What's Sauce for the Goose is Sauce for the Gander

[His statement was not sexual in nature, it was] intended to convey that the Duchess [of Sussex] possessed charm and beauty and was a suitable match for her fiancee, who has a reputation of possessing charm and handsome looks." 
"No reasonable woman would consider his remark to be a sexual comment about the Duchess."
"[He] felt this over-policing of his innocently intended remark, and its being twisted into an accusation of sexual harassment, was unduly punitive and said so."
"[Two female colleagues] had been looking at a picture of a man, specifically, Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau, and stated that he is 'hot' intended as a reference to Mr. Trudeau's sex appeal. [His employer] took no action on this complaint, undertook no investigation and imposed no discipline on the female employee."
"Defendants enforced their policies regarding sexual harassment in a manner that was discriminatory, specifically that they dismissed a male employee with no investigation within two days but took no action when placed on notice of a similar remark by female employees in the presence of witnesses."
Complaint, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York

Meghan Markle and Justin Trudeau.  Chris Jackson/Getty Images; Chris Young/The Canadian Press

Yet another tediously tiresome and reputation-destructive, employment-ending fallout of the #MeToo movement that has long outlived its temporary usefulness in calling to account genuine instances where men at all levels of society have been brought to task over their treatment of women, from violent rapes to social harassment to careless insults, for too long tolerated by society and by women too subconsciously bludgeoned into acceptance of the 'inevitability' of fallout from accusations.

There is little doubt that many men, empowered by a general laxity in social mores and acceptable and sensitive respect for their opposite gender casually humiliated women they were in contact with as a male entitlement. They are now more conscious of what constitutes acceptable manners and have been newly acquainted with that quaint old notion of peer- and gender-respect. As for the authentic criminal violators of the social compact of violence against women they too are paying their belated dues.

Feminists, intoxicated with the heady brew of finally achieving a good measure of notice and overdue attention to the fact that being male is no entitlement to belittling females, and seeing powerful men brought to the level of social and legal condemnation they finally deserve have dug in their heels to pursue any possible perceived albeit innocent-of-intent assaults against female dignity. Off-colour jokes no longer permitted, no big loss. Courtly gestures or 'implied' inferiority, or simple assertions of admiration have now been placed squarely in the box of the forbidden.

General society has become so cowed by the vehemence with which women on social media 'gang up' to decry male attitudes and behaviour that sensible women tolerate it as too long in coming but with a growing look askance the madness, sensible men head for the hills, no longer willing to risk their reputations by having anything to do with women. Leading women professionals to decry the distance their male counterparts are now leaving between themselves and young women whose careers could be advanced through mentorship....
Former PBS journalist Hugh Heckman is suing the news station for wrongful termination after he was fired for calling Meghan Markle, 'not bad' 

Hugh Heckman, 72, a former editor for PBS NewsHour was working on a story relating to Britain's Prince Harry and then-fiancee Meghan Markle on November 25, 2017. He was overheard to have remarked to a male colleague, both studying a photograph of the two now-royals, the expression "not bad". A woman sitting six metres off to whom the photograph was unseen, commented that his comment was in contravention of company sexual-harassment-in-the-workplace training. "Haven't you learned?", chastized another. 

They then went on to lodge a formal complaint to CBS authorities about his sexist behaviour. Two days later he was fired. Mr. Heckman obtained the services of a lawyer. And with the help of his lawyer has set out to change PBS practices and training to "provide equal employment opportunities for employees based on sex", along with an unspecified compensation for lost earnings, for humiliation, and for loss of professional reputation.

"There are many serious cases of sexual harassment going on, as we know from the #MeToo  movement, and then we have this one."

"That makes people question the seriousness of these issues."
Jillian T. Weiss, lawyer for Mr. Heckman

Condoning Cultural-Inspired Killing

"If my film ["A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness"]can hopefully play a small part in getting legislation passed and [inspiring] introspection on why this exists in our society, how it manifests, it's a victory."
"We cannot compromise on the 52 percent of Pakistan [Pakistani women's human rights]. That is not the way [legislation protecting women's rights, but lacking implementation]."
Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, Karachi, Pakistan

Pakistani journalist and filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy accepts the award for Best Documentary Short Subject Film for "A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness" at the 88th Academy Awards. (MARIO ANZUONI/REUTERS)

"My firm opinion is that honour killings are community-sanctioned violence, and this cannot only be changed by laws. The perpetrator walks proudly with his chest puffed up with pride [having fulfilled his cultural obligation to restore honour by killing the one who brought dishonour]."
"There was one shelter for women in Karachi when its population was two million, and there's still one shelter, and the city's population is 24 million."
Zia Ahmed Awan, Pakistani lawyer

Ms. Obaid-Chinoy's documentary short film depicting the horror experienced by an 18-year-old Pakistani woman when her father and her uncle attempted to murder her, followed by the cruel imposition on her survival of the murderous attack, that she oblige convention and public opinion by forgiving the two men for their unforgivable assault upon her struck a powerful note for women in Pakistan. The cultural social practise of restoring honour by killing the woman responsible for flouting convention by eloping or embarking on an unsanctioned personal relationship outside of marriage, or marrying an 'unsuitable' man is not only a stain on Pakistan, it is also a frequently exported custom when Pakistanis emigrate to live elsewhere.

In 2014 over 700 women have been documented as having been killed, according to statistics arrived at by the Aurat Foundation women's advocacy group, though other groups cite much higher figures. The film, "A Girl n the River" had a special screening for Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who after congratulating the film maker for having received an Oscar, made an announcement that his government would be "in the process of legislating to stop such brutal and inhumane acts in the name of honour". While he's at it, he might consider enacting legislation that he plans to have fully implemented, against persecuting Christian women, including those who spurn Islam.

Islamist fundamentalists and their political parties in Pakistan will resist any attempts to turn around long-standing and publicly respected customs that imperil women who refuse to comply with societal custom that dictates how they may live as women in an Islamist society. The kind of resistance that women like Ms. Obaid-Chinoy face in agitating and campaigning for justice and human rights assurances for Pakistan's women is not easily bypassed, for those women themselves place themselves in danger by their public condemnation of the status quo.

In rural areas of the country in particular tribal leaders make it their first order of business to respond when a woman in their community has done the unthinkable, taken the initiative to make a personal choice that will dictate her future in the decision to seek a divorce, elope with someone her parents have not chosen for her, or insolently insist on making her own choice in these matters. Eloping couples are hunted down and killed, as an example to others who might wish to emulate their unsanctioned behaviour bringing dishonour to the community.

"There is so much pressure from the tribal leaders and landlords, and even from the families [in support of honour killings]. There is maybe one case out of dozens that ends up in court", explains Farida Hashmat, a lawyer. "Very few people get to the court." And should a woman attempt to report her fears to police she will come hard up against disinterest and an unwillingness o intervene. Police involvement with upholding the law is lax, there are few resources dedicated to giving haven and support to abused and threatened women, and existing legislation has few mechanisms for implementation.

When, in Punjab Province, a new law was enacted by legislators offering protection to victims of domestic violence, it faced condemnation by right-wing parties. Conservative politician Maulana Fazlur Rehmen described the law as a "humiliation of husbands". During a television broadcast cleric Mufti Muhammad Naeem spoke of Ms. Obaid-Chinoy as an "obscene woman".

Marital Incompatibility on Steroids

"If, despite all the evidence I have, the accused are allowed to escape then no other women will ever try to prosecute for this type of crime."
"Ultrasounds in India always happen behind closed doors because every doctor knows it's a crime and will never give the results in writing."
"They didn't say anything to me, but afterwards it was clear that my husband and my in-laws knew that I was carrying girls. After that, they began badgering me to have at least one of them killed. They told me we could not bring up two girls, we would not be able to afford to get them married."
"He threw me out of the house because he wants to remarry someone who can give him a son.""Even as an educated woman I am pushed around. But my daughters are now my biggest source of happiness, and I am proud that I have saved them."
Mitu Khurana, 39, pediatrician, Jaipur, Rajasthan

Mitu Khurana (right), from Jaipur, claims her husband Kamal (left) secretly asked doctors to take an ultra-sound of her babies while she was in hospital with a stomach complaint in 2004

China and India, each representing huge countries geographically and each having over a billion people (1.3-billion and 1.2-billion respectively) undertook to persuade their citizens to have fewer children; China with a one-child-only per family law, India with forced sterilization. In both countries boy babies were considered to be more desirable than girl babies and the result has been the abortion of female foetuses with a resulting gender imbalance causing social havoc in both countries. 

 

China has relented on its one-child coercion, and India has made ultrasounds illegal.

Social and cultural biases cannot be changed so readily to meet a new climate of enlightenment, however, and ultrasounds are still taking place, illegally. Dr. Mitu Khurana has fought a long legal battle over an ultrasound that was done at her husband's behest without her knowledge when she was pregnant with twin girls. She had experienced an allergic reaction and was taken to hospital, given sedatives and a kidney scan taken. Her husband took advantage of the opportunity to convince colleagues to take an ultrasound.

 

The 39-year-old paediatrician refused to abort the twins and is involved in a 'landmark' legal fight at India's high court

Dr. Kamal Khurana, her husband, has denied his wife's allegations. This is, in fact, the first time that such charges have ever been brought to an Indian court. But it is an important struggle for very basic human rights. It has been estimated that 12 million female foetuses were aborted in India through a period of 30 years. An investigation of 89 hospitals n Delhi alone discovered birthrate discrepancies of great proportions. In one instance, 285 girls were delivered for every 1,000 boys.

 

The United Nations made note of the situation and concluded that the number of violent sex crimes so common in India may very well be partially related to the dwindling number of Indian girls in the population, a shortage that has reached "emergency proportions". The lawsuit that Dr. Khurana brought both against her husband and the Jaipur Golden Hospital was thrown out recently by a lower court, citing a lack of evidence.

 

Dr. Khurana described the untenable situation she faced after the 2004 ultrasound had been taken without her permission, and against the law, in a collusion between her husband and other doctors at the hospital. Her husband afterward began insisting she have an abortion and was often violent in his behaviour; once, she stated, pushing her down a set of stairs. When she asked for medical help, her husband responded by confining her with "the intention to induce abortion".

 

It was her parents who brought her to hospital the next morning. Her twin girls, Guddi and Pari, were born some time later, prematurely at 31 weeks' gestation. They are now ten years of age. Dr. Khurana says that when one of her little girls was only four months old her mother-in-law had attempted to push the child down a staircase. Her husband denied the girls could have been his; he had been informed by a priest that he would have a son. He insisted that a DNA test be undertaken.

Leaving Islam

"I just couldn't agree with most of the stuff, especially with the treatment of women -- that got me out of Islam."
"They [her family] think I'm a bad Muslim. But I doubt if they'd ever think I'm an ex-Muslim. That would be the end. He [father] would never accept my apostasy."
"There was a lot of pressure to be completely religious. [Punishment followed transgressions]...There was a tear in a page [Koran] and my father assumed I'd ripped it. He got my hand -- and put it on the stove."
"I just filled in two bags of my papers and stuff and told my brother, 'I have to take out the trash', and there was a cab waiting for me and I went straight to the shelter."
Halima, 18, Ontario biology student

"As a kid I really believed with all my heart, but my faith just kind of went away. It flickered out. I stopped feeling the presence of God. And that's when I took seriously the possibility of Islam being wrong."
"There really isn't a defence for any of it [religion]."
"I realized that I don't want to stick to just one way of looking at the world."
"I wanted to do my part for the apostate community, I guess. To normalize the process of apostacizing ... To say, 'I'm an ex-Muslim, you are not alone, you are not the only apostate in the world' There's such a taboo surrounding apostasy in Islam."
Zain, 27, Pakistani Canadian

"There's great animosity towards ex-Muslims. You're treated like a traitor, just for not believing the same thing. And you're expected to keep your mouth shut and not criticize the religion."
"I wanted to belong [to be a good Muslim]. I wanted to feel connected to my roots. I wanted to have a certain identity. And I really wanted to believe."
"Men can date, have sex outside of marriage can marry somebody not of their religion -- they can pretend to have their wives convert -- they can go through the motions. But if we want to be free, we have to leave. There is no middle ground for women."
Kiran Opal, founding-member EXMNA: Ex-Muslims of North America

It certainly is not Islam alone that prefers to have its faithful remain faithful. Other religions are quite the same in that respect, as are other cultures representing ethnic groups, as well as ideologies. Most view those that leave the fold as traitors to a common faith, belief, cause and work to impose isolation and suffering on those who dare to withdraw from or reject those sacraments that held them to the community of faith, cause or belief.

In many faiths, the result of some intrepid soul risking being rejected by those they are emotionally closest to, of bringing shame to them from within the community is to be viewed with incredulous dismay disdain and dismissal, so that hearts are hardened toward them and just as they have chosen to reject what is of inestimable value to those who have given themselves over to the religion, culture or ideology, they find themselves alone in an unfamiliar, desolate place of mind, struggling to find themselves.

Most religions, however, do not view those they know as apostates as no longer worthy of life. God, after all, regardless of the religion that claims the Almighty, happens also to be the fount of life, the maker of life. So how much sense does it make for a religious authority to delegate to itself the taking of life? Yet some countries devoted to their fundamentalist version of Islam -- a growing phenomenon all over the world of Islam -- take it upon themselves to sentence those who leave Islam to death.

It is not only the religious authorities that pronounce capital punishment upon those of their citizens who are incautious enough to make it be known that they will no longer live as Muslims, but the extended families of those who remove themselves from the Islamic orbit. For women, breaking away from the tradition of 'modesty' under Sharia that requires them to be subservient to men, and who have little defence against rape when they are held to have led men astray, their lives may be forfeit to the Islamic charge of having defiled Islamic precepts of female purity.

For Halima, the young Ontario biology student whose strict Muslim family initiated a process to have her marry a 50-year-old Yemenite and enable his re-settlement in Canada, that constituted the final break. She could not envision herself at 18 married to a 50-year-old man she did not know, and living a traditional life of an obedient Muslim woman; she chose freedom and opportunity. "Come home -- or you'll regret it", her father wrote to her, and Halima would know very well what that regret might constitute; "honour killings" by family members of those who transgress have made their mark.

When Zain with his Pakistani background, born of immigrant parents to Britain, pursued philosophy, the study of Friedrich Nietzsche freed his mind of doubts and by age 19 he no longer believed. He made online contact with a young woman in Canada and they planned to elope. When his parents discovered his plan to marry a woman who was not Muslim they attempted to convince him to reject this path. But he had left the faith and at age 20 left Britain for Canada, and there married the young Canadian woman.

It is doubtful he will ever be reconciled with his parents. He fled Britain to find his destiny in Canada, outside Islam, and with a young woman not of his ethnic group, his culture and the religion he was born into. And now that he has been very public with his apostate status his extended family became aware from an online testimony in aid of others like himself, and they took it upon themselves as pious Muslims to "collectively shame[d] my parents for being bad parents", leaving them socially isolated. Forgiveness is not to be found in that dead zone.

A young Bengali-British woman interviewed for Simon Cottee's soon-to-be-published The Apostates: When Muslims Leave Islam, spoke of the shame and self-hate experienced by those vulnerable to being shunned and cast out and held to be less than human for their choice to leave Islam. "It was rough and I could barely pull myself together ... because I knew they wouldn't accept me", leaving her "lost, as though I don't know who I am anymore".

Enter a support group established in Toronto and in Washington in 2013 for ex-Muslims to find comfort and companionship within the emotional embrace of others like themselves who mustered the courage to find their own way in life, outside Islam. EXMNA: Ex-Muslims of North America was set up to help these rejected souls meet others like themselves. The group states its opposition to avoidance of religious criticism.

Its motto is "No Bigotry and No Apologism", aptly describing their mission to oppose those who fall in line behind accusations of "Islamophobia"; insisting that moral relativism is a false yardstick by which to measure Islam. Kiran Opal, one of the group's founders, experienced doubts about Islam and Sharia, but it was not until her family brought candidates for marriage within the faith to her attention that she realized she would have to be responsible for herself to escape the trap.

Kiran Opal in her complaint overlooks one important thing; when men marry outside Islam, they seek to convert their wives to Islam, and that usually solves the problem. Islam is a prosetylizing religion, it has always, and continues to, focus on converting non-Muslims to Islam. This represents an important obligation due Islam by its faithful. Women, on the other hand, deciding to marry a non-Muslim do not necessarily observe the need to convert their husbands because they are isolated and rejected to begin with, for marrying outside the faith.

She, like others who leave Islam, know that in making that decision they leave behind much more than just a religious belief. Islam is a complete way of life, a social, political cultural structure whose strictures are well defined, with immutable expectations from its adherents. Leaving Islam means leaving family, friends, and all that is familiar in life. Leaving those who decide they can no longer live within its confines with guilt and indecision and a profound sense of loss; all that was ever familiar and dear to them sacrificed to achieve their individuality and an altogether different future.

The Broader Issues at Dalhousie

"They're using their entitlement and prestige and their positions as dentists, they're exploiting that."
"It's not enough to just say we're going to give them sensitivity training. They need to look at some of these broader issues of concern."
Jackie Stevens, Avalon Sexual Assault Centre, Halifax

"People are deeply disappointed and concerned. People find the language and the conversation entirely unacceptable."
"My mind is sort of at root causes, which is why are people saying the things they're saying? What is it about the environment that seems to be fostering this?"
"The route we’ve taken is the route the women have selected. We will also hold the men accountable for participation in this process."
"We all know some redress needs to be made. Our objective is to create some space to create what they think the effective redress is."
"I’m struck by the maturity and grace of the women I’ve talked with. I’m struck by the horror and regret I hear from some of the men involved that have corresponded with me. It doesn’t excuse it. It doesn’t remedy the situation. But it’s a fact."
"This incident is particularly saddening because it shows how much more work we have to do, as an institution and a society, to create an environment free from harassment, discrimination and sexualized violence."
Richard Florizone, president, Dalhousie University, Halifax

"It does give them a lot of control [restorative justice] … in terms of how they handle the process, but with that control comes a lot of pressure and in some ways the potential for revictimization".
"The message has to be clearly sent that this is taken seriously that this kind of conduct is not acceptable and will not be tolerated and whatever process they’re using, that message has to be out there."
Wayne MacKay, law professor, expert on cyberbullying, Dalhousie University

Dalhousie University in Halifax has postponed some exams and launched an investigation into disturbing, sexually explicit Facebook posts attributed to male students in the faculty of dentistry. (CBC)

Dentistry is an elite medical profession, a very remunerative one, appealing to people who are capable of amassing grades good enough to admit them to the dentistry school. A graduating class of Dalhousie dentistry students has fired up Canada-wide indignation through their inexcusable juvenile
crudity in discussing their male preoccupation with female students whom they find appealing. Not appealing in the sense that they'd like to date them in a respectful manner, but rather that they relish scenes of degrading, violent sex with these women.

And nor did the 13 men set to graduate out of the class of 47, keep their obnoxiously psychopathic sexism to themselves, in the secret of a tell-no-one dark chamber of embarrassment and guffaws; they chose to post their stupid comments on Facebook. How's that for the scholarly minds of mature fourth-year dentistry students letting off frat steam? The Facebook Class of DDS 2015 Gentlemen(!) page posted a vote to select which female student on campus they'd prefer for "hate" sex, joking about the very professional use of chloroform, and other odious comments.

Little wonder university president Florizone is upset over the episode of male maturity sliding into the realm of bathroom humour that is bleak, black and sexist beyond rationale. Little wonder he spoke to some of the men involved who were, Mr. Florizone said, effecting an attitude of "horror" and regret at the situation. Presumably at all the backlash to their unspeakable stupidity, not necessarily their actions which precipitated the public outrage. So, President Florizone decided to postpone final exams, possibly until things simmer down.

The question is, why are the thirteen involved not being expelled completely from the program, and the final tests carried out for those of the class who were not involved? The public would be grateful if such an action were to be taken, to remove the potential of these men in their twenties who haven't the grace and intelligence not to indulge in such disgustingly antisocial antics, becoming accredited professionals and plying a profession upon which they have brought shame. Better they might be led to pursue a career as bar bouncers.

Before they even get to that point, consider the harm done to the women students, knowing that among them male counterparts viewed them in such a despicably cynical sexist manner. They have embarked on a profession respected in society, and find it difficult to respect others...? And should the affair be dismissed with a pantomime of bringing offender and offended together to calmly talk things through to everyone's satisfaction, who in the process will be satisfied? The women, knowing that under that kind of pressure to redeem themselves the men involved will grovel, but not repent?

The kind of mentality that finds pleasure and humour in degrading other people will find no moral lesson in those discussions admitting their social failures as human beings. The penalty is simply too ambivalent and slack, too readily shrugged off. Certainly not sufficiently compelling to persuade them of the gratuitous harm they have committed to the well-being of women on campus.

Root causes, Mr. Florizone? Generalized societal disinclination to hold to account the gross indecency of people, thankfully in a minority, who see nothing amiss in patronizingly declaring their superiority over others through gender determination, persuading themselves that sexual violence is a matter of huge amusement. President Florizone should heed his own university's students' code of conduct, the penalties for which range from a warning to a suspension or expulsion, reflecting violation of behavioral expectations.

Tribal Council Law

"We kept begging them. We begged with folded hands, but they would not listen. They dragged her away to the forest."
Mother of 14-year-old rape victim

Members of the All India Democratic Women's Association shout slogans during a protest in New Delhi against the gang rape of two teenage girls.   (ALTAF QADRI/ASSOCIATED PRESS)

In a small village in Jharkhand state in Bokaro district, a man carried out the instruction of the village council. He fulfilled his honourbound duty by dragging a young girl into a nearby forest and raping her. The young girl's brother was blamed for a sex assault, so the council felt honour justified that the husband of the woman said to have been molested by the girl's brother should rape his 14-year-old sister.

The husband of the woman purported to have been molested by the brother was only too pleased to carry out the sentence.

"They attacked her in retaliation and we are taking this case very seriously", said local police official Jitendra Singh. Two men have been arrested in this latest case of rape. The girl belongs to the Gulgulia community, and in India's rigid caste system is near the bottom of the social and privilege heap. "It is a barbaric incident that took place. We will not spare the accused for it", said Jharkhand chief secretary, Sajal Chakraborty.

Only a week earlier an Indian lawmaker had revealed the deep-seated contempt in which the safety and security of Indian women is held within the country. In addressing followers of his Trinamool Congress party, Tapas Pal, in instigating sentiment against the rival Communist party had this to say:
"If [the Communists] try to kill and intimidate our workers ... I will not spare them. I will let loose my men to rape your women", he said, his statement filmed on a smartphone.

Mr. Pal later confessed to a "gross error of judgement and deeply insensitive", as an apology after criticism was expressed by his own wife, and his party leadership disowned him. But not entirely. Trinamool Leader Mamata Banerjee, one of India's most powerful women, while criticizing Mr. Pal for his "big blunder" blocked any moves for him to be removed.

Socialist Samajwadi Party Leader Mulayam Singh Yadav quipped "boys will be boys" in discussing sentences for rape, during the recent election campaign. In the resort state of Goa, a minister said the best way to stop women from being harassed on the beach was to ban bikinis. As simple(-minded) as that.

In the rape of the 14-year-old ordered by the village council, the two men police arrested were the village headman and the main rape suspect. The girl's brother, on the other hand, has also been arrested on charges of molestation.

Just Another Honour Killing

It is a case of honour killing. The couple were not beheaded, but were killed with the knives and had severe signs of torture on their heads."
Muhammad Pervaiz, Satrah, Punjab police chief

According to the FIR, the couple's family tied them up in public and beheaded them in a village near Sialkot.—File photo

"Their legs and arms were tied while their mouths were gagged with pieces of cloth. The father of the girl announced loudly that he was going to slit the throat of [his] daughter and her husband."
"He said they should learn what would happen to them [children urged to witness the murders] if they married someone of their own choice."
Muhammad Ijaz, neighbour

It was first reported that Sajjad Ahmed, 31 and his bride Muafia Bibi 17, had been beheaded in a grisly 'honour killing' that took place in Satrah, Punjab province in Pakistan. Neighbours have since denied the beheading; they were, they claim, stabbed to death in the presence of family and neighbours, including children whom the young woman's father who led the killing, insisted it would be instructive to the children to watch.

The young couple had their throats slit and onlookers watched as they then bled to death. This is Pakistan, after all, where honour killings are common enough that human rights groups claim 900 were reported in 2013, though it is generally believed that the number is grossly under-reported.

 A Pakistani woman Nargas Bibi shows family pictures of her son Sajjad Ahmed and his wife Muafia Bibi, who were killed by Bibi’s parents, at her house in Hussain Abad village near Sialkot, Pakistan, Sunday, June 29, 2014. AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary

Residents of this town explained that relatives of the young woman had convinced the couple they supported the marriage, inviting them to the town. Once there, they were drugged.They hadn't long to live, after that. It was a particularly gruesome honour killing. Hundreds of which go virtually unnoticed every year, considered by authorities as representative of domestic accidents or suicides.

They were slaughtered to restore family honour. The young woman evidently married without the consent of her father. For that cardinal cultural social sin she paid dearly. Police are said to have arrested five people who were involved in the atrocity, which is to say 'honour' killing.

In an earlier well publicized case of a couple who had married without her father's consent and who had been bludgeoned to death by her relatives outside a courthouse on a busy Lahore street, Pakistan's prime minister demanded that police chiefs explain why they had done nothing to intervene.

The World's Greatest Democracy

The cousins, two girls of the ages of 14 and 15, had no facilities in their homes where they or any other family members could perform the most ordinary of human functions; voiding their bladders, emptying their bowels, something most people are accustomed to performing in privacy, in their own home bathrooms equipped with toilets to carry the waste away. But they, like around fifty percent of people living in India, have no such facilities.

They must evacuate their bodily-waste products in public, and they do, for they have little other choice. People go out from their homes and take themselves into empty fields or railway tracks or any other relatively close outdoor space, and they perform their daily evacuation. And it is there, where they are most vulnerable, that girls and women are violated. Not just any girls and woman, but mostly those of the 'untouchable' class.

The Hindu caste system holds that there are the privileged, of high caste, and the untouchables, the low caste people who are considered little better than slaves at the disposal of the high castes. And so, their human rights are largely non-existent. They are preyed upon in this most vulgar and unjust of social-religious-cultural systems that victimizes them, even though in India this is now against the law. It is also against the law to force girl children into marriage, but it is also customary.

The two cousins will never have to worry now about being forced into marriage with an elderly cousin or a wealthy old widower. They were abducted in full sight of other villagers similarly occupied in a field close to their home in Badaun in Utter Pradesh state. When the father of one of the girls went to the local police station, he was turned away. When he went to the home of one of the men whom he knew had abducted the girls, he was refused his demand for their release.

BBC News

All this with imperious impunity, with the serenity of entitlement. The girls were raped, they were strangled, they were hanged from branches of a tree for the entire community to see that this could happen to any one of them, for they were lowly Dalit. In India, many upper caste men believe implicitly it is their right to have "first choice" of any Dalit girl.

BBC News

"Rape is loss of our reputation, livelihood, honour and the end of our future" said one woman whose 14-year-old daughter with three of her friends were seized by five relations and neighbours of their feudal landlord. The girls had been drugged and raped throughout the night before they were finally released to their families. This, a family with five children who farm rice and barley fields with no income to show for it, to service a generational debt they could never pay off to a high-caste family.

The murdered cousins were seen being led away by local high-caste farmers, by their uncle. When the uncle attempted to intervene, he was warned off, with a gun. One of the girls' father said the police had "refused to look for my girl". Had his pleas been answered by a search -- since they knew very well where the girls were taken, having confronted one of the abductors who admitted the girls were with him, but refused to release them -- the girls' lives would have been saved.

"If my daughter doesn't get married and suffers her entire life, wouldn't it have been better for her that she had been killed by those beasts?" said the mother of the young girl who had been raped along with her three friends. It is impossible to imagine the lifelong trauma suffered by these children. The mother feared as well, with the tarnishing of the family honour, that her older daughter too would now be unmarriageable.

The entire family was forced to flee their village after death threats from the upper caste Hindus who had banned them from sending their children to school, from visiting the local temple, or from buying food from the shops. They migrated, along with 80 others from their village to Delhi, where they live in unspeakable privation, on the streets.

An Excellent Response to the Stupidity of Muslim ‘Feminists’ who Defend the Hijab and Niqab

by TarekFatah • March 17, 2014 

“I just love this excellent letter written by Pakistani journalist Kunwar Khuldune Shahid. Such a wonderful response to those ‘educated’ women who are proud of being veiled Muslims and who foolishly defend Islam, the anti-women religion. The author of this letter is a man. I am proud of men like Kunwar Khuldune, who believe in women’s rights.” – Tasleema Nasreen

Thank you, dear ‘Muslimaat’

A letter of gratitude to Muslim feminists who defend the hijab and niqab and are social media jihadis

Dear Muslimaat,
I don’t have words to express my gratitude and appreciation for your noble battle against evil. Your #MuslimahPride movement against #Femen was a slap on the collective face of Western imperialists who believe that Muslim women can’t fight for a cause. It was also a resounding reminder for the rest of the world that you have what it takes to spark a revolution. What the ignorant world does not realise is that once you have the permission of your husbands, fathers, brothers, uncles, the approval of your neighbours, in-laws, their relatives and the consent of your spiritual guardians, their God and their scriptures, you can be quite the rebels.
It takes a lot of courage to ridicule something that is already taboo where you live. It takes volumes of bravery and valour to bow down to the status quo, and toe the lines that have been forced upon you. It takes unbelievable amounts of gallantry to act out a script that someone else has written for you. And it must take guts and the proverbial cojones to take a stand against cruelty and the personification of tyranny that a horde of topless women is.
Who on earth are those damn Europeans to try to steal your voice? Do they not realise that your lives were defined a million-and-a-half ago by the Arabs, who protected your rights and guarded your modesty by ensuring that you don’t have much of a say in most things? Who are those unabashed infidels to protest on your behalf? Do they not realise that you are not allowed to express, let alone clamour in favour of, anything that contradicts the ostensibly divine scriptures? Who are those shameless activists to try and liberate you? Do they not realise that you can’t be liberated without the permission of your mehrams?
I can’t thank you enough for choosing to be more offended by naked bodies than dead bodies. And since there are so many different kinds of you to thank, I’ll try to address you one by one.
Dear ‘guardians of modesty’ Muslimaat, thank you for letting patriarchal societies define ‘modesty’ for you. Thank you for accepting contrasting definitions of modesty for men and women, and for not being a source of strength for your sisters and daughters, vindicating the men’s claim of you being the weaker sex. Thank you for teaching your daughters about the sin that having sex is, throughout their lives, and then compelling them to do it immediately with a man they first met a couple of hours ago, after signing a few papers and getting the clergy’s approval. Also, thank you for blaming your fellow women when they are raped, since men have the divine license to refuse to keep their emotions in the right place. And thank you very very much for being more misogynistic than any male chauvinist can ever possibly be.
Dear ‘feminist’ Muslimaat, thank you for being a ray of hope for bacon-eating vegetarians, god-fearing atheists and peace-loving terrorists. Thank you for reiterating the fact that your mehrams choose to overlook the divine orders and allow you to think freely and take your own decisions. Thank you for citing your personal example to highlight how you wear the hijab by your own choice, ignoring the fact that an overwhelming majority of Muslim women are coerced into doing so. Thank you very much for making the whole debate about you, when it was always about the torment and suffering that most of the Muslim women are going through.
Dear ‘liberal’ Muslimaat, thank you for defying the orders of your deity by choosing to not cover your heads. Thank you for disregarding other restrictions that your religion commands, and then having the audacity to condemn someone who is critical of these very commands. Thank you for cherry picking the commandments and making your ideology sound compatible with the 21st century, only to castigate those that take the same ideological orders literally and implement them. Thanks a lot for elucidating that you don’t need liberation and for paying no heed to the fact that the most of the women in your country do. And thank you very much for clinging on to those very shackles that have enchained the prospect of women empowerment in your country.
Dear ‘revolutionary’ Muslimaat, thank you for ignoring the life threats that Amina Tyler and many others like her are facing, after choosing to protest against the harassment that they have to bear on a daily basis. Thank you for overlooking other lesser issues like terrorists attacking a 15-year-old schoolgirl; female genital mutilation; women being raped with judicial approval just so they don’t die virgins; two-year-old girls being forced to wear veils because the disgusting men in your country have no self-control; and fathers legally getting away with raping their daughters by paying a few riyals. Thank you very much for screaming bloody murder over half-naked women’s claim of representing you, but accepting rapists, pedophiles and sorry excuses for human beings as your state leaders and role models.
#MuslimahPride is not just a hashtag, it’s a symbol of integrity and pride. It’s about taking pride in inequality, in half testimonies, in blaming rape victims and in gender discrimination. It’s about taking pride in chauvinism, where men have divine permission to beat and rape their wives, marry multiple times and possess slave girls. It’s about taking pride in patriarchal societies where husbands are categorically told in detail how they should punish their “disobedient” wives, while not a single text exclusively tells women what they should do with unfaithful husbands. It’s about taking pride in not being allowed to vote, let alone lead your nations, and about finally being allowed to ride a goddamn bicycle – under a mehram’s supervision – in the year 2013 AD.
The #MuslimahPride jihad will be written down in history as the moment where Muslimaat made it clear to the world that no one should protest on their behalf, half-naked or otherwise. Thank you, dear Muslimaat, for saving the rest of the world’s time by clarifying that you’re fine living in the 7th century AD, and no one should push you towards the enlightened times, regardless of whether they have clothes on or not. Thank you for being a source of inspiration and an illuminating example for everyone. We all know that you have what it takes to transform the plight of the women and change the dynamics of the world, as long as you are back home before sunset.
More power to you.
PS: I hope being addressed as ‘dear’ does not land you in trouble with your oversensitive male guardians.
Yours thankfully,
Kunwar Khuldune Shahid
The writer is a financial journalist and a cultural critic. Twitter: @khuldune

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The Afghan madrassa accused of radicalising women

Malyar Sadeq Azad BBC Afghan

Female students in full body veil at the Ashraf-ul Madares madrassa

 

An unregistered religious school in northern Afghanistan has been accused of radicalising thousands of women.

A BBC investigation has found that the Ashraf-ul Madares madrassa in Kunduz province preaches that listening to radio, watching television and taking photos are un-Islamic activities and that women should not work outside their homes.

Activists say the school undermines women's rights, but the founders say they are providing badly needed religious education.

About 6,000 women and young girls are studying at the madrassa which was established by two influential mullahs in Kunduz four years ago.

Students from the madrassa are instantly recognisable because of their strict Islamic clothing.

The older students cover their heads, faces and eyes, and they also wear gloves and socks. Some wear a full body black chador, which has led to them being dubbed "tent-wearers" by some residents.
Kunduz city officials say the radical interpretation of Islam taught in the school - particularly over dress codes - is causing tension between seminary students and other local people.

Teachers at the madrassa say religious instruction in state schools is insufficient

 

"They tell them 'you are an infidel - why is your clothing un-Islamic, why don't you know how to pray?'" says an official from the Kunduz Women's Affairs Directorate.

Some of the seminary students also attend local government-run schools, and here too there have been confrontations.

"When [they] see students or teachers of ordinary schools wearing normal clothes or with their hair visible, they stop them and openly tell them: 'You have committed a sin by not wearing clothing to cover your entire body'," says Wazhma, a teacher at a government-run school.

The head of the madrassa, Mawlavi Abdul Khaleq, rejects the criticism.
He told the BBC the school's goal was to help young women achieve their full potential by understanding the history and basic teachings of Islam.

"In the beginning of Islam, Muslim girls used to take part in religious activities," he said. "They even used to participate in wars… but we Muslims have now lagged behind."

 
So what do the students themselves think? Although they've been warned not to talk to the media, one young woman agreed to speak on condition of anonymity.

"If a chocolate does not have a wrapper, every fly can sit on it, but if it has a wrapper, it can be protected better," she said. "So the hijab for women is like a wrapper for them."

She told the BBC that she had grown up as a refugee in Pakistan, and had previously attended a private university.

"I used to wear short, tight clothes which are not appropriate for a Muslim woman," she said. "But now I have been informed about the truth of Islam and I know it is not appropriate for a Muslim girl to laugh and joke at any party."

A madrassa teacher instructs pupils from behind a curtain

 

In government-run seminaries in Afghanistan, male teachers can instruct girl students face to face - as they do in ordinary schools and colleges.

But at Ashraf-ul Madares, male staff have to teach their girl students from behind a curtain or from inside a booth in order to avoid eye-contact.

"There should be partitions so that the male teacher can't see the girls, even if they wear hijab, because their eyes are open during reading," says Abdul, one of the seminary teachers.

The rules are less strict for the 200 girls under 10 who also study at the Ashraf-ul Madares.
Here the teachers sit among the children, wooden ruler in hand to enforce good behaviour.

"The madrassa discipline is military-style, and children will be punished if they don't learn well or are noisy," Abdul says.

So why go to an unregistered madrassa when there are more than 30 similar schools in Kunduz run by the Ministry of Education and already catering for some 2,000 female students?

Officials at the Ashraf-ul Madares argue that the curriculum provided by the Ministry of Education is not fully Islamic. They say they offer different teaching based on books brought in from Iran, Pakistan and some Arab states.

Afghanistan's deputy education minister Shafiq Samim, declined to comment specifically on the Ashraf-ul Madares madrassa, but acknowledges there is a problem in Kunduz.

Teachers use a wooden booth in class to avoid direct contact with female students 

 

"Students are told people who don't pray are infidel, while in Sharia law only unbelievers are called infidel," he said. "One madrassa student even told her mother that she was infidel because she did not pray for a few days."

Mawlavi Abdul Khaliq, the head of Ashraf-ul-Madares takes issue with this.
"Those who oppose this seminary are actually unaware of Islam or are influenced by countries that support non-Islamic ideas and values in Afghanistan and want a decline in Islamic values", he says. "In general, these kinds of people are provoked by outsiders."

Many of the school's critics also want to know how it is funded.
Mawlavi Abdul Khaliq says some costs were covered by donations from students.
"They sell their earrings, rings and gold to help," he said. "Once we were even able to buy land for around $20,000 and build on it, all paid for by these girls."

The madrassa has expansion plans, hoping to open branches in other Afghan provinces.
The Ministry of Education has confirmed that there are about 1,300 unregistered religious schools operating in the country, as opposed to 1,100 state-run madrassas.

Shahrzad, a civil society activist in Kunduz fears that the growing influence of conservative establishments outside government regulation could cost women in particular dear.

"When religion is misinterpreted, the first and biggest victims will be women," she says. "Their Islamic and legal rights, their rights to work, learn, train and join politics and their civil freedom will be restricted."

Patriarchy and Female Circumcision

"If the equivalent procedure were done on men there would be global thermonuclear conflict. People would be at each other's throats, seeking revenge and restitution. And here we've tolerated this for millions of women worldwide."
Dr. Marci Bowers, reconstructive surgeon, San Fransciso, U.S.A.

Female genital mutilation ... or cutting (FGM), is a tradition in 29 countries concentrated in the Middle East and Africa. According to the latest report out of UNICEF, 125-million girls and women have been cut. Another 30-million are at risk over the next decade. This is a rite of passage for girls becoming women, and sometimes for girl-children long before they will ever become women, to pass through in a culture that values virginity before marriage and the assurance that before marriage no girl or woman would seek to have sexual relations lured by hormones and pleasure.

For most of the girls and women who undergo this procedure, it is part of their Muslim heritage. The custom is a tradition that most women themselves cannot see beyond, for it garners them respect, and without evidence that cutting has taken place, no woman can be self-respecting, knowing that no man would take her as a wife whose modesty and adherence to customary practise signifies she will make a good, 'traditional' wife. Whose issue he can control. It represents male ownership of female fecundity.

Some types of FGM are devastating in their results, particularly infibulation, considered the most seriously invasive and dangerous surgical technique of all. It is a barbaric flesh version of the medieval chastity belt, an iron girdle whose key a woman's husband kept, and only he could free her from the affliction of that confinement....

                                                 Women in a fifteenth century Italian breviary

Infibulation involves cutting the clitoris just as the other forms of cutting do, but it goes beyond this, by stitching the vaginal opening shut with a tiny hole left open for passage of urine and menstrual fluids. While undergoing the procedure some girls have been known to bleed to death post-operation, while others suffer chronic infections and incontinence. Sexual intercourse in an adulthood of marriage is painfully difficult, and childbirth a dreadful misery that some never recover from.

Moreover, neither do the babies. A study by the World Health Organization found that an additional one to two babies per 100 delivered in a hospital setting die as a result of FGM. With such casualties in hospital settings, speculation of far greater losses are fairly well guaranteed in less formal, clinical settings such as rural villages where specialist medical assistance is not available. Even when women from the Middle East and Africa migrate to Europe or North America the tradition carries on.

Women themselves, concerned for the future welfare of their daughters and granddaughters see to it that they are 'cut', thus sparing them the potential of being passed over as wives in traditional marriages. A 2011 Canadian census and statistics from UNICEF on the prevalence of FGM holds that with recent waves of immigration from Africa and the Middle East an estimated 80,000 or more FGM survivors live in Canada. In that number is included very young girls and teens.

Somali-born Kowser Omer-Hashi, a midwife living in Toronto 14 years ago, involved herself in speaking out about FGM, wanting to protect girls from being taken by their families back to Africa for a 'visit' back home, whose mission was to have the girls 'cut'. She, along with Dr. Beverley Chalmers, adjunct professor of obstetrics and gynecology, University of Ottawa, surveyed over 400 female Somali immigrants on their Canadian birthing experiences.

 FGM is illegal in Canada. The survey discovered that nearly half of the women expressed a desire to have their own daughters circumcized.  Omer-Hashi worked with doctors, social workers and educated health professionals, to increase awareness of the situation. She found herself ostracized by her own community, threatened and put aside. Her marriage, her health, her job were all affected. Until she finally stopped her anti FGM activism.

 

For 15 years, Amran Mahamood made a living circumcising young girls in Somalia. Four years ago, she gave it up after a religious leader convinced her the rite was not required by Islamic law. She now fights the practice, also known as female genital mutilation. FGM is declining in parts of Somalia, but the country still has the highest rate in the world.Photograph by: AFP , AFP/Getty Images

"That's why FGM has survived hundreds of years. People keep their hands off, saying, 'That's their tradition', and that attitude is wrong, wrong, wrong", she said, blaming the white host community for their sensitivity to tradition and culture emanating from other countries. "It's time we broke the silence", Lynne Featherstone, British education minister said last month. All government hospitals in Britain now must record information on patients suffering or at risk of FGM.

The Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists of Canada recommended training on the issue to be included within the Canadian medical curriculum. "We need to raise awareness of this issue (and start) support groups", Dr. Margaret Burnett, chair of the society's committee on social and sexual issues, claimed. French urologist Pierre Foldes began treating women with FGM while working with WHO over two decades ago, developing a reversal procedure.

He now performs 50 reversal procedures monthly, paid for by the health service in France. And he has taught his procedure to doctors interested in performing it themselves.  Dr. Foldes has operated on over four thousand women, teaching the procedure  to doctors from around the world. One of those he taught was U.S. surgeon Marci Bowers. She became the first North American doctor five years ago to perform FGM reversal surgeries, and it comprises her pro bono work.

Dr. Bowers was born male. She was married and bore three children, but became convinced she was acting out the wrong gender role and underwent transgender procedures that altered her identity from "Mark" to "Marci" Bowers. "When I see so many of these women say I've lost my identity, that really pulls on my heartstrings", she says. Dr. Bowers specializes in gender reassignment surgery, a procedure very much in demand.

It is her unpaid work that inspires her to return the lives of women deprived of their idea of themselves as femininely sexual, and the reality of their loss and their pain, that gears her to offering to these women a biological, personal treasure that has been taken from them in a culture of male dominance. 

Men Stuck At "Boys Being Boys"

"We're in a remarkable place. The chief witness lied under oath. The lead prosecutor resigned because he found her untruthful and non-credible. The army's senior leaders agree with his assessment and yet we're going to trial."
Richard Scheff, lead lawyer, for American Brig.-Gen. Jeffrey Sinclair

The number of reported sexual assaults in the US military has been on the rise, jumping to 5,400 in the last year alone

 

From a high-ranking, rising star in the firmament of America's top battle commanders, Brig.-Gen. Jeffrey Sinclair is set to be judged by a panel senior in rank to himself -- so he is looking forward but not particularly wanting to be in the situation -- of being judged by a jury of generals. This is the military justice system. And, under the stern dictates of justice in the military justice system it is feasible, but hardly conceivable that he could be disciplined in a fairly stark manner; life incarceration in a military prison.

US Army Brig Gen Jeffrey Sinclair is accused of forcing a female captain to perform a sex act on him and threatening to kill her family if she reported it

 

The U.S. has seen quite a number of charges laid against its senior military officers around the subject of sexual misconduct. Illicit alliances for the most part, with senior, married officers engaging in sexual relations with women under their command. The shock and repercussions that shook the Pentagon with the November 2012 revelations of David Petraeus, newly assigned as CIA director, the most renowned general of his time having been revealed with an adulterous affair, are still reverberating.

From sex-and-bribery to a three-star admiral caught out using counterfeit chips at a riverfront casino, and an Air Force nuclear commander relieved of duty after he disgraced himself on a drinking binge in Moscow, new revelations are surfacing to embarrass and confound the nation, without let-up. One general was fired from the Army for groping a woman, another was invited to retire after accepting costlygifts from a foreigner, and the U.S. Army's top commander in Africa was demoted after it was discovered he and his wife enjoyed a $750-a-night hotel suite in the Caribbean at taxpayer expense.


The latest revelations of top-ranking misbehaviour appears in a category of its own. Brig.-Gen. Sinclair was deputy commander of the 82nd Airborne, and now he's facing court martial on criminal charges in a Fort Bragg courtroom. Those criminal charges are inclusive of his having physically forced a captain under his command to perform oral sex. That's what women are for, after all, in peace and war, right? Well, wrong, and Brig.-Gen. Sinclair denies guilt.

It has been confirmed that he had a three-year extramarital affair with a junior female officer during war tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. But forcing anyone to comply with his sexual cravings? Never. Innocent of the charges, M'Lord. Married, a father of two children, at 51 years of age, his career utterly destroyed, the man pleaded not guilty to eight criminal charges inclusive of forcible sodomy, indecent acts, violating orders, and conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman. Quaintly Victorian, is it not?

The sex involved was always consensual, argue his lawyers, defending the man considered to represent the most senior U.S. military member ever to face trial for such violently squalid behaviour. The woman, they claim, fabricated the assault claims to avoid herself being prosecuted for adultery; she pursued him, not he her. Prosecutors, on the other hand, refer to this disgraced man as a sexual predator, abusing his position of authority over subordinates. They emphasize that he had threatened to kill the woman, and her family as well, should she think of revealing the situation.

The veracity of the main accuser was called into question when the chief prosecutor, Lt.-Col. William Helixon resigned, informing another military lawyer he was unable to proceed unless the most serious charges were dropped. There is suspicion that senior officers may have had a hand in influencing the case against their erstwhile colleague. The Uniform Code of Military Justice expressly prohibits adultery or "improper" personal relations. Military leaders are facing intense scrutiny from Congress and the White House for their response to sexual assault or abuse in the ranks.

Some lawmakers have gone so far as to attempt to strip commanders of their authority to oversee such investigations under the premise that, lacking appropriate legal training they seem hardly prepared to take on the task. Added to that, they are often seen as being insensitive to the problem and how best to handle it, other than to hope it will just go away. It won't. Data reveals that the number of officers leaving the Army as a result of misconduct tripled in the past three years. Enlisted soldiers forced out for drugs, alcohol, crimes and other misconduct rose from 5,600 in 2007 to over 11,000 in 2013.

 "I wouldn't say lack of character was tolerated in (war) theater, but the fact of the last 10 or 12 years of repeated deployments, of the high op-tempo - we might have lost focus on this issue," Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army's top officer, told the AP last week. "Sometimes in the past we've overlooked character issues because of competence and commitment." At your peril.
 

This photo April 23, 2013 file photo shows Army Chief of Staff Ray Odierno testifying on Capitol Hill in Washington. AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File