McGuinty Government enabling victimization of Muslim women and children
Important Update : Safa Rigby responds in the Comment Section on the previous post .
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The media torch for the polygamy exposé in Toronto has now been passed to the National Post . John Turly-Ewart picks up the story today, and reveals that Safa Ribgy recently learned that her husband had not one, but two other wives:
…She’d followed her husband’s advice that she leave Toronto and live in Egypt for a year on the grounds that it would be better for their children to spend more time in a Muslim country. Now she knows it was a ruse. During her time there, he married two other women…
I really don’t understand why the CBC doesn’t base a series on this story, rather than Little Mosque on the Prairie. It would seem so much more realistic and relevant. Oh my, what a politically-incorrect notion that was! The Thought Police will surely get me now.
In any case, you can see the cultural brow-beating of Muslim women in this statement by Imam Aly Hindy , when Ms. Rigby confronted him about performing a marriage ceremony when he knew that her husband was already married:
“You will have to stand beside [your husband] in these difficult times,” Hindy told her. “You should stop causing problems to him. You will not get anything by divorce except destroying your life.”
Wow! Talk about emotional abuse.
Meanwhile, the Conservative opposition raised the question in Queen’s Park. Liberal MPP Ted McMeekin replied with the following bafflegab :
“Polygamy is a serious crime in Ontario. It’s not something that’s tolerated. As you know, the best advice I can give the honourable member opposite is that if she has any evidence that someone is engaging in multiple marriages, she should report it, because our Registrar General and our official reporting mechanisms have no evidence that that’s happening. As you know, Mr. Speaker, marriage is a contract. A contract requires a licence, and once a marriage occurs, it has to be registered. There are no multiple marriages being registered in the province of Ontario.”
As Turley-Ewart points out, just because a marriage hasn’t been officially registered, doesn’t mean that a crime wasn’t committed according to Section 293 of the criminal code:
…Contrary to Mr. McMeekin’s assertion in Ontario’s Legislature, there is no suggestion that a polygamous marriage has to be registered before the government can act. Indeed, the wording of Section 293 suggests the drafters sought to render illegal exactly this sort of situation.
By turning a blind eye to polygamy, Premier McGuinty is giving licence to shariah by stealth…
Dalton McGuinty is very good at appearing to do something with his fondness for bans on minor issues, but when it comes to really important stuff like upholding the law, then he runs for cover.
Meanwhile, the Safa Rigbys of Toronto live under the shadow of his tacit acceptance of Sharia law.
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Related : B.C. launches probe into polygamous community - CTV.
Tuesday Update: Good for Lisa Macleod - Tory MPP pushes for Ontario Polygamy Probe (Star).
June 2nd, 2008 at 10:16 am
My guess is that there is no longer a definition of marriage so anything goes and the Government is now complicit in the destruction of the family and “canadian values” (small “c” canadian!!)
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:27 pm
The unnerving part for me how accepting people are of polygamy. They seem want to equate it as being as harmless as gay marriage or infidelity. The circumstances are entirely different. Homosexual marriage is very small in number and they will likely never have much societal impact as a group. Infidelity is a marital transgression but not a whole scale transformation of women or family rights.
Look at this woman’s story:
She returns to find that, in her absence, her husband has married two other woman. She was not given any choice, her feelings on the matter have no standing, her religion is insisting that she accept it and her government is ignoring her plight. So she and her children, against her wishes but with the blessing of her religion and the government, must now share their husband and father with two other families. Her other option is divorce, being ostracized from her community, possible threats to her safety from her family and religion and financial/emotional insecurity as a single parent. Wow…. our society is sure “progressing” with respect to women’s rights.
Beyond that is the historic reality of polygamous societies. They are very unsuccessful and unstable in relation to western societies. The very structure of multiple partner marriages breeds resentment and dysfunction in both the families and the cultures in which they reside. There is a reason that polygamous cultures are at the bottom of the developmental pack - they are regressive and aggressively patriarchal. This is not about Puritan values regarding sexual relations, this is about the very real and well know problems inherent in polygamous cultures.
Shouldn’t some of our taxpayer funded women’s groups be protesting this evolving situation. Perhaps they are too busy worrying about the CPC so-cons hidden agenda to keep women barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. After all, why should progressives worry about these foreign woman’s rights to the choices and protection available to the rest of us? To judge the appropriateness of another culture in relation to western values would, of course, be the greater sin.
June 4th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
[...] why is the McGuinty government turning a blind eye to this abuse? Posted in Ontario - yours to recover someday, Polygamy [...]
June 5th, 2008 at 9:58 am
[...] what about the emotional abuse inflicted on the poor woman when a powerful religious figure warns her: “You will have to stand beside [your husband] in these difficult times,” Hindy told [...]
June 15th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
[...] Ignoring the victimization of Muslim women via polygamy? (Added as an update) [...]