Ottawa complains to Afghan ambassador over rape law

Grizabella · 09:22 PM

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/612522

Quote:

OTTAWA — Canadian officials called in Afghanistan's ambassador to express "deep concern" with a law that would make it illegal for Shiite women to refuse to have sex with their husbands.

So I doubt anyone is going to argue that this law would be a good idea. But do you think it's our responsibility to try to protect these women? There's a lot of controversy over forcing western ideals onto other cultures. If you think we are responsible to take some form of action over this, what do you think we should do? Simply lecture Afghanistan on why this is wrong? Implement some kind of trade block?

(note - I think this topic should be labelled triggering, but I can't find how?)

Mortalis

*Shrug* Everything runs it's course, eventually broken laws will be overturned. All things both good and bad come to an end. So in my opinion, let them be with their laws, the more strict the laws become, the faster there will be revolution. The faster the revolution, the closer to having a fair government they'll be. I'm not saying that we should start a revolution over there, I'm simply saying we should leave them be to fix their own problems. If I didn't make sense, I'm sorry, kinda sick right now, and not comprehending much of what I'm saying

Grizabella

But I think the problem is that the women have little means to rebel. Women in Afghanistan are uneducated, and taught from birth to submit to men. They're often killed for what we would view as a slight rebellion. I don't think the women would rebel on their own.

Mortalis

Perhaps, perhaps not, without knowing the future first hand, the outcome is impossible to gather. I generally say let things go, in either case, even the most uneducated will rebel when pushed hard enough. They either rebel, or they eventually die. If they die, then it matters not for the group that enforced the laws, they will try to enforce their laws on another group, who will rebel. Everything happens in time. Patience is what is required. I'm more than willing to say that sure, maybe we should help, but I'm more interested in the how. As you said, a stern talking to isn't likely to change their traditions. Threatening them would be a terrible idea, so I'm not really sure what we could do, even if we wanted to.

Grizabella

But in the case of a law which makes it legal to rape women, and illegal for the woman to resist rape, is the best solution to wait for the situation to resolve itself?

Mortalis

Would a lack of a law stop them? As you said, women don't have any rights over there, the law just makes it formal.

Grizabella

Which is what I'm trying to get at - are we responsible for the rights of women everywhere, or only the rights of women in the western world?

Jack

And I'm sure their reaction was:

"Oh no Ottawa wants us to change the law, all mighty Ottawa! What shall we do? I guess we better chang-BAHAHAHAHAHAHA I can't keep this up anymore Ahmed! Let's just ignore them."

Mortalis

Personally, I think we should focus on home. *Laughs* Probably pretty close to how they reacted too Jack. Anyway, the least we can do is learn from other country's follys, it may seem cruel to let them suffer, but in all honesty, the world was built on the suffering of others.

Grizabella

Well if nothing else I suppose it's good to see that there is compassion for those who are less fortunate than we in the western world are (insert sarcastic smiley here)

Mortalis

I have seldom been known as compassionate. I rely on logic for most things lately, emotions tend to disrupt life.

Blackwing

Nothing will be done about it.