With respect, Mr. President, I ask you, as the son of a single mother who is now regarded the world's most powerful man, to be more aware of the
suffering of women around the world. I refer especially to the suffering imposed upon women by Islamic leaders under a belief system
associated with your father's. If you are already aware of this suffering, it behooves you as
a self-made man of strong positive self-regard to act in a way that will move male Islamic national leaders to set aside their unreasonable,
self-limiting predilection to dominate women in their families and nations.
Recently, the women of Tunisia, yet another Islamic country where men have
traditionally held illicit, exploitative and violent power over women, have protested their demand for equality with men throughout the Islamic world
(1). These women are so exposed to shameful treatment that they have been prepared to
display half their naked bodies as objects of the derision they must endure (2).
Yet you continue to maintain friendships with male leaders in the Islamic world who are of a similar
persuasion to those in Tunisia, such as the Prime Minister of
Turkey, Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan, who wants to limit women's rights progressively
(3); and his ally Massoud Barzani of Kurdistan, who does not allow his wife to
be seen in public. In case you do not know, thousands of Kurdish women have been
killed under Barzani's rule (4) and that of his ally, Jalal Talabani. Regrettably, the
US has had varying levels of input into these cruelly dysfunctional and merciless
governments, whose measures have abused the Kurdish population for over twenty
years (5).
The Kurdish women are descendents of Queen Vashti of the Medes
(ancient Kurds), who was one of the first women in the ancient world to stand
up for the principal that women have a God-given equal status and value to men in every society(6).
Recently, Massoud Barzani, who claims to be a Kurd, closed the border
between Iraq and Syria to punish women and children for political events in
Syria (6). Even in the 1961-1975 war, when Iraqi Kurds fled to Iran every time the
Iraqi army attacked Kurdish civilians, the Iranians, whom the Kurds called
their enemies, did not defy human rights and international laws protecting women
and children to the degree Barzani does under the protection of the US and Israel. Not much has changed in Kurdistan
since Queen Vashti was ordered by her husband to demean herself by attending his
drunken party and paid a heavy price for her defiance. Barzani's intoxication
with power is still wreaking havoc on Kurdish women.
Now, after two-and-a-half-thousand years of oppression,
the Kurdish people, including their women fighters, are refusing to tolerate
persecution by Islamic religious leaders any longer. They are arming themselves
to fight both for Kurdish women's rights and the liberation of all the Kurdish people from those who are robbing them of their culture and human rights, including
freedom of conscience under the law and the economic benefits that flow from the natural
resources of their land.
As President of the US, you can put a stop to further bloodshed in the ancestral lands of Queen Vashti. It is a shame that you have
not done more before, especially given the expertise available from women such as Hilary
Clinton in your earlier administration. If Hilary had been as strong on women's
rights in the Middle East as she is on the rights of women in the West, many lives could
have been saved and changed. Your own
wife is a a gracious, intelligent, beautiful woman, who has contributed
mightily to her country because it constitutionally entitles her to the freedom and respect necessary to do so, and which, in any case, she deserves. Clearly, your daughters
are following in her footsteps. However, the only way Kurdish women can achieve freedom and respect now
is with a gun. Such is their desperation that they are prepared to give up
their lives, including opportunities to marry and have a family and to develop their
personal gifts and talents in careers outside the home.
So, Sir, it is now your responsibility to ask other rulers, such as the King of Saudi Arabia and the President of
Kurdistan, with whom the
United States is dealing, why they are treating their
women like second-class citizens. (7) You have the power, as leader of the world's strongest country, to indicate that you
expect better of them.
Sanctions have been imposed by the US before on countries like these. Their leaders need
to be informed that this will happen to them, unless they give their women the
freedom that is their human right. These women too must be allowed to live in a political environment in which they can become the mothers of
peaceful, fulfilled, fear-free children who can grow into nation-building
adults.
The world knows that you
go to a Christian church. Remember that Jesus Christ himself mixed compassionately with women
who had been sexually and economically exploited by the rulers of their day, and
condemned to death. They were women who, in seeking spiritual and emotional rest and safety, had
been marginalized for racial, ethnic, religious and national reasons, and were suffering from sickness, disability, or threats to their children's welfare. Jesus offered all of them healing, hope, and the power to change.
Please follow
the example of the greatest figure in human history and lead the men of the
world to a righteous masculinity by which they would be willing to sacrifice their own lives for their women, instead of robbing them of their dignity and well-being. And lead them too to a fearless reinstatement of women in their divinely bestowed estate of equal honor and opportunity with men.
Queen Vashti and her
descendants await your support.
1.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/02/world/africa/tunisia-rape-protest
2.
http://rt.com/news/tunisia-femen-jail-sentence-593/
4.
http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/articles/misc2013/6/state7150.htm
http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/articles/misc2013/2/state6863.htm
http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/articles/misc2013/2/state6863.htm#Related
Articles
5.
http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/articles/misc2013/6/state7139.htm
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
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