Women are mistreated in Islam

Hmm, your arguments are sound and I don't think I have much to rebut. However, here is how I see this debate right now. You have gone to great lengths in providing evidences of how women are uplifted especially when you consider the degradation women used to endure before the Quran was revealed, so much so that the status of women are at par with men. The only way I see I can counter this is either: a) Arguing that the rules set for women in Islam is unsuitable for this day and age; b) Arguing that the Quran was not really sent down by God and therefore written by people who have limited knowledge of what rulings to set Sadly, I feel that I will not be doing this. Even if I did, this debate will never end and it will go on and on because I do think there is a limitation to what we think is "right" and "wrong". The definitions of morality and of what should and should not be is a wide spectrum and I will not be going down this road. Anyway, I have said that I will take the stand that the Quran really IS the word of God and therefore, all teachings inside are for the good of humanity even if we cannot see those benefits yet. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ The thing is the title of this debate is "Women are MISTREATED in Islam". It is not "Women are equal to men in Islam" or "Women are uplifted in Islam" or "Women have more dignity in Islam as opposed to other religions". If these were the titles of this debate then you have probably already won. CASE CLOSED. The thing is when the word "mistreated" is used it signifies that there is a certain benchmark that has to be achieved. Clearly, I have defined the topic as to mean that women in the ISLAMIC WORLD are not treated to that level of dignity as prescribed in the HOLY TEXT. And here is where I think the problem is. You are arguing on the wisdom of the Holy Text but that is not what I am arguing about. To me, you absolutely have to look at the condition of the women in Muslim countries. If you just argue only about the wisdom of the rulings for women in the Quran, then how in the world are you going to compare that with anything? Go back to the word "mistreated". Against what benchmark do you judge women to be mistreated? If you ignore the situation in Muslim countries and only look at what the Quran prescribes, then I think that there is no benchmark for you to say whether they are mistreated or not. When the Quran was revealed, people could see that it's teachings were beautiful because the condition of their women did not yet achieve the standards prescribed in the Holy Book and using some judgement they could see how beautiful those teachings were. Only then were they able to say "oh, women in our society have been MISTREATED all this while." You need to have that benchmark to compare against. You also made a factual error when you said Iran protesters protested in front of the embassy. They did not just protest. They crashed into the place and lighted it up. I hope you are not selectively describing things because that seems to be another problem among religions. Selectively interpreting what they want to interpret to benefit themselves. I am sorry if I am being extremely inadequate in my arguments. I think you expected this to be a very high-level theology debate with arguments about morality and so on.