Worst Countries: One of these Things Is Not Like the Other

The Toronto Star’s current edition includes a Top 10 Worst Countries To Be A Woman list today. Aside from the usual left-wing editorializing that the Star is proud to display in every story they publish,

Measures of well-being include life expectancy, education, purchasing power and standard of living. Not surprisingly, the top 10 [best countries for women] are among the world’s wealthiest.

(emphasis added)

The report, made by a New York-based group called “Equality Now”, also showcased a blaring absence of the United States in the Top 10, making the whole comment about wealth questionable at best.

The most stunning and obvious factor that the paper made no mention of was a commonality that all but three of the 10 worst countries had:

Afghanistan (Muslim)
Democratic Republic of Congo (Socialist)
Iraq (Muslim)
Nepal (Hindu)
Sudan (Muslim)
Guatemala (Catholic)
Mali (Muslim)
Pakistan (Muslim)
Saudi Arabia (Muslim — on steroids!)
Somalia (Muslim)

To quote Mark Steyn, there seems to be a trend here: “it starts with ‘I’, and ends with ’slam’”!

This entry was written by Matthew and posted on Sat Mar 8, 2008 at 10:03 am and filed under Citizenship & Immigration, Culture, Foreign Policy & Military, Media & Communication, Religion & Ethics. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.

Comments (6) to “Worst Countries: One of these Things Is Not Like the Other”

  1. Stan wrote:

    Check out bride kidnapping in Central Asia. Shouldn’t the feminists be marching about that?
    BBC and PBS did a whitewash documentary on it, in one scene they asked a woman who had been kidnapped and forced into marriage how she liked it. Her husband was standing beside her when she answered.
    What did they think she was going to say?
    Wife beating is socially acceptable there.
    Did the think she would dare critisize it or express unhappiness?

    Posted on 08-Mar-08 at 12:58 pm | Permalink

  2. Mé wrote:

    What? No comments about Guat-islam-a?

    Posted on 08-Mar-08 at 1:14 pm | Permalink

  3. Bo wrote:

    If we’re listing countries by religion, Congo should read (Catholic) not (Socialist) - that’s the system of government. But that wouldn’t help prove the point, would it?

    The other question is: what correlates more strongly with poor conditions for women - religion, or economic underdevelopment/inequality?

    Posted on 08-Mar-08 at 3:24 pm | Permalink

  4. Enkidu wrote:

    It wouldn’t change the (im)balance of the list is the least to shift Congo from Socialist to Catholic. 7 of the 10 worst countries in which to be a woman would still be Mohammedan.

    Posted on 08-Mar-08 at 4:56 pm | Permalink

  5. Dmorris wrote:

    I’m truly shocked the USA isn’t on that list!

    Posted on 08-Mar-08 at 6:29 pm | Permalink

  6. Bo wrote:

    It’s true the majority are Muslim countries - the question is whether that statistical correlation implies that religion is the reason. You could also break these down in other ways: most of the countries are deserts with shortage of water and as a result have serious rural poverty and social unrest; most of them have poor literacy… but again, none of those things would prove the desired point, so they’re not mentioned.

    It’s very true that Muslim countries, on average, are difficult places to be women. The question is whether the religion is the reason - and whether it’s important WHICH religion it is. Women’s rights in the West have improved a lot in the past couple of hundred years, which coincides with the shrinking of Christianity as a guiding institution of political life. Maybe the problem is not (Muslim) but (Religious)…

    Posted on 08-Mar-08 at 8:16 pm | Permalink

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