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American Morning
Discussion of the Treatment of Women in Islamic Cultures
Aired November 26, 2001 - 08:25 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back at 25 minutes after the hour.
Many have been shocked by the way the Taliban regime has treated women. First Lady Laura Bush commented on it two Saturdays ago, and "Time Magazine" this week focuses on the future of women in Afghanistan, as well as the rest of the Muslim world.
Lisa Beyer wrote one of those articles, and she's here to tell us what she found. Welcome.
LISA BEYER, TIME MAGAZINE: Thank you.
ZAHN: Good to have you with us.
So, describe to us the various interpretations of the Koran and how that is affecting women in many different Muslim countries.
BEYER: Well, a lot of light has been cast on the situation of women in Afghanistan over the last few months. And I think Americans have been quite shocked to learn that women in Afghanistan, for example, have to cover themselves from head to toe, or at least they did under the Taliban.
They were not allowed to work. They were not allowed to go out in public without an escort. They were not allowed even to be educated.
And it's certainly true that the Taliban have taken the repression of women to an extreme. But it doesn't - their treatment of women doesn't exist in a vacuum. They didn't entirely make this stuff up.
The Taliban existed along a continuum within the Islamic world of repression of women.
The Saudi Arabian government isn't very far away in its treatment of women from the Taliban. And of course, Saudi Arabia is a major ally of the United States.
And you go, then, from country to country until you finally get to Turkey, where women basically have more or less the same rights that we do in this country. But Turkey has achieved that, essentially, by throwing out Islamic precepts. ZAHN: (INAUDIBLE) is a secular ...
BEYER: It's a secular state.
ZAHN: ... country. So let me ask you this. How does the treatment of women in these various countries square with what the Koran says about a woman's place in society?
BEYER: Right. Well the Koran is a bit of a mixed blessing for women. For his day, Mohammed was actually a feminist.
At the time that Mohammed came to power in Arabia in the seventh century, before Islam came to be, in the pagan culture of Saudi - of Arabia - for example, it was a common practice to bury alive newborn females who were unwanted.
ZAHN: (INAUDIBLE)
BEYER: Women were treated as possessions. They weren't allowed to inherit. They weren't allowed to own property.
Mohammed changed that. He banned female infanticide, infanticide of any kind. He made the education of women a duty. He prescribed that they should own property and they should be able to inherit.
And even in his own personal life, he was a bit of a progressive. He did housework. He had many wives and concubines, but they tended to be working women. His first wife was a merchant who actually was the one who proposed to him.
At the same time, Mohammed, in passing down the divine law that makes up the Koran today, in trying certain principles which are considered today to be the immutable word of God in the Islamic world, and so they cant' be changed.
And so, for example, a woman's testimony in court is only worth half that of a man. (INAUDIBLE) ...
ZAHN: Now, in which countries does that ...
BEYER: Well, this is Islamic law, and ...
ZAHN: Right.
BEYER: ... it's, I mean, it's in the Sharia, the Islamic law. So the countries that adopt Islamic law, for example, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, Pakistan, would have this as part of their criminal code. There are other countries that don't. Countries sort of, you know, picked and chosen.
But overall in the cultures, you know, the message is passed down, whether the law is actually there, that women aren't worth the same as men, for example.
ZAHN: So much has been made of the fact that the Taliban have so perverted the message of Islam, ... BEYER: Right.
ZAHN: ... but in fact what you're telling me this morning is that's necessarily true.
BEYER: Well, ...
ZAHN: Because if you were to follow the Koran, ...
BEYER: Right.
ZAHN: ... the subjugation of women is ...
BEYER: It's there.
ZAHN: ... clearly reinforced there.
BEYER: I think that it is fair to say that the Taliban perverted Islam. For example, they didn't allow women to be educated. And the Koran is clear about that.
They didn't allow women to work. And, as I said, Mohammed's wives worked. That is not part of Islamic tradition.
But, again, the thrust of what the Taliban were up to, which was segregating women and keeping them below men is something that you can find the roots for directly in the Koran, and is something that exists throughout the Islamic world.
ZAHN: Well, your piece is absolutely fascinating. Lisa Beyer, thank you for providing more insights for us this morning.
If you want more detail, you're going to have to turn to "Time Magazine." I just found the breakdown of the various countries fascinating, ...
BEYER: Thank you.
ZAHN: ... and how the treatment of women varied from country to country.
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