Archbishop says Sharia law in this country is unavoidable

[spokette]

Really?

Well if it does happen (heaven help us if it does), guess who will lose out because it certainly won't be the men.

There are over 50 muslim countries in the world so if someone wants to observe sharia law, I'm sure one of them will accommodate their lifestyle choice.

My parents came from Jamaica in the 1960s and even though they retained their culture, they observed British law.

My personal opinion is that Sharia law is incompatible in a country where laws are in place to protect and uphold the rights of women because it is usually women who receive a raw deal.

There was a documentary shown a few years ago which followed a female lawyer in an African country (cannot remember which one - might have been Nigeria) who adjudicated over cases where women seeked redress in civil courts whilst their husbands went to the Sharia courts. It made me thankful to live in this country.

Also remember the case of the Muslim woman in Nigeria who was sentenced to death for having an affair with a married man which resulted in a child? He was given a slap on the wrist and told not to do it again.

What I meant was 'no-one on this thread wnats it', not 'no-one wnats it'.

Who do you think wnats sharia law in this country, and how do you think they will go about getting it?

I know there are various groups aiming to create a caliphate her and in other European countries - but I think they represent a minority of muslims.

About a fifth of the planet is Muslim.

It's the fastest growing religion on the globe.

Try inviting the minority you're talking about to a dinner party.

Bet ya'll need extra chairs.

I don't think it is fair to say that monkeytrousers is making a "false exrapolation" between Islam and FGM.
on the contrary, she is not exactly the only one making that extrapolation, there is plenty of evidence of that in this country and many many countries.
as the article I posted said -

"But at the village level, those who commit the practice believe it to be religiously mandated. Religion is not only theology but also practice (my emphasis). And the practice is widespread throughout the Middle East. Many diplomats, international organization workers, and Arabists argue that the problem is localized to North Africa or sub-Saharan Africa,[4] but they are wrong. The problem is pervasive throughout the Levant, the Fertile Crescent, and the Arabian Peninsula, and among many immigrants to the West from these countries. Silence on the issue is less reflective of the absence of the problem than insufficient freedom for feminists and independent civil society to raise the issue."

IT might be considered "unhelpful" to point out that Islam is used to justify FGM in this country as well as others, but that doesn't make it false.

MT, re: "[Female circumcision] is part of global Islamic culture and is performed in the name of Islam"

You ARE incapable of learning

Coming from a 'position of ignorance' (as you once said), you think the book you read by an African victim of female circumcision makes you an authority on Islam. It does not.

Your understanding of Islam is quite shockingly superficial and its expression on these threads laden with clichés. Sadly, you think yourself knowledgeable on the subject. You are not.

If you really understood Islam, you would know that if something was really part of Muslim culture, it would be followed by most Muslims EVERYWHERE. Like women covering their heads. Like fasting during Ramadan. Not just in Africa. Everywhere there are Muslims.

Don't make me write another post on this.

cobblestones - France does not recognize polygamy and has not done anything for 'inclusion of Sharia'.

What exactly are you talking about?

You said: "The French were extremely liberal in connection with the inclusion of Sharia. They recognised polygamy as well as numerous other rights that were demanded by their immigrant population as appertaining to their religious freedoms."

France did allow polygny Cote.

You don;t understadn me. We should leave it at that then.

The News at Ten inflaming young men I'mnot sure about Blu. Two weeks ago we had the Iraq deputy prime minister complaining of extremist literature in British Mosques.

How is the debate about this - inflamed and polarised as I do accept it sometimes is - still more influential to the young male mind than videos of training capms, suicide bombers testimonies, footage of executions, including beheadings, not of just as much significance.

Anyway, I sense this thread may be gathering a polemical momentum with Cobbles posts and so will give it a rest. I did very much agree with one of CS's points though; "They are now reversing their decision - having found that there is no reciprocity of liberalism or tolerance."

Especially to feminists. All I am ever saying is that we should tread very carefully with this.

"Silence on the issue is less reflective of the absence of the problem than insufficient freedom for feminists and independent civil society to raise the issue."

Yes, HCC, it's Moynihan's law again

MT - You are killing me.

France does not and did not 'allow polygyny'. No man can nor could marry a second wife in France, including Muslims.

When a non-citizen wishes to marry in France, he needs to provide a paper from his consulate that says he is not married. This is also what Muslims have to do.

According to the BBC "Polygamy is illegal in France but until 1993, it was possible for immigrants to bring more than one wife from their home country to join them.".

Cote, FGM is prevalent in many countries, and
they are not all in Africa.

Also, FGM takes place in this country. I know this because I have seen the results myself, and I can assure you that those who carry it out in this country, claim it is part of Islamic culture and tradition.

Burkina Faso
CAR
Ivory Coast
Djibouti
Egypt (around 95% of women have suffered some form of FGM)
Eritrea
Guinea
Indonesia
Nigeria
Senegal
Somalia
Sudan
Togo

Thank's for that clarification Blu.

Hirsi Ali cites 30 countries, not all of them in the African subcontinent.

This is a complex dabate Cote and blanket denials don't add anything, especially when there is lots of evidence to the contrary.

For the other business, would it be fair to say:
GM is not decreed dy Islam, demanded by Islam or at root an Islamic practice
However
Many societies which practice GM have adpoted islam and many now claim that the practice is part of their religion, and then practice GM in the name of Islam. ?

Has anybody mentioned the poll in the Mail today?

cry. a lot.

i included that link because of what it said about the aspects of the quoran that can be interpreted as both sexually progressive and pro women's rights.

how both the bible and the quoran are interpreted are in large part about the socio-cultural context in which the interpretation is carried out.

It was possible to bring extended family over for 'familial regroupment' (and that extended to mothers of one's children, regardless of marriage) in France, until the immigration numbers became a concern in early 1990s.

That does not mean that polygamy was "allowed" in France, which is what monkeytrousers claimed - yet another example of complete ignorance glossed over by several minutes on Google.

Nobody can nor could marry a second/third/fourth wife in France. Ergo, polygamy is not and was not 'allowed'.

Erm, haven't we come full circle Cote?

Polygamous marraige might not be legal, but setting up polygomous households by bringing over women oppressed in a diffrent culture is still not acceptable if that law of the land does not allow it. It is polygamy tolerated in the name of cultural reletavism - and I assert that as feminists, we should not tolerate the intolerable.

MT, we should not tolerate the intolerable?

Cd'A, 'ergo' my ass.

PiJCs, google it?

Purlease!

I suggest that those who want a point of view in the future start to educate themselves in the present.

No, we shouldn't. Not sure I get your point.

Radio 4 now - repeat of an earlier Law in Action about Sharia and other religious courts.

Please, please read this article by the wonderful, erudite Irshad Manji (author of "The Problem with Islam" and who had received many death threats because of her bold candour in writing honestly and bravely about the corruptors of modern day Islam".

This comment encapsulates for me what is so unsettling about Rowan William's discourse.

"The archbishop would retort that he?s proposing nothing more than choice: those who want Sharia law can have it; those who don?t, won?t.

Get real, Rev. When it comes to contemporary Sharia, choice is theory; intimidation is the reality".

She goes on to write

"Ask Muslim women in my home country of Canada. Two years ago, when news broke that the government of Ontario was considering how to introduce voluntary Sharia law, the very first people to hit the streets in protest were Muslim women.....

What united them was the understanding that in practice, Sharia would be imposed on Muslim Canadian women, most of whom are newly arrived immigrants. They can?t speak English or French, don?t know about Canada?s Charter of Rights and Freedoms and won?t be told about it.......

Thanks to the tribal mindsets of Muslim today, contemporary Sharia ain?t so contemporary. That?s why it can?t be trusted as a source of justice in a pluralistic society".

monkeytrousers - What you consider 'unacceptable' about French government policies notwithstanding, your statement that polygamy was allowed in France was and is still wrong.

cobble - re: "Cd'A, 'ergo' my ass."

Very intelligent contribution to the debate

Please illuminate us on one more thing: Why is it that people of limited rhetorical ability start talking about their smelly body parts when they realize they can't win?

spokette - "Contemporary Sharia" is a contradiction in terms.

I read a similar comment in the letters page of The Times (I think) - A Muslim woman was asking if the Archbishop does not realize that many Muslims have come to the UK precisely to escape the Sharia.

And re "he?s proposing nothing more than choice: those who want Sharia law can have it; those who don?t, won?t." - Whoever said that does not seem to realize that once the Sharia courts are an option, women will be forced to go there and to accept their decision, especially for cases like divorce.

At the risk of repeating myself and for those who want to further educate themselves, read : Nawal al-Saadawi

She graduated from the faculty of medicine at Cairo University in 1955 and practiced medicine for ten years, becoming a vigorous opponent of the exploitation of women in Egypt and the Arab world. She was dismissed from her position as Egypt's general director of health education for having written Woman and Sex (1972), which discussed the sexual exploitation of women, including prostitution, clitoridectomy, incest, and sexually transmitted diseases.

She openly discussed taboos such as rape, women's submissive roles in the family and society, sexual repression, and inconsistent social and religious values.

Between 1979 and 1980, she became the United Nations advisor for the Women's Program in Africa and the Middle East. Her literary and scientific writings resulted in her imprisonment in 1981. Upon her release in 1982, she founded the Arab Women's Solidarity Association International, which was closed down in 1991 by the Egyptian government.

She and Dr. Sherif Hetata, her second husband, were members of the Commission of Inquiry for the International War Crimes Tribunal (1992), which investigated war crimes against Iraq. She also served on a mission to bring medical aid to Iraq in defiance of U.S. sanctions. In 2001, an Egyptian court dismissed a lawsuit filed against her by a religious extremist for having "scorned Islam."

She has written more than thirty books, which have been translated into thirty languages and have reached both a popular and an academic audience worldwide. Her books in English include Searching (1991), My Travels around the World (1992), Memoirs from the Women's Prison (1994), Woman at Point Zero (1997), The Nawal El Saadawi Reader (1997), Hidden Face of Eve: Women in the Arab World (1997), The Innocence of the Devil (1998), Daughter of Isis: The Autobiography of Nawal El Saadawi (1999), and Walking through Fire: A Life of Nawal al Saadawi (2002).

Nuff said.

The Archbishop is talking out of his a*
Beth Din and Sharia courts are more than should be tolerated already.

MT - How about this as "polygamy tolerated in the name of cultural relativism"? (note the correct spelling)

Polygamous marriages now recognised formally in UK, so long as the weddings took place in countries where the arrangement is legal.

Sounds like what France did at the time to me. Except that UK is doing it now. Is it now your view that polygamy is 'legal' in the UK?

Here are your country's new welfare guidelines:

New guidelines on income support from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) state: "Where there is a valid polygamous marriage the claimant and one spouse will be paid the couple rate ... The amount payable for each additional spouse is presently £33.65."