Via New Humanist Blog, The Jewel of Medina, a romance novel about Mohammad and Aisha that’s got Muslim pedophiles all up in arms because they’re afraid it might condemn them for keeping nine-year-old girls as sex slaves, has been released in the US. I had basically zero interest in this book until I read Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s review of it:

Ms Jones does not condemn Mohammed for having sex with Aisha at the age of nine. The sex scene is not described graphically and its conclusion for Aisha is described by Ms Jones as something Aisha always wanted.

Now I want to read this book because I’ve got to find out how Ms. Jones manages to portray being raped by a man old enough to be her grandfather as something a nine-year-old girl “always wanted”. When I was nine years old, I wanted a puppy. Maybe I’d just been corrupted by Western society or something.

LA Times: Yemeni 10-year-old divorcee Nujood Ali goes back to school

Like children across the world, 10-year-old Nujood Ali went back to school this month after a lengthy break. But Nujood hadn’t been lazing about or playing hide-and-seek with her friends during the summer.

Instead, after she was pulled out of the second grade by her father earlier this year, she was married off to a man three times her age, who beat her and sexually abused her.

For many girls in this traditional society, where tribal custom and conservative interpretations of Islam dominate, that would have been the end of the story. But Nujood was outraged. She gathered up her courage and on the advice of an aunt went to court in April. She got the help of a lawyer and filed for divorce.

A judge quickly granted it.

And on Tuesday morning, the divorcee, possibly the world’s youngest, once again became a schoolgirl.

The story says that some schools rejected Nujood as a student because they were afraid she would tell the other students about her experience in a traditional Islamic marriage with a man three times her age, just like the one little Aisha had with the Prophet Mohammed. Gee, I wonder why they would have a problem with that? I mean, that would mean there’s something wrong with having sex with nine-year-old girls. But everyone knows that’s perfectly okay, right? The Koran says so and everything!

I’m so confused…

(Yes, yes, I know. But I couldn’t resist the snark.)