May 7, 2016 by IdealisticRebel

No Honor in Killing

The issue of The War on Women is happening all over the world. It looks different in every country but it still exists everywhere: it is still the disrespect and even hatred of women by men.

In America, it is pay inequality and the glass ceiling. It is also the fact that we are the only citizens who are not legally equal.

Often women are not given an education, and in some countries, women’s bodies are controlled and the government decides if they have children and how many. In other countries, a wife is immolated upon the briar of her dead husband. In some other countries, girls and women are sold because the family is too poor and there is not enough food. In yet other countries, female genital mutilation is performed to make a girl marriageable and to ensure she will not enjoy sex; in others, acid is thrown in a girl’s face to disfigure her because she said no to a young man; and in some a woman is killed in a so-called honor killing to save face for the family. In some countries, men buy little girls to have sex with them because they are pedophiles.

Think about it. It is the most disgusting list of crimes. I can barely think of a more despicable list. Fathers, Brothers, Uncles, Grandfathers look the other way; some participate; some organize the events. Misogyny has existed for many millennia and I realize it will not go away over night. But we must stand up to it. We must speak out. We must do whatever we can to help each woman who is being used, sold or brutalized.

Turning the world light on each incident is a good place to begin. Pressuring police in various countries to arrest and courts to convict perpetrators is also a righteous action.

Women, stand up for each other. Feminist men, stand up, speak up and be the brave souls we know you are and help women everywhere to become free, to live free and to pass that on to their daughters.

Namaste,

Barbara

Pakistan police arrest 14 in ‘honor killing’ of teen said to have helped bride to elope

By Aamir Iqbal and Tim Craig May 5

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — More than a dozen leaders of a small village in northwestern Pakistan were arrested Thursday and charged with burning a teenage girl to death because she helped one of her friends elope, security officials said.The crime, which is renewing attention on Pakistan’s horrific record of protecting women and children from abuse, took place on the outskirts of Abbottabad in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.Khurram Rasheed, police chief for the northern district of Abbottabad, said Thursday that the body of Ambreen Riasat was found in a burned van in the tourist resort of Donga Gali on April 29, the Associated Press reported. Her exact age was in dispute.A graphic photo of the teenager’s charred remains quickly circulated online. It appeared as though the girl’s arms had been bound before she was set on fire.Initially, police suspected that she may have been raped by a scorned boyfriend or as part of a family dispute. But Saeed Wazir, the regional police chief in Abbottabad, said Thursday that the killing was a “pre-planned act” involving 14 village leaders. Wazir said the entire village council had sanctioned the act to send a message to other minors.“They said she must be burnt alive to make a lesson for other girls,” he said.In an act of defiance against Pakistan’s strict Islamic and paternal customs, Wazir said, the victim had helped one of her friends secretly marry her boyfriend. The bride “didn’t obey her father’s will and did a love marriage at court with a guy,” he said.

After the bride’s father found out, he requested that village elders investigate. In many parts of Pakistan, women and girls are expected to receive their father’s consent before marrying.

The village elders called a meeting, which is referred to as a Jirga. Under Pashtun culture in Pakistan and in neighboring Afghanistan, such gatherings are often held to try to reach consensus on how best to resolve local disputes. At times, the meetings also become a form of street justice.

According to Wazir, the village elders investigating the marriage quickly discovered that the victim had helped her friend evade her father’s will. The elders decided the victim needed to be punished for not disclosing her role in the marriage.

Several men then dragged the teenager out of her house and tied her into the van, Wazir said.

“Despite the requests and pleas from her parents, villagers forcibly brought her out and set her afire while roping her to the seat of the vehicle,” he said.

Both the leader of the Jirga and the father of the newlywed girl were arrested, Wazir said. A dozen other men who participated in the Jirga also were charged, he added.

It was not immediately clear whether the new bride or her husband were punished.

The case represents a troublesome expansion of mob-like tactics that women can face in Pakistan when they disobey their parents or extended family members.

According to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, 8,694 girls and women have died in so-called honor killings here between 2004 and 2015. Those crimes involved revenge killings for dishonoring a family, village or local custom.

About one-fourth of those cases involved the death of a minor. Although most common in remote areas, honor killings still occur in Pakistan even in larger, more progressive cities. The problem was highlighted recently in the Oscar-winning film “A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness.”

The documentary profiles a 18-year-old woman who was beaten and shot by her father and uncle in Punjab province after she married a man against their wishes. The woman, Saba, survived. Her father and uncle were arrested but later freed, according to HBO Documentary Films.

After he saw the film, Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif vowed to end honor killings.

Earlier this year, Sharif’s political party, Pakistan Muslim League-N, pushed through a women’s rights bill in Punjab province. The legislation, strongly opposed by the religious community, establishes a 24-hour domestic abuse hotline and network of shelters offering housing, first aid and counseling for women.

Still, a horrific wave of abuse continues.

On Sunday, Punjab police arrested a man and charged him with killing his wife, who was seven months pregnant, the Express Tribune newspaper reported. Using a club, the man apparently beat the woman to death after she refused to allow him to take a second wife.

Also in Punjab over the weekend, a man tossed acid onto a 37-year-old woman, resulting in burns over 30 percent of her body. Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper reported that the woman’s nephew is the main suspect. The man apparently wanted to marry one of the woman’s daughters – his cousin — but was refused.

“He was annoyed with his maternal aunt for turning down his marriage proposal,” Azhar Akram, a police officer in Multan, told Dawn.

Craig reported from Kabul.

February 1, 2015 by IdealisticRebel

Women’s Voices

There was a time when women had strong voices. They were lovers, mothers, healers, and midwives. Then came the “Burning Times”. Women and children called witches and tortured with drowning, hanging and burning. Millions were killed in Europe and really no woman was safe.

This was followed by Patriarchy and the silencing of women’s voices. There have been a few women through the years who discovered their voices but it was unusual. The Suffragettes found their vocal chords and their mouths and women have been speaking ever since. Of course, the louder we speak, the more some people close their minds off from truth and equality.

Clearing the Air

It’s been ten years since you tried to kill me.

Biking home one night, I saw only your legs

stepping behind a tree, then you fell on my throat

like a cat. My books crashed the birds out of sleep.

We rolled in the leaves like lovers. My eyes popped

like Christmas lights, veins snapped, your teeth wore

my blood, your fingers left bars on my neck.

I can’t remember your name,

and I saw your face only in court.

You sat in a box, docile as old shoes.

And I, who had never felt any man’s weight

sometimes felt yours for nights afterwards.

Well, I’m ready to forgive

and I don’t want to forget.

Sometimes I tell myself that we met

differently, on a train. You give me

a Batman comic and show me your passport

I have nothing but my report card.

but I offer my mother’s fudge for the grapes

rotting the one paper bag you carry.

In my tale you are younger and loved.

Outside you live in a thousand faces

and so do your judges, napping in parks,

rushing to fires, folded like bats on the truck.

mad and nude in a white Rolls’

pinching dollars and leather behinds.

Burned from a tree by your betters, you take

to the streets and hang in the dark like a star,

making me see your side, waking me

with the blows and the weight of it.

—Nancy Willard

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We can…we will change our one world.

July 23, 2013 by IdealisticRebel

Meet a Child Soldier

Child soldiers forced to fight and kill

You may have guessed, I am taking an online course on Human Trafficking. I have known about this terrible crime for a long time. I haven’t known anyone personally that has gone through this. Of course, when women and children disappear, they might be dead or sold into slavery.

In my research I found a book. It is called, “To live and to Tell, written by a young man named Francis Duworko. This boy was taken from Liberia. This country was founded in 1816, as a place of settlement for freed North American slaves. There were many issues that centered around the different groups of people. 1980 was the date for its first bloody coup d’ tat.

The first Liberian Civil War was 1987-1989. Then there was a second Civil War which lasted until 2003. Many people were wounded, killed, raped and tortured.

Francis was born in 1982 in Monrovia, Liberia. He was abducted to be a child soldier when he was eleven years old. What happens to these children? Francis tells about children being made to kill their parents, or die themselves. Children are forced to rape sisters and other female family members.

Frances got out and surprisingly he came out of it an optimist. My sense from reading his book is that is rare. He wanted to make a difference in life and help other children get away. Many of these children are still suffering from what they experienced.

” Never let people suffer what you suffered, when you can help them improve their situation.”
—–Frances Duworko

Somalian boy soldier

Frances puts everything in a positive light. He now lives in Canada with his family. He advocates that if we think we can change the present situation, it can be changed for the better. Francis encourages everyone to have a goal, a dream and to write it down and focus on your dream.

This is a small book, with a heart that is open and filled with compassion. He even encourages people to meditate on their dreams. Learn to dwell on the goal and not on the past. The past is gone, and can’t be changed. Live in the present moment to make your dreams come to fruition.