does no one care that tamer hosny has only one eyebrow??

What’s with the picture accompanying the “Egypt Christian shoots his Muslim sister” story? An angry, scary-looking brown man who is NOT the subject of the story. Perfect.

— All France is doing is isolating the women it wants to make “more French,” in the end just polarizing people with hatred on both sides
— “Transvestites” in Indonesia: Might some of these people actually be transgendered, as opposed to transvestites?
— Did anyone notice the caption for the Gaza story? “Veiled Palestinian women. (Not related to story.)” Did some editor fail to read the parentheses and change the picture, or does the publication want to highlight the fact it’s just using the picture for decoration?
— Tamer Hosni kiss: Sigh. Can’t they just get over it?

But in all honesty, I think the issue with the morality police in Saudi Arabia is it seems they don’t have anything better to do than to harass people. I’ve been reading stories about the morality police, and they bother people for some of the stupidest things. Don’t they have anything better to do? I mean, really?

Similarly, walking around completely naked is not allowed as this is considered to be offensive, again mainly to children and thus harmful. However, in places like Ontario, where I live, women can walk around topless if they want. This is allowed.

I did not say laws cannot be inspired by religion, as many morals are regardless of religion, but to specifically have Islamic laws is very dangerous. Very rarely have Muslims, or any religion, been able to implement “Islamic” laws. After all, Islamic laws are all a matter of interpretation. Very few rules (murder is haram) are clear-cut. So implementing Islamic laws then becomes very relative. The laws will depend on who interprets them.

And although non-religious laws are often up for re-interpretation the main difference between those and religious laws, is that religious laws cannot be questioned. If one does question them then their Islamicness is questioned and doubted. “How dare you question this law?? It is made by God!” Non-religious laws cannot be defended in this manner so can be questioned.

Once you bring God into the picture then you can use Him to control and subjugate people very easily.

And as far as implementing women’s rights – Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan all have Islamic laws. And their women’s rights records are deplorable. They use Islam to oppress women and justify this oppression through Islamic laws!

State and mosque should be separate.

I think you’re confusing the role that religion can plays within government and how it can structure government, and the way in which the political elites interpret the rights and obligations set out in the Qu’ran.

And my point above was that what, you’re saying to governments “Please, don’t follow your own morality, instead we’re going to shove our own liberal secular interpretation of human rights in your face and force you to comply” ? Islam itself presents an ideological framework in which to base all social and political life. Such a framework sits extremely uneasily with Western liberal secular conceptions of government and state.

It also doesn’t really make much sense, especially considering you wrote a favourable review of Mojha Kahf’s article last week; who claims the rights she listed as ones being granted by Islam, rather than those rights being inalienable human rights granted by her government.

Sobia, how can you maintain such a distinction?