Friday, December 2, 2011

Backgrounder

The act of committing an honour killing is a violation of human rights. The complication is found in trying to destroy them, to remove honour killings from cultures is another violation of human rights entirely. Honour killings mostly occur in countries where women are seen as objects rather than people. The men of the family have to take responsibility of the women to ensure she behaves. If she commits an act of dishonour such as: refusing an arranged marriage, sexual activities outside of marriage, homosexual acts, or "allowing herself to get raped" she will be punished. Punishment ranges from domestic abuse to murder, most time the brother is forced to be the perpetrator so the punishment, if any is not severe. The reason there is no punishment is because most of the law system agrees with killing in the name of honour. Honour killings in the western world have occurred in the past and the perpetrator punished to the full extent of our laws. There are many protests for them to end but nothing is changing rapidly.
Photo by: The Mamosta

8 comments:

  1. Nice blog Cameron!!I'm so glad we don't have honour killing here in Canada haha seems like a very strict tradition the penalty is scary.

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  2. Great first blog entry! I really enjoyed reading it and I can really relate to your topic because it connects to the topic I have chosen as well. Adding onto Adam's comment above, honour killing does happen in Canada which is quite shocking!

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  3. A few questions - In which cultures is this prevalent? Is "honour killing" a essential part of those cultures? How does religion come into all this? And how would removing honour killings from other cultures be "another violation of human rights"? I didn't understand that clearly, but it could be that I'm just sleep deprived (which is true).

    With the Shafia murder case so frequently on the news these days, honour killing such a hot topic. Looking forward to your posts.

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  4. Cameron, I like your blog but I would like to know more about the reasons of honor killing and what organizations try to stop honor killing.

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  5. Just wondering what you mean by "to remove honour killings from cultures is another violation of human rights entirely"? Are you thinking about Euro-centric views on women's rights being imposed on other cultures? Is there a point where upholding basic human rights (in this case women's rights) over-rides cultural traditions?

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  6. In response to Adam's comment - we DO have honour killings in Canada.

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  7. I think that the dilemma is that "we" (ie: Western culture) cannot impose the criminalization of honour killings - the change must come from within the cultures themselves. Have you found instances of resistance from within cultures where honour killings occur ? This statement is too broad: "most time the brother is forced to be the perpetrator so the punishment" in which countries ? where did you get this information ? statistics ?

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  8. Are men ever victims of honour killings?

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