"Honour killing"

And it's not saying that it is the women's fault at all, just recognising that without women's co-operation, the patriarchal system would not work; it would just collapse.

So these women have no choice, then? Well, I think that they do have a choice and some of them make the choice to harm other women.

No disrespect here, but what exactly is the point of feminism if it is just somehow accepted that these women don't have a choice in what they do?

If you genuinely do not believe they have a choice, what are you fighting against exactly? Because the men in the patriarchal system aren't going to come around to the feminist way of thinking, are they?

And if those women have no free will or choice in what they do, then it means just that i.e. they have no self-determination or free will, so I ask in all honesty and without wishing to be rude or insulting, why not just give up the feminism cause?

Some women do take part in all kinds of things, absolutely. They collude - but that's up for debate I suppose). The question is, though: are they also making the important decisions?

In the same vein it could be argued that slaves participated in slavery inasmuch as they usually did not unite in revolt against slave owners. And also in the form of some slaves taking over supervisor/foreman roles and thereby assisting in the control of fellow slaves. However, this can hardly be construed as slaves in general being responsible for slavery.

It is the colluding in one's own oppression thing by internalizing patriarchal values.

We can apply this to all sorts of misogynistic acts - rape apology for example.

We have no idea of the conditioning these women have been subjected to. Anyway they would become victims themselves if they didn't obey the patriarchal code.

Yes, I think we need to drop the idea that the women are in some way responsible because they participate.

We see this phenomenon with FGM too.

dittany Much as I find the whole notion of 'honour' killings abhorrent, much as I dislike religion, much as I dislike all of it, women do take part in the oppression and pain of other women.

Sorry have read back. In fact I said in another post what I understood your post to be about.

SaF it was me who said the clumsy thing. I'm sorry if that upset you. And BTW I didn't misunderstand what you were saying and said so in the same post.

You are not alone - it would appear that I am am an ignorant bigot with a side helping of racism too.

And there I was trying to be very specific after I saw what happened to you by being slightly clumsy.

Anyway - sorry if my comment upset you, it was meant in defence.

Sorry, I don't know what page - I read MN in the old format so that I can navigate easily and search for stuff on threads without having to change pages. It is handy for long threads or threads where you want to check something that is being referred to from upthread.

I can give you the link again gladly, but you might want to go back and look at it within the context of the thread in order to understand better what I am talking about now.

www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/ASA33/018/1999/en/9fe83c27-e0f1-11dd-be39-2d4003be4450/asa330181999en.pdf

your right about the links, what page was it on, sound interesting now.

im not sure what i mean about izzat tbh, i have never had someone define their definition of izzat to me, however i am aware that their are people within my inlaws who do refer to it, in relation to women, but would never kill their wives or daughters, even though they have accussed said wife or daughter with having illicit assosciations with the oppossite sex.

when i say refer to it, i mean generally in the middle of a heated arguement in anger, for example my husband once took offence to a male poster in an islamics foums manner in talking to me and stareted ranting about how people are disrespecting his wife and his wife is his izzat, therefore they are disrespecting me, and another time some random pakistani boys started calling me as they got my number of the avon catologues i was distributing, and he said similar sentiments.

i dont understand urdu or punjabi, so althouh i have heard others say the word, i cant really say what context they were using it in!!

(although there was a woman i know whose mil started ranting about izzat when she decided to go to work, and how the woman was shaming her husband as his family in pakistan who he hadnt seen for 30 years would think he couldnt support her)

Could posters please stop making out that I said either that; all women in Pakistan wear burqas, or that honour killings only happen to women wearing burqas. Or that honour killings only happen in Muslim countries for that matter.

Perhaps people don't follow links so they don't know what I am actually referring to.

Thank you.

bob izzat is a punjabi word and concept and most of the honour killings that occur in the UK seem to be by people from the Punjab region, which covers parts of Pakistan and India.

obviously most people dont believe in honour killings although they still believe in izzat, but less extreme? like some believe the women is their honour, so they should honour her as well as she should conform, etc and that if anyone attacks in any way their wives they et very upset as their honour is bein attacked? but although they believe in izzat, they wouldnt kill their wives or dauhters, it takes a special kind of person to do that!!

another point is you point to more liberal attitudes, and i think we have to understand that izzat is a cultural phenomena not a religious one, so people may be extrememly conservative in religious manner, but this may not reflect on their cultural conservatism, infact it may be a reason for them to try and distance themselves from ignorant cultural practices, with no foundation in any of the 3 faiths of the region.

Because at that moment I was taking about honour killings that happen in Pakistan within traditional communities.

I had this in mind because I had just linked to and quoted from a document on the subject. It wasn't a general comment about honour killings, it was a specific comment about the sort of honour killings I had just been reading about and linking to.

Thanks Beach - clearer now. :) Well, but nailak has a point - the mother convicted for her part in the daughter's death seems only to be wearing a loose headscarf in all the photos I have seen of her - not anything covering her face.

Just to take up a point from nailak's first post about South Asian women often being the "upholders" of tradition more than men. I would say that something similar happens with regard to "mainstream" traditions of female dress and behaviour in the UK. What I mean is in my experience, it is women who appear to "police" the appearance and behaviour of other women - make comments about whether it is appropriate or not.

I think this is for reasons described by Andrea Dworkin in Right Wing Women. Some women go more for the option of carving out the most advantageous position for themselves within patriarchy rather than fighting against it. They strive to be "good" women, and dress and behave in ways they think will gain favour with men. One way to keep such "favour" is to criticise other women who they don't think are doing such a good job of that.