>>there sure are lots and lots of things I can't understand <<
>>about the 'non-western' world. Some simple examples:
>- female circumcision;
>- arranged marriages;
>- bondage of children for family debt;
>- multiple wives;
>- dowries;
>- fetus sex determination for the purpose of aborting female fetuses;
>- killing female infants;
>- letting cows wander the streets;
>- beggars with bosses;
>- "banking" in Muslim countries;
>- the power of Imams in controlling the people;
>- elections with 1 person on the ballot;
>- child labour;
>- common 'property' (i.e. not owned by someone);
>- legally killing females who 'dishonour' the family;
>... and there are tons more.
I would certainly agree you don't understand them <g>. It is quite a laundry list - lumping infanticide, 'honor killing' and clitorectomy with halal banking and cows in the street <s>
( I thought that last problem was an issue in Saskatchewan ... ;-)
Of course, I agree with your basic thrust and I don't think there is anything wrong with a strong cultural bias.
One of my favorite stories of the Raj is when Napier outlawed suttee ( widows being thrown on the funeral pyre ) and was told by the local nabobs that this was a sacred custom. He replied, "In my country we also have a custom - when men burn women we hang them. Let us each follow our customs."
Charles Hankey
Though a good deal is too strange to be believed, nothing is too strange to have happened.
- Thomas Hardy
Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm-- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.
-- T. S. Eliot
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.
- Ben Franklin
Pardon him, Theodotus. He is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.
