Thread: New Iraqui draft law on marriage. Alarmists at work?

Apparently 9-year-olds will be marriageable if the law gets through. Alarmism?

I've read that only about 1 or 3% of men actually take more than one wife in muslim countries (probably the 3% of people who can afford just about anything). Do you know of any cases personally? If you can actually marry a kid there, is it just "on paper" or would a man have the right to have sex at such a young age? Wouldn'd it be at least frowned upon?

A contentious draft law being considered in Iraq could open the door to girls as young as nine getting married and would require wives to submit to sex on their husband’s whim, provoking outrage from rights activists and many Iraqis who see it as a step backward for women’s rights.

Iraqi Bill to Legalize Child Marriage Criticized - TIME

Lots of girls are married off at those ages in several countries. Often in violation of the paper laws of the country in question, but local authorities have a lot of authority in such matters.

Bangladesh “Girls are old at 20�: The social pressure behind child marriage in Bangladesh - Girls Not Brides

India Courts still confused about legal age of marriage? - The Times of India

Pakistan Child Marriage Should Be Legal: Pakistani Legal Advisory Body

Afghanistan IRIN | In-Depth: Youth in crisis: Coming of age in the 21st century | AFGHANISTAN: Child forced marriages still a common tradition | Afghanistan | Children

Saudi Arabia are getting right up with the new kids of the 19th century Saudi Arabia Drafts Law to Prevent Child Marriage

As for would require wives to submit to sex on their husband’s whim, that was accepted as a common law concept in most countries until the last few decades. Until 1976, there was no such crime as rape in marriage anywhere in the world. The last US state to make it a criminal offecne didn't do so until 1993.
Rape in marriage becomes illegal in South Australia | AWAVA Timeline Marital rape (United States law) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In addition, a wife's refusal to submit to sex was routinely allowable as a defence of "provocation" for men charged with assault or murder of their wives in most western countries that I know of. I think getting all sanctimonious about some countries being less than a generation behind the rest of us is unjustifiably self-righteous.

Originally Posted by adelady

I think getting all sanctimonious about some countries being less than a generation behind the rest of us is unjustifiably self-righteous.

Quite right. In Spain, for example, women were not allowed to buy a house or even get a job without their husband's consent. And that's how it was right up to 1978.

That was just two generations ago.

women could not vote in switzerland till 1971.

I blame Kekrops.

Theres no point in ripping our shirts over a "draft" law, anything outlandish from fringe elements can appear in drafts for any number of reason without having much if any chance of making it in the final version, if it makes it as a law then we can examine it.

I lived with Iraqi Army for a year as a military advisor and know many Iraqi Soldiers and interpreters quite closely. Of those only one was married to more than one wife, a Major who'd taken on two who lived in separate houses in different neighborhoods. Marriage is still sometimes used to help resolve tribal issues and prearrangements by elders still done for young children. I never saw or heard any suggestion this had anything to do with pedophilia, or tolerance of such.