Muslimwoman
Coexistence insha'Allah
Wow, what an excellent, interesting post! Thank you so much! Thanks for the effort.
Sunny
You're welcome anytime.
Salaam
Wow, what an excellent, interesting post! Thank you so much! Thanks for the effort.
Sunny
Something I find amusing is that here in the States it seems sometimes that the payoff for feminism is that women get to be even more blatantly objectified. But it's really not feminism. Real feminism is as dead as Betty Friedan, who I'm convinced will forever spin in her grave. The politics of pretty, that's what we've got.
Chris
Can you believe some Muslim people in the west (particularly USA I notice) are now using the argument that polygamy is a good thing because some women would rather concentrate on their career, so a second wife can look after her husband and children while she rakes in the bucks
That is true. In India, the famous muslim singer Lucky Ali, who is married and has sibling children , married again.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_Ali
I wonder whether Lucky's first wife being unsatisfied herself, will have any problems in taking an another husband using Lucky's reasoning herself.
That said, alhamdolillah, they are a small percentage of Muslims.
Yeah sure,we all know that.
Do you know Niranjan, it doesn't matter how pleasant I try to be with you, you still manage to remain ignorant, aggresive, sarcastic and outrightly biased. Do your scriptures not tell you that arrogance and pride are a sin? At least I am prepared to accept the wrongdoing of some people of my faith and I spend time to try to explain misconceptions of my faith as well as spend time listening and learning. Perhaps you should try humbling yourself (unless your caste doesn't allow this), sit back and try listening or engage in real discussion rather than just running off at the mouth all the time. A one sided discussion is called a lecture!!!
Ok, lets get into discussion on a logical frame of mind. And I apologize sincerely if I have hurt your feelings as you too are my sister and friend. But you see I am a bit hurt myself seeing what is clearly happening to muslim women and little girls, whom I see as my mothers and sisters as well.
And I really don't like it when someone tries to demagnify the situation by saying that it is practiced by a small section of muslims when it is not.
Any way, if possible , try to spread awareness of this and try to prevent it as much as possible.
Thanking you,
Your brother,
Niranjan.
Niranjan
I am a woman and a mother (albeit to children who are not my own) do you not think it hurts me deeply that these women and girls are being treated this way? Do you not think it offends me deeply that any sister in the world is being treated in such a degrading way? Can you even imagine what I think of these 'men' and what I would be capable of if you gave me an AK47 and pointed them out to me in the street? I would happily go to prison for the remainder of my life or even be killed if I could stop just one woman or girl from going through this pain and I do not say that lightly. I would certainly kill, if I knew for certain who had done some of these things, normally I do not like violence but I see no alternative with some of these men, it would be better if they didn't walk the face of the earth.
It will be of little consequence to you but it also deeply pains me the way they use and twist my religion for their own desires, they have the audacity to mention the name of G-d when they commit these crimes and I do not believe G-d will forgive them their crimes or the use of His name in such vanity.
Niranjan
This is the last time I will post to you. Everytime I feel you accept I am not a monster for being a Muslim and I try to be nice to you, you just throw Muslim attrocities at me. Yes they happen NO I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THEM.
Goodbye and salaam
Muslimwoman said:This is certainly a difficult issue in Islam and a discussion I often hold with more traditional Muslims. I don't wish to bore you with quotes but I would like you go to a Quran search on the web and put in the word hadith. What you will read are the many verses pertaining to the Quran being THE hadith and G-d tells us in the Quran that no other hadith should be followed.
It is also well documented (believe it or not in hadiths) that the Prophet Mohammad (pbuh) did not want a miriad of hadiths written, he was a very wise man indeed and anticipated the chinese whispers that would follow.
Even today traditional followers will tell you that the four traditional schools of thought are the right path and you may follow any of them but they all differ in opinion (not just on minor issues). I am currently having a discusion with a Muslim brother on another thread regarding this very topic, how can 4 different opinions all be right? Ver confusing for us laypeople who just wish to please G-d.
I would love to hear your views on the Israel/Palestine issue. Before I moved to Egypt I had very set views about this topic but now I have had to explore it more deeply and am now not sure what to think. What truly astonished me (and saddened me) is the depth of hated, and I mean hatred, some Arabs hold for the Jewish population. To see a 6 year old child cheering because a Jew had been killed made my blood boil, just the lunacy of teaching small children such hatred. Although it did make me start to see how Islamic fundamentalism begins. So please share your thoughts with me – I love to learn.
How fascinating, I hope that you will be able to return there one day. I have been interested to watch the change in political stance there over the last few years. Sometimes when I look at Egyptian culture I can just see the line between their African and Arabic roots. It is certainly a beautiful area of the world, that sounds silly because it is mainly sand, but having been I feel sure you know what I mean. I think perhaps it is the vastness that impresses me and the constantly changing landscape. Please will you share some of your experiences from childhood, what was it like to be a child growing up in such a rich culture with such difficult political issues?
Go on then be agreeable and tell me your agreeable solution….
I agree with you in part, men must be responsible for their own actions and controlling their own urges. Non Muslim men manage to look at women in bikini’s without either having to rape them or go insane, so why can’t Muslim men. The obvious answer is they can and do. I read a comment by a Muslim scholar recently that stated that men were basically ‘unable’ to control their urges, perhaps he should have rephrased it to say HE couldn’t. Honestly, I despair at some of the things Muslim men sometimes.
However a question has arisen, over the past 20 years or so, in the west of whether the dress and behaviour of women contributes to rape – usually through court cases. I am in no way excusing rape but I do think it raises the issue for women.
This situation we find ourselves is has come from men not from G-d.
Thankyou. No offense meant to Christian women but could you imagine if they decided to wear easter bonnets all year as a sign and symbol of their faith. Would everyone believe them to be oppressed? Would governments ban the wearing of easter bonnets?
Salaam
"chinese whispers"? this phrase carries a certain connotation that i would like to understand before i respond. what do you mean, exactly, by this phrase?
This was a game we played as children (no idea why it is called Chinese whispers but I intended no racial slur). The first person reads a card and whispers the contents to the next person and so it goes on until the last person. Invariably by the time it gets to the last person and they shout it out it is just nonsense and bears little resemblance to the original saying.
well.. it is easy enough for four views to be correct, it simply depends on their perspective.. in any event, this is one of the issues that makes it difficult for a non Muslim to discourse about Islam, without a central orthodoxy, as it were, it is quite muddled about the correct view within Islam and so forth.
This is the problem, many Muslims themselves do not understand it. We are not talking about scholarly discussions but about pronouncements that have real and profound effects on peoples lives. I have no problem accepting that 4 men can have a discussion, all with different views and all be correct according to their understanding but when you take that out into the real world it has a damaging affect.
For one school to decide that the marriage of a woman raped by her father in law is dissolved, she has committed adultery (even though forced) and she must therefore leave her husband and then you have the other schools saying this is not correct, with no choice for the woman to go to another school for a ruling - I simply cannot accept that they are all right. The Quran is simply not that ambiguous and these issues arise from power/political ambition
on a more practical slant.. it is quite clear thatJordan and Syria have sufficient land to create a sepearte Palestinian state, if they would so choose. why they have not done so is certainly suspect, in my mind.
Jolly good question, sounds like a dig your heals in situation. Get what is yours and we will back you all the way, from a distance whilst not in any danger. Such a sad situation.
indeed. one often imputes ones own failings and views unto the whole of humanity and in doing so often draws inaccurate conclusions about a great many things. i would agree, i suspect this person was unable to control their own thoughts and thus is trying to excuse them by laying the responsibility for them on someone else. though i'm pretty confident that, even in Islam, such things are highly dubious and not likely to succeed.
I wish that were the case, this rhetoric was not an isolated case. My experience here is that men are taught from childhood that they have urges that ‘must’ be met and they go insane if they are not dealt with. Then of course they are taught to be modest, masturbation is a sin and stay ‘pure’ until marriage. To me it is simply setting up the young men to fail and leaves them concerned about their sanity.
this is an issue raised by men that are guilty of raping a woman and are seeking to excuse their behavior.
if you were to see a jar full of money sitting on someones table, even if they leave the room, you should not take it. If you do, it is not the other person that is responsible for your theft, it is you and you alone.
i find the entire argument invalid and without merit, i.e. that the way a woman dresses provokes a man to commit a crime.
As a western woman I have to say I feel differently but I accept that may be because of my life here now. The issue of date rape has been a concern for some time now, of course there is no excuse for rape but does women’s behavior (not just dress) somehow contribute to this? I feel confident that if I was raped now I could feel certain I had done nothing to contribute to this action. Whereas when I lived in the west I would have to consider whether my dress and my behavior had done something to contribute. In short, I would now be able to deal with the aftermath in a much clearer way, I could accept it as entirely the fault of the man rather than feel I must question myself. I am not suggesting women should feel this way but when you talk to rape victims guilt, albeit unwarranted, is always a large factor.
they wouldn't be Easter bonnets then, would they? in any event,
Oh okay straw boaters then or French berets.
that said, there are plenty of Christian types that wear head coverings all the time, the Quakers and Amish come to mind.
And how many newspaper articles have you read about them being oppressed? There are many women around the world that dress differently for reasons of culture, religion and indeed fashion but I do not hear people screaming out that they are oppressed.
many beings believe that their deity cares about their clothing, what it looks like, how it fits them, what it covers and what it does not. i have, personally, found this feature of deistic traditions to be very strange and seems to be more of a matter of control over the populace by religious authority than anything else.
For me it is not about the actual dress, I dress to be modest is all. I do not believe G-d cares if I wear black or blue or green, if it has flowers on or stripes, He simply calls for me to be modest and not to show my body off to the world. Some days I wear abaya and others I wear jeans and a long blouse (always with my head covered). I try not to be too influenced by religious authority, I follow what my heart interprets as modest, hence I do not walk around in a bikini.
Salaam
Muslimwoman/ said:My view is that I search the books of hadith and accept those that are in line with the Quran and reject those that are not. The idea, to me, that you must follow the hadiths blindly and accept all of them as factual is just plain silly.
Muslimwoman[/quote said:This is the problem, many Muslims themselves do not understand it. We are not talking about scholarly discussions but about pronouncements that have real and profound effects on peoples lives. I have no problem accepting that 4 men can have a discussion, all with different views and all be correct according to their understanding but when you take that out into the real world it has a damaging affect.
I wish that were the case, this rhetoric was not an isolated case. My experience here is that men are taught from childhood that they have urges that ‘must’ be met and they go insane if they are not dealt with. Then of course they are taught to be modest, masturbation is a sin and stay ‘pure’ until marriage. To me it is simply setting up the young men to fail and leaves them concerned about their sanity.
As a western woman I have to say I feel differently but I accept that may be because of my life here now.
The issue of date rape has been a concern for some time now, of course there is no excuse for rape but does women’s behavior (not just dress) somehow contribute to this?
I feel confident that if I was raped now I could feel certain I had done nothing to contribute to this action.
Whereas when I lived in the west I would have to consider whether my dress and my behavior had done something to contribute. In short, I would now be able to deal with the aftermath in a much clearer way, I could accept it as entirely the fault of the man rather than feel I must question myself.
I am not suggesting women should feel this way but when you talk to rape victims guilt, albeit unwarranted, is always a large factor.
And how many newspaper articles have you read about them being oppressed?
There are many women around the world that dress differently for reasons of culture, religion and indeed fashion but I do not hear people screaming out that they are oppressed.
Well ... There could be a reason:
Is it today in Egypt allowed to 52 years old men to marry 6 years old babies and consume the marriage when they're nine?
you would take the money simply because someone left it out in the open?
no. in no uncertain terms. each being is responsible for their own actions and i'm fairly sure that most religious doctrines would agree with this view. does that mean that a person could not be provoked into an act of aggression? of course not.. that can, and does, happen. that does not, however, remove the responsiblity of ones actions.
since rape has nothing to do, per se, with the woman.. there's no real method that you could ascertain this. perhaps your very unattainability provoked the assailiant? there is really no way to know that you didn't contribute, in some small way... is there?
because it is *entirely* the criminals fault, in all ways and in all cases.
that a woman feels guilty about being the victim of a crime is certainly the result of cultural conditioning and social mores that sigmatise the victim and protect the criminal by trying to insinuate that he had "no choice" or "she was asking for it."
hmm.. well... in American history, at least, both of those groups were victims of severe persecution. if you'd like to read about how they are losing their disctintive culture and way of life, i'd be happy to find something for you.