Highlights:
The Federal Sharia Court of First Instance in Ajman earlier sentenced................... Abdul Aziz - in his fifties .... to death ..... guilty of having sexual relationships with his stepdaughters. .............
The four girls were sentenced to 80 lashes each. Those sentences have already been carried out.
They were charged with 'allowing' their stepfather to have sex with them. The girls reportedly gave birth to 11 children by the man.
One of the girls was eight months pregnant when they were arrested in 2005, according to police.
The women now aged between 21 and 26 told the judge their stepfather used to threaten them with a knife, forcing them to surrender to him.
Oh, and there's more:
the younger daughter aged 15 was planning to marry an Emirati, but her stepfather refused.So. Let's do the maths, shall we?
With the help of her fiance, she reported the case to police accusing her stepfather of incest and fathering children with her sisters, and that he also wanted to have sex with her.
He married their mother twelve years ago, when the girls were between 9 and 14 - and the youngest would have been 3.
Let's do a little thinking, shall we? If he's trying to start with the youngest when she's 15, perhaps that has been the pattern with the others? Unless of course, this is the one who had the wits and nerve to hold him off a bit longer?
Howsoever, let us say, for the sake of argument, that you are Stepdaughter Number One, aged 15, and Mummy and nice shiny new StepDaddy have been married a whole year, when Mr Shiny comes at you with - Oh look! - a nice shiny knife - demanding sex. What do you do?
Well, you're 15, which makes you a big girl now: confident, resourceful, mistress of your fate, and ..........ah..... alone in the house. You just say no, don't you? Of course you do, and then he smiles understandingly, puts the knife away, and tells you you're a good girl to know the difference between right and wrong, and stand up for your personal standards.
And he's just an old silly-billy.
If, on the other hand, you allow your mother's forty-something husband to do what he wants, then obviously, you want it too. ("Oh StepDaddy, what a big knife you have." smirk). You also want a baby - babies! - lots of babies! Just think how you'll enjoy the baby showers! The excitement of clandestine, they'll-imprison-and-lash-me-if-they-ever-find-out-about-this, childbirth, in the cosy, loving care of Mummy, your role model for female empowerment.
How you'll brag to your sisters, tell your friends, and look forward to each romp, each birth.
How jealous you'll be when he starts 'courting' Sisters Number Two - and Three - and Four - and Five.
And of course, they'll be just as keen as you were, because they are also just desperate to have sex at knife-point with their step-father; thus terminating their childhood, ruling out marriage, and committing themselves to living a shameful, criminal lie that can only end when StepDaddy dies or the police find out and put you all in a proper jail.
But then, won't it be fun when you girls have eleven babies to play with? Fun, fun, fun!
Unless Miss Priss, sister number 5 spoils it all. Don't you just hate whistle-blowers?
That's it, isn't it? Innocent or guilty.
Pop Quiz! (Please scroll down: I can't close this gap.)
Either
| A | B | |
| You say no | or | You willingly surrender at knifepoint |
| You're honourable | or | You must be culpable |
| You live happily ever after in the family home with knife-waving-but-otherwise-harmless StepDaddy, who will obviously respect your wishes | or | You're a very bad girl |
| You and your sisters make a free decision to remain inviolate | or | You all choose to have illicit sexual relations with your mother's husband, and to have eleven children by him |
If you ticked A, that's lovely, and just what any judge in the land would expect.
If you ticked B, then of course you deserve 80 lashes each, you wilful, self-indulgent sluts.
And pity poor StepDaddy, who has been sentenced to death by stoning.
I know I do.
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17 comments:
Blessing - you are now on a formal warning. It is not appropriate to call crime victims "whores" and if this is your genuine opinion, save it for your own blog. Do it again and that's it, you're off. Your anti-western bigotry is just as foul as any anti-arab or anti-muslim bigotry and just as unacceptable.
If you don't like it here on UAE comm, you can always leave.
This long post would be better on a personal blog (my opinion). Anyway, you can probably get rid of the long gap by not using any line breaks in your table. That is, edit the table so it is just one long paragraph--with no keyboard returns.
I fixed it after searching Blogger help - BD was right, Blogger was reading the line breaks in the html code. Typical Blogger ;)
Thanks chaps!
to b.d. & SD for technical support.
to SD for moral support(OMG!)
Perhaps you're right, b.d., but I was so utterly horrified by this story that I had to set down my response, where other people would find it, and perhaps respond themselves. I know I was writing in highly emotive terms, but I couldn't just shake my head and mutter to myself.
It really troubles me that - in my view - four people who have already suffered so much are punished further. There was an appeal against the man's sentence, but no-one seems to have had any qualms about punishing the four girls. This points to an assumption of complicity and guilt, with no consideration of the circumstances as mitigating factors.
It has been established for decades that people in positions of care or authority who sexually abuse children find strategies - psychological or physical - to prevent their victims from speaking about it.
Even if the judges were not aware of this, surely, surely it is relevant that a grown man, resident in the girls' home, used a knife to get what he wanted? Surely it should be recognised that the man who is capable of using a knife to force four adolescent girls in his care into incest and adultery, as they are defined here, would have no hesitation about reminding them of the legal penalties for 'their' actions, should the authorities ever find out?
Surely, in a region which places such emphasis on female honour, there should be some understanding of how ashamed these girls would feel, and how reluctant to speak of their shame to anyone?
And surely, someone should have given serious thought to the climate of apprehension, shame and fear that this man must have created in that household, and the cumulative effect on those girls as they saw their turn coming, in a span of twelve years?
Doesn't the combination of an abusive stepfather, a helpless or complicit mother, and a wall of silence surrounding the birth of eleven children suggest how helpless and hopeless these girls must have felt?
Shouldn't all this raise serious doubts about how much choice, control, and therefore culpability can be ascribed to them?
With hindsight, would the youngest sister still report her stepfather to the police?
Do the four older girls think that their new 'freedom' is worth the cost?
The sentence of death by stoning will no doubt deter some potential offenders from sexually abusing children in their care. Unfortunately, there will always be those who think that they can get away with it; and now they have a new weapon to encourage silent submission: eighty lashes if you tell.
Therefore, I will hope for a review of the law through which this case was prosecuted, and the drafting of guidelines for judges who have to rule in such cases,these guidelines to be informed by proper research into the effect of longterm intimidation, and physical and/or sexual abuse on adults and minors.
Thoughts, anyone?
Mamaduck - sorry for what you had to go through, most of the bile was targeted at me but sadly you and your post got caught in the crossfire.
this is disgusting and downright horrifying. i agree with him being stoned to death - but giving the girls eighty lashes? :-/
mamaduck,
I hope for more. That there would be an environment created where Emiratis feel speaking out in public against punishment of the girls in cases like this one, speaking out before the whipping sentence is carried out.
If it is not accepted that parents are capable of creating a world where children find no hope, then one horrible conclusion some might draw is that the penalty should be raised to a number of lashes sufficient to resist the step father even at knifepoint.
ABIT: here's some advice: STFU & fk off.
Haven't the poor souls have suffered enough - childhood, innocence, dignity, self esteem all robbed of 'em???
Worse there isn't any aftermath support/guidance/counselling extended of any sort????
I am just sick reading the sentence :(
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