When will Muslims protest this????
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| Mon, 09-14-2009 - 2:06pm |
((Yemeni girl, 12, dies in painful childbirth
AMMAN, Jordan (CNN) -- A 12-year-old Yemeni girl, who was forced into marriage, died during a painful childbirth that also killed her baby, a children's rights group said Monday.
Fawziya Ammodi struggled for three days in labor, before dying of severe bleeding at a hospital on Friday, said the Seyaj Organization for the Protection of Children.
"Although the cause of her death was lack of medical care, the real case was the lack of education in Yemen and the fact that child marriages keep happening," said Seyaj President Ahmed al-Qureshi.
Born into an impoverished family in Hodeidah, Fawziya was forced to drop out of school and married off to a 24-year-old man last year, al-Qureshi said.
Child brides are commonplace in Yemen, especially in the Red Sea Coast where tribal customs hold sway. Hodeidah is the fourth largest city in Yemen and an important port.
More than half of all young Yemeni girls are married off before the age of 18 -- many times to older men, some with more than one wife, a study by Sanaa University found.
While it was not immediately known why Fawziya's parents married her off, the reasons vary. Sometimes, financially-strapped parents offer up their daughters for hefty dowries.
Marriage means the girls are no longer a financial or moral burden to their parents. And often, parents will extract a promise from the husband to wait until the girl is older to consummate the marriage.
The issue of Yemeni child brides came to the forefront in 2008 with 10-year-old Nujood Ali.
She was pulled out of school and married to a man who beat and raped her within weeks of the ceremony.
To escape, Nujood hailed a taxi -- the first time in her life -- to get across town to the central courthouse where she sat on a bench and demanded to see a judge.
After a well-publicized trial, she was granted a divorce.
The Yemeni parliament tried in February to pass a law, setting the minimum marriage age at 17. But the measure has not reached the president because many parliamentarians argued it violates sharia, or Islamic law, which does not stipulate a minimum age))
Muslims around the world will gather to protest a stupid Danish cartoon, but will do nothing to stop atrocities like this. Why do Muslims around the world allow these gross violations of human rights? Why does America and other civilized countries allow this to continue?

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I think painting any religion with a broad brush is a bad idea. Like Christianity, there are denominations of Islam (Shia, Sunni, Sufi, Wahabi, etc.). A lot of what Americans perceive as Islam is a small group of fundamentalists, who like their Christian contemporaries, don't represent the majority. And while human rights are an international concern, I think America needs to clear our own house first.
I know there are many Christian denominations that encourage infringing on other's rights, like the right to marry, or a woman's right to autonomy over her own body. Some Christian denominations believe that women should not work outside the home or have access to education, and that women must "obey" their husbands.
I think we all need to value human rights across the board. Bashing just leads to hysteria, and is usually based on false information.
~Heather~
~Heather~
We have older generations and uneducated people in this country that still think it is OK for men to have several wives...
Changing the world won't happen overnight. You would have to go through several generations before people change their habits or customs. We can't force our own customs on other countries, just like we wouldn't like for some other country to force us to change OUR laws...
Well said by both you & jean!
Women's organizations do try to do something, but sometimes they can't do what they want to do.
It's atrocious, what some societies and religions allow happen in the name of religion or beliefs.
ddnlj, you are right, we can't say that all Muslims are alike.
You're confusing religion and culturalism.
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