Divorce is painful for everyone involved, especially for the person being asked for a divorce. No-one likes personal confrontation, but with all the new technology we have at the tip of our fingers, people are turning more and more towards social networking sites, texting and email for their dirty work. Rather than doing the right thing and discussing, face to face, the reasons why they want to end a marriage or relationship, or even trying to work things through, people are taking the easy way out.

I had a friend whose boyfriend sent her an email breaking off their relationship. And now, there’s a case of a 39-year-old British man, Neil Brady, who announced his divorce on his Facebook page. His wife, Emma, apparently had no clue, until a friend of hers in Denmark noticed he had changed his status on the social networking site Facebook. How cold and impersonal is that?!

Although Brady’s Facebook divorce, was the fist ever, text messaging from cell phones is quite a common practice, apparently. As I was researching for this post, I came across a few articles stating Britney Spears supposedly sent a text message to her then-husband Kevin Federline asking for a divorce.

But what really surprised me was how prevalent it was in Asian and Middle Eastern countries. Apparently, Shariah lawyers in Malaysia have weighed in on the matter and say it’s okay for Muslims to divorce their husbands or wives on Facebook or any other social networking site, or via SMS.

“Syariah lawyer Muhamad Burok said it does not matter how the declaration of divorce is made as long as it is communicated to the spouse.

“A declaration of divorce among Muslims that follows the hukum syarak is a communication between parties, in this case between a husband and his wife.

“This includes putting down words in writing and sending it to the spouse. It does not matter what medium was used; be it email or SMS; as long as it’s later verified in the (Syariah) court.”

It’s also condoned, and becoming more common, in Egypt, Qatar, UAE , Dubai, but banned in Singapore. I was actually surprised to see that some of the articles I read date back quite a few years. Perhaps some of them have changed their policy on it, but obviously not Malaysia. However, Ozalina Othaman, a female member of the Malay ruling party, condemned the ruling, claiming it trivializes divorce. According to Islamic law, a husband can divorce his wife by saying “I divorce you” 3 times, and text messaging is making it so much easier.

No matter where you live, though, it’s a cop out to not have the courage to tell someone, in person, that you want a divorce.