Reflections From a Murky Pond

 
Did the young Arab girl A’isha weep when Muhammad mounted her and tore though her virginity and any semblance of innocence she might have retained at that point? Did she cry bitter tears when, at the age of nine (some apologists say 12 – 14) the middle-aged founder of Islam first used her?

Humanity will never know; it’s never been a safe question ask.  The mere allusion to Muhammad’s debased pedophilia is enough to get one savagely murdered in some noisome quarters of the world. Soon it may be risky across the globe if mankind falters and the Islamists get their way.

I think it safe to say that at least one of the young girls going though this same rape and torment in this supposedly enlightened age will be weeping, screaming, and pleading for her “husband” to stop when he gets the urge to rut in her. Sadly, her cries will be unheeded by the vermin on top of her, the rest of the nest of them around her, and seemingly most of mankind as well, who will shake their heads but take no action beyond that.

A Saudi mother is expected to appeal a judge’s ruling after he once again refused to let her 8-year-old daughter divorce a 47-year-old man, a relative said.

Sheikh Habib Al-Habib made the ruling Saturday in the Saudi city of Onaiza. Late last year, he rejected a petition to annul the marriage.

The case, which has drawn criticism from local and international rights groups, came to light in December when Al-Habib declined to annul the marriage on a legal technicality. His dismissal of the mother’s petition sparked outrage and made headlines around the world.

The judge said the mother, who is separated from the girl’s father, was not the legal guardian and therefore could not represent her daughter, the mother’s lawyer, Abdullah al-Jutaili, said at the time.

The girl’s husband pledged not to consummate the marriage until the girl reaches puberty, according to al-Jutaili, who added that the girl’s father arranged the marriage to settle his debts with the man, who is considered “a close friend.”

In March, an appeals court in the Saudi capital of Riyadh declined to certify the original ruling, in essence rejecting al-Habib’s verdict, and sent the case back to al-Habib for reconsideration.

Under the Saudi legal process, the appeals court ruling meant that the marriage was still in effect, but that a challenge to the marriage was still ongoing.

The relative, who said the girl’s mother will continue to pursue a divorce, told CNN the judge “stuck by his earlier verdict and insisted that the girl could petition the court for a divorce once she reached puberty.”

The appeals court in Riyadh will take up the case again and a hearing is scheduled for next month, according to the relative.

Child marriages have made news in Saudi Arabia in the past year.

In a statement issued shortly after the original verdict, the Society of Defending Women’s Rights in Saudi Arabia said the judge’s decision went against children’s “basic rights.”

Marrying children makes them “lose their sense of security and safety,” the group said. “Also, it destroys their feeling of being loved and nurtured. It causes them a lifetime of psychological problems and severe depression.”

Zuhair al-Harithi, a spokesman for the Saudi Human Rights Commission, a government-run group, told CNN that his organization was fighting child marriages.

“Child marriages violate international agreements that have been signed by Saudi Arabia and should not be allowed,” al-Harithi said.

Child marriage is not unusual, said Christoph Wilcke, a Saudi Arabian researcher for the international group Human Rights Watch, after the initial verdict.

“We’ve been hearing about these types of cases once every four or five months because the Saudi public is now able to express this kind of anger, especially so when girls are traded off to older men,” Wilcke told CNN.

— Mohammed Jamjoom
Reporting for  CNN, April 12, 2009

This is the sort of thing that humans find sickening. Some misborn mockery of a man can’t pay his debts, so he sells off his daughter to another subhuman piece of filth for the purpose of slaking its perverted lusts.

When the girl pleads for protection from the upcoming serial rape, what passes for a court system in Saudi Arabia declares that she’s too young to understand divorce and so must remain “married” to the vermin until she reaches puberty.

That’s Arabs for you. The girl’s too young to understand divorce, but not too young to be bred by some sweating, filthy, creature who mocks mankind by his piss poor aping of them.

And, of course, when the girl’s mother tries to get the Saudi courts to see something akin to reason, Sheikh Habib Al-Habib declares that she has no standing with the court and that the state-sanctioned rape and enslavement of her daughter will proceed.

Of course, under Shari’a – the law as laid down by Muhammad – such villainy is fully condoned, so one must expect any mouthings issued from the maws of al-Qummal like Sheikh Habib Al-Habib to fully support pedophilia and the selling of young girls into bondage.

While this is something that everyone has come to expect from what the Arabs try to pass off as their “civilization,” one has to – if one is human and possessed of reason and morality – wonder why it must be, albeit tacitly, condoned by mankind.

Would it not be better if mankind rid itself of this infestation and the diseases of both flesh and spirit that it carries?

That we as members of a society must judge the actions of others is a fact. While there is no need – beyond the pragmatic or utilitarian level – to “pass judgment” upon a person or his actions, we must judge the import of those actions and frame them in the context of their intent and within the framework of the other person’s goals in order to predict future behaviors and their possible effect upon us.

The question arise though – how do we judge another’s intent and goals? What scales do you use to derive our measurements? Do we weigh the actions of others on our own scales of malice, or do we weigh them on what we can perceive of their scales of malice?

For he is very wise, and weighs all things to a nicety in the scales of this malice. But the only measure that he knows is desire, desire for power; and so he judges all hearts. Into his heart the thought will not enter that any will refuse it.

— Gandalf
J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring, p. 203

It a common thought that we judge others by own desires and from solely within our own framework of goals and perceptions – or at least it’s a common rebuttal in many arguments. Somehow I doubt this assertion is anywhere near universal in its accuracy.

I think it is important for people to determine by which and whose scales they judge the actions and malice of others though.

Our Scales:

If we are judging the actions of others based upon what we would do in a similar circumstance, then our judgment is bound to be very subjective. It also would, at that point, say as much or more about ourselves as it does about the object of our judgment.

It would also be a flawed basis for judgment in many cases. People are not all the same and – beyond the primal needs – do not necessarily have similar motivations. By judging others only by own goals we leave ourselves open to being outmaneuvered by our enemies, as the quoted passage above asserts.

Still, it’s a consistent framework for judgment and one that can be rapidly brought to bear on a situation. Therefor it is not wholly lacking in merit – if one accepts its limitations and plans accordingly.

Their Scales:

If we are judging the actions others based upon their own goals and capabilities, then our judgment is not going to be subjective in the same manner as if we judged based on what we would do in the same or similar circumstances. The subjectivity would be more a case of targeting the assessment to the situation and individuals or groups involved.

It would also be a basis of judgment that has to be predicated on either prior knowledge of the individuals or groups involved or a high degree of empathy. Lacking a sufficient amount of either would render judgment based upon their intent, goals, capabilities flawed to the point of uselessness.

Still, it has the capacity for greater accuracy than basing one’s judgment on ones’ own intent, goals, capabilities. Therefor it is not wholly lacking in merit – if one accepts its limitations and plans accordingly.

It is certainly beyond me to determine which framework of judgment is better in the long run; I’m not even sure if either one is better than the other in an overall manner. Both scales of malice, internal and external, have the strengths and weaknesses.

It is not beyond my capabilities though to conclude that it is best to know, or at least consider, by which one – or at what level of combination – one is assessing the ramifications and intent of others’ actions in any given situation.

OK, it’s truly a moot point, but this cartoon bring up a very relevant point and possibility – if in a completely Liberal-biased – and/or amoral – and sarcastic fashion. Leaving aside the Liberal’s propaganda of folding embryonic stem cell (ESC) research into the larger field of stem cell research, it’s a valid point that a moral person should question whether or not they’re willing to accept treatments derived from the destruction of human embryos.

Perhaps it’s a fair and necessary compromise that all medical advances and procedures arising from the destruction of human embryos be labeled as such so that those people with moral objections to murder being used to further science can conscientiously object to such treatments.

One wonders if the Liberals would be in favor of such a compromise because of a hope that the people with ethical and moral objections to killing human embryos would die off sooner, or if these Liberals would decry such a labeling as being stigmatizing and prejudicial and fear that free market pressures would scuttle the treatments – as they have repeatedly done during the last eight years.

Because of the latest outrage from the Liberals – the one’s who want the entire Bush administration tried by foreign or extra-national courts for war crimes – over the CIA’s destroying a bunch of interrogation videos the whole issue of President George W. Bush’s handling of the War on Terror in a post 9/11 world is back – yet again – in the limelight.

As expected, people’s responses to the situation break along ideological lines. The Liberals are calling for blood and vengeance and the Conservative are claiming that there was no wrongdoing at all. So, the hatred and polarity of the two sides increases to little purpose and the moderates are forced to choose a side or be reviled by both.

As is also expected – at least by my few regular readers 😉 – my opinion is somewhat skewed from the normative values of Liberal, Conservative or Moderate.

Did the Bush administration violate US law during the War on Terror? In the case of the warrantless wire-taps, I would say “Yes.” In their handling of the various illegal combatants and terrorists, I would say “No.” Bush’s people were very careful to stay outside  – as opposed to either within or in violation – of the letter of the law in those matters.

Did the Bush Administration violate the US Constitution? My answer is forced to be “Maybe.” The sworn duty of the President to defend the American people in times of strife may or may not trump the other rules set forth in that document. It could certainly be argued that it trumps other lesser laws. Indeed, it could reasonably be argued that President Bush was required to act as he did by our Constitution itself.

Please remember that our Constitution was written in a totally different age and doesn’t direct address a great deal of the things that happen with disturbing frequency in these sadder days.

A large part of what concerns me is the total vilification of President Bush by the Liberals and their propaganda machine, more commonly referred to as the ‘Main Stream Media.” The only motive ever ascribed to President Bush has been variations on the the theme of abject evil. This seems very wrong to me.

Let’s look at this from a very fundamentally American perspective for a moment. What viable seeming choices did President Bush have in the wake of the Islamist-wreaked terrorism of 9/11? What is a POTUS expected to do when presented with an extreme circumstance that pits our own Declaration of Independence against itself.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

What is the President of the United States, sworn to defend our people, to do when the precepts of Life and Liberty are in conflict? When he is faced with the proven risk to an unknown number American lives, is it intrinsically evil to abrogate the Liberty in some measure of a few?

Understand – I am not saying that President Bush made the right decisions in every case, but is it right to decide that he made those decision do to some evil motive?

Across the seas of history despotism has risen time and time again. Tyrants have ruled many lands in many times, more often than not to the great detriment of their peoples. But it is not the selfish and evil despot that does the greatest harm; it is the tyrant who enforces his rule for what he sees as the good of his people that does the longest lasting and most grievous harm, and is the one most to be feared.

The groundwork of mischief is this. A man fancies that he knows what is best for other men; that he is better acquainted with their sources of happiness than they can be; that he has more appropriate knowledge, and having more power, that he can turn his knowledge to good account on their behalf. He has formed his own estimate of good he is thoroughly persuaded that such and such a thing is good, and being good, he will compel others to receive and to adopt it, because it is good, and because he knows, from experience, it is so.

Yet despotism never takes a worse shape than when it comes in the guise of benevolence; and is never more dangerous than when it acts under the impression that it represents beneficence.

— Jeremy Bentham
Deontology; or, The Science of Morality

Benevolence may be nothing but the pale and impotent shadow of virtue when it does not lead to pragmatic beneficence, but this benevolence can also lead to the worst sort of tyranny when one man or an oligarchy decides that they know what is best for society.

One can look back and see that some of this happened under the Bush administration. A certain pragmatic despotism was enacted for the sake of what they thought was the greater good of America.

One must also look forward though. The Liberals are now in power and they have a long history of personally invasive legislation, all or most of which is meant to be for our own good. It would be best if America kept itself wary, lest these Liberals enact a “nanny state” who despotism will wear a kindly face, but whose iron fist will strike as hard as any other tyrant’s.