Truth About Women Living in Iraq
15 October 2005 12:12 am by Taylor Marsh
The Truth About Women Living in Iraq
EMAIL RECEIVED AFTER A RADIO INTERVIEW FRIDAY: “Please
broadcast your ridiculous opinions somewhere other than Iowa (how about relegating
yourself to urban chicago where they want liberal thinking). It is frustrating
listeng to you describe the war has detrimental to womens rights in Iraq. I
am lucky enough to have had contact with women from that part of the world
and you are doing them a disservice. I have never seen a people so
excited about voting, if only here in America we had that zeal for freedom-Maybe
some day we will have to fight for our freedom again. If that day comes hopefully
people like you wont be out there persuading everyone that freedom is only
important to us. God forbid someone who thought like you ever ran this country,
the terrorist would be lovin it.”
– Shellman
And the “hate mail” just keeps on coming. Thanks, Shellman.
It means that I'm not only doing my job, but doing it well.
However, it's pathetic that people like Shellman are so ignorant
of reality, while lecturing me about my “opinions.”
Shellman and others prefer to stay in their bubble of ideology
and ignorance, pushing propaganda for the president. Ignoring the facts that
I and others present, because there are many of us out there.
Hey, but don't take my word for it. Listen to
what the Iraqi women are saying about the Iraqi constitution.
a tent, but they pulled Iraqi women out of this tent,” said
Zakiya Khalifa Zaidi, 73, a well-known actress who is now an activist.“The constitution was written in
a very tense atmosphere,” Zaidi said. “That's
why we lost many of our rights amid the chaos.”“Women lost ground in the constitution,”
agreed Hajim M. Hasani, the speaker of the National Assembly.
“Speaker of the National Assembly,”
is Ms. Hasani's job. If she's saying “women lost ground in the constitution,”
well, you might want to take her word for it.
But no, people like Shellman think they know better. If we had a trained Iraqi soldier for every
arrogant pro-Bush butthead we'd be on our way home by now.
There is more evidence than I care to offer about how women lost in this
constitution. There's more trouble down the road for our Iraqi sisters, too,
which means for Iraq as well. George W. Bush put them in this spot by botching
every angle of the peace, which led to back room deals that made women a bargaining
chip. It sounds ugly, but it's true.
As the constitution was being drafted by rival factions
battling for control of Iraq and its future, women, who make up more than
50 percent of the population, were never treated as more than a side issue.
None was involved in the backroom dealing. They had to rely on male leaders
with other issues on their minds to plead their case. President Bush has said
women's rights is one of the reasons Americans are fighting in Iraq. A Western
official in Baghdad said Friday that the proposed constitution was “a
good constitution for women, and very frankly that's something we were very
insistent upon.” The draft going before voters Saturday specifies equality
regardless of a person's sex and aspires to reserve 25 percent of the seats
in the National Assembly for women. But it
also gives each Iraqi household the option of using religious law to decide
matters of inheritance, divorce, alimony and other family issues. Rights advocates
have said they fear women will be coerced by male relatives into accepting
the least favorable interpretations of religious law — forbidding divorce
without a husband's permission, for example, or cutting a daughter's inheritance
compared with a son's. The constitution also sets aside seats for Muslim clerics
on the Supreme Court, which will weigh the constitutionality of all laws.
… Shiite marshals roam the southern city of Basra, chastising women for
showing a bare arm or calf and beating them for picnicking with male friends.
Female lawmakers from the governing Shiite religious parties talk with relish
of establishing a husband's right to beat wives — albeit subject to regulation.
Female officials speak with approval of a woman in the southern city of Najaf
who was denied a judgeship because of her sex.
IRAQI
WOMEN SEE LITTLE BUT DARKNESS
You can't blame the Iraqi women's plight on Saddam.
The only place to point fingers is at the failures of President Bush's leadership
in this nightmare called “liberation,” that's gone from WMD scare to fighting them over
there so we don't have to fight them over here to “spreading democracy” to selling the Iraqi women out.
Bill O'Reilly would have a field day on that one, wouldn't he? Ken doll Sean, too.
But the truth is that because our president couldn't make peace, restore
order, and jump start the infrastructure after the war, precious time was
lost, especially by L. Paul Bremer and his crew. In the end, after months
and months, even a year, President Bush had no place to go, but to deal with
the men who wanted what they wanted and Bush had to give it to them. We were
in no place to bargain, so the die was cast and women were left out. So, democracy
and Islamic law were written into the constitution, two mutually exclusive
ideas that are about to meet head on, with women the losers.
If Iraq disintegrates, it will be W.'s deal with the devil that begins
the slide into chaos. A country cannot survive unless the women, which in
Iraq represent over 50% of the population, have, not only an equal voice,
but a place of honor and respect. If you are still considered property, there
is no respect and you have no life. That is what we have birthed for the women
of Iraq, regardless of whether the constitution passes.
It sickens me.
