Yemen - 12-Year-Old Dies During Childbirth...

This is one of those moments where you are thinking about what you were doing at 12 years of age. It certainly was not thinking about getting someone pregnant and for my female readers I bet it was not about giving birth to your first child sometime through that last year before reaching teenager-hood.

I consider myself culturally aware and sensitive and all those other politically correct ideas, but for the life of me I cannot fathom the interest that some men have in wanting to marry pre-pubescent girls and then wanting to consummate that marriage after the girls first period. I am sure that there are arguments to be made for and against whether the Koran permits such unions.

My take as a non-Muslim who has read a little was that perhaps these unions might have been part of the cultural landscape and perhaps even permissible back in the prophet's day but even then the prophet was given special leeway from Allah in this respect. And, it was very much a case of the prophet saying do as I say and not as I do on this particular front. I am guessing that if I have misunderstood on these details someone is sure to want to set me on the straight path.

Anyways, this post is about a 12-year-old Yemeni girl who was forced into marriage as an 11-year-old and subsequently fell pregnant. She has died during childbirth and the child she was carrying has also died. Apparently, Fawziya Abdullah Youssef, endured a complicated labour and delivery that lasted some three days, according to the Yemeni Organization for Childhood Protection (Seyaj).

The problem is that the law that has been passed setting a statutory minimum age for girls to marry has not been enacted by the President, Ali Abdullah Saleh. So, even if law enforcement was inclined to stop the practice of grown men taking young girls as brides they could not legally do it.

Another issue is that even if the law is signed off on by the President then the reality is that many Yemeni families are impoverished and illiterate. When this is combined with ignorance of the harm that young girls will suffer as a consequence of being married off before reaching there teens means that tragedies such as Fawziya are all the more likely to occur.

Seyaj estimates that the marriage rate for girls under the age of 15 is approximately 50% in the rural parts of Yemen.

The marriage of children is not an uncommon thing in Yemen. I have written about this in the past here.

Random House and A'isha -- Muslim Opposition

It seems that Random House could not stand the heat in the kitchen and has bailed out. Random House was set to publish a historical fiction novel by Sherry Jones, this would have been her first novel, quite an event for an aspiring author. However, the subject matter of this piece of historical fiction was none other that A'isha, the child bride of the Prophet Mohammad.

Random House sent a copy out to selected individuals to gauge feedback. This feedback included on recipient lobbying Muslim websites and warning them of the books imminent publishing date. Random House fearing a backlash similar to the Satanic Verses or the more recent violence associated with the publication of some cartoons of the Prophet, has decided that it is no longer willing to publish the novel (some of the quotes in this piece are sourced from here).

The Jewel of Medina, focuses on the life of A'isha, one of the Prophet's wives. The historical record seems to suggest that when the Prophet married A'isha she was young, some say a mere six years of age. Most Muslims claim that the custom of the time would have meant that the marriage would not have been consummated until A'isha reached puberty. Truth be told, on this we will never really know the truth. But there is something troubling about grown men marrying pre-pubescent girls no matter what the circumstances.

The problem here is that Denise Spellberg, Associate Professor of Islamic history at the University of Texas, declared the book to be a "very ugly, stupid piece of work" that "made fun of Muslims and their history". The rhetoric then escalated to whispers of this work being "a new attempt to slander the Prophet of Islam." Spellberg went on to tell Random House editors that this was a "declaration of war" that would be "far more controversial than The Satanic Verses and the Danish cartoons". This must be one hell of a debut novel, particularly if it was going to see the author subject to a fatwa condemning her to death and incite the sort of violence we saw with the publishing of the Prophet Mohammad cartoons.

I hope another publisher has the testicular fortitude to pick it up and publish it.

The deputy publisher of Random House, Thomas Perry, in real chicken speak said that Random House had received "from credible and unrelated sources, cautionary advice not only that the publication of this book might be offensive to some in the Muslim community, but also that it could incite acts of violence by a small, radical segment."

It is always interesting to hear and read claims that Islam is a religion of tolerance and peace, yet any mention of the Prophet or his wives in any context is seen as an attack on Islam. In similar circumstances when Dan Brown had his historical fiction novel The Da Vinci Code published there were supporters and critics. Some loved the book, others thought it to be garbage. But, the Christian clergy of whatever stripe did not organize the masses to go out an boycott products or march on the publisher and burn it down, or issue a religious edict condemning the author to death. Perhaps the best way to approach any book is to read it first and then make reasoned arguments against it if you disagree with its substance. Yet, when it is all said and done the book is a work of fiction.

I unfortunately was not one of the lucky ones that saw an advance proof of the Jewel of Medina so I do not know whether the response by Random House is proportional to the offence the book may contain. More to the point, even if the book offends some Muslims, it is hardly likely to be the flashpoint that results in the implosion of Islam.

Yet, in any event, my question is, "whatever happened to free speech?"