The Religion Virus: somalia

I could not have picked a more horrifying, tragic example to prove the point of my last three blogs (part 1, part 2, conclusion). WARNING: The details that follow are very disturbing.

Aisha, a 13 year old girl in Somalia, reported being raped to the Shabab Milita (sometimes called the "Somali Taliban") who control her town. Instead of receiving their sympathy and support, the girl was convicted of having sex outside of marriage, and sentenced to death by stoning.

Thousands of people crowded into the local stadium to witness the execution. A hole was dug in the ground, and the girl was buried up to her neck. Then about fifty men started stoning her, throwing rocks at her head, to kill her. After a while, she was dug up, and nurses were called in to verify that she was dead. When they discovered that she was not, the girl was buried again, and the stoning continued.

At some point, it was too much for the crowd, and they stormed down from the stadium bleachers to try to stop the horrifying execution. The military opened fire on the mob, and a young boy was killed by their gunfire. The 50 men finally completed their task; the young girl was dead.

As for the three rapists, they have nothing to fear. No arrests have been made, and apparently there is no expectation that they ever will be brought to justice.

Violence is part of our genetic makeup, our animal heritage, but as my three-part blog series tries to show, we have the ability to be ethically advanced. As rational, thinking beings, we can recognize the good parts of our instincts, such as love, marriage, children, and family. We can also recognize that some instincts, such as violence, murder and war, are no longer useful nor moral, and we can leave these things behind us in history.

But as long as outdated and immoral religious laws are followed and revered, young girls like the poor, dead Somoli, just barely a teenager, will face the horrors of rape, only to be murdered when they seek help.

Those of you, Christians, Jews, or Muslims, who think you are exempt, and try to say, "That's not MY religion," need to go back and reread your holy books. It IS your religion. YOU are the problem, because YOU don't see that your holy writings are nothing more than outdated stories, that should have been left behind long ago.