Alina wrote:However, I feel the need to correct Paul. When you say the traditional Turkish harem was a place of the household forbidden to male strangers, you're kind of wrong. The tradition of the harem comes from the Arabs, and from Islam. The Turks were not originally Islamic. Therefore, traditionally, Turkic peoples had no Harems. Furthermore, women in traditional nomadic societies, including Turkic ones, had considerably more freedom than most other pre-20th century women. Though, of course, there was a load of sexism too. One of the traditional Turkish practices was to feed guests, give them something to drink, give them a place to stay, and give them a woman to have sex with of the guest's own choosing. So, if you take the word harem, in the original meaning - it means forbidden. But, it also means sacred. So, if you choose it to mean something sacred, then certainly hospitality qualifies as sacred. As such, giving women to male guests for sexual purposes is hospitable, and by extension, also sacred. So a traditional Turkish harem involves pimping out your close female associates to strange men who come and visit your tent.
Thanks. I knew something was wrong with those bloody Turks.
admin wrote:Bah, the British settled the matter.
Ehm, not really I think...
admin wrote:What a shame we don't still have the ancient religions in Europe and the Middle East. The religions of the Book really screwed things up, nah?
I agree it's somewhat a pity that we can't hang the corpes of our enemies on trees anymore, but the Middle Eastern polytheistic religions were beyond perverted.
The Dutch now have a better navy than us. - an unnamed senior officer in the Royal (UK) Navy, January 2007
