Women use Koran to demand equal rights

[Coventina]

Source: International Herald-Tribune

KUALA LUMPUR: The religious order banning women from dressing like tomboys was bad enough. But the fatwa by this country's leading clerics against yoga was the last straw.

"They have never even done yoga," said Zainah Anwar, a founder of a Malaysian women's rights group called Sisters in Islam.

Anwar argues that the edict, issued late last year by the National Fatwa Council of Malaysia, is pure patriarchy. Islam, she says, is only a cover.

It was frustrations like those that drew several hundred Muslim women to a conference in this Muslim-majority country over the weekend. Their mission was to come up with ways to demand equal rights for women. And their tools, however unlikely, were the tenets of Islam itself.



Read more: http://www.iht.com/articles/2009/02/16/asia/women.php

---

I wish them success!

[loudsue]

1. YAY for them!! While they're at it, they need to change all that

stoning women for being raped bullshit.

[ensho]

2. me too, and wishing them much Stamina

nt

[marshall]

12. They're gonna need it!

Not the most tolerant of places.

[Warpy]

3. A lot of the Quran is staunchly feminist for its time

and women during the golden age of Islam fared much better than their Christian sisters would for centuries. Hell, I think that's why they had their golden age, but that's just me.

Repressed, self loathing gay men generally gravitate toward religion, it seems, and they always seek to suppress anything feminine in a futile attempt to suppress what they see as feminine within themselves and despise.

It seems we have to rub their noses in their holy books frequently.

[kentauros]

48. Well said!

:D

Now if only Sufism were the more popular form of thought within Islam ;)

[biscotti]

4. Pretty Cool

Wow, this is great and could make such a difference around the world.

[msongs]

5. time to sweep away the superstitions and myths of an ignorant past! nt

[get the red out]

6. Religion is the enemy of women

and it is time that women around the world find ways to fight back. Smart ladies.

Banning yoga, my GAWD! Of course, if Palin had won what would be getting "banned" here? (and I say Palin because I believe the Religious Right would have made sure she wasn't #2 for very long had McCain won in November).

[Raster]

8. MOST organized religion is patriarchal in nature and substance, denying women

priesthood and clerical status. Islam, unfortunately is no better, and at times worse, although true Islam does make some attempt to recognize a woman's status as a whole, sentient human being. However, the patriarchal debris polluting the three desert religions is ultimately anti-woman.

[femrap]

10. I'd have to say ALL

organized religions place women in the underclass.

[Eryemil]

15. No true Scotsman fallacy

What is "true Islam" except the one that agrees with your particular sensibilities?

[Raster]

17. Excuse my terminology. Islam untainted by radicalization, i.e., Wassabist Islam.

Are you familiar with Islam, or just looking for an argument?

on edit: I am a gay man and find all three of the Abrahamic desert religions vulgar. They have no worthwhile meaning to me.

[Eryemil]

19. No argument, just wondering

I am sick of liberal Christians referring to fundies as ("not real Christians™)
Pretty much any possible possible point of view can be justified by picking through scripture and plucking out the convenient bits.

That's where I was coming from.

[defendandprotect]

22. Good correction . . .

And, yes, I think we should more often point to the violence and insanity

of the Bibical writings and question why they still stand.

The Bible should be condemned for its violence and its violent "god" who, don't

forget, "loves you!" but will see you burn in hell.

The Catholic Church certainly didn't used to involve itself with having members

read or officials interpret the Bible. They made clear that it was convoluted.

And Pope John XXIII with Vatican II took the RCC even further into democracy -

and gave the church a compassionate and humane face. Pope John XXIII acknowledged

each members right to personal conscience and their right to decide for themselves

on even the use of birth control.

Of course Pope John XXIII was dead not too long afterwards and so were the next few

Popes who were planning, it seems, to do away with restrictions on artificial birth

control.

The new Pope Benedict is planning to turn the RCC to Evangelicalism.

Organized patriarchal religion is the underpinning for all patriarchy.

[Raster]

24. Yep, that is the surreality of religion...pliant, maleable...

and changeable into anything the interpreter wants.

[blueraven95]

7. Good for them!

I wish them luck

[femrap]

9. K and R

May the women of Afghanistan follow their lead.

[Mari333]

11. "use the masters tools to bring down the masters house"

it often works.

[biopowertoday]

23. I recall Audre Lorde's essay.

The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. Audre Lorde

Sister Outsider


She argues you have to invent new tools.


But work with what you have. at least they are not sitting around taking the edits. I hope they stay safe.

[Mari333]

27. Well, at least put a crack in the foundation

:)

[biopowertoday]

32. yes. I wish them well.

[Hulk]

13. Good luck with this one ladies.......I think I know how it's going to end.

We are talking about a Muslim nation, with Muslim fanatics dictating the rules of law.

If you think for ONE MINUTE that those goof balls are going to give a rat's ass what the females in their religion think about some issues, I've got a few bridges I'd like to sell ya.

LOST CAUSE. Lost, because even in the Christian religion, women have no say. Religion is a "male thing"...and they can be as suppressive as you can only dream.

Religion is so misused. NOTHING like Jesus, Muhammad or any other great spiritual leader meant for it to evolve into. God is great. His men that he left in charge are the devil's workshop.

[silverweb]

14. Best wishes in their efforts.

:kick:

[4lbs]

16. Also, Dubya really screwed things up for them.

<snip>

"She (Mir-Hosseini) said that in Iran reformers were gaining ground, but that former President George W. Bush's antagonism toward the country ended up strengthening hard-liners there."

<snip>



Wow, you think?

[madrchsod]

18. women in early islam and early christianity

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_Islam#Early_reforms_under_Islam

http://www.geocities.com/mutmainaa7/people/early_muslim_women.html


http://www.womenpriests.org/classic2/lap_cnt.asp

http://www.amazon.com/Women-Early-Christianity-Translations-Greek/dp/0813214173



fundamentalism in both religions have suppressed women`s rights.

[slampoet]

20. Well Frikkin DUH!!! to this reporter. Feminists in muslim countries have used the Koran since 700ad

Hell even Mohammed's wives used his holy words to stand up for their economic rights which were better than the west until about 1950.

[KrazyinKS]

21. I think that is how real progress will be made

I have always though that real social progress will be made by the women of the radical muslim countries, because they are way to patriarchal. Life is a balance, one small segment of the society should not have complete control. As hard as it is going to be it probably has to be done within the confines of Islam. Religion is very political a lot of the times. That is why Constantine promoted Christianity, for political purposes.

[biopowertoday]

25. Pakistan Agrees to Enforce Islamic Law in Violent Region

I doubt if women were allowed anywhere near these so called agreements!!


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/17/world/asia/17shariah.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print
February 17, 2009


Pakistan Agrees to Enforce Islamic Law in Violent Region
By ISMAIL KHAN

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Pakistan government officials said they struck a deal on Monday to accept a legal system compatible with Shariah law in the violent Swat region in return for peace.

The agreement contradicted American demands for the Pakistan authorities to fight harder against militants, and seemed certain to raise fears in Washington that a perilous precedent had been set across a volatile region where U.S. forces are fighting Taliban militants operating in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
.................

The deal on the Swat region was conditional on both sides fulfilling their side of the bargain, government officials said.

They said the authorities agreed to a legal system rejecting any law that did not comply with the teachings of the Koran and the sayings and teachings of the prophet Muhammad, known as the Sunnah.

“After successful negotiations, all un-Islamic laws related to the judicial system, those against the Koran and the Sunnah, would be subject to cancellation and considered null and void,” said Mian Iftikhar Hussain, the information minister of the North West Frontier Province, according to Reuters.

The region’s Swat Valley was once one of Pakistan’s Alpine tourism resorts but the flow of visitors dried up and thousands of people fled their homes after militants launched an uprising in 2007.

Since last summer, some 12,000 government troops have been fighting a military operation in Swat against a Taliban force of about 3,000 fighters. The militants have kept a stranglehold on the area for months, killing local police officers and officials, and punishing residents who do not adhere to strict Islamic tenets.

Government officials said on Monday that the agreement was struck with Maulana Sufi Mohammad, who has long pressed for Shariah law to be restored in Swat and who had pledged to persuade Taliban fighters in Swat to lay down their arms.

The authorities, for their part, promised to introduce the new legal system once peace had been restored, government officials said.

[ohio2007]

37. barefoot,pregnant and sweating over a hot cave fire is their right to life

Pakistan turned their backs on the children of "Bedrock"

[ensho]

44. and now the women and girls of Swat are crying

nt

[bird gerhl]

26. FUN FACT

Imperialism, NOT ISLAM, advances the most reactionary and the most debilitating social phenomena. Imperialism, NOT ISLAM, is the mortal enemy of democracy, feminism, development, equality, literacy, and culture.

[DavidDvorkin]

29. You seem to have a problem with the distinction between "fact" and "opinion".

[Eryemil]

31. Word.

[bird gerhl]

33. Like I give a fuck what a bunch of bleeding heart colonialists think

[ohio2007]

35. short timer ?

[DavidDvorkin]

38. Oh, my Goodness, you're giving me the vapours!

Or so I assume you'd like to think.

[ismnotwasm]

28. Awesome

Here is a great article from 2005 by Asra Q. Nomani auther of "Standing Alone" An American Woman's Stuggle for the Soul of Islam


"BARCELONA -- Several months ago, when a group of Spanish Muslims approached city officials here about sponsoring a conference on Islamic feminism, one responded, "Isn't that an oxymoron?" That's what many people believe. To conservative Muslims, the phrase is an insult to Islam. But to many moderate Muslims -- and I count myself among them -- an Islamic feminist movement fits with the religion's early teachings and offers one of our best hopes for countering extremism. Indeed, those of us who have joined the movement since it emerged in the 1990s have come to understand that Islam needs to go back to its progressive 7th-century roots if it is to move forward into the 21st century.

How difficult that is -- and how important -- became clear to me when I joined the first International Congress on Islamic Feminism, which was held in this Spanish city just over a week ago. When the floor was opened for questions during one session, a young Muslim man made the comment I've heard so often: "In Islam, there is no place for feminism. . . . " Sitting on the dais, where I had just chronicled our successful struggle to integrate some U.S. mosques, I took it in stride. I've become accustomed to belittling comments, even death threats. But what happened next stunned me.

From the middle of the audience of some 250 women and men, Amina Wadud, a Muslim scholar of Islamic studies who calls herself "a pro-faith feminist," stood up. "You are out of order," she said to the man. "What you are doing is exactly the kind of thing that we are here to be able to stop." The audience broke into cheers. Another Muslim man tried to protest. I interrupted him. "We're changing history today," I said. "We're not going to shut up."

What stunned me was not only the confidence with which we spoke but the willingness of the group to back us -- 12 Muslim women scholars and activists who had been invited to attend the conference by a small but ambitious group of largely Spanish Muslim converts, the moderate Catalan Islamic Board"


http://www.asranomani.com/Writings.aspx

[ensho]

45. thanks for sharing a great moment

nt

[sam sarrha]

30. ..that'll probably get'm buried up to their necks and stoned to death......

[ohio2007]

34. I don't think they practice the wahibist style in that part of the world

thats why these women can get away with it ;)

[shireen]

41. no. Malaysian society would never tolerate that. nt

[arundhatiroyfan]

36. K&R. n/t.

[superconnected]

39. Good luck to them. I hope they don't get killed for voicing dissent,

as is usually the case.

[shireen]

40. no that won't happen.

not in Malaysia. They may be conservative, but they're not crazy like the Taliban or Wahhabist in Saudi Arabia.

[barb162]

43. That's my worry. n/t

[AB_Positive]

42. I like the theory

Using the tools of the oppressor to free the oppressed. How often has it worked in history though?

[Xenotime]

46. Women should have equal rights without having to use fundie tactics.

[defendandprotect]

47. Men have to begin to understand that patriarchy is about

elite white males -- and help crush it -- !!!

Organized patriarchal religion is the underpinning for patriarchy ---

[intheflow]

49. This is what early American feminists did with the Bible.

In 1895 Elizabeth Cady Stanton went so far as to publish The Woman's Bible which highlighted women's equality. Some of her introductory remarks to that tome are online here.