Court Orders Iranian Man Blinded

The reason he has been ordered blinded is because he himself blinded a woman who spurned his marriage proposal by throwing acid in her face.

Plenty of examples where religion has been the progressive social movement as well.

One-size-fits all never works, no matter how you apply it.

Some plenty's are easier to find than others.

I like your avatar.

Brilliant as usual db. There's just one problem with this. When our tongues are wagging our minds are tied up and no longer in overdrive.

Are you really sure you want to give women any more time to think than they already have?

Depends where you look.

Agreed, but I still believe that it hinders more than helps.

I question why the concern is that these attacks are committed against women or gays, and not that they are committed. What I mean to say is, throwing acid in ANYONE's face is awful - it is not made worse when its done to one person or another. Looking at people as collective groups instead of individuals is one of the tenants of racism and bigotry - if we seek to protect individual's rights instead of group A or group B, we'd be much better off.

Because men aren't really doing it to men. It's sex-specific, not sex-neutral.

I agree that, for instance, the justice system should treat these types of cases equally, but too frequently do I see this line of argument start to imply that we as a society should look at them as gender or race or whatever-neutral when they simply are not. How can we address the root causes of these issues if we aren’t willing to see these correlations?

This is like a crime... courts punishing women in custody battles for having careers.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/ar...-children.html

Why is that a crime?
The courts have been punishing men for having careers forever.

I see a recurring pattern in threads like these. Many people sling mud at religious believers because they are exclusive and judgmental. This may be the case, but no more than any other group. People the world over lump themselves, either implicitly or explicitly, into some sort of club. The tenants of these clubs is that you generally believe A,B, & C and you are strongly against X, Y, & Z. There is no all inclusive big tent; for this to be so, you would have to include literally everyone, including those who are mean to cute puppies.

People like to point to religions as the source of much brutality, but really, crazy people are going to do crazy, violent things for one reason or another. Some guy in the Middle East throws acid in a girl's face for reading; in America, people trample a person to death in Wal-Mart on Black Friday to save a few bucks on a freaking television. How about we all try to be civil despite our differences, work things out like adults, and leave the vitriol and blunt instruments at the door?

Fish --

That's the first thing that crossed my mind. It's taken for granted that men can't be as good parents as moms in large part because they have to work outside the home. Besides us being foul beasts and all.

Unfortunately it's simply impossible to separate religion from things like the middle east troubles. Or witch burnings, religious persecutions, and other things that are done explicitly in the name of religion. No one is granted the authority to call people irreligious just because they don't like their particular interpretation of religion.

Wow. To make such a broad statement, you have to examine every single case. The courts usually do their best to find a decision that is best for the kid and not for each individual parent.

This would probably be a good topic for its own thread. Whenever I hear about parents fighting over custody of a kid, or allowing courts to decide the future of their children, I feel so depressed. What a terrible situation for the kids. I don't know why parents can't be equally involved in their childrens' lives and just share custody. Why does one parent have to pay the other one support, why don't they just split the cost of the kids' expenses?

Oh ... Poor innocent Katy.

Because in a divorce, someone's feelings end up getting hurt, the fight is on and to hell with reason or taking into account what is in the best interest of the kids. Someone is only seeing red and all common sense goes out the window.

Even worse and more chilling, often it's just business, and business is first and foremost about making money, not ethics or people's feelings. Once the relationship is over, it can become open season on each other simply because that's what makes the most sense financially ... the kids and everything else be damned.

I think it's interesting that some people look at religion as the source of brutality, while others see it as the opposite. To me religious people should be (and usually are) pacifists and show great compassion for others including strangers. So I never look to blame religion for these things. I realize that other people see it as just the opposite.

When I read about the acid-throwing incidents I never blamed it on a religion and I didn't see it as the isolated act of a psychotic nut. I saw it as a broad societal problem in countries where women are subjugated and where the court system turns its head to crimes against women. In some cases the men are throwing acid because they feel that the girls have overstepped their bounds, in other cases they do it because the girl has rejected them and they want revenge. They do it because they believe that they have a right to put a woman in her "place," as they feel these women are a threat to their culture. I'm not sure how to explain what I mean but I guess what I'm trying to say is that I feel it's less a religious thing and more of a broad cultural viewpoint that embraces the idea that women are second class citizens. I know some will say that the culture is defined by the religious beliefs but I'm wondering if the culture has warped the religion, not the other way around.

There is acid throwing, and then there is acid throwing. It's true some of it is made without reference to religious motive, but my impression from reading stories about it here and there over the years(this is not a new thing in India) is that mostly it is not related to religion ... at least in India.

Some of it is not even made with reference to making sense, as with some cases in India I've read of where the victim didn't even know her attacker, but her attacker desired her and despaired at not being able to have her. Or whatever, who knows how crazy people think. At other times, the girl didn't know the guy, but unbeknownst to her he had asked her parents for her hand and been refused. Either way, the girl didn't have a clue as to what it was about. And that didn't seem to bother the attacker much.

As far as I know, throwing acid in people's faces is much more unusual in places like the one where the terrible story that started this thread unfolded. At least, to judge by the ratio of stories I personally have read about it happening in the middle east as opposed to India.

And it's always been a crime, in my opinion. Now it's being committed against women, too, which is probably the best hope for reversing the trend. Personally, I think it's silly for the courts to have a tendency to favor the non-working parent in custody battles, as I feel like this was originally a justification used to give custody to the mother. Now that women are increasingly the working parent, maybe this will be reversed, and the courts will view a stable job for a career-minded parent as a possible positive influence in their children's lives.

Probably a topic for another thread, but this thread title made me think of this story.

There's no impact on women in family and work situations that doesn't have an impact on men, so it's a fair subject for discussion.

Quoted from the article linked above

I have an old friend who is living almost this exact situation. She was a lawyer who quit her job to marry a charming guy with little education. They immediately began a family. After a few years of struggling financially, living in a trailer park and realizing that her husband was a rather lazy man who seemed to enjoy relaxing more than working, she finally went back to work as an attorney and he became the primary caregiver of their children. This really irked her because he was extremely nonchalant about whether or not their kids did their homework or any chores around the house and she felt the situation was pretty unfair. But they were in debt and she had to help pay off credit cards and bank loans.

While she was at work he would hang out with his new best friend, the next-door neighbor lady, and her kids. My friend would come home from work and find them together many afternoons. She confronted her husband and he admitted he was having an affair. So guess what happened next... she files for divorce and he wins primary custody of their kids, and to top it off she is ordered to pay HIM support as he pals around with the next door neighbor lady. There was little any of her friends or family could say to make her feel better.

The courts should not be allowed to make such profound decisions when it comes to families. In general, parents should share parenting duty and the one not working should be ordered to get at least a part-time job. Why should the one who is busting ass be penalized.

The entire situation makes me mad. I could go on for hours about it. If parents want to divorce they should be forced to live within 2 miles of each other, forced to split all expenses and parenting duty, and neither owe the other alimony (unless one is handicapped and cannot work). There should be mediators who monitor these family situations and yell at the parents if they act selfish. I would be good at this job.

I do agree that there should be some sort of consideration of the effects of moving on the children and the non-custodial parent. A divorce can be devastating enough, and so can losing custody -- but then to have the custodial parents move to another city or even state or country, effectively cutting you off from your kids except for rare visits (if you can even afford them) forever? That's really rubbing salt in the wound big time.

I'm just not sure how to work it. Should parents who move more than an hour or two away get less money from the non-custodial parent? It sounds like there will always be someone to self-righteously call you an idiot, ignoramus, or arsehole no matter what you think about this issue.