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Original poster

'Honour' crimes in the UK

75 replies

HedleyLamarr · 03/12/2011 09:37

This mornings lead news on BBC Breakfast is about so called 'honour' crimes. Apparently there were 2800 identified by police forces who bothered to reply to an FOI request. I'm struggling to understand why this has not been given more publicity until now.

OP posts:
CogitoErgoSometimes · 03/12/2011 09:56

It's because, up until relatively recently, this type of criminality has been treated as 'culturally sensitive' and we've been too cowardly to tackle it effectively for fear of causing offence. It falls into the same thorny area as arranged marriages, girls disappearing from school registers with no explanation and other ways in which women, mostly from the muslim community unfortunately, are subjected to treatment that wouldn't be tolerated anywhere else in our society. What the figures released today show is that the problem is now being taken seriously enough to categorise as a specific category of offence. I'd say that was progress.

kreechergotstuckupthechimney · 03/12/2011 10:57

Not sure it's just the Muslim community.

woollyideas · 03/12/2011 11:14

If you want to help campaign against honour crimes this website is brilliant.
www.stophonourkillings.com/

This crime is covered up all over the world, unfortunately.

DownbytheRiverside · 03/12/2011 11:19

Or this website.
www.gendercide.org/case_honour.html

DownbytheRiverside · 03/12/2011 11:27

' I'm struggling to understand why this has not been given more publicity until now.'

Because like Operation Trident and gun crime in the black community, it is not seen as something of interest to the majority of the community in this country.
It doesn't affect them, so they are neither frightened by the possibility of it happening to them or theirs, or motivated to question it or attempt to stop it.
It is very hard for female members of a community that has oppressive and violent practices to speak out, there is massive denial that it happens and to speak out often results in being shunned and cut off from family.
In the same way that wife beating and abuse goes unchallenged.

woollyideas · 03/12/2011 12:14

Exactly, Riverside. And even where there are laws in place to protect the victims of these crimes, the women are subject to other 'laws' imposed on them by their families/cultures, which they feel they are more bound by. There can be dreadful repercussions for anyone who dares to speak out against what is happening in their community.

DownbytheRiverside · 03/12/2011 12:19

If you are in a household where you are not allowed outside unless in the company of a male relative, and where the phone is locked by the male to prevent outside calls, how are you going to protest? Or even know that it is possible?

scaevola · 03/12/2011 18:08

I saw something about this on the News this evening.

I was staggered that the number of these crimes is on the increase, and has doubled in London in recent years.

Original poster
HedleyLamarr · 03/12/2011 18:32

Thanks for the link, I shall have a look.

OP posts:
TroublesomeEx · 04/12/2011 07:32

I don't know whether it's just the muslim community, but they have a issues with forced marriages at my mum's school - girls not returning from a holiday to Pakistan and then younger family members in the school telling people it was because they'd been married whilst they were there.

It really bothers my mum/the rest of the staff. They see young girls getting excited about leaving school, going to university, full of excitement about what the future holds...

How can it be more dishonourable to have a relationship with someone outside of your culture than it can be to kill your own children?

It has been treated as 'culturally sensitive' until recently. I hope we hear more about it and that these girls are afforded the protection they deserve.

FantasticVoyage · 04/12/2011 09:44

If we want 'honour' killings and forced marriages to stop, we should charge entire families under joint enterprise and (where possible) deport them.

shouldnotbehere · 05/12/2011 11:02

Well said FantasticVoyage. Not enough is done about it.

These young girls, are often still chidren. Are NSPCC, Children in Need, Women's Aid helping them?

It really should not be allowed in the UK. End of. I'm mixed race (Jamaican grandmother, other grandparents English and Welsh), and I think ethnic minority communities should have to abide by UK laws. No exceptions, if not happy, they can always return to Parkistan / India / Bangladesh.

nailak · 05/12/2011 11:10

Honour kilings and forced marriages are not from Islam.

It is a Punjabi cultural concept which occurs in Muslim and Sikh communities originated in Punjabi.

Islamicly marriages are invalid if forced.

Sometimes culture and religion conflicts, and it is hard for even members of the culture and religion to know the difference.

nailak · 05/12/2011 11:12

I'm sure in those countries honour killings are also illegal shouldnot.

shouldnotbehere · 05/12/2011 11:16

Thanks Nailak, I agree. It just seems we turn too much a blind eye to it, when we are meant to be a country with human rights to be proud of.

I suspect there is less done to help women (and men) get out of forced marriages in Pakistan.

3rdOneComingUp · 05/12/2011 11:19

This is one of the more important issues for women in our time and the fact that it is on the increase demonstrates that we are regressing as a society. It is UTTERLY unacceptable and i don't give a fuck if it's culturally sensitive. It turns me into a bit of a frothing berserker.

How dare they? How dare someone take someone else's, a close relative's, life because of community pressure. Those who commit the crimes should be made to suffer the full extent of the law.

There are some great books on the subject
womensgrid.freecharity.org.uk/?p=1694

nailak · 05/12/2011 11:24

I don't think it is culturally insensitive. Who says it is?

shouldnotbehere · 05/12/2011 11:32

It shouldn't be culturally sensitive. It upsets me, that this it is allowed to take place.

One of our friends is married to a girl born in this country of pakistani origin. She had to run away to marry our friend, as her family were arranging a marriage for her. Fortunately her family did not go in for honour crimes, but they did decide she was dead to them, and cut her out of their lives. She was very close to her mother, as the only daughter, and her mother, had no choice in the matter, her father said she was dead, and that was the decision made.

nailak · 05/12/2011 11:35

It all goes back to the patriarchy.

Your friend, did they arrange her marriage before they found out she was having an extra marital relationship or after?
Did they offer her a choice of proposals?

Did they disown her for marrying a man of her choice or marrying a non Muslim?

In Islam family ties are emphasised and it is sinful to break them.

mousysantamouse · 05/12/2011 11:41

Illegal - maybe
socially acceptable (in some cultures/countries) - it appears so
enforcable? - would be extremly difficult I would guess...

wannaBe · 05/12/2011 11:41

they should start by not calling it honour crime.

Nothing honourable about violence and murder even if that is the intention.

And increase doesn't necessarily mean that there is more of it, just that more of it comes to the attention of the authorities. That is progress, actually.

TroublesomeEx · 05/12/2011 11:43

nailak it's 'culturally sensitive' because they are practices generally found in non-white communities and the people in this country who have the power to stop it are white.

People have worried about being accused of being racist for challenging practices of another culture on the grounds that that they just don't understand them.

Hopefully, this is changing now.

shouldnotbehere · 05/12/2011 11:54

I'm not sure if they knew of her affair or not. I'm not aware of her being offered any choices.

They disowned her for marrying a non muslim. She had to notify the police of her running away, in case she was kidnapped and taken to Pakistan, but once her family realised it was permanent, they decided she was dead to them. Saying that she is dead to her family, she always seems to know what's going on in her family's life, and so must have some contact with certain members.

She's happily married to the man she ran away with, has two sons, and living about an hour away from her home town. This was about 15 years ago.

3rdOneComingUp · 05/12/2011 11:56

I would hazard that there are more 'honour' crimes committed now than there were 50 years ago, just by the increase in demographic.

nailak: your version of islam is not the version these people believe is theirs.

TroublesomeEx · 05/12/2011 12:03

shouldnotbehere you could be describing my mum's friend here Sad.

Shocking that there are so many, so very similar, stories.

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