Welcome to Ahmadiyyat, The True Islam — Page 444
− true teachings of Islam in many parts of the Muslim world and the − negative role of the Western media. It has become a rule with the Western media to associate the ugliness of behavior, wherever it occurs with Islam, − and to refrain from associating Jewish, Christian, Buddhist or Hindu behavior to their respective religions. The Islamic injunction of segregation is certainly not born out of a − narrow-minded attitude of the past dark ages. In fact, the question of promiscuousness or otherwise in a society, has no relationship whatsoever to the advancement or backwardness of time. Societies throughout history have either ridden along the crest or descended to the troughs of social or religious waves. The concept of women's liberation is not at all a progressive trend of human society. There is strong evidence that both in the remote past, as well as in the closer period of human history, women as a class have held a very powerful and dominant position in human society in different parts of the world. Free and uninhibited intercourse between the male and female section of the society is nothing new and novel. Civilizations came and went. Behavior patterns kept oscillating between one style and another. The myriads of social tendencies have been falling and settling down into different patterns, only to go through new experimentation and formation at each twist of the kaleidoscope. Yet, no trend has ever been fixed by which we could conclude with certainty that throughout history, society traveled from segregation to promiscuity or from confinement to comparative emancipation and liberation of women. . . . . . . Before Islam, in Arabia, women were treated as chattels and − were deprived the right to oppose their husbands, fathers or other members of the family. However, there were exceptions to the rule. Occasionally, a woman of outstanding leadership quality would play a significant role in the affairs of the tribe. Islam changed all that, not as a natural progressive outcome of − social tensions but as an arbiter of values. A social system was dictated from on high which was unrelated to the normal forces which shape a society. 444