It would be difficult to create a more oppressive culture for women than that of the Punjab, in which at least 17 women daily are victims of "gender related" violence (I still take issue with how "gender is used in our vocabulary).
According to the report, there were 1,650 cases of gender based violence in July and September. They included 477 cases of abduction, 347 murder cases (including 85 killed for ‘honour’), 250 cases of rape, 165 suicides, 37 incidents of domestic violence, 10 cases of burning, eight acid attacks and two cases of sexual assault.
While educational opportunities are minimal for girls (and certainly, not all boys have access to school either), that status only changes the nature of the abuse:
The report suggests that the type of violence the women were subjected to varied across socioeconomic class and age brackets. The more educated women were subject to more emotional and psychological abuse than women from rural, feudal or tribal backgrounds. Women from the lower income bracket were subjected to more physical abuse.
According to the report, 56 per cent of the incidents were reported from rural Punjab, 38 per cent from urban centres and around six per cent from small towns. The report suggested that women from rural areas were more vulnerable than their counterparts in urban centres and towns.
The number of rape complaints in rural centres was double the figure for urban centres. Furthermore, 62 per cent of incidents of honour killing occurred in rural areas.
The authors said that most of the cases probably went unreported.
So the statistics are probably much higher in every case, since some villages accept the status quo as "normal" and police aren't often involved.
Skirkat Gah Advocacy and Communications Director Fauzia Viqar said domestic violence was an invisible crime in that it was rarely reported till it bordered on extreme. The notion of “sanctity of privacy” had stigmatised open discussions of domestic violence.
Viqar said the matter required a law that criminalised acts of domestic violence, otherwise considered quite normal in Pakistani society. She said redress for victims of domestic violence in civil courts and criminal courts were also limited.
Irfan Mufti, of the SAP-PK, said violence against women took place in their families, communities and the society. The latter two forms were kept in check to some extent but violence within households are rarely reported, he said.
He said there had been several reported cases in which the men of the family had subjected their women to violence and had their elders’ approval to do so.
Imagine the feeling of despair--which explains the high number of suicides. Extricating the religious roots is impossible at this point, although one would hope that Christianity would eventually make a difference. Prayers for these dear women.
Comments
“People have realized that the complete removal of the feminine element from the Christian message is a shortcoming from an anthropological viewpoint. It is theologically and anthropologically important for woman to be at the center of Christianity."
This is just another of the unintended consequences of the cultural acceptance of contraception and abortion! Men's sexuality has been robbed of its creative essence. It is now viewed as something that imposes a burden on women (when conception happens to occur), something used to control women or something that is purely recreational. Why would men bother?? In taking away their responsibility, we've also robbed them of their significance! In the big picture of humanity, men have been made into nothing more than a nuisance women have to figure out how to control in order to bring about the next generation. Men don't see it as their task to protect the vulnerable because they see themselves as the vulnerable ones. A few well preserved vials of sperm would make men entirely obsolete in the world's ethos today!!
That is astounding Robin, and good for you for standing up. At the heart of that matter, I think, is even worse than a gender mixing message. There is an increased sharper and sharper focus on the "self." Solid Catholic teaching returns our focus away from ourselves to Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The original sin, Eve denied her womanhood when she desired to be like "gods." Since the only god she knew was the Father. Where was Adam? He stood impotent... in other words, they were divorced. There's a young girl at Robin's son's high school who was just told that she is the center of the universe and it's a tragic disservice to her.
Ditto what Mary said! A lot of high schools have very poor math and science depts, for boys and girls. I also am educated as a chemical engineer, but chose to teach the two years before we had children because its hours were more suited to spending time with children. (I was looking ahead). When it came time and I was pregnant with our first, I realized that I did not want to leave him with someone else, and was able to stay home full time. I am not sure it would have been that easy if we were used to another engineering income and not just a private school teacher income. Also some of my first job offers were out on oil rigs - I had no interest in that at all even though I enjoyed my engineering classes and did well in them. No one discouraged me from an engineering job, on the contrary I got a lot of flack for my decision not to pursue an engineering career.
I've been lurking, but this is one that irritates me. Beats the heck out of me what these "barriers" are. I was educated as a chemical engineer, where 1/3 of our class was women. However, in electrical engineering, only 1 or 2 out of 30 were women. Is it possible that women are Just Not Interested in some areas? Nah, it must be The Man keeping us down so we must legislate (and, I agree -- when they say "legistlate", I hear "quota"). And actually, I have a friend that was also a chemical engineer. When she lost her job, she decided not to go back into engineering and started working from home so she could spend more time with her 3 kids. Also, if nothing else, there are all kinds of incentives for women to enter science and engineering -- scholarships not available to men, guaranteed housing on campuses that do not guarantee housing to the general population, etc. I think you hit the nail on the head when you said that schools in general are not preparing students for the hard sciences. It is truly a sad state of affairs, the lack of science education these days.