Saudi court rejects divorce plea from EIGHT-year-old girl married to 58-year-old man

[IndianaGreen]

Source: Mail Foreign Service

Saudi court rejects divorce plea from EIGHT-year-old girl married to 58-year-old man

By Mail Foreign Service
Last updated at 8:24 PM on 21st December 2008

A Saudi court has rejected a plea to divorce an eight-year-old girl married off by her father to a man who is 58, saying the case should wait until the girl reaches puberty.

The divorce plea was filed in August by the girl's divorced mother with a court at Unayzah, 135 miles north of Riyadh just after the marriage contract was signed by the father and the groom.

Lawyer Abdullar Jtili said:"The judge has dismissed the plea, filed by the mother, because she does not have the right to file such a case, and ordered that the plea should be filed by the girl herself when she reaches puberty."


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1099447/Saudi-court-rejects-divorce-plea-EIGHT-year-old-girl-married-58-year-old-man.html

[opihimoimoi]

1. Whad a minute...don't Bush/Cheney go paling with them??? Who knew the Bushies were like that? Damn..

[Baby Snooks]

8. Bubba of Arabia pals around with them also...

But of course we know Bill Clinton is a little perverse to begin with. Maybe he taught the Saudi princes his "cigar trick" while they were writing out the checks to his foundation.

How nice of the Saudi court to allow the girl a couple of years to think it over. You have to wonder if she will be allowed to petition for divorce before or after the honeymoon.

[IndianaGreen]

17. Women cannot not divorce their husbands in Saudi Arabia, or drive cars

Religion is used as justification for this outrage.

[Baby Snooks]

19. Actually they can...

They just are very rarely allowed to. But they are allowed to have checkbooks and write checks to terrorists. Just ask Princess Haifa next time she and her husband Prince Bandar are at the Bush's for dinner.

[opihimoimoi]

25. But its the pictures of the Bushies sucking ass that sticks in my mind

espec when they hold hands while they walk around...

[Baby Snooks]

30. They're just friends...

Supposedly. But you never know.......

[aquart]

40. Oh, good grief. Now it's Clinton's fault.

[aquart]

2. Maybe he'll be nice and dead by the time she reaches puberty.

And I would never wish her father to be hit by an oil tanker truck, oh no, but Inshallah!

[Number23]

13. Nice and dead...

Oh, that would be very nice indeed. :thumbsup:

My heart weeps for this little girl.

Edit: "Relatives who did not wish to be named said that the marriage had not yet been consummated, and that the girl continued to live with her mother.

They said that the father had set a verbal condition by which the marriage is not consummated for another 10 years, when the girl turns 18."

The one bright spot in this whole sordid tale...

[thecrow]

34. Imagine being 18 and having to "Consummate" with a guy of 68...

Ewwwwwwwwww!

[Gwendolyn]

35. If he looks like Omar Sharif... there are worse things in life.

When I was 18 I had the most insipid, pining away crush on my 58-year-old prof. He was dreamy. Girls are sometimes attracted to older men. :)

Of course, if the betrothed is a total mieskeit, that's a different story. But girls don't really make their own choices anyway, so it's luck of the draw I guess.

[meow2u3]

41. We'd have to send him a can of spray starch

That's the only way that old fart could get it up to consummate the marriage :rofl:

[aquart]

39. 18 copulating with 68...now there's a fun time had by all.

Especially once his dick falls off in answer to my prayers. His and daddy's.

I am not now and never have been pro-patriarchy.

[qazplm]

3. hard to be tolerant of such cultures

really really hard.

[jeff30997]

5. Yes indeed.

Extremely hard.:puke:

[tomreedtoon]

32. Which is why we need to stop buying their oil.

Seriously. Bush and Company wanted to convert them all to Christianity by force. That's the wrong approach.

The only reason we have to deal with Islamics at all is that they have all the oil. If we develop other energy sources that don't use oil, we can cut off their influence in the world, and we can allow them to stew in their own backwardness. We could make the Middle East the West Virginia of the world; someplace nobody would ever, ever want to go to or deal with.

Yes, this is partly contempt for a backwards, religiously obsessed and cruel people. Both the Middle East and West Virginia. But the whole point is to show everyone, including the Islamics and the West Virginians, that there is a better way of life. We can't do that if we're beholden to them.

[Posteritatis]

6. That's why, sometimes, I don't bother trying

There's times where, despite being a white educated male of Anglo-Saxon descent and this Intrinsically Evil, I don't feel the least bit uncomfortable saying "fuck that, what you are doing is wrong."

This is one of those, right here.

[edc]

18. Not here

It's hard but possible to tolerate it over there. But not here. Not ever.

[Pacifist Patriot]

27. There is no need for enlightened, tolerant and compassionate people to tolerate...

dehumanizing values.

[silverojo]

37. I'm not tolerant because that's not a culture

That's abuse, pure and simple, and these perverts simply hide behind religion to justify it. Kind of like the Mormons.

Kind of like every major religion, which is why I reject them all.

[Odin2005]

4. WARNING SARCASM: "But but, we are supposed to respect other cultures, we have no right to complain!"

:sarcasm:

[Baby Snooks]

12. Even our own...

There are still some states where the Jerry Lee Lewises can marry their 13 year old cousins. Just as long as they consent to the marriage along with their parents. Age of consent applies to sex. But not marriage.

[pnwmom]

22. There are no states here where 8 year olds can get married, no states

allowing marriage under the age of 14, no states where a judge would not consent to a divorce between a 58 year old man and an 8 year old, and no states where the father and new husband wouldn't be sent to jail.

[zelta gaisma]

7. WTF!? ....

Sending her off to be legally (in her country) raped at 10-13(onset of menses) ...Do you think her father thinks of her as his child or just a chattel? I have a pretty good understanding of middle eastern customs but the emotions and motivations behind them sometimes are beyond me. If anyone here DOES come from the culture can you PLEASE tell me, DO fathers love their daughters? what are they thinking when they do this kind of thing? if some man approached me asking to marry me 11 yr old i'd tell him not to come NEAR her or i' show him that what they do at Guantanamo isn't even CLOSE to torture...

[enlightenment]

20. Read the article, please.

The child is living with her mother. She has not been 'sent off to be legally raped'. She has been married by proxy.

It stinks, but so far it doesn't stink as badly as you imply.

[pnwmom]

23. She has been legally tied to this man. This stinks badly, period. n/t

[tinrobot]

31. So, she gets turned over to the old man when she hits puberty.

Not much better.

[pnwmom]

33. Did you read the part where the father SOLD his daughter to this man

because he needed money? Disgusting.

[enlightenment]

36. Yes, I did. I'm not defending what he did.

I'm suggesting that saying the child was turned over to this man and is being 'legally raped' (per the poster) is erroneous.

There is enough to the story, as it stands, to be disgusted about without making inventing things that aren't happening. That sort of hyperbole dilutes a valid problem - it's like crying wolf. If you add falsehoods to a story for added effect, people focus on the falsehoods . . . kind of like inventing injury where none exists, just to get attention. Do it enough and people stop paying attention.

The issue is that Saudi law allows men almost absolute control over women. This marriage by proxy, while historically common, is no longer acceptable in modern society. The mother is trying to 'free' her daughter from the marriage and the court is saying that she doesn't have the right to decide that. Interestingly, the daughter does have the right, once she reaches puberty (which will be before she turns 18).

If the contract stipulates that the marriage will not be consummated until she is 18, that actually gives her time to get out of it.

Is it right that she was sold off as chattel? Hell, no. But she is not being raped - and that's what I was responding to in the posters message.

[zelta gaisma]

44. arranged marriage and consummating

Ok you right i did jump the gun. It's a bit of a sore subject , what i meant was if she is handed over at puberty and the marriage is consummated that is plain and simple legal rape. i personally can state this.

[enlightenment]

46. I agree.

100%.

[JerseygirlCT]

43. Chattel

Women are chattel, period. The man is king. He does what he will with his property - wife, daughters...

It's a sick, sick, twisted "culture". And we absolutely need to quit treating it and those who purvey it as if they're worthy of being in the company of civilized nations.

[Faygo Kid]

9. Disgusting.

There is no room for "tolerance" in my heart for such appalling behavior.

Bush's buddies, indeed.

He's OK with that, but not with gay couples who want to marry. Again, disgusting.

[TheCowsCameHome]

10. And these bastards live in the lap of luxury from our oil dollars.

What is wrong with this picture?

[jgraz]

11. Now THERE'S your 5000-year-old definition of marriage.

Aren't you glad we decided to redefine it?

[theoldman]

15. Actually this is how it's been for much longer than 5000 years.

Only Christians in the West have practiced marriage as we know in the US for about 200 years. Check out marriage in Asia less than 100 years ago.

[The_Commonist]

16. That's exactly what I was thinking.

[IndianaGreen]

24. Marriage is between one man and one woman (regardless of her age)

Yep, I get it!

[acmavm]

14. Well maybe the next time the head of our CIA is in Bandar's hottub he

can put in a word for the kid.

:sarcasm:

[JerseygirlCT]

21. Scum. They are scum. It's really that simple

that regime, that "government" is disgusting, from top to bottom. Their twisted theology, their twisted governance... they're just vile. I run out of words.

And we cannot get unhooked from the need for their oil soon enough.

[Divine Discontent]

26. When does this guy get invited to the Inauguration as a representative of children rights

:sarcasm:

seriously hope this girl escapes him in whatever manner she is capable of figuring out.

[olddad56]

28. age is only a number when two people are in love. (kidding)

[StudsT]

29. the Bush Crime Family's Personal Buds... want some freedom fries with that shock-n-awe?

this msg brought to you by...


StudsT

[tom_paine]

38. Bushie Arabia: A Bushie Paradise!

[2Design]

42. these are bush's buddies - he loves these guys so much who funded the 911 attack n/t

[JCMach1]

45. This court is full of shit... i.e. this ruling goes against Islamic Law

much less common decency.

But since when do most Saudis show any decency...? Come to the UAE and I can show you a few eye-opening things about the good old KSA.