Afghani rape victim freed from jail, on condition she marry rapist

Well, we had some help from communism being a completely terrible system in that regard. And the two scenarios aren't close to the same thing.

 

Islam is not trying to conquer America. A tiny portion of it is. And hondo, your post clearly meant "as long as we're not helping gays overseas, why give them rights here?"

 

As a legal system, and as a political system, Islam is just as brutal, just as evil, and just as morally bankrupt, as Communism.

How can you look at the stories already cited and think otherwise? And, we haven't even mentioned that apostasy is punishable by death.

Perhaps it can be reformed as a religion, but we should not treat Sharia law as anything other than a system that legitimizes brutality against women (and homosexuals and apostates and non-Muslims).

Women are property in Islam. That's a system, an idea, that should be defeated. Not it a war, but by fighting for ideas. What are we doing to promote our values?

Instead, we're helping to draft Constitutions with Sharia as the basis for all law in Iraq and Afghanistan, and celebrating the same in Egypt and Libya.

 

I was wondering if any of the cable newsers, or Sunday shows would try to book the Saudi "scholar" who determined allowing women to drive would lead to the end of all virgins. Or maybe they'd ask the Saudi Ambassador about it.

Then I remembered how embarrassed the press gets when Islam is questioned.

At the National Press Club, asking tough questions of a Saudi can get you suspended:

And, even when lifted, Erik Wemple in the Washington Post couldn't help but describe Husseini as acting "a bit brashly" and pushing "the boundaries" then he offers "Congratulations to all parties".

Now please tell me another circumstance where a member would be suspended for asking tough questions, and where the Press Club would still be offered congratulations at the end of the episode.

 

Somehow, we never have a problem with lecturing the Israelis:

 

As much as some people might criticize gay rights in the U.S., we've made great strides in past years and we certainly treat the gay community, as a whole, much better than they would be treated in an Islamic state. What part of that don't you get?

 

How should Islam treat Mosaic Law?

Or Christianity? Or Judaism?

 

Which countries are ruled by them? The Vatican? Anywhere else?

We should condemn brutal systems of government. It shouldn't matter if a religion is the basis of their governing philosophy.

Are there passages of the Bible you disagree with? OK, great. And, if a country uses such a passage as it's basis of law, if it uses it to brutalize women, I'll join you in condemning that system of government.

 

Hillary is exactly right. It's a human rights issue.

Couldn't we do the same thing with women's rights?

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Symbolism's important, as is language, but neither change anything in a vacuum. In Africa especially there needs to be real political and economic pressure brought to bear on countries that seek to exterminate homosexuals. And which do so under cover of Christianity.

As to women, you're mostly right, but you're also 100 years late. International Women's Day celebrated its 100th anniversary this year.

www.un.org/en/events/women/iwd/2011/

and as I've said, the organizations that do the most to defend women's safety, like Amnesty

www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/issues/women-s-rights/violence-against-women?id=1011012

are anathema to the rightward half of the US electorate.

Besides, "Women's Rights" are already singled out in the official language of the US State Department

www.state.gov/g/drl/hr/

along with things like 'freedom from torture' - so we send out our usual mixed official messages.

It took a long time to break down apartheid in South Africa. Years. Lots of violence and lots of martyrs and lots of global consciousness- raising and education. And as I said, that was a relatively simple and obvious evil overcome by a relatively straightforward application of political, economic and cultural pressure.

 

Bravo to Ms. Clinton and to President Obama for showing some spine to the countries that kill and terrorize and criminalize gays as a matter of policy. For one, the left goes against the grain of one of their greatest hypocrisies: demanding tolerance for countries, cultures and religions and ignore their long track record of engaging in this kind of behavior. As she noted, our record in this regard isn't perfect. But our government certainly isn't killing people in the GLTG community, or winking at it. These other countries need to know tolerance for their beliefs or religion doesn't include tolerance of their discrimination.

 

I'm not sure what this sentence means.

But I am sure that small-minded partisan bickering in the US is one of the biggest impediments to solving these obvious global problems.