Sharia Courts Established By Law in Britain

john31584 · Zinc Saucier

RE: Sharia Courts Established By Law in Britain

SlashXLA · Senior Member

john31584 wrote:
If you want to be worried and/or outraged at something, your energies will be far better spent on this.

I hesitantly agree with some concepts that are implied in this ruling.

john31584 · Zinc Saucier

Damn wizards.

Andy001 · Spaghetti

john31584 wrote:
Reading the article, it's not quite as bad as I initially thought. It sounds like this is just private arbitration, which happens to apply sharia. If it works in the UK anything like it works in the US, arbitration can't be used in a criminal case, and can only be used if both parties agree to resolve a dispute through arbitration.

Arbitration awards are enforceable under the principles of contract law: the parties agree to submit to arbitration, and abide by its ruling. If one party doesn't obey the ruling, the other party can take him to court, on a breach of contract theory.

Presumably, all of the "safety valves" that operate in contract law to prevent enforcement would also operate here: if the agreement to arbitrate was entered into under fraud, duress, or undue influence, it won't be enforced. Likewise, if the contract is for an illegal purpose, it won't be enforced (presumably if a sharia arbitrator sentences somebody to be stoned to death - which seems unlikely, given the types of cases that are being handled here - a British court won't enforce the judgment).

With all that said, I don't entirely approve of this. I fully support the right to engage in private arbitration, governed by whatever rules the parties agree to. If 2 parties voluntarily agree to have their dispute arbitrated under Sharia law, I support their right to do so. It affects nobody but them. But I'm pretty uncomfortable with a backwards system of law carrying any weight in a civilized nation, even in the roundabout way that arbitration judgments are given legal force, and even among those who "voluntarily" submit to it. Given the power imbalance that exists between men and women in the Muslim world, I'd question whether some of these agreements were voluntarily entered into.

-- Edited by john31584 at 02:16, 2008-09-16

Eye concur.
I'm glad this thread didn't develop into a lot of ill-informed shouting.

Jason · Only in cartoons

The best part of the thread was the Monty Python video.

john31584 · Zinc Saucier

A Monty Python video is the best part of just about any thread with a Monty Python video in it.

DEATHPIGGIE · I'm fat and nobody likes me

I'm just worried about how far private arbitration will lead this people, creating an entire culture of totally deprived women and children. It doesn't seem right to me, at least in a moral sense, that people should be brainwashed into such a society of violence and oppression when they live in a relatively free country.