No Concept of Rights

Pascal Fletcher:

Herding camels or goats out in the sun-blasted dunes of the Sahara, or serving hot mint tea to guests in the richly carpeted villas of Nouakchott, Mauritanian slaves serve their masters and are passed on as family chattels from generation to generation.

They may number thousands, anti-slavery activists say. A shocking anomaly in the 21st century, this is widely accepted in a racially diverse, hierarchical society dominated by a Moorish elite and a brand of Islam that preaches submission.

Read what Patrick has to say about this "brand of Islam".

Back to the article:

[...] a 1981 decree outlawing slavery is a dead letter and slavery is alive in Mauritania, with all its manifestations of non-paid work, punishment, forced sex and other abuses.

Earlier this decade, Arabs were still buying children from Pakistan and bringing them to the Middle East for camel racing. Those kids were purposefully underfed; less burden for the camels. For the sake of "image", the practice was banned.

"Yes, it's true," said Abdarahman Ould Mohamed Abd, 52, a street vendor sitting outside his ramshackle hut. "In the interior of the country, it's the worst. You see it in the way some people treat others. Sometimes, they (the masters) have even killed children," he added.

His own surname means "son of Mohamed Slave" as "Abd" is the Arabic word for slave.

Comments

[Garduneh Mehr]

I too am a fan of Patrick O'Brein's Clarity & Resolve :-)

[Josh Scholar]

"It's like having sheep or goats. If a woman is a slave, her descendants are slaves," said Boubacar Messaoud, who was born a slave and is now his country's leading anti-slavery campaigner.

Amad left the "slaves for eternity" thing out of his recent praise for slavery post. I guess it got in the way of claiming that slavery was morally superior to western justice and war practices.

[Isaac Schrödinger]

Many Muslims don't let small things like facts get in the way of their arguments.