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Divorce, Arabian Style: Text Message Divorces Worry Arab Women
July 29, 2008 4:25 PM
By Lara Setrakian, ABC News Digital Reporter, Dubai
In some parts of the Arab world divorce can come at the push of a button.
In today’s Gulf Daily News: A women’s group in Bahrain is pushing for laws against the practice of divorce by text message.
Under Islamic law men can initiate a divorce simply by saying out loud “I divorce you,” or something to that effect. In today’s high-tech Muslim world, men from Egypt to Malaysia are opting to deliver the message to a cell phone inbox.
According to Adel Al Mo'awda, a government official quoted in the Bahraini paper, some judges accept text message divorces as legitimate.
“Some [Islamic law] judges will say you can't write the divorce unless you can't speak, but others say you can write it, so it depends on the judge," Al 0Mo'awda said.
Women can initiate a divorce in court through a longer, more complicated process.
Arab women increasingly choose to do so as more of them join the workforce, achieve financial independence, and have less tolerance for an unhappy or abusive marriage. A 2005 study in Sharjah, one of the seven United Arab Emirates, found that 90% of divorces there were initiated by women.
"Unfortunately, many couples are impatient and fail to understand each other….I think a luxury life coupled with the lack of spousal awareness are increasingly becoming a curse,” Umaima Al A'ani, who led the study, told a paper at the time.
Clerics and community leaders have roundly denounced the trend and what they see as the related social upheaval. Saudi Arabia, the most conservative of Muslim countries, sees an estimated 66 divorces per day. By way of percentages, The Associated Press cited one expert’s estimates that at least 30 percent of first marriages in Saudi Arabia end in divorce – not too far from the United States' 33 percent.
July 29, 2008 in Lara Setrakian | Permalink | User Comments (5)
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I believe those guys over there are on to something. My best advice would be not to marry in the first place, they are hardly worth the time, effort, or money. It's all about money and property to these women, no doubt about it. Looks like the guys don't care one way or the other and reveals who is in charge over there; happily, it ain't the women.
Posted by: therockofages | Jul 29, 2008 8:37:21 PM
That is terrible that there is such little respect for women in much of the Arab world. Articles like this must be embarrassing for modernized Muslims worldwide. When Muslim extremists say that they are fighting to keep their way of life, are they killing random people in the name of preserving THESE types of values?
Posted by: o | Jul 29, 2008 8:55:07 PM
Best thing for women over there to hear - "I divorce you". Women are so controlled by Islamic society and the Mideast in general. Islamic men are extremely paranoid, pseudo-pious men. If I were a woman, I'd wanna be single
Posted by: Bob | Jul 30, 2008 8:44:50 AM
In a part of the world where life in general seems to be of little value it's not surprising that the personal lives & relationships of their citizens seem to be so bad too. Everything we hear seems to point in the direction of life in the Middle East being nothing but a hardship. I don't know how anyone could be optimistic enough to marry and have children when there seems to be no hope for a better future for those children.
Posted by: rigatoni28 | Jul 30, 2008 9:05:23 AM
When you travel the world enough you realize there are many ways to see reality. There is not one religion which only has lovely people in it.
One need not look further than this very posting board to see disrespect of women.
Ignorance is ignorance.
Posted by: Karen | Jul 30, 2008 10:38:27 PM
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