Islamist group whipping women in Somalia for wearing bras

[DPDarkPrimus]

A hardline Islamist group in Somalia has begun publicly whipping women for wearing bras that they claim violate Islam as they are 'deceptive'.

The insurgent group Al Shabaab has sent gunmen into the streets of Mogadishu to round up any women who appear to have a firm bust, residents claimed yesterday.

The women are then inspected to see if the firmness is natural, or if it is the result of wearing a bra.

If they are found wearing a bra, they are ordered to remove it and shake their breasts, residents said.

Al Shabaab, which seeks to impose a strict interpretation of Sharia law over all Somalia, also amputated a foot and a hand each from two young men accused of robbery earlier this month.

They have also banned movies, musical ringtones, dancing at wedding ceremonies and playing or watching soccer.

'Al Shabaab forced us to wear their type of full veil and now they order us to shake our breasts,' a resident, Halima, told Reuters, adding that her daughters had been whipped on Thursday.

'They are now saying that breasts should be firm naturally, or just flat.'

Officials of Al Shabaab, which Washington says is Al Qaeda's proxy in the failed Horn of Africa state, declined to comment.

The group's hardline interpretation of Islamic law has shocked many Somalis, who are traditionally moderate Muslims. Some residents, however, give the insurgents credit for restoring order to the regions under their control.

Al Shabaab, which means 'youth' in Arabic, control large swathes of south and central Somalia.

Abdullahi Hussein, a student in north Mogadishu, said his elder brother was thrown behind bars when he fought back a man who humiliated their sister by asking her to remove her bra.

'My brother was jailed after he wrestled with a man that had beaten my sister and forced her to remove her bra. He could not stand it,' Hussein said.

Men were not spared the' moral cleansing'. Any man caught without a beard was been publicly whipped.

'I was beaten and my hair was cut off with a pair of scissors in the street,' Hussein said.

'My trouser was also cut up to the knee. They accused me of shaving my beard but I am only 18.

'They have arrested dozens of men and women. You just find yourself being whipped by a masked man as soon as leave your house.'

source


And I thought the evidence of sexual repression in religious extremists couldn't get any more obvious...

[Sidewinder]

Islamists... making women... shake their boobs like a not-yet-topless dancer in Vegas. If that doesn't scream, "HYPOCRITE!!!" I don't know what will.

[wautd]

They have also banned movies, musical ringtones, dancing at wedding ceremonies and playing or watching soccer.

What is it with fundies and their hate of anything fun?

[The Spartan]

Because it takes away time you should spend worshiping, studying the holy book, et al.

[Darth Wong]

They have also banned movies, musical ringtones, dancing at wedding ceremonies and playing or watching soccer.

What is it with fundies and their hate of anything fun?

Seriously? Much of Judeo-Christo-Islamic religion is based on self-denial. The idea seems to be that worldly pleasures distract a person from his worship of God.

Proverbs 21:17: "He who loves pleasure will become poor; whoever loves wine and oil will never be rich."

Ecclesiastes 2 is titled "Pleasures are Meaningless" in the NIV. If you read the whole chapter you'll see why.

Ecclesiastes 7:4: "The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of pleasure."

1 Timothy 5:5-6: "The widow who is really in need and left all alone puts her hope in God and continues night and day to pray and to ask God for help. But the widow who lives for pleasure is dead even while she lives."

2 Timothy 3:1-7: "But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— 5having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them. They are the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over weak-willed women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires, always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth."

2 Peter 2:12-19: "But these men blaspheme in matters they do not understand. They are like brute beasts, creatures of instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like beasts they too will perish. They will be paid back with harm for the harm they have done. Their idea of pleasure is to carouse in broad daylight. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their pleasures while they feast with you. With eyes full of adultery, they never stop sinning; they seduce the unstable; they are experts in greed—an accursed brood! They have left the straight way and wandered off to follow the way of Balaam son of Beor, who loved the wages of wickedness. But he was rebuked for his wrongdoing by a donkey—a beast without speech—who spoke with a man's voice and restrained the prophet's madness. These men are springs without water and mists driven by a storm. Blackest darkness is reserved for them. For they mouth empty, boastful words and, by appealing to the lustful desires of sinful human nature, they entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error. They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of depravity—for a man is a slave to whatever has mastered him."

The last two quotes pretty much summarize the Puritanical mindset. In general, these types of religion despise worldly pleasures as either a weakness or an outright evil. Is it any wonder their followers often do the same?

[Tanasinn]

What is it with fundies and their hate of anything fun?

My two cents?

I'm of the opinion that fundies understand that anything enjoyable is a distraction from grovelling worship of whatever invisible man they happen to grovel before. What better way to ensure slavish obedience than to make these alternative forms of gratification forbidden, to give people guilt complexes about the most basic diversions? You see it in the U.S. whenever something catches the imagination of the youth. Rock and roll was the devil. Dungeons and Dragons was the devil. Pokemon was the devil. It comes off as me as nothing more than a blatant attempt to give people nothing to turn to besides god. It's about control.