Taliban forces in Afghanistan meted out their brand of Sharia justice this week by executing a 19-year-old woman and 21-year-old-man for the crime of wanting to elope. The couple were shot by a firing squad before witnesses.
The couple was going to try to get to Iran but may have been turned over by their parents or neighbors.
Last year, militants across the border in Pakistan killed five women for wanting to marry men for love.
For the full story, click here.
Turkish Lawyer:
Very good, that is exactly what it is. Why is it that so many people want to control other people? I cannot figure it out, I have enough trouble just taking care of myself and my family.
Where do you find the time to control other people and your own life? Where does the inclination even come from? Do these people talk to God? Or do they just think they are so brilliant as to be infallible? Delusion on a grand scale that knows not race, religion or priveledge. Man is not designed to be controled by other men, it is against our nature.
This does not bode well for our country. The fact that the president of Pakistan has ceded much of the western portion of his country to the practitioners of Sharia law makes our necessary interaction with the “government” of that country infinitely more difficult. And horrendous stories like this only serve to stoke outrage on parts of our own citizenry, which can lead to demands for our deeper intervention in both Afghanistan and Pakistan when we should be looking for opportunities to withdraw from the sordid mess in that region of the world.
The example of this couple’s fate at the hands of religious fanatics is both sad and disgusting, flying as it does in the face of common decency and fundamental human rights, but it is not our business. We would be well advised to leave this can of worms sitting on its 15th century shelf. I do not want to see our military troops or civilian advisors asked to address any of these countries’ religious miseries.
Regarding the motives behind the execution, I think it has more to do with the intent of fundamentalist Islamists to control who women should marry and prohibit any interaction between unmarried people of the opposite sex.
The article mentions that the girl was engaged to be married to someone else so allowing her to elope would have (in the twisted minds of these fundamentalists) set a “dangerous” precedent for other women to follow.
Mike and Sidney,
I agree with your take on the Taliban and their outrageous murder of this young couple. This fanatical approach to governing is the result of “true believers” leaving logic and reason behind. This is what the radical religious right here in the States would want for us. A government overrun by religious maniacs.
Good point Mike, egotism ruins everything.
Sidney,
Good show. Well played.
Sidney,
Point taken. Marxism became a religion for many and its’ fundamentalists proved just as scary as any produced by religion. It’s never the ideology though, it’s always the egotism, greed and lust. Those three examples of human frailty will take any belief/ideal and trash it on an altar of cruelty and excess.
The Marxists were as dogmatic and doctrinare as any other group. Secular Humanists can be led to fanaticism and slaughter just as well as the Religious.
If it wasn’t for US meddling under Carter, Reagan et al, Afghanistan might be ruled now by the secular humanists & socialists we helped exterminate years ago.
Religion subverts family values! I would be surprised if I had any capacity for surprise left when it comes to fundamentalism.
It would seem that there is only one maxim of any worth in this philosophy. The word of the cult leader (and his interpretation of the Great Big Book of True Wisdom) must be followed without fail in all things. Anyone who dissents, even marginally, must be killed. A slap on the hand is never enough for these guys.
Sidney,
Cogent analysis dead on the mark.
It strikes me that the doctrine of the Taliban is based in anger and outrage. Acts like this are designed to keep the level of anger in society high, and silence attempts at dissent with terror. The result is a very angry populace, who, terrified of their masters, will be willing to take out that repressed rage on whatever enemy the clerics turn them against. This is not a formula for nation-building, it is a formula for conquest.
Well Mike,
Have their been any troubles in the country with people eloping? Did I miss another history class?
I can not phantom a just religion or cult that would scarf ice its own in the name of love.
As a parent I find it impossible to understand how parents, in the throes of religious belief, can turn against their children. This is tough to admit since as a Psychotherapist (retired) I’ve been trained to try to understand others divergent points of view. Yet, when tears come to my eyes, if thoughts of my children and now grandchildren run through my consciousness, I cannot relate to ever turning against them. It may be my ego that compels me to think that this is true of most normal parents, but I believe it characteristic of human behavior. Given this we must contemplate the evil spawned by religious belief (fundamentalist)and conclude that it is a bane of humankind. This cannot be excused by cultural diversity or crazed piety, but is in and of itself a reflection of insanity.
But every body got to get stoned, they’ll stone you when you are unable. . . .
“The couple was going to try to get to Iran but may have been turned over by their parents or neighbors.”
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Who says Orwell was writing in the future?
Well at least it was quicker than getting stoned.