1. Sharia Law is not even implemented except in two countries, KSA and Iran. By law, a woman is not required to cover up, but the rest is society's imposed 'rules'.
2. No. Women, even in Iran, don't need a male to accompany them, despite whatever is the religious POV.
This is a classic example of Western failure to understand Middle-Eastern regions.
The "nation" is not really a legal institution. Only in the most industrially developed nations do they have any real authority. Generally, most of the laws governing individual behavior and standards are maintained by tribes and their claimed districts.
To parallel with U.S. governmental structure, in most of those nations, the 'nation' is one of our states with the equivalent of the Continental Congress presiding over the counties within the state that are self-sufficient governing entities with almost no restrictions in the laws they can establish in their 'county.'
The question isn't: "Is there a law...?"
The question is: "Will the locals kill me for this?"
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As for the thread in general;
Equality is vague. It's equal opportunities that should be granted to both, and the rest depends on the individual's effort.
I do agree though there is a form of bias towards women sometimes, like the example of a breakup gone bad and suddenly there's accusations of rape while the guy is completely innocent.
On the other hand, many people have rape, sexual abuse and other derogatory jokes that are too tolerated, which reduces women's issues into laughing material, and Feminism comes to highlight it.
It's about the same as the various race cards that people like to pull - though *** has a more universal appeal.
I've seen more than a few cases where a girl will invite her co-workers and superiors into compromising situations to 'inspire' them to make her job easier (usually by doing something for her). In some cases - she gives a considerable amount of 'service' to these people. In others - she merely makes them think they are close to getting said services.
Then, if any of them wise-up, and start distancing themselves and refusing to do favors - she calls in sexual harassment, rape, whatever she can think of. All she has to say is that: "He said that he needed .... additional reason... to consider my promotions" - and she's being thrown all kinds of money to keep from pressing charges by Corporate.
That said - there are guys who legitimately use their position to extort such things from females in their employ.
There will never be a 'solution' for it. So long as a girl can turn to give a guy just the view she knows he finds appealing - she'll be able to twist -someone- around her thumb. Not all guys will go for it - but enough will. Similarly, so long as anyone holds positional authority - he/she can use that position to pressure someone he/she finds attractive into actions to receive a promotion (even if unintentionally ... a supervisor finds he really likes one of his temporary workers and asks her on a date; she is seeking a permanent employment contract, and decides to take him up on the date because she doesn't want to damage her chances of being considered). And girls aren't exactly the only ones who get favors done for them. Attractive guys are more likely to be hired by the predominantly female hiring managers. Performance evaluations are less likely to be harsh to any member of the opposite *** generally considered to be attractive.
There is one 'solution' I've always wondered about, however. Originally, I considered it more for military purposes - but it might apply to other segments, as well. Rather than having a man or woman as your indivisible unit - it would be a male-female pair. Now - the original concept would be that you would be training special operatives from a young age in a group setting, then in their mid teenage years, allow them to naturally pair off through a series of challenges and make those pairings a permanent indivisible unit for the sake of deployments. Each pair would receive a single evaluation comprised by other pairs.
Though you would have to impose heavy selective controls on your starting populations. Infidelity is common among humans because of partnerships being considerably non-ideal (both in emotional satisfaction and in physical attraction). This system would only work if each pair was very content with their partnership - else the politics and griefs of infidelity would rip the system apart.
Might work in the future as an experimental society with strong 'warrior society' overtones.
