-a984-fbbacad9e7dd is the Financial Times, dated 2019 and it says 40% of the 900 Britons who went to fight in Syria had already returned. Maybe more have since.

There was a radio 4 documentary about her today. She and her friends are intelligent , or ' booksmart' as one of her peers described it. Doesn't mean she was emotionally mature of course.

After the programme I googled a bit about Al Khaansa , the women's morality police in Raqqa , Syria. It is a quite harrowing and depressing read. From what I read Shamima and her friends are likely to have watched videos by older women like Sally Ann Jones or Aqsa Mahmoud.

If she and others do return it will take years of therapy to sort their heads out , after what they've done and seen. But what's the alternative? Can't just leave them to become ever more deranged.

100%

While I haven't been able to read the thread I was having this discussion last night and am glad to see it's pointed out here how nonsensical and misogynist it is that 15 year old girl groomed into a radicalised, intensely sexist group where she has no rights is somehow not only responsible for her own fate, but actively held up as an antagonist in British society.

It makes me feel so sick and depressed. She was a child and is still very young.

Yes I agree with you. She’s a terrible person.

Honestly I will never understand it - she was a groomed child. No matter what she did after - she was a vulnerable child and UK failed her. She should intend come back here and face a trial. It is all populism you're right

I agree that she was a groomed child. It's chilling that people choose to ignore this.