No responses? I'm surprised, I didn't think it was a bad question.
One thing is, technically it's not really supposed to work like that. As a purple area, it's for the use of members of the area only. It's not a blue area where others are allowed to ask questions. So you might not be getting answers because really this area isn't meant for this purpose.
I have a question and I hope it doesn't offend anyone. If so please delete the thread.
I was reading about Assad in Syria and how under him women had a lot of rights compared to his theocratic neighbors. In most middle eastern dictatorships, from the Shah of Iran to Saddam Hussein and Hosni Mubarak, the rights of women were much greater than in any theocracy which has come to replace those nations.
From a feminist perspective, which is more right, to support a dictator who promotes women's rights and equalities or a theocracy which the people have chosen but suppresses women?
So feminists should support dictators who promote women's rights rather than theocracies which are more egalitarian (in terms of wealth distribution, etc) but suppress women?
I think the answer here is what Quintessence said, that people have multifaceted views of the world, rather than only belonging to one group or movement, and all of those facets have to be considered and weighed.
So for example a person can be pro-Democracy, pro-Capitalism, pro-Women's Rights, pro-LGBT, pro-Religious Freedom, and so forth. And yeah, there might be examples where there are conflicts, and one has to choose one over the other. Say one presidential candidate supports women but not LGBT people, while the other one supports LGBT people but not women. Or say one presidential candidate supports women and LGBT and religious freedom, but you differ from their view on fiscal policy, whereas another candidate has a fiscal policy you agree with but their social policy regarding women, LGBT, religion, and whatever else, is way off base. Which do you select?
It would come down to weighing the importance of each one to you. So not all feminists would necessarily have the same views regarding which is preferable; a dictatorship that is kind of okay for women, or theocracy that is worse for women. Both are kind of undesirable for a lot of people, and they may oppose both of them, and have to pick the better of two bad scenarios for now (and really, no individual person gets to "pick" anything). Or they can try to leave if possible, if the options are all bad.
It's a difficult problem all around, that's for sure, and not just regarding women's rights, but many issues. Like in Egypt they overthrew the dictator, and then elected the Muslim Brotherhood, but then they didn't like that either. Theocracy stepped into fill the void when the dictator was gone, and that's a trend that is happening with a lot of the countries in the area: once a dictator is weakened or kicked out, Islamists tend to gain power and influence.
