Government should act to abolish Sharia courts

There are already laws to protect people from anything a Sharia court might dish out. Why stir up more trouble?

Jingle, have you bothered to read the link? The law is turning a blind eye to the routine oppression of women in the guise of 'culture'. It is only recently that anything has been done about the young teenage girls who were forced into marriage to a much older man, often a relative.

If you read through to the end you can see how the laws were not working for this young woman

Bit odd that there seems to be no links to this story in a British newspaper.

And the only info I can see on the web about this woman is that she is a celebrated muslim atheist.

It seems to be all Facebook and Twitter.

Don't get me wrong. I am against sharia law being practised in this country - or anywhere really. But I would like a more evenly balanced article about it.

You think she is stirring ? If I had fled the Sudan I don't think I would have been so public about joining an ex Muslim group but then I'm a coward

www.loonwatch.com/2012/09/dispatch-international-counterjihad-publishes-a-paper/

It appears the paper could be an extreme right wing group hard to find much about it other than the link above.

I don't base my views on that paper, but on widespread reports of women and girls being badly treated in the UK as well as in other countries.

greatnan I appreciate and support concerns about traditional and cultural oppression of women and have actively campaigned against FGM and forced marriage (Not specifically Islamic as I think you know)
I have argued with Muslim fathers who wanted to withdraw daughters from PE/swimming and won!

However if this 'paper' is an organ of a right wing or extreme left wing organisation and is trying to incite anger against Muslims per se that is a very different situation and unhelpful.

I just want to know more about the credentials of the publication. Also I have several Muslim family members, friends and acquaintances who dread dramatic 'red top ' anti Islam style headlines as it often gives rise to indiscriminate aggression against their community and to them as individuals.

Of course the oppression of women needs to be discussed and challenged. If it is being hidden behind the skirts of a religion then the leaders of that religion need to hear the arguments and disapproval and know that it cannot continue.

Penstemmon - I agree with you entirely.

I live, and have worked in areas of the north with large Muslim Pakistani communities. Increasing numbers of African asylum seekers are also settling here. I posted on another thread that in the main, we seem to all live in relative peace but these issues about FGM and the oppression of women and girl children are significant. I agree, we aren't helped by extreme views from either the right, or the left. George Galloway spoke in our town after 9/ll and didn't challenge the local Imam who insisted the USA and the Jews were behind 9/ll and it had nothing to do with any one with an Islamic background. The EDL marches and attacks on Mosques are frightening.
How can it be that no-one in this country has been prosecuted for FGM? Why is it so difficult for us to have an open, and balanced discussion about cultural differences?

NSPCC are trying for prosecution for FGM this year, Iam64.

Here's a link to a relevant article that I've just posted on the child bride thread:

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2415492/Dentist-Omar-Addow-struck-offering-perform-female-genital-mutilation-girls.html

Here's a link to another article specifically about Somalia. There's a large Somali community in this country.
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/sep/07/female-genital-mutilation-tradition-somalia

FGM is an appalling practice and I hope all GNs will support the campaigns against it. But, I don't think it helps to mix it up with sharia or indeed with Islam. It is (unfortunately) practised in a number of places by women of all faiths, including traditional and animist beliefs. It is not part of Islam. Same with child brides - young girls are married too early in a number of cultures for social and economic, not religious, reasons.

But it more often happens in Islamic societies than many others, lily. Islamic culture is not the same as the religion but the religion is part of the culture and as far as we can tell, not enough is being done to protect girls from abuses like FGM and being married off too young in cultures where it most often happens. Saying it has nothing to do with Islam is head in sand stuff.

And Sharia law is Islamic and we know it allows female oppression too. Two plus two....

If British police are ignoring women reporting these threats against them, it is diabolical. The law in this country is the British law, not Sharia. I hope someone is advising these women to seek out their MPs.

Tbh I don't really trust rags like this online one, but I think I have heard about this before.

I think they are going all out at the moment to stop FGM. I hope so.

Two plus two in this case equals an undistributed middle, bags

From a WHO information sheet
Who is at risk?
Procedures are mostly carried out on young girls sometime between infancy and age 15, and occasionally on adult women. In Africa, more than three million girls have been estimated to be at risk for FGM annually.

About 140 million girls and women worldwide are living with the consequences of FGM. In Africa, about 101 million girls age 10 years and above are estimated to have undergone FGM.

The practice is most common in the western, eastern, and north-eastern regions of Africa, in some countries in Asia and the Middle East, and among migrants from these areas.

Cultural, religious and social causes
The causes of female genital mutilation include a mix of cultural, religious and social factors within families and communities.

Where FGM is a social convention, the social pressure to conform to what others do and have been doing is a strong motivation to perpetuate the practice.
FGM is often considered a necessary part of raising a girl properly, and a way to prepare her for adulthood and marriage.
FGM is often motivated by beliefs about what is considered proper sexual behaviour, linking procedures to premarital virginity and marital fidelity. FGM is in many communities believed to reduce a woman's libido and therefore believed to help her resist "illicit" sexual acts. When a vaginal opening is covered or narrowed (type 3 above), the fear of the pain of opening it, and the fear that this will be found out, is expected to further discourage "illicit" sexual intercourse among women with this type of FGM.
FGM is associated with cultural ideals of femininity and modesty, which include the notion that girls are “clean” and "beautiful" after removal of body parts that are considered "male" or "unclean".
Though no religious scripts prescribe the practice, practitioners often believe the practice has religious support.
Religious leaders take varying positions with regard to FGM: some promote it, some consider it irrelevant to religion, and others contribute to its elimination.
Local structures of power and authority, such as community leaders, religious leaders, circumcisers, and even some medical personnel can contribute to upholding the practice.
In most societies, FGM is considered a cultural tradition, which is often used as an argument for its continuation.
In some societies, recent adoption of the practice is linked to copying the traditions of neighbouring groups. Sometimes it has started as part of a wider religious or traditional revival movement.
In some societies, FGM is practised by new groups when they move into areas where the local population practice FGM.

Makes me want to throw up.

I second that Stansgran

I have changed my opinion regarding Sharia Courts. I originally thought, as they had no legal clout, they were relatively harmless. Having read more, though, I believe they generally undermine our own judicial system that, at least in principle, recognises that women have equal rights to men. I would add that there is a similar Jewish Court system which has also been criticised for the way it operates in favour of men, but this doesn't seem to receive so much coverage.

Like J08, I was uncomfortable about the tone of the Sharia Court article and the way it rubbishes multiculturalism. I wondered what Dispatch International was and so did a quick search. It appears to be a Norwegian/Swedish publication. One article is entitled "Leading elites are blind to the consequences of low-IQ immigration" and there is also an article defending the EDL.
I

One of the problems in discussing this subject is that one is likely to be accused or being intolerant/racist if you criticise such practices. This kind of nervousness seems to have stopped schools reporting 'missing' teenage girls who had been taken to Pakistan to be married. The girl who was murdered by her parents some time ago had tried to kill herself by drinking bleach when they tried to force her to marry an older relative.
Marriages between close relatives in the Pakistani/Bangladeshi communities have led to an above average number of birth defects and I wonder if this could be one way of convincing parents that it is not a good idea.

Thanks for the info lilygran. It's good to get as much info as possible about this practice.

downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/whnews/whnews_20130910-1217a.mp3

interesting non-sensational discussion about exploitation of Asian girls on woman's hour R 4.