NY Times: Sharia Isn't That bad, English Law Much Worse....

Let's send some of the Times staff to Iran or Saudi Arabia, have them commit a crime and see which justice system they prefer.....

Why Shariah?- NY Times By Noah Feldman

In some sense, the outrage about according a degree of official status to Shariah in a Western country should come as no surprise. No legal system has ever had worse press. To many, the word “Shariah” conjures horrors of hands cut off, adulterers stoned and women oppressed. By contrast, who today remembers that the much-loved English common law called for execution as punishment for hundreds of crimes, including theft of any object worth five shillings or more? How many know that until the 18th century, the laws of most European countries authorized torture as an official component of the criminal-justice system? As for sexism, the common law long denied married women any property rights or indeed legal personality apart from their husbands. When the British applied their law to Muslims in place of Shariah, as they did in some colonies, the result was to strip married women of the property that Islamic law had always granted them — hardly progress toward equality of the sexes.

In fact, for most of its history, Islamic law offered the most liberal and humane legal principles available anywhere in the world. Today, when we invoke the harsh punishments prescribed by Shariah for a handful of offenses, we rarely acknowledge the high standards of proof necessary for their implementation. Before an adultery conviction can typically be obtained, for example, the accused must confess four times or four adult male witnesses of good character must testify that they directly observed the sex act. The extremes of our own legal system — like life sentences for relatively minor drug crimes, in some cases — are routinely ignored. We neglect to mention the recent vintage of our tentative improvements in family law. It sometimes seems as if we need Shariah as Westerners have long needed Islam: as a canvas on which to project our ideas of the horrible, and as a foil to make us look good.

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Comments

[Elric66]

These kind of stories are done by those who oppose the death penalty. Liberalism is a disease of the mind.

[Elric66]

"Before an adultery conviction can typically be obtained, for example, the accused must confess four times or four adult male witnesses of good character must testify that they directly observed the sex act."

Which is why Muslim woman are raped so often in the Islamic world. Friggin moron.

[skh.pcola]

There are no males of good character in Islam. Duh. Ol' Noah needs some edyamuhkashun in reality.

[Elric66]

SKH,

One doesnt need reality if one is a liberal.

[skh.pcola]

So true. That's why they are so full of angst and self loathing. They recognize their 'tardedness on a subconscious level and fight off the painful truth like 6-year olds fighting bedtime. Idjits.

[Elric66]

That they are. No one can be this devoid of reality without some mental condition or disease.

[Cinder]

It's odd to me how some people talk about how we USED to be. That's irrelevant NOW. What laws do we follow NOW, and what laws does Sharia promote NOW? Using the past like this only fogs the window of the present reality.

[ZIP]

Cinder,

They do the exact same thing when comparing Islam to Christianity. It the but, but, but excuse.....

[Merrimac]

Cinder (I gotta hope that's not short for "Cinderella"): Would you term four men, who stood by and watched a woman or girl being raped, as men of "good moral character" and therefore, under Sharia Law, suitable witnesses in a rape case? Under Sharia Law, if a case of rape is proven, the raped woman or girl is then charged with "having sex outside of lawful marriage", suitable punishments for her being lashed or even executed. Kind of a no-win setup for females, I'd say. They practise their Sharia Law NOW, in Moslem countries: Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam, signed by 54 countries in 1990, states that "There shall be no crime or punishment EXCEPT as provided for in the Shari'ah" and "All the rights and freedoms stipulated in the Declaration are subject to the Islamic Shari'ah".