GAH! Going to go drink some Tequila now...
May. 5th, 2005 06:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
semiotic_pirateFor all of you who have looked at my journal info, you know that I read and post to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
feminist. It has recently taken a turn for the worse. At least, it seems to be much more highly regulated with lots of slaps on the hand by mods - for some people, while other people can throw off backhand insults and get chuckled at. There also seems to be less discussion and more reactionary commentary going on: "OMG! That's so horrible!" I never would have been able to get away with just saying that in one of my old women's studies courses. I'm getting constantly jumped on because I keep posting about what's happening to women in other countries. Like an article that talked about how Kuwait had again voted not to give women the right to vote or hold office. Or the article below. Now, the original cut had been right after the first paragraph of the article and I assumed that the title alone would indicate that the information within the article could be triggering. (For those of you not in the know, triggering is another phrase for flashbacks of a traumatic event.) Most recently, someone had posted an article (I believe in the NY Times but I am not sure) about how women in one of the "stahns" were being abducted by men to force them to marry them. This is a tradition that is still supported by parents of men and women in the area, though the practice is falling out of favor and has been disliked by many for some time.
Whatever the case may be, I am feeling more and more restricted by what I can say in this forum and it has decreased my participation and enjoyment of the community itself. The funny thing is is that some of the mods have also (whined) commented about people going back to their personal blogs and bitching about stuff that goes on their. Uh, personal blogs are there for people to make statements about their lives. There is no rule anywhere that says you can't bitch about shit in your own personal blog. Jeez.
Regardless, the following is my much modified post, transplanted here because I have a feeling it is going to get sacked over on their site. Am I being overly callous in my assessment of this situation?
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I recall that someone posted earlier about kidnapping being used to force women to marry their abductors, and this reminded me of that.
Edit 3:
Due to ANOTHER mod (I believe that so far I have heard from three different ones so far) asking me to now LJ-CUT in a different way... I am again modifying this post. Is this a feminist site or an abuse recovery site? I was very good about putting in a cut for the content of the article itself - it seems like we are allowed to post less and less in this community. What is going to be left to discuss if we can't discuss current events happening around the world? There are victims everywhere - even myself. I'm not going to hide from these issues, I want to confront them, and I've already replied to someone else's comment as to why I think talking about these things is important. As many of you have pointed out SILENCE only prolongs the continuance of Bad Things Happening To People. The more we confront it, the more we talk about it, the more we educate about it (socialization issues) the more likely we are to initiate CHANGE in our societies.
My main point in posting this is not to horrify you with what happened, but to point out that there are large groups of women protesting traditions that are harmful to them and their equal place in their culture. I took a Global Feminism class a couple of years ago and I came to the realization that I can't just pay attention to what goes on in my own back yard (the United States). I have to support women's efforts elsewhere to free themselves.
may be triggering /edit 3
UK Times Online
May 05, 2005
I’ll marry her if I can go free, says rapist who gouged out victim’s eye
From Catherine Philp in Delhi
THE young nurse should have spent yesterday quietly celebrating the sentencing of the hospital auxiliary who had raped her and gouged out one of her eyes before leaving her for dead. Instead she was hauled before a Delhi court to answer the defendant’s proposal that he marry her to save her from dishonour — and escape his punishment.
Minutes before the court was to hand down its sentence to Bhura, the convicted man, his lawyer intervened to present his astonishing offer. “In order to save the life of the victim as well as both the families, the convict, from the core of his heart without prejudice to the merit of the case, is ready to marry her,” he told the court. Bhura, who uses one name like many Indians, was prepared to bear the cost of the wedding and accept the woman without a dowry. The court agreed to suspend sentencing and called for the woman — and her parents — to attend the next day to give her answer. The decision, which caused widespread outrage, is proving to be a large embarrassment for the Indian judiciary, which stands accused of putting medieval attitudes towards women above justice.
The case was already well-known in India because of its brutality. The nurse, then 19, was sleeping by the bedside of a comatose patient in Shanti Mukund hospital when the auxiliary attacked. As she tried to force him off, he plunged his fingers into her eyes, gouging out the right one and damaging the left. He dragged her to a bathroom where he raped her, locked her in and left her for dead. She has since been treated for depression and undergone four operations but has never recovered the sight in her right eye.
After hearing the court’s decision she said: “It is like being raped for a second time. I would rather die than marry him. He should be hanged so that such a horrendous act is not repeated.”
She arrived at court yesterday flanked by scores of activists lending their support.
“This is subversion of justice and most insulting and demeaning for the victim,” Brinda Karat, the president of the All India Democratic Women’s Association, said. “The work of the court which has found this man guilty is to convict him and not act as a marriage bureau.”
The court imposed two life sentences on the convicted man but only after the woman rejected his proposal and expressed her outrage. “After he was found guilty, he is trying to escape punishment with the bogus offer,” she told the court.
He did not succeed but others have. Rape carries such a stigma in India that few men will countenance marrying a rape victim and in several cases, families have pressured raped daughters into marrying their assailants in order to avoid dishonour, even after conviction. In one case, police refused to take details of a rape until they had tried to persuade the parents to marry the victim to her assailant. In another, the marriage took place in the courtroom after the victim’s parents demanded it.
Activists said yesterday they feared the case might encourage other rapists to pressure victims into marriage to avoid punishment. Madhu Kishwar, editor of Manushi, a women’s affairs magazine, said. “The court should have instead given the accused five more years for suggesting such a thing.”
HONOUR AND OBEY
January 2004: A 50-year-old former Assam state minister forces his maidservant to become his second wife to forestall a rape case against him. He had raped her when she was 12 and married her after DNA tests proved he was the father of her child.
August 2004: A woman judge in Delhi orders the release from jail of Karan Singh, accused of raping a mentally disabled teenager, after he agreed to marry her. The judge said his offer proved he had repented.
March 2005: A courtroom in Orissa is turned into a marriage hall when the parents of a 22-year-old rape victim force her alleged assailant to marry her in exchange for withdrawing the case.
feminist. It has recently taken a turn for the worse. At least, it seems to be much more highly regulated with lots of slaps on the hand by mods - for some people, while other people can throw off backhand insults and get chuckled at. There also seems to be less discussion and more reactionary commentary going on: "OMG! That's so horrible!" I never would have been able to get away with just saying that in one of my old women's studies courses. I'm getting constantly jumped on because I keep posting about what's happening to women in other countries. Like an article that talked about how Kuwait had again voted not to give women the right to vote or hold office. Or the article below. Now, the original cut had been right after the first paragraph of the article and I assumed that the title alone would indicate that the information within the article could be triggering. (For those of you not in the know, triggering is another phrase for flashbacks of a traumatic event.) Most recently, someone had posted an article (I believe in the NY Times but I am not sure) about how women in one of the "stahns" were being abducted by men to force them to marry them. This is a tradition that is still supported by parents of men and women in the area, though the practice is falling out of favor and has been disliked by many for some time. Whatever the case may be, I am feeling more and more restricted by what I can say in this forum and it has decreased my participation and enjoyment of the community itself. The funny thing is is that some of the mods have also (whined) commented about people going back to their personal blogs and bitching about stuff that goes on their. Uh, personal blogs are there for people to make statements about their lives. There is no rule anywhere that says you can't bitch about shit in your own personal blog. Jeez.
Regardless, the following is my much modified post, transplanted here because I have a feeling it is going to get sacked over on their site. Am I being overly callous in my assessment of this situation?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I recall that someone posted earlier about kidnapping being used to force women to marry their abductors, and this reminded me of that.
Edit 3:
My main point in posting this is not to horrify you with what happened, but to point out that there are large groups of women protesting traditions that are harmful to them and their equal place in their culture. I took a Global Feminism class a couple of years ago and I came to the realization that I can't just pay attention to what goes on in my own back yard (the United States). I have to support women's efforts elsewhere to free themselves.
may be triggering /edit 3
UK Times Online
May 05, 2005
I’ll marry her if I can go free, says rapist who gouged out victim’s eye
From Catherine Philp in Delhi
THE young nurse should have spent yesterday quietly celebrating the sentencing of the hospital auxiliary who had raped her and gouged out one of her eyes before leaving her for dead. Instead she was hauled before a Delhi court to answer the defendant’s proposal that he marry her to save her from dishonour — and escape his punishment.
Minutes before the court was to hand down its sentence to Bhura, the convicted man, his lawyer intervened to present his astonishing offer. “In order to save the life of the victim as well as both the families, the convict, from the core of his heart without prejudice to the merit of the case, is ready to marry her,” he told the court. Bhura, who uses one name like many Indians, was prepared to bear the cost of the wedding and accept the woman without a dowry. The court agreed to suspend sentencing and called for the woman — and her parents — to attend the next day to give her answer. The decision, which caused widespread outrage, is proving to be a large embarrassment for the Indian judiciary, which stands accused of putting medieval attitudes towards women above justice.
The case was already well-known in India because of its brutality. The nurse, then 19, was sleeping by the bedside of a comatose patient in Shanti Mukund hospital when the auxiliary attacked. As she tried to force him off, he plunged his fingers into her eyes, gouging out the right one and damaging the left. He dragged her to a bathroom where he raped her, locked her in and left her for dead. She has since been treated for depression and undergone four operations but has never recovered the sight in her right eye.
After hearing the court’s decision she said: “It is like being raped for a second time. I would rather die than marry him. He should be hanged so that such a horrendous act is not repeated.”
She arrived at court yesterday flanked by scores of activists lending their support.
“This is subversion of justice and most insulting and demeaning for the victim,” Brinda Karat, the president of the All India Democratic Women’s Association, said. “The work of the court which has found this man guilty is to convict him and not act as a marriage bureau.”
The court imposed two life sentences on the convicted man but only after the woman rejected his proposal and expressed her outrage. “After he was found guilty, he is trying to escape punishment with the bogus offer,” she told the court.
He did not succeed but others have. Rape carries such a stigma in India that few men will countenance marrying a rape victim and in several cases, families have pressured raped daughters into marrying their assailants in order to avoid dishonour, even after conviction. In one case, police refused to take details of a rape until they had tried to persuade the parents to marry the victim to her assailant. In another, the marriage took place in the courtroom after the victim’s parents demanded it.
Activists said yesterday they feared the case might encourage other rapists to pressure victims into marriage to avoid punishment. Madhu Kishwar, editor of Manushi, a women’s affairs magazine, said. “The court should have instead given the accused five more years for suggesting such a thing.”
HONOUR AND OBEY
January 2004: A 50-year-old former Assam state minister forces his maidservant to become his second wife to forestall a rape case against him. He had raped her when she was 12 and married her after DNA tests proved he was the father of her child.
August 2004: A woman judge in Delhi orders the release from jail of Karan Singh, accused of raping a mentally disabled teenager, after he agreed to marry her. The judge said his offer proved he had repented.
March 2005: A courtroom in Orissa is turned into a marriage hall when the parents of a 22-year-old rape victim force her alleged assailant to marry her in exchange for withdrawing the case.
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an expat Feminist community memeber
Date: 2005-05-06 11:59 pm (UTC)I totally agree. I was one of the people who could never say anything right. So I got myself banned. The new mods are insane. especially grrangela (?) she seems to have it out for you on that post like she had it out for me a month or two back.
And no one seems to care about other countries - just about make-up here.
Re: an expat Feminist community memeber
Date: 2005-05-07 11:38 am (UTC)They are veering into the world of censorship where they only want to talk about their own personal issues. It has also turned into something where they are blind to their OWN priviledged situations. Ohhh, I am being forced to wear make-up by the patriarchal system... ooohhh, Hypocrites.
Re: an expat Feminist community memeber
Date: 2005-05-07 02:35 pm (UTC)And ironically - the post right before that post was posted by me and was about Race, Gender, and Education and racial and gender inequalities (where a real conversation about privelage might apply) and no one read it or commented on it - until I took away the LJ-cut about three days after I posted it.
Strange.
Re: an expat Feminist community memeber
Date: 2005-05-07 05:47 pm (UTC)and another thing - your post was about racial inequalities and that's not an issue that they want to discuss... it doesn't pertain to them personally. plus there is the lj cut thing - some people (okay most people) think that the only time we should cut is for content, not for length. GAH!
I wish there was another alternative forum where these folks don't hold the reigns, maybe an "international_feminist_issues" community or something where we can discuss stuff. ::sigh::