Daily Kos

OUTRAGE: Iraq imposes Sharia law

by ihlin

Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 12:50:06 AM PDT

Ok politically obsessed folks, let's get our heads out of New Hampshire for once, and focus on what's REALLY important and what's happening to our Iraqi sisters. The Governing Council of Iraq just  got rid of Iraq family law and chosen to impose their own idiotic Sharia laws. the WOmen of Iraq are completely outraged. we can say what we want about Saddam, but Iraq had some of the most progressive laws and protections for women in the areas of marriage, divorce in the Muslim world. There has been a virtual blackout of this on the news (save for a buried Washington Post article). Isn't it ironic that US intervention always leads to more repression for women abroad, whether it's helping foment the Islamic Revolution (through overthrow of 1954 mossadegh) to overthrowing saddam and now having women take several step backwards. And of  course ignorant Americans (helped by an indifferent press) somehow think the Iraqis have all these new "freedoms".

Please, everyone, read Riverbends important, heart rending thoughts on this instead of the ARG polls. And then i can remember again what i'm fighting for. too bad none of the other Democratic candidates are speaking out on this.

http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21321-2004Jan15.html

Tags: (all tags) :: Previous Tag Versions

Permalink | 17 comments

  •  Great Googlymoogly (none / 0)

    Blowback coming at ya in 5, 4, 3, 2 ...

    by Ptolemy on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 12:59:12 AM PDT

  •  You gotta be shitin' me (none / 0)

    Calm down.. read the article first Mitch.

    BRB

    cheers,

    Mitch Gore

    Wanna win in '08...?

    Put your money where your mouth is.

    by Lestatdelc on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 01:16:26 AM PDT

  •  Ok (none / 0)

    It's not in effect at the moment, but why is this only being posted here now?

    That article was from the 15th!

    Did I fall asleep for  a week or two and miss it getting talked about here?

    cheers,

    Mitch Gore

    Wanna win in '08...?

    Put your money where your mouth is.

    by Lestatdelc on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 01:19:27 AM PDT

    •  blame Iowa (none / 0)

      more soldiers have died too. but i guess we haven't heard about that either. i did hear the latest in the Laci Peterson trial though!!!

      there was also a 10,000 person anti-terrorism march that has not been reported. the right-wingers are apopletic over that one.

      this was the first time i had heard about it, because i haven't read Riverbend in awhile (too Iowa obsessed like i said). I hope Kos can put this on the main page. We need to raise hell about it. As a young female, i just feel so badly for those Iraqi women and would like to do what i can.

      by ihlin on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 01:27:15 AM PDT

      [ Parent ]

    •  was on cable news this afternoon (none / 0)

      Think it was CNN but I have a quick trigger on the remote.

      Story also said Bremer would likely kill the law so the council of puppets is re-thinking.

      by HiD on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 01:27:32 AM PDT

      [ Parent ]

  •  The woman Iraq "Ambassador" (none / 0)

    was sort of explaining on one of the news channel yesterday something to the effect that this "would only affect family law" not "business and employment law".

    I understand the difference but it doesn't make it any better for Iraqi women and kids in cases of divorce and for inheritance or age of marriage, polygamy etc.

    Not that any of those cannot but worked out in a progressive - and equitable - fashion within Shari'a but I'd have to see the details to figure that out.  Not easily done and must come from a consensus of the clerichood. I doubt there has been much of a debate on the topic of late in Iraq. Civil law was secualar and equitable under Saddam.

    (I rarely post but the subject is close to my heart)

    by Dounia on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 01:35:56 AM PDT

  •  Bremer might kill it all 6 months long (none / 0)

    ...but what happens after we "in theory" hand over in or around June?

    So here's the puzzler...

    How the FUCK are we safer with a Sharia Iraq with the CIA saying there is a real possibility of civil war soon because someone in Iraq pointed out where former CIA asset Saddam was hiding in a  dirt hole?

    cheers,

    Mitch Gore

    Wanna win in '08...?

    Put your money where your mouth is.

    by Lestatdelc on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 01:49:48 AM PDT

    •  Langley Twins (none / 0)

      Isn't it funny that both Saddam and Osama are both ex-CIA assets?

      by paper tigress on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 02:24:22 AM PDT

      [ Parent ]

      •  Noreaga (none / 0)

        Don't forget the pineapple.

        He is the one that most resembles Saddam now, though Saddam ain't gonna end up in a Florida Fed cell.

        We will only hear a scrubbed transcript form whatever "trial' occurs under military tribunal (not sure if it will be US or "Iraqi" tribunal, i.e. same diff but for different public play).

        I think that the later will most likely occur, makes for a nice "see, Iraq now is working under the rule of law" and a death sentence from such a tribunal which has already been floated out there in the press last week.

        Though I can see Saddam living since anything that ever "got out" about what he says "unvarnished" is 100% dismissible thanks to comical Ali during the war.

        cheers,

        Mitch Gore

        Wanna win in '08...?

        Put your money where your mouth is.

        by Lestatdelc on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 02:32:24 AM PDT

        [ Parent ]

  •  Saddam best possible alternative? (none / 0)

    It's not a popular thing to say, but at times I've wondered if, brutal as he was, Saddam might not have been the best thing for Iraq.  He secularized the laws and modernized the society.  

    Is Democracy necessarily a step up in a place where most of the people have ignorant and incorrect beliefs?  Hell, Democracy works poorly enough here in the US, how is it going to work over in Iraq.  

    Anyway, no surprise to me that this is a step backwards.  I'm not going to get too upset about it, seeing as the damage is already done.  I just think in the end the Iraqis could very well end up worse off than under Saddam.  Actually, that's what I've been thinking all along, and why I never could buy the "humanitarian" argument, even if I set aside all of my other beliefs about the war being wrong.  

    Don't like XOM and OPEC? What have YOU done to reduce your oil consumption? Hot air does NOT constitute a renewable resource!

    by Asak on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 02:39:38 AM PDT

  •  The misogyny of king George (none / 0)

    Since we last met in this chamber, combat forces of the United States, Great Britain, Australia, Poland and other countries enforced the demands of the United Nations, ended the rule of Saddam Hussein -- and the people of Iraq are free. - George W. Bush 1/20/2004

    January 22, 2004 article from Democracy Now on Skull & Bones alumni John Kerry and George W. Bush:

    JUAN GONZALEZ: You mentioned the organization's relationship to women. For those of our viewers who don't know about that, could you explain that -- the history of that relationship.

    ALEXANDRA ROBBINS: Skull and Bones has been an all-male group, was an all-male group beginning in 1832 when it started, up until 1991. And what happened was there was basically a 20-year fight between the younger members of Skull and Bones and the older more staunch old blue members. In 1991, the seniors in Bones, these are the 22-year-olds who were actually in the Tomb that year at Yale, (the Tomb is the name of their building, by the way) in 1991, the Bones seniors intended to tap women, but the alumni of the society heard about the plan, changed the locks of the Tomb and threatened to shut down the society completely. When the seniors threatened a lawsuit, Bones held a vote that narrowly endorsed admitting women, the day before initiation a group of Bonesmen led by William F. Buckley obtained a court order blocking the initiation. The group claimed that admitting women would lead to (and I'm quoting here) "date rape in the medium term future." Eventually, Bones held a second vote that again narrowly admitted women. Both Bushes have refused to disclose which way they voted. Senator Kerry and former Senator David Born both said they voted to admit women. Once the women were initiated, several of the older members, including a former congressman who I spoke with, distanced themselves from the society.

    JUAN GONZALEZ: What about George Bush on this issue? Have we ever found out how he voted on this defining moment?

    ALEXANDRA ROBBINS: No. Both Bushes have not disclosed the way they voted.

    AMY GOODMAN: Although Bush was quoted as saying, and this was George Herbert Walker Bush, is that right, saying that women would be the downfall of Yale?

    ALEXANDRA ROBBINS: That's George W. Bush.

    AMY GOODMAN: George W.?

    ALEXANDRA ROBBINS: George W. said in the 1980's, that -- to a woman who was a graduate of Yale -- that women would be the downfall of Yale. There are many other instances, some of which I point out in my book, that lead to -- lead one to assume that he voted against admitting women.

    I'm curious, can anyone come up with any speech or legislation where George W. Bush pledges any support for women? Why does Dubya hate women so? Is it because he could never be good enough for mommy?

    Now, people had lost their fear. From that moment I knew we would win. - Oscar Olivera

    by Josh Prophet on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 02:40:28 AM PDT

  •  Yes, it's an outrage (none / 0)

         But what is more outrageous, is that Americans think that they can go into a country that they know nothing about--and care less--overthrow the existing government by force and intstall "democracy" the way you would install a new plumbing fixture.  

         Can anyone seriously believe that the shrub cares about women's rights in a far-away country when he works avidly against those rights here at home?  

         Women HERE need to consider that the absolute WORST way to promote women's rights in other parts of the world is to connect them to Westernisation:  Doing so makes working for women's rights equivalent to betraying your country.  This is not a good strategy.  But it HAS BEEN the strategy, and women in the Middle East are going to be paying the price for a long time to come.  

         P.S  Bremer's veto is going to be no help:  to an Iraqi, he's the face of the enemy.  The Governing Council is a band of Quislings, and reports of Council members smuggling bales of the new Iraqi banknotes suggests they themselves know which way the wind is blowing.  

    by gaianne on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 10:05:34 PM PDT

    •  For dinar smuggling link (none / 0)

      Scroll down to Tuesday 20 January 2004 at 2: 21 AM on the page you find  
      here.    

         It seems that 5 million new Iraqi dinars weighing 1 & 1/2 tons were discovered being smuggled through the Beirut airport.  

      by gaianne on Sat Jan 24, 2004 at 10:47:12 PM PDT

      [ Parent ]

Permalink | 17 comments