Honor Killings: Miscellaneous Notes

I should probably add some thoughts to my previous post about honor killings. I should warn you however that this post will not have the moral clarity of the previous one; instead it will be a somewhat wishy-washy post.

I wanted to post something about this topic immediately after Joe Katzman brought it to my attention. However, I wanted to highlight some of the work local organizations have done for women’s rights in Pakistan. That proved a somewhat difficult task since most of the information related to that is not available online. Here are a couple of links to organizations:

Edhi Foundation
Human Rights Commission of Pakistan

The two most famous names in this field are Asma Jehangir and Abdul Sattar Edhi.

So is honor killing in any way related to Islam? Yes and no. It depends on what you mean by that question. If you mean that is it a practice in predominantly Muslim countries, then the answer is yes. If you mean that the perpetrators of these crimes look to Islam and Quran for justification, then the answer is somewhat muddled. The major justification is not Islam but tradition, as evidenced by the support of the Awami National Party (which is secular). However, Islam is in a way part of the traditions in Pakistan. Also, those conservative Pakistanis who won’t even dream of honor killing themselves do find the alleged conduct of those women and the NGOs (nongovernmental organizations) who support them to be abhorent to Islam. This group is much larger than those who do kill women for “honor.” That is why I am of two minds about this. People (for example, Aziz; I can’t find a specific post, read his whole blog, it is good) say this is tribalism and not Islam. And they are correct that it is a cultural thing more than a religious one. However, slavery, apartheid, Jim Crow etc. were also basically cultural issues but there were a lot of people who used religion for advocating racial superiority. And in the end, the boundary between culture and religion is fuzzy.

Are honor killing and violence against women only limited to Muslim countries? Absolutely not. (If you doubt me, go do your own research.)

At the same time as condemning and punishing (through the law) those who committ such henious acts, we must change the whole idea of human rights and women’s rights in these countries. The problem is deeper than a few hundred women killed. In some ways, it pervades the culture. For example, take a look at sex selection (via abortion) in India and China.

By Zack

Dad, gadget guy, bookworm, political animal, global nomad, cyclist, hiker, tennis player, photographer

4 comments

  1. well-it seems that many of the “honor killing” cultures were patriarchal to start out with. but when they made the transition from pagan to monotheist, they froze a variety of their social norms and mores, and imbued them with religious significance (right, or wrongly). i also thing that the clear and systematic nature of sharia tends to allow the indigenous patriarchy to leverage itself well beyond its natural state.

    historically for instance, muhammed and islam helped abolish infanticide and codified the rights of women in the arabian peninsula. great. but how many powerful women like khadija or the female poets of pagan arab tradition do you have after islam? sometimes the world is zero-sum-in creating a floor to human barbarity, islam also fixed the ceiling for female achievment.

  2. Culture and Real Islam

    What is to blame? Islam or culture? Can they even be separated? Islam is what is practiced by Muslims and this varies by time, place and context.

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