The Daily Caller posted a story today about Middle School students in a southern Indiana school who were taught that living under Sharia Law is wonderful.
The article reports:
The assignment provides a reading passage ostensibly written by a 20-year-old woman named Ahlima who resides in Saudi Arabia.
Ahlima says she feels “very fortunate” to be governed by Sharia law — the notorious Islamic penal code which, in countries such as Saudi Arabia, includes the practice of cutting off the hands of criminals who steal. She observes that she is about to become some guy’s second wife. She supports the repressive clothes women in Saudi Arabia must wear. “I understand that some foreigners see our dress as a way of keeping women from being equal,” Ahlima writes. “I find Western women’s clothing to be horribly immodest.”
The article points out that Ahlima is an imaginary character invented by Sharon Coletti, the president of InspirEd Educators, and based on someone Ms. Coletti saw interviewed on a television program.
The article states:
Coletti, the creator of the assignment, defended her work.
“If I can shape something so that kids have to decide for themselves, once I get them involved in the situation, they never forget it,” the former social studies teacher told The Courier-Journal.
Coletti, who describes herself as a practicing Christian, also said she hopes her materials help student to become “patriotic” and “problem-solvers.”
However, the fictional story of 20-year-old Ahlima who is becoming a second wife and loves to wear repressive clothing is apparently no longer for this world after the Highland Hills Middle School kerfuffle.
Coletti said she will retire the assignment and related material going forward because she doesn’t want to court bad press.
The same assignment has caused parents to be angry in the past. In 2011, parents in Smyrna, Georgia accused Coletti of “indoctrinating” middle school children with the Sharia lesson.
Where are the feminists when you need them?
We need to teach our Middle Schoolers that all cultures and legal systems are not equal. We need to stop apologizing for western civilization. Western civilization is not perfect, but it provides more freedom and opportunity for all people, including women, than Sharia Law. According to Sharia Law, a man can have more than one wife. All a man has to do to divorce his wife by declaring “I divorce you.” She has no say in the matter. The testimony of a woman in court is worth less than the testimony of a man in court under Sharia. Under Sharia Law, the murder of infidels or taking them as sex slaves is allowed. Under Sharia Law, pedophilia is acceptable. There is no religious freedom under Sharia Law. Under Sharia Law, allegiance is to Islam–not to a country or the set of laws of that country. That is why Sharia Law and the U.S. Constitution are incompatible.
Teaching school children that Sharia Law is a good thing is teaching them that women have no value. Is that really the lesson we want to teach our young women?