Two things: 1) I’m not sure where to put this. I actually want an answer to this question, but I can smell a debate in the air. 2) Sorry if this has been brought up, but I couldn’t find it through a search, and am not going to spend 35 minutes using this chickenshit search function to be certain.
So… Fox News has been vigorously covering this story about a teenage Ohio girl who converted to Christianity from Islam, then fled to Florida (Really? Why Florida) for fear of being the victim of an “honor killing.” I’ve never really paid much attention to the story, and initially dismissed it with a, “Oh joy, they’re doing another Muslims Kill Christians” story. Link.
But then this little sentence jumped out at me: “If I had stayed in Ohio, I wouldn’t be alive,” she said. “In 150 generations in family, no one has known Jesus. I am the first — imagine the honor in killing me.”
Wait – what? Imagine? So is this story based entirely on conjecture? Apparently, this all came from blogs she wrote, describing how she feared for her life. So then I thought, Wait a minute. Are her parents actually going to kill her, or is this just fear dreamt up by the Christians who converted her? Has the family ever said anything about killing her? Have they ever expressed disapproval of her new religion? The only thing I’ve been able to get that even resembles a statement from the family is this: “I love my daughter and I want her to come back to the family,” he said, declining further comment.
No one seems to be covering this except Fox and some Christian news places. Google isn’t helping, and I’ve never seen it brought up on any other channel. Does anyone else know this story? Is this girl’s fear based on anything her family actually said or done?
I don’t know why you would be so incredulous. There are honor killings in Islam all the time and the Koran prescribes death to apostates. I mean there are multiple news items a day on this topic worldwide.
Obviously the Father is not going to tell the news that he wants to kill his daughter. And maybe he isn’t going to kill her. But she is afraid, and rightly so, because it’s common amongst her religion. Apostasy is the worst crime there is in Islam as I understand it. That doesn’t mean that he WILL kill her, but she might believe it.
Well there are all kinds of crimes committed by all kinds of religious nuts. Is there any evidence that this particular family is interested in killing this particular girl?
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard the term “honor killing,” and this actually reminds me of a similiar story that happened here in the US recently involving a teenage girl. The one I’m thinking of, though, involved actual threats from the girl’s father. All I’m getting from this coverage is the girl afraid, and not much else.
It’s really difficult for me to believe that a Muslim lenient enough to allow his daughter to be a cheerleader would be dogmatic enough to kill her for converting.
Should have waited a year to get that Jesus in your heart, Rifqa.
Wait just a damn minute… these evangelical Christians in Florida harbored a runaway minor for three weeks before letting authorities know where she was? They better damn well be facing some charges.
It’s not nuts, religious or otherwise. While this kind of thing is endorsed in the Qur’an, it’s actually taken directly from the more barbaric tribal practices of the Bedoins and Arabs (IIRC, it was common throughout Central Asia, and still is). They may get a nice clean feeling, but it was going on long before Islam. And I am a man with no love for Islam.
Of course we don’t really know what might happen, and whether the threat is real or not. But I have to say, I get more of the “religious nut” vibe from the Florida Christians than I get from her parents.
Just because honor killings happen “all the time” doesn’t mean it’s a given that it was going to happen here. It’d be like assuming Japanese parents would use karate on their kid for not liking sushi.
Sounds like bullshit to me. We have no evidence other than the word of the girl that her parents want to kill her, and she’s obviously under the influence of her church. This kid has essentially been kidnapped by a cult. This Lorenz couple sounds like a couple of zealots making their assumptions based on their twisted assumptions about Muslims rather than any actual threats. I think they want this kid as a trophy, and the whole death threat contrivance is just a way to get publicity. Pretty disgusting that these kinds of Christians feel the need to browbeat other people’s kids into converting to their religion at all. Does Jesus really want people to divide and destroy families like that?
The husband probably just wants to molest the kid.
Well just like it in that it’s not like it at all. I can come up with stories all day of honor killings in Islam. Can you come up with a single story of a Japanese parent using karate on their kid for not liking sushi?
Her parents have said unequivocally that this is ridiculous. Their children are Westernized. This girl was even a cheerleader. It is more suspicious to me, anyway, that she was in contact with the minister’s wife in Florida before she ran away, and that they kept her there in secret for three weeks. Isn’t there a legal term for that? “Custodial interference” or something? (I’m hot for these wacko Christians to face some charges.)
Honor killings don’t happen “all the time” in the United States, is a very important distinction to make here.
Just using the same logic they’re using. I can show examples of Christians sexually abusing kids all day, therefore these Christians will certainly sexually abuse this kid.
I suspect you could come up with stories all day of honor killings in particular tribal areas. Ignorance and hatred done in the name of religion. We have a crapton of it here in our own country as well.
Ok, for a better example, it would be like a girl being afraid her christian parents would hang, burn, stone, or crush her under boulders for converting to wicca.