News Egypt's Islamists warn giving women some rights could destroy society

[Evo]

It seems pretty clear that the whole debate is structured by a binary view of things : our liberty and equality against their alienation and hierarchy. Some posters try not to be judgemental but they think within this framework and they fail.
Long ago I stopped judging people and their ways of life. I can tell you that freedom has no content at all, and that there is no point to fill it with a particular set of value and laws rather than an another one... The key point is your attitude towards them.

Oppression cannot and should not ever be swept under the rug. People should never accept the mistreatment of others. That type of thinking is wrong no matter how you try to make excuses for it.

 

[nazarbaz]

Evo, you just don't know what you are talking about if your main source of information is média.Things are à lot more complicated than you seem to think.

 

[Evo]

Evo, you just don't know what you are talking about if your main source of information is média.Things are à lot more complicated than you seem to think.

Did you read the article?

A coalition of Arab human rights groups - from Egypt, Lebanon, the Palestinian Territories, Jordan and Tunisia - called on countries at the Commission on the Status of Women on Thursday to stop using religion, culture, and tradition to justify abuse of women.

I would guess that these people understand the culture.

 

[leroyjenkens]

Who knows this kind of societies from the inside knows that women's run it despite all the leads that tend to prove the opposite for a western eye.

Women run the societies and we just think they're being oppressed? So they can wear bikinis to the beach if they want to?

 

[lisab]

The one thing that westerners need to learn is to shut up when they obviously don't get what is going on. I have no sympathy for islamists and I fought them almost all my life but you have to know that most of what you are saying about the arab world and the muslim cultures is gross misconception. Who knows this kind of societies from the inside knows that women's run it despite all the leads that tend to prove the opposite for a western eye. The inferiority of status is here to hide à de facto superiority in what matters most for them : the politics of the family. This idea that your countries are an oasis of freedom in a world hostile to liberty and justice is ridiculous. It reminds me what is most silly in my native society standard behavior and thinking : judging the big complicated world outside by the old village habits and giving good or bad grads to whatever seems to be différent from us. You don't seem to be that différent from this standpoint.

Regarding the bolded part of your post: how can you say you know what matters most to women?

 

[pftest]

[...]The inferiority of status is here to hide à de facto superiority in what matters most for them : the politics of the family.[...]

So women are superior in "the politics of the family". Can you explain what you mean with this? Is it that they can decide what to cook?

Last i checked the faith in the region prescribes the husband to beat his wife when she doesn't obey him. Also in matters of disagreement (for example divorce), women do not get superior family rights, quite the contrary. Not to mention the horrific consequences of prescribed female clothing and behavior.

 

[nazarbaz]

Your vision of these societies is ridiculous and full of clichés. You will continue trying to patronize people and they will keep not caring about your opinion and "values". This tendency to make big empty sentences and discourses on things obviously beyond the speaking subject is the mark of mediocrity : the kind of it that thinks it will teach others how to be free and ethical or simply how to live. If you think that islam summarize how these societies work then you really don't know what you talk about. Take what I am telling as a warning and a reminder that you're not in position to take harsh moral stances against whole societies and cultures. It is worthless.

 

[Evo]

Your vision of these societies is ridiculous and full of clichés. You will continue trying to patronize people and they will keep not caring about your opinion and "values". This tendency to make big empty sentences and discourses on things obviously beyond the speaking subject is the mark of mediocrity : the kind of it that thinks it will teach others how to be free and ethical or simply how to live. If you think that islam summarize how these societies work then you really don't know what you talk about. Take what I am telling as a warning and a reminder that you're not in position to take harsh moral stances against whole societies and cultures. It is worthless.

Based on history, there is hope that intelligence will rise above ignorance, but it won't happen unless people work to rid themselves of those that would oppress. And, you don't know the background of people here so I suggest that you stop pretending that you know something that you don't know.

 

[aquitaine]

Your vision of these societies is ridiculous and full of clichés. You will continue trying to patronize people and they will keep not caring about your opinion and "values". This tendency to make big empty sentences and discourses on things obviously beyond the speaking subject is the mark of mediocrity : the kind of it that thinks it will teach others how to be free and ethical or simply how to live. If you think that islam summarize how these societies work then you really don't know what you talk about. Take what I am telling as a warning and a reminder that you're not in position to take harsh moral stances against whole societies and cultures. It is worthless.

The election results speak for themselves and what these societies really stand for. We are in a position to take such moral stances because for hundreds of years many people sacrificed a great deal to purge most of those evils from our society, sacrificed their time and sometimes even sacrificed their lives. By not taking a stance, all of those sacrifices mean nothing.

 

[ginru]

It's interesting to read this clash of cultures. Some years ago I traveled overseas and stayed with 3 generations of a large family living together sharing 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom and still essentially being happy. I was told that the Mother is like the "General of the House" celebrated as the glue that holds the family together in harmony. Perhaps this is what nazarbaz means by "the politics of the family". I think for certain societies, the Family is a sacred institution that combines education, health care, welfare, and retirement all into one package. Even when governments fail them, their family is seen as the last line of safety and security.

Perhaps it's all too easy for certain groups to demonize our own culture of freedom with pictures of train-wreck celebs, high divorce rates, broken families, elders thrown into retirement homes and gangster rap raising children. This scares people into thinking this will be the future demise of their own sacred institutions of family and religion if they allow our progressive ideas to sway their daughters towards our values.

I feel we should easily understand this fear factor after 9/11. We were willing to get bogged down in 2 costly wars and sacrifice freedom in order to protect our own sense of safety and security. Yet, we look down on other cultures when they get overprotective of the things that they hold dear as the foundations of their society. I feel the best solution is somewhere in the balance of the two sides (Evo & Co vs nazarbaz), but perhaps we're just more into winning the culture argument/war rather than combining the best of both worlds for a more peaceful path to Progress.

 

[Evo]

It's interesting to read this clash of cultures.

The thread is about

Egypt's ruling Muslim Brotherhood warns that a U.N. declaration on women's rights could destroy society by allowing a woman to travel, work and use contraception without her husband's approval and letting her control family spending.

 

[jobyts]

The thread is about

For an intellectual discussion, we need to discuss deeper why and how different ideologies get evolved from different societies. Otherwise, the discussion is very shallow and not satisfying for a scientific minded group.

Discussion about different cultures and their sociological evolution are very relevant to the topic.

 

[Evo]

For an intellectual discussion, we need to discuss deeper why and how different ideologies get evolved from different societies. Otherwise, the discussion is very shallow and not satisfying for a scientific minded group.

Discussion about different cultures and their sociological evolution are very relevant to the topic.

It's a current events article specifically about this event. It's not meant to be a Social Sciences subject which, you would be correct, could go into deeper discussions, but would require a lot of studies.

 

[ramsey2879]

It's a current events article specifically about this event. It's not meant to be a Social Sciences subject which, you would be correct, could go into deeper discussions, but would require a lot of studies.

Ihe focus of the Op is specifically "Michelle Bachelet, a former president of Chile and head of U.N. Women, which supports the commission, said the commission was unable to reach a deal a decade ago when it last focused on the theme of women's rights and ending violence against women." and the Muslim Brotherhood movement of Egypt which opposed specific parts of the commission's preliminary deal based upon its fears that parts of the deal would undermine "society". That is very much a social sciences subject in my opinion. Posts dealing with the role of women in various societies would appear, to me, very germane in reaching an consensus that improved women's rights and protected women world wide.

From a website listing current United Nations resources regarding women issues, it would appear that no deal has currently been reached again for much the same reasons that no deal was made a decade ago. See http://www.un.org/womenwatch/directory/instruments_treaties_1003.htm

 

[Evo]

Ihe focus of the Op is specifically "Michelle Bachelet, a former president of Chile and head of U.N. Women, which supports the commission, said the commission was unable to reach a deal a decade ago when it last focused on the theme of women's rights and ending violence against women." and the Muslim Brotherhood movement of Egypt which opposed specific parts of the commission's preliminary deal based upon its fears that parts of the deal would undermine "society". That is very much a social sciences subject in my opinion. Posts dealing with the role of women in various societies would appear, to me, very germane in reaching an consensus that improved women's rights and protected women world wide.

Anyone is free to start such a thread in social sciences where it can be moderated appropriately. This thread is just about the protest to the Muslim Brotherhood's statement.