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Honor killing in Pakistan

TimCallahan

Philosopher
T
Joined
Mar 11, 2009
Messages
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I just heard about this on the BBC World radios broadcast: A Pakistani couple murdered their 15 year-old daughter, burning her to death by pouring acid over her, even as she pleaded for mercy. Her crime? She looked at a boy as he rode past on a motorcycle. That's right. You didn't read it wrong, and I didn't write it wrong. These parents - yes, the mother, too - showed no remorse, shed no tears over having killed their own 15 year-old daughter by pouring acid on her. They said they had to do it to keep the girl from dishonoring the family. Her name was Anosh Zafar. Her parents were Mohammad Zafar and his wife Zaheen.

I don't know if we should charge this up to Islam, as it is practiced in many benighted countries of the world; if it's part of culture specific to the Indian subcontinent; or if it's simply an aspect of traditional culture - the death of which, as industrial culture overspreads the planet, many of its supporters decry. I'd be interested to hear from others as to which of the three suspects is the culprit.

I'd also be interested in what punishment jref members think should be meted out to these horrid people. My own feeling is that the two of them should be submerged in a strong solution of sulphuric acid. On the other hand, perhaps they should be candidates for the Darwin Award for ending, or at least diminishing the likelihood of passing on their genes.

ETA: Lest one is tempted to see this as an isolated incident, consider this one that occurred earlier this year (from the article):

Islamabad: In a shocking incident, a Pakistani man, Arif Mubashir, has gunned down his six daughters on suspicion that two of them were in relationships with boys in the neighborhood.

According to this site (not safe for office or school), 675 women were murdered in honor killings in the first nine months of 2011.

ETA 2: According to this site, about 1,000 young people of both genders are killed per year in India, often for marrying outside their castes.
 
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Could it be possible to shame those killers publicly, heaping scorn and condemnation on their activities, showing that it is not "honorable" to murder children for being children?
Notoriety for being stupid and told that in their neighborhoods might peer-pressure those of similar moronic attitudes into withholding the death penalty.
Couple of my lady friends were merely tossed out of the house, not killed, for similar offenses. But here in civilization, a single woman is not an object to be raped and murdered just because she has no male protector right there.
 
I saw the BBC video today.
I can't get the face of the mother out of my memory.
Where do they get the acid?
 
Apparently, it's not just in Islam and not just on the Indian subcontinent that such atrocities happen. Consider this article from the Guardian (from the article, emphasis added):

Hassan Habash even gave his word to an emissary from a Bedouin tribe traditionally brought in to mediate in matters of family honour, a commitment regarded as sacrosanct in Palestinian society. But the next weekend, as Faten watched a Boy Scouts parade from the balcony of her Ramallah home, the 22-year-old Christian Palestinian was dragged into the living room and bludgeoned to death with an iron bar. Her father was arrested for the murder.


Two days later, another ritual of killing unfolded a few miles away in Jerusalem.

Maher Shakirat summoned three of his sisters to discuss a family uproar after one of them, Rudaina, was thrown out by her husband for an alleged affair. Maher listened to Rudaina's denials, and her sisters' pleas that they were not covering up the affair. Then he forced the three women to drink bleach before strangling Rudaina, who was eight months pregnant. The other sisters tried to flee but Maher caught and strangled Amani, 20. The third, Leila, escaped but was badly injured by the bleach

Also from the article is this tale of a mother who killed her daughter for getting pregnant after tow of her brothers had raped her (emphasis added):


Amira Abu Hanhan Qaoud murdered her daughter, Rafayda, because she became pregnant after being raped by two of her brothers.

"My daughter fell over and broke her knee. I took her to hospital and there the doctor told me she was pregnant. So I killed her. It's as simple as that," said Mrs Qaoud on her doorstep in Ramallah. Mrs Qaoud waited until the baby was born and given up for adoption. Then she presented her 22 year-old daughter with a razor blade and told her to slash her wrists.

She refused so her mother pulled a plastic bag over her head, sliced her wrists and beat her head with a stick. The brothers were sentenced to 10 years for the rape. Mrs Qaoud spent two years in prison for killing her daughter. She has purged her home of all pictures of her older children, and declines to discuss the killing, saying all she wants is to forget about it.
 
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Darat said:
Usually batteries.

And unfortunately for us UKains we don't have to look outwards, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-19068490
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Batteries? I'd imagine you can buy some pretty strong liquid acids in any country. I remember my dad using some really nasty acid to take the paint off our patio once when I was a kid.

The best you can say about this horrific act is at least the parents are in jail.
 
When I worked for the state of georgia there was a sweet Pakistani woman who was always nice to me. She was nice everyday and everytime I saw her.

I often wondered if it was safe for her to do so. I mean her family lived in Georgia and they were freshly immigrated from Pakistan.
 
Cainkane1 said:
When I worked for the state of georgia there was a sweet Pakistani woman who was always nice to me. She was nice everyday and everytime I saw her.

I often wondered if it was safe for her to do so. I mean her family lived in Georgia and they were freshly immigrated from Pakistan.
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Not every family from Pakistan are fanatics.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Not every family from Pakistan are fanatics.
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Possibly their being from Pakistan rather than in Pakistan would have to do with their not being fanatically rooted in the traditional culture. Of course, some do bring their horrific views with them.
 
I think these "honor" killings indicate that in Pakistan the perception is that a family's loss of honor or respect in a community will result in a significant loss of access to resources. These acts, though they are barbaric by our standards, are the result of cultural and social and economic pressures that we don't understand. I'm not saying it's OK, because it clearly isn't, but I would guarantee that the socioeconomic landscape which these people face (or have historically faced) has a lot to do with it.


Having said that, I can't imagine that this sort of behavior is at all common. That it is not unheard of is clear, but I think you're really talking about outliers among outliers. The reasons given for these murders are both banal and arbitrary. Surely 15 year old girls look at people where there father or mother would be able to see and they are not murdered by the family.
 
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Proper punishment? Everyone around them who ever knew that family says "how dare you!" and pulls the family our of their house and beats them to within and inch of their life. While it's easy for me to get mad behind my computer I'm just as enraged that no one in their community hasn't done this. Hell, WE do this, just with due process.
 
joesixpack said:
I think these "honor" killings indicate that in Pakistan the perception is that a family's loss of honor or respect in a community will result in a significant loss of access to resources. These acts, though they are barbaric by our standards, are the result of cultural and social and economic pressures that we don't understand. I'm not saying it's OK, because it clearly isn't, but I would guarantee that the socioeconomic landscape which these people face (or have historically faced) has a lot to do with it.


Having said that, I can't imagine that this sort of behavior is at all common. That it is not unheard of is clear, but I think you're really talking about outliers among outliers. The reasons given for these murders are both banal and arbitrary. Surely 15 year old girls look at people where there father or mother would be able to see and they are not murdered by the family.
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The culture thing I get. Got any evidence there is economics involved?
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
The culture thing I get. Got any evidence there is economics involved?
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This is entirely speculation on my part, but I'm sure you'd agree that cultural mores emerge from objective conditions. The idea of "honor" and "good family name" generally have economic (i.e., material) implications. Even in societies with no monetary system, there are still rules that dictate who has preferential access to resources (a pecking order).
 
I have a simple mind on these things: if you can find out ahead of time, leave the planners of the mutilations/killings visibly dead and terribly mutilated (prior to the deathy thing) with an informal note carved in appropriately on them to explain the why and wherefore and suggest safwer paths to follow. If found out afterwards, a thorough flaying followed by a nice salting or warm alcohol bath (don't want infections) and then really hurt them and leave their bodies displayed for other potential miscreants of their ilk. I believe medical knowledge to be very useful in dealing with these turds.
 
Note to cultural apologists: I have no problem with others following their chosen/familial/geographic culture for THEMSELVES AS AN INDIVIDUAL and with NO application of same to any other persons within or without of family or religious or political circles. I have no problem with their dissolution if they have a problem with my preferred policy.
 
fuelair said:
Note to cultural apologists: I have no problem with others following their chosen/familial/geographic culture for THEMSELVES AS AN INDIVIDUAL and with NO application of same to any other persons within or without of family or religious or political circles. I have no problem with their dissolution if they have a problem with my preferred policy.
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Don't conflate "explanation" or an effort to understand with "approval" or "apologetics".
 
joesixpack said:
Don't conflate "explanation" or an effort to understand with "approval" or "apologetics".
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Trying to recast familicide as some kind of objective result of socioeconomic factors instead of taking the stated justification for the acts by the murderers at face value does sound an awful lot like apologetics, actually.
 
Beelzebuddy said:
Trying to recast familicide as some kind of objective result of socioeconomic factors instead of taking the stated justification for the acts by the murderers at face value does sound an awful lot like apologetics, actually.
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I think you should learn the difference between acknowledging the materialist origins of human behavior and idealist moralizing.

Seriously. Simply because you can't separate your emotional response from rational thought doesn't mean that those of us who wish to achieve a deeper understanding of behavior approve of murder. I'm certain it feels great to be righteously indignant at the murder of a teen aged girl, but your indignation serves no other purpose than to stoke your own sense of moral superiority.

Furthermore, I don't think you actually know what the hell apologetics means. I see you and others bandy that word about as if it's equivalent to "approves of Muslim Terrorism". "Explanation" does not equal "justification", "analysis" does not equal "approval".

Years ago, mental illness was treated as a moral failing. People who studied it were, in your opinion, simply apologists?

Trying to recast human actions as anything other than the result of physical laws and objective material conditions is little more that idealism.
 
Call me a 'Cultural Apologist', but that's their way. I don't have to like it or agree with it, but that doesn't give me any right to interfere. They will be punished accordingly if they have contravened their laws.

If they do this in a country that is not theirs where 'honour killing' is (quite rightly) treated as a primitive act of murder, and whose laws they have chosen to abide by, and are governed by whether they like it or not, then they should suffer the full force of those laws.
 
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