Reply to: One step forward, one step back

[NotAllThere]

Am I on your ignore list?

Oops. My apologies.

[xoggoth]

A few hundred years it wasn't unusual in some sections of society for a girl to be married as a child, and as soon as she started menstruating was available to her husband to provide an heir. There are plenty of examples of girls among European nobility getting married before their 10th birthday, and starting to produce children from about age 12 onwards. While in this day and age we find that abhorrent, back then it was a normal part of culture - not just arab, but worldwide.

I wouldn't say that anyone who has sex with an underage girl is a paedophile as our age of consent at 16 is rather arbitrary, most girls are sexually mature well before that and some societies may reasonably set a lower age.

Nevertheless, I don't think our law is daft. Girls may be sexually mature but are they really all mature enough to make their own decisions and cope with the consequences? I think we have moved forward in those few hundred years but many Muslim nations have not. The problem here is that we are talking about a revered religious figure whose life is seen by some as a role model whose message outranks such logical considerations. Iran and Saudi Arabia have both sought to use the saying in the Hadiths concerning Aisha's age as a justification for lowering the legal age of marriage.

[GJABS]

You will need to read this first before making such a statement

https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng-press#{%22itemid%22:[%22003-6234980-8105265%22]}

I read that, and what it said is that the lady's motive in making the statements was only to malign the religion of Islam, and that this could stir up trouble with the muslims. But who are they to say what her motives were? I think a far more likely motive is that she thought the fact of Mo being a pedo might lead to some of his followers following his example in the present day. This is not a criticism of Islam directly, it is primarily a warning to the parents of non Islamic children that Muslims might pose a risk to their children. This is a public interest issue that is clearly something that should be open to debate in Austria, and accepted or rejected following that debate.

[vetran]

What about a 13 year old wife? Is that okay? Ballad of the 13-Year-Old Bride – Cuepoint – Medium

Still exists in the USA today, that god fearing Christian country: Age of marriage in the United States - Wikipedia, can't shag her though, apparently....

apparently not, I suspect it would be the same now.

The British tabloids went ballistic, and after a few dates, the tour was cancelled. Jerry Lee held a defiant press conference at the London airport, boasting about his houses and cars and accusing the British of being “just plain jealous,” and the Lewises returned home to Memphis.

So your argument for marrying at six is that in Alaska after a judicial review a marriage licence can be issued for 14 year olds:

A superior court judge may grant permission for a person who has reached the age of 14 but is under theage of 18 to marry and may order the licensing officer to issue the license if the judge finds, following ahearing at which the parents and minor are given the opportunity to appear and be heard, that the marriage isin the best interest of the minor

https://www.tahirih.org/wp-content/u...ompilation.pdf

Or In North Carolina after the horse has bolted you can close the stable door?

) If an unmarried female who is more than 14 years of age, but less than 16 years of age, is pregnant or hasgiven birth to a child and the unmarried female and the putative father of the child, either born or unborn,agree to marry, or if an unmarried male who is more than 14 years of age, but less than 16 years of age, is theputative father of a child, either born or unborn, and the unmarried male and the mother of the child agree tomarry, the register of deeds is authorized to issue to the parties a license to marry

Neither seem to help your case much.

[vetran]

There's no evidence that Mo shagged a 9 year old. What evidence there is suggests that it wasn't until she started her periods that sexual intercourse took place. Of course, the whole thing could be fiction.

A few hundred years it wasn't unusual in some sections of society for a girl to be married as a child, and as soon as she started menstruating was available to her husband to provide an heir. There are plenty of examples of girls among European nobility getting married before their 10th birthday, and starting to produce children from about age 12 onwards. While in this day and age we find that abhorrent, back then it was a normal part of culture - not just arab, but worldwide.

Funny - I thought you'd be against applying the standards of our age against former times. I didn't realise you're a millenial snowflake.

By current standards & laws Muhammad had paedophilic tendencies. 60 year old & a 10 - 13 year old is still pretty weird by today's standards.

Islam should deal with it by agreeing in modern terms it looks odd and not consider it offensive too try to understand his life in context.


Just as Christians were once big into stoning and drowning of witches, the modern church would consider it abhorrent and denounce it. I don't expect anyone to be prosecuted for saying God liked stoning and that was wrong!

22 Bible verses about Stoning

[NigelJK]

Thats the crux of the matter though isn't it? If you adhere to 'teachings' that are 1,000's of years old and probably manipulated by the 'powerful' over that period then you will never fit into a progressive society.

[darmstadt]

What about a 13 year old wife? Is that okay? Ballad of the 13-Year-Old Bride – Cuepoint – Medium

Still exists in the USA today, that god fearing Christian country: Age of marriage in the United States - Wikipedia, can't shag her though, apparently....

[original PM]

There's no evidence that Mo shagged a 9 year old. What evidence there is suggests that it wasn't until she started her periods that sexual intercourse took place. Of course, the whole thing could be fiction.

A few hundred years it wasn't unusual in some sections of society for a girl to be married as a child, and as soon as she started menstruating was available to her husband to provide an heir. There are plenty of examples of girls among European nobility getting married before their 10th birthday, and starting to produce children from about age 12 onwards. While in this day and age we find that abhorrent, back then it was a normal part of culture - not just arab, but worldwide.

Funny - I thought you'd be against applying the standards of our age against former times. I didn't realise you're a millenial snowflake.

Interesting point - and no I do not think that is a good idea..

I suppose where I was coming from is that if someone nowadays says that the teaching of 'whoever' were right and we should be allowed to therefore take child brides they should be called a peado - because they are trying to apply standards of a former age in this current one.

Also the reason for younger breeding was mainly because they needed people to work the fields, infant death rates were high, life expectancy was short etc etc - so what is the use of a fertile woman if she is not producing the next generation - in much the same way at the time what use was a man if he was not gathering food/hunting/ defending the village.

[Gibbon]

A few hundred years it wasn't unusual in some sections of society for a girl to be married as a child, and as soon as she started menstruating was available to her husband to provide an heir. There are plenty of examples of girls among European nobility getting married before their 10th birthday, and starting to produce children from about age 12 onwards. While in this day and age we find that abhorrent, back then it was a normal part of culture - not just arab, but worldwide.

Am I on your ignore list?

[NotAllThere]

But does the Koran not say that taking a nine year old wife is fine?

And in our laws is someone who ****s a nine year old a paedo?

So someone, somewhere is incorrect.

There's no evidence that Mo shagged a 9 year old. What evidence there is suggests that it wasn't until she started her periods that sexual intercourse took place. Of course, the whole thing could be fiction.

A few hundred years it wasn't unusual in some sections of society for a girl to be married as a child, and as soon as she started menstruating was available to her husband to provide an heir. There are plenty of examples of girls among European nobility getting married before their 10th birthday, and starting to produce children from about age 12 onwards. While in this day and age we find that abhorrent, back then it was a normal part of culture - not just arab, but worldwide.

Funny - I thought you'd be against applying the standards of our age against former times. I didn't realise you're a millenial snowflake.

[Gibbon]

But does the Koran not say that taking a nine year old wife is fine?

And in our laws is someone who ****s a nine year old a paedo?

So someone, somewhere is incorrect.

"In our laws" all of the ancient world were sexual deviants. Girls were typically married as soon as they menstruated circa 12 years old. Young boys were 'taught' by older men in return for sexual access. I detest Islam, but contextually it wasn't uncommon in the times for old men to take child brides, it helped assure virginity for one thing.

[original PM]

But does the Koran not say that taking a nine year old wife is fine?

And in our laws is someone who ****s a nine year old a paedo?

So someone, somewhere is incorrect.

[NotAllThere]

Looks like Article 10 of the ECHR is about as useful as a chocolate teapot...

That's right, because no-one's right to free speech has ever been upheld in important circumstances.

[Paddy]

Looks like Article 10 of the ECHR is about as useful as a chocolate teapot, in that it gives humans no rights to free speech in any circumstances where that speech could be of any value (that value coming from saying things some other people don't like, thereby creating a motivation for political change).

You will need to read this first before making such a statement

https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng-press#{%22itemid%22:[%22003-6234980-8105265%22]}

Principal facts
The applicant, E.S., is an Austrian national who was born in 1971 and lives in Vienna (Austria).
In October and November 2009, Mrs S. held two seminars entitled “Basic Information on Islam”, in
which she discussed the marriage between the Prophet Muhammad and a six-year old girl, Aisha,
which allegedly was consummated when she was nine. Inter alia, the applicant stated that
Muhammad “liked to do it with children” and “... A 56-year-old and a six-year-old? ... What do we
call it, if it is not paedophilia?”.
On 15 February 2011 the Vienna Regional Criminal Court found that these statements implied that
Muhammad had had paedophilic tendencies, and convicted Mrs S. for disparaging religious
doctrines. She was ordered to pay a fine of 480 euros and the costs of the proceedings. Mrs S.
appealed but the Vienna Court of Appeal upheld the decision in December 2011, confirming in
essence the lower court’s findings.
A request for the renewal of the proceedings was dismissed by the Supreme Court on 11 December
2013.
Complaints, procedure and composition of the Court
Relying on Article 10 (freedom of expression), Mrs S. complained that the domestic courts failed to
address the substance of the impugned statements in the light of her right to freedom of expression.
If they had done so, they would not have qualified them as mere value judgments but as value
judgments based on facts. Furthermore, her criticism of Islam occurred in the framework of an
objective and lively discussion which contributed to a public debate, and had not been aimed at
defaming the Prophet of Islam. Lastly, Mrs S. submitted that religious groups had to tolerate even
severe criticism.
The application was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 6 June 2012.
Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:
Angelika Nußberger (Germany), President,
André Potocki (France),
Síofra O’Leary (Ireland),
Mārtiņš Mits (Latvia),
Gabriele Kucsko-Stadlmayer (Austria),
Lәtif Hüseynov (Azerbaijan),
Lado Chanturia (Georgia),
and also Claudia Westerdiek, Section Registrar.
Decision of the Court
Article 10
The Court noted that those who choose to exercise the freedom to manifest their religion under
Article 9 of the Convention could not expect to be exempt from criticism. They must tolerate and
accept the denial by others of their religious beliefs. Only where expressions under Article 10 went
beyond the limits of a critical denial, and certainly where they were likely to incite religious
intolerance, might a State legitimately consider them to be incompatible with respect for the
freedom of thought, conscience and religion and take proportionate restrictive measures.
The Court observed also that the subject matter of the instant case was of a particularly sensitive
nature, and that the (potential) effects of the impugned statements, to a certain degree, depended
on the situation in the respective country where the statements were made, at the time and in the
context they were made. Accordingly, it considered that the domestic authorities had a wide margin
of appreciation in the instant case, as they were in a better position to evaluate which statements
were likely to disturb the religious peace in their country.
The Court reiterated that it has distinguished in its case-law between statements of fact and value
judgments. It emphasised that the truth of value judgments was not susceptible to proof. However,
a value judgment without any factual basis to support it might be excessive.
The Court noted that the domestic courts comprehensively explained why they considered that the
applicant’s statements had been capable of arousing justified indignation; specifically, they had not
been made in an objective manner contributing to a debate of public interest (e.g. on child
marriage), but could only be understood as having been aimed at demonstrating that Muhammad
was not worthy of worship. It agreed with the domestic courts that Mrs S. must have been aware
that her statements were partly based on untrue facts and apt to arouse indignation in others. The
national courts found that Mrs S. had subjectively labelled Muhammad with paedophilia as his
general sexual preference, and that she failed to neutrally inform her audience of the historical
background, which consequently did not allow for a serious debate on that issue. Hence, the Court
saw no reason to depart from the domestic courts’ qualification of the impugned statements as
value judgments which they had based on a detailed analysis of the statements made.
The Court found in conclusion that in the instant case the domestic courts carefully balanced the
applicant’s right to freedom of expression with the rights of others to have their religious feelings
protected, and to have religious peace preserved in Austrian society.
The Court held further that even in a lively discussion it was not compatible with Article 10 of the
Convention to pack incriminating statements into the wrapping of an otherwise acceptable
expression of opinion and claim that this rendered passable those statements exceeding the
permissible limits of freedom of expression.
Lastly, since Mrs S. was ordered to pay a moderate fine and that fine was on the lower end of the
statutory range of punishment, the criminal sanction could not to be considered as disproportionate.
Under these circumstances, and given the fact that Mrs S. made several incriminating statements,
the Court considered that the Austrian courts did not overstep their wide margin of appreciation in
the instant case when convicting Mrs S. of disparaging religious doctrines. Overall, there had been
no violation of Article 10

[GJABS]

Looks like Article 10 of the ECHR is about as useful as a chocolate teapot, in that it gives humans no rights to free speech in any circumstances where that speech could be of any value (that value coming from saying things some other people don't like, thereby creating a motivation for political change).