Mumsnet Talk

Very good article, extremely upsetting though obviously, it's highlighted on teh front page of the Independent and a big special about it inside, apparently they are going to do a series. Good to see something like this on teh front of a daily paper.

here

and one woman's story here

Also anotehr charity for our list - the Jordanian Women's Union.

And reading it, how can people possibly say "there's no need for feminism"? Don't get it.

One of the men, a man who killed his sister, said "She committed a mistake, even if it was against her will". This is echoed around teh world when it comes to rape, isn't it, with greater or lesser consequences depending on where you live, but always the same underlying idea.

ISNT - I just read it

christ: it's relentless isn't it?

Utterly fucking horrific. Of course what is really needed is for reserves of oil/minerals to be discovered in some of these countries, then America and Britain might be happy to agree to invade them in order to stamp out this abuse of women.

Hasn't actually worked so far though has it SGB - all this recent "oh yes btw we're talking to the Taliban, sorry ladies byeeeee" stuff

Elephants - my point, really. The Western governments never gave a fuck about women's lives under the Taliban until they fancied helping themselves to the oil, and now they've got it it's all 'WOmen? What women? Oh well, maybe they need to learn to manage their men a bit better...'

Message withdrawn

I can't bring myself to read all of it. It's just overwhelming.

It is utterly horrific, and overwhelming as you say. Perhaps one way to get a handle on it would be to remind ourselves that if we talk about any category of horrific wrong-doing and/or suffering in global terms it does become very difficult to conceive of resolution just because you lose the concrete cultural and economic, etc., causes that give it its being in each country. It becomes almost a kind of abstract horror.

Perhaps the only way of starting to feel constructive is to re-localise, and start thinking more specifically about the causes and solutions in each country. I don't know how, exactly, in the case of any country. But I think it was the 'world catalogue' quality of the article that was so completely despair-inducing.

I mean, obviously there are good reasons for giving this weight to the global picture, as Fisk has done, because that forces home the universal aspect of the crime: that is is perpetrated by men against women out of sexualised hatred and a conception of women as forbidden autonomy. But the war against this has to be fought in local terms?

Yes riven I know you always like to make the point that things aren't all rosy here and of course they aren't. The problems have the same root ie women are second class citizens/subhuman/not inportant. But surely you wouldn't argue that it is as bad as the things stated in this article? I don't see david cameron making statements like the statement made by the russian president, or women being executed in public by groups of men, or the courts handing down punishment of gang rape on women who have been raped.

To say that these things are equivalent is depressing. The causes are the same but life in north london is pretty bloody far from life under the taliban. The idea that we must sort our our own troubles first is to turn a blind eye to so much suffering. We need to do all we can to help women here and overseas.

And there does genuinely seem to have been a trend in recent British policing to deal more and more effectively with 'honour' crime -- despite some notable failures.

I don't think it really needs to be a competition, and I liked that the article was at great pains to demonstrate that this isn't "a Muslim thing". I think the Million Women Rise march/movement could be a really good thing in this fight, in that it concentrates on women all over the world joining together. Anyone else been involved in that?

Is it just me who doesn't care about trying to big up how the UK govt is tackling it. Clearly it's not working, and other governments aren't doing enough either. I would be curious as to why the attitude in Lebanon is so different to that in neighbouring countries - anyone know?

I know where I'd rather live let's put it at that. In my world I am in next to no danger of anything like what has been highlighted in this article happening to me.

I find it interesting that the attitudes that cause these terrible problems are the same as the attitudes here that cause problems.

As for what to do...

At a human level, I think that donating to, or helping in other ways, charities and organisations that are operating at grass roots level.

At a global scale, it's got to be a political solution, hasn't it? Keep working to improve things here in terms of getting womens voices heard, keep campaigning, get political, get power. Only when women are fully represented in power will there be any changes - of course hoping that women in power would actually give a monkeys about any of it (no guarantee there obviously)...

I think that in the next few decades/century as countries start to act on having fuel sources other than fossil fuels, things will start slowly to change. I bloody well hope so.

Well done Isnt. Good thread. I don't get the Indie normally but bought it for this and am going to go to bed reading it.

Interesting how on mn in four posts it somehow becomes the west's fault. In fact the Guardian has just run a piece on how taxi drivers etc in the UK are being paid as bounty hunters for women (and men, but mainly women) fleeing force d and bad marriages. The UK has been obliged to introduce forced marriage legislation and legislation to stop girls being taken abroad for forced marriage.

Don't make this out as the west's fault, that's bizarre and doesn't exactly help make progress towards ending it.

Exposure is a massive weapon, it's been a difficult one to face up to, but well done the Indie.

It happens in wealthy countries and poor countries, countries where the west has an interest, countries where it doesn't, countries in the west, countries where the west has been actively involved and countries where it hasn't.

To make it out to be "the west's" fault just encourages an abdication of responsibility. If we think we have a duty or even a right to interfere to try to prevent it, there's no point pretending the problem originates somewhere it doesn't ie in western capitalist culture or western "militarism".

Perhaps some people think that as a cultural issue we shouldn't interfere.

After recent conversations on mn I've resolved an internal struggle and I think we should. This is like apartheid. Humane duty overrides cultural sensibilities. That's what I think.

I think honour killings have been very common (and condoned) in Brazil, I don't know if they have managed to turn this around though.

Article here

Anyone know what happens to the families afterwards? Is 'honour' restored, does the wider community respect what they have done?

God that's interesting Darcy, as I wrote my last post I was just thinking about south America and how little I know about the status of women there. Thanks for the link.

Isn't, your comment about needing more women in power, who actually give a monkey's. A couple of years ago a woman journalist driving home through Delhi after a shift that finished at around 3am was carjacked and murdered. She was criticised as being "too adventurous". By whom? By prominent female politician Sheila Dikshit.

Also a lot of mothers and mothers in law are involved in honour killings in some parts of the world, and not just "pardoning" husbands and fathers: women actively involved in killing their daughters, daughters in law, siblings.

How can there be SO LITTLE INTEREST

it really pisses me right off

interesting campaign link in your op.isn't. thanks.

eLeision.. "dealt with in local terms". I used to be torn about this very issue. Yes change is best from within and there are "within" groups like isnts which need support. And as you point out, and the article stresses, "within" is now often western countries. But I still think the horror is too great and the women too powerless to leave it all to them. outside help and support required.

My guess is that the liberal media tends to look the other way on honour crimes because they are so prevalent within Gaza and the West Bank, and it's so un-PC to be seen as anti-Palestine...?