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ENIGMA OF WOMEN'S LIBERATION IN THE 21ST CENTURY - BY: Nerjis Kazmi & Najeeb Kazmi |
The subject of talk this evening has probably been selected, as an acknowledgement of the fact that women have, in general, been a target of discrimination, through ages. This is particularly true within the perspective of South Asian and Middle Eastern societies. The process of systematic apartheid against women, under the garb and cover of religious jurisprudence, which has been going on since many hundreds of years, still continues, most blatantly, in our societies. It is pathetic that majority of women in our societies are not even aware of their basic rights and the ones who dared to raise the voice of dissent and who tried to advocate the principle of equality, have quite often been brutalized and even killed, many a times by their own tribes and “loved ones”. The most sorrowful fact is that, woman, in our societies is considered a commodity and practical manifestation of this fact is embedded in all spheres of our life. This perception has to be changed. Canadians, this year celebrated International Women’s Day on March 8, 2004. We dedicate our words and actions to this noble cause for which all of us gather here, tonight. Contrary to whatever lip service we may do, women are still considered as “half being” and this fact is legitimized by quoting words from the Holy Scriptures. This is not directed towards any religion in particular, but is true about all the three big religions of the world. The only difference is that while others are willing and ready to do a realistic interpretation of Holy Scriptures, while we, the Muslims, are still drenched in the fallout of the past and insist on living in the past. At present, women throughout our region are denied their full legal identities by due to unjust laws, discriminatory constitutions, and biased mentalities that do not recognize women as equal citizens. Looking at history, all religions have resisted women's rights, secularism, modernism and human values. Dramatic differences between Eastern and Western societies emerged in the 19th and 20th centuries. Economic and social changes along with the impact of Western culture brought about forces within Middle Eastern societies favoring changes in the condition of women. Exposure of Middle Eastern societies to enlightened political thought and ideas, however, did little to dismantle misconceived Islamic laws and their backward social institutions oppressive to women. Changes in interpretations of the so-called Islamic law pertaining to women have met with considerable resistance. Fundamentalists see modern values such as women's rights as a Western conspiracy accompanying the political and economic offensive, and as a cultural reaction they turn to their own medieval tribal traditions. Life is all about partnership between men and women and both have to lead their lives in unison with each other, for a healthy and harmonious society. Life is not about operating in ones own individual circles, with limited or no interface. In our societies, while we have a lot of passion for enjoying the fruits of technological innovations of the developed societies, we are still not to dismantle the old order of gender apartheid. The defence mechanism of our men folk is tuned in a similar fashion. Women, in our societies, consider ‘compromise” as the best virtue she can possess. While the Western societies can also not be considered as free of all bias, these societies, as a minimum, consider and acknowledge the phenomenon of change and adjustment as the only permanent thing in their social and political lives. They recognize the importance of a constant adjustment in the norms of the society, irrespective of what any religion or dogma may assert. Whenever we do a critical study of ancient world history, it is documented and we see that in the so called “matriarchal” societies of the past, where women used to be the tribal chiefs, they did not make and practice any law which aimed to control the destiny of men, in general. There was peace and harmony between both genders. Troubles started to brew when men took control of the societies and imposed discriminatory laws aimed at domination and gender apartheid. Thanks to the involvement of religions in the state affairs, which acted as catalysts to perpetuate, legitimize and regulate male domination, but with a spiritual sugar coating over a rotten core. Politicization of religion is a major issue that has imposed serious setbacks on women's lives in the region, in the recent decades. It has become a political movement that goes against secular and progressive movements for liberation, cultural and intellectual advances, and against the oppressed who are fighting for justice, freedom and equality in the region. In the 1970s, the political Islamic movements grew stronger and became more widespread. In the 1980s, the movement was supported and nurtured by Western governments to be used in the conflicts and tensions of the Cold War. Key features of political Islam include opposition to the freedom of women and to women's civil liberties, and to freedom of expression in the cultural and personal domains, the enforcement of brutal laws and traditions, not to mention killing, beheading, and genocide. In Iran, Sudan, Pakistan and Afghanistan under the Taliban, Islamic regimes proceeded to transform the countries, and particularly women's homes into prison houses, where the confinement of women, their exclusion from many fields of work and education and their brutal treatment became the law of the land. Very often, state is used to strengthen tribal control over women, making them even more dependant on these institutions. Unlike in the West, where the individual is the basic unit of the state, it is the family that is the basis of Arab states. This means that the state is primarily concerned with the protection of the family rather than the protection of the individual family's members. Within this framework, the rights of women are expressed solely in their roles as wives and mothers. State discrimination against women in the family is expressed through unjust family laws that deny women equality in divorce and child custody, access to education, healthcare, land ownership and inheritance. If the law is designed to protect women only within their role in the family, it will fail to protect women who are in need of protection from their families. By failing to protect women from violence such as domestic abuse, rape, marital rape, and honour killings, the state fails to provide the needed protection. Family laws based on the misconceived version of Islamic Shari'a frequently require women to obtain a male relative's permission to undertake activities that should be theirs by right. This increase the dependency women have on their male family members in economic, social, and legal matters. For example, in many Arab countries adult women must obtain the permission of their fathers, brothers or husbands in order to attain a passport, travel outside of their country, start a business, receive a bank loan, open a bank account, or even get married. Mentioning South
Asian scenario, there is a disproportionate share of deprivation that is borne
by women. In addition, there are gender-discriminatory practices in the legal,
economic, political and social spheres primarily due to the effects of
oppressive patriarchal systems on women's lives. Data bring to light the fact
that although the average South Asian woman works exceedingly hard, her economic
contribution is barely acknowledged at national levels and her access to health,
education and other basic human rights lags far behind that of men. These
discrepancies are blatantly obvious from a variety of statistics. South Asia has
both the lowest literacy rates and the largest gap between the rates of male and
female literacy. While South Asian women make up about 21 per cent of the
world's female population, 44 per cent of the world's illiterate women are south
Asian. Discrimination against women often begins before birth. Practices such as
neglect of health and gender biased feeding practices combined with heavy work
burdens and other social disadvantages cancel out the biological advantages that
women enjoy over men in other developing and developed countries. At 940 females
for every 1000 males, South Asia has one of the most distorted and alarming
gender ratios in the world. In Pakistan, to this very day, massive human rights abuses are being committed under the vicious immoral practice known to us as karo-kari, which wrongfully translates into the term 'honour killings'. On September 9, a press report in a Pakistani daily, “The Nation”reported that in the first eight months of 2003, 631 women and girls fell victim to 'honour killings', six of them minors, were ritualistically butchered, some hacked to pieces. Almost all of the crimes have gone unpunished. A little rumor mongering is enough to provoke lethal violence. Women are not even given a chance to clear up possible misunderstandings. Tradition decrees only one method to restore honour - to kill the allegedly offending woman. Standards of honour and chastity are not equally applied to men and women in Pakistan and many other South Asian, Middle Eastern and Muslim countries. Honour killing of women have no real basis in religion but are encouraged by the rise of religious fundamentalism and in this patriarchal society women, helpless under the law and under social mores, are naturally the prime victims. Cases of karo-kari cannot be stopped unless the state immediately bans the jirga system, which is the prime protector of the karo-kari tradition .... The government and state machinery are natural allies of the feudals and the feudals are the upholders of karo-kari. Women and girls continue to be subjected to abuses in the home, the community and in the custody of the state. Hundreds of women have been killed in so-called 'honour killings. The State of Pakistan is impotent and is too busy these days in its “Bush-o-phobia” and the so-called “war on terror”. Women of the
State of Pakistan are under the draconian Qisas and Diyat law and the inhumane
and shameful Hudood Ordinances. The Zina ordinance is probably the most brutal
of the lot and the most discriminatory. It is practiced not only against women,
but also against non-Muslims as their individual testimony is also disallowed
under the law. Having said all this, the question is what is to be done? This question is not very difficult, but the answers have many facets, and are either like a jigsaw puzzle or have, over a long period of time transformed into a matrix of ignorance. Every individual appear to have a recipe, but as yet an acceptable solution to the problem is a pipe dream………but we have to start somewhere. Personally, I am an optimist by nature and believe that there is a solution to every problem being faced by women and men, or the society in general. I call it a positive development that, for the first time in the whole history of Islam and Muslims, issues such as veil, polygamy, equality, child custody, divorce, segregation and many other issues are being discussed openly in the Middle Eastern and Muslim societies. Public and independent struggle for women's rights will intensify and become further widespread in the 21st century. Modernization of thought has, indeed, improved women's position generally, but we all know that the success of any reform is tied to economic and social changes. Generally, we can say that the process of change has begun, and nothing can stop this peaceful transformation, now. Given that there is an intrinsic animosity of religion towards equality between the sexes and women's rights and their role in society, how can the condition of women in these societies be improved?. One of the most important answers is to get rid of political Islam as a precondition to any improvements in the status of women. Even if you may like to call it Islamic, the existing social system is based on retardation and backwardness, and women will have no cause to regret its demise. The 21st Century must be the century that rids itself of political Islam. The preamble of this chapter has already begun in Iran. The most hopeful signs and the most remarkable stimulus for change continue to come directly from Iranian women both in Iran and in exile. In Iran, women presented the first and the most effective challenge to the Islamic regime by courageously questioning the right of Islamic authority to define the conditions of their lives. The second most important answer to the question of Middle Eastern and South Asian women's liberation is secularism and the establishment of egalitarian political systems in the region. Secularism has been and continues to be a pre-requisite for women's liberation. Finally, last but not the least, if we look at the objective of reforming and modernizing religion. Is this a worthwhile objective? Why should religion be modernized? If we say that slavery, fascism or patriarchy can become humane and be modernized, someone could ver well argue that why these should not be abandoned altogether. The objectives of those who want to modernize religion are far more limited. It is not the modernism that the women and men, equally deserve, as this will only prolongs the age-old oppression and subordination of women in religion-stricken societies. Rather than modernizing religion, it must be caged, just as humanity caged Christianity two centuries ago. Religion must become subordinate to secularism and the secular pluralistic state. In the end, I would like to thank you for patiently listening to our opinion. You have the right to differ with us, but I can say with surety that whatever has been said, is in good faith and with complete honesty. Please do give it a second thought. If someone wishes to aid the helpless abused women of the blighted nation called Pakistan, they can contact the brave volunteer women of the Aurat Foundation (aurat@khi.compol.net), who are far more active and effective than Pakistani government or assemblies, who are primarily a part of the problem and not the solution. Thank you. |
Dear
Friends,
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