women's rights vs indigenous rites

So you have no problem with countries that do not allow women to vote?

Do you know what Sati is? It is a hindu custom where the widow is burnt alive on her husbands funeral pyre.

What about women who are stoned to death in Iran for adultery?

I really dont see how anyone could justify these acts(and there are far, far more). They are barbaric, they are brutal and they have no place in this world. Why is it insensitive to condemn these things?

 

It was banned a long time ago.

 

Some people take wearing clothes as against their morals, what can you say about morals when the "moral standings" themselves are so ridiculously degenerate. Also, one set thing does not apply to all circumstances, you may believe n equality but when it comes to child bearing , can you conceive? Similarly, when doing physically demanding tasks and you have two choices a short, thin woman and a big muscular man, who would you pick to do carry big loads? would you give them both the same amount to carry? The conclusion of this would be that both genders cannot be treated equally at all times, saying "anything less of equal treatment" is simplifying it, because it does not always apply.

 

Sati may have been banned, but it is still "culturally" acceptable in many places.

I still go back to slavery. Any culture can gussy up slavery and try to make it sound not bad. In the USA, Masters used to say their slaves where "like my own children." And it was said that the American economy would collapse without it. Many things are said to make wrong practices sound less than awful. There is nothing nice, pleasant or good about even the "lightest" form of FGM. Almost all forms destroy the clitoris, a procedure which although often done BY other womyn, was forced by some of the men, so that womyn wouldn't enjoy sex enough to "stray." Damn, being good in bed, and being NICE to your womyn keeps her from "straying" not cutting off her clit and saying "well, it's not that bad, at least we didn't sew up her vagina." Sheesh. How bad would just cutting it OFF be? Pretty bad. I'm sorry, but you CAN'T make FGM or MFM look or sound good.

 

The point isn't whether they choose it often. The point is that any culture deserves to have their cultural heritage open to them.

It isn't as if they just enjoy cutting off clits. Its an age old passage into womanhood.

 

spooner: I don't care. If a culture violates human rights then i dont think that aspect of cultural heritage needs to remain in tact. Human rights trump cultural rights everytime.


Jedi: Equality under the law, not equality in ability. I am sure you can figure out what the difference is.

 

Which is just another example of why popular Western attitudes of "well just ban it" are pointless. Legislation does little to improve the situation on the ground. If you want to change the practice, you have to get in there, understand WHY people willingly participate (including women who choose to go on the pyre because life as a widow sounds worse, based on the social ostracism, etc.). Then, you have to work on the reasons behind it -- provide some center to support these abandoned widows, protect them from retribution from those who may see this as dishonoring the family, etc.

Frankly, one of my big problems with feminist activism in terms of women's/human rights in other cultures is that they are excessively simplistic (yes, that is a bad thing if you want any beneficial change). Things are far more complex than "this is bad, m'kay".

The comparison to Moroccan slavery was based on actual ethnographic observance, including talking in a protected setting with former slaves. There is likely a huge difference between what a Master and a Slave will say in many cases... Though, there were cases even in the US where a slave managed to gain a position of prominence above his fellow slaves, so would not have likely complained as much as the lowly field hands would. It's a very complex issue.

But, even in the US, without adequate social support networks, many former slaves wound up in pretty much the same situation -- getting wages that barely cover room & board, still no vote, still with legal segregation, so their life situation didn't really change much.

I'm not suggesting that anyone not care for human rights. But I am saying that the situation on the ground, including the harms vs. benefits equation that keeps the subjugated from rebelling, is far more complex than most activists in the US bother to ever address (I wonder how many even realize this). Focusing on the practice itself does no good -- you have to understand the reasoning behind it, be it social, religious, political, economic, etc., and deal with that. At the same time, you have to look at what benefits, in terms of subsistence security, social networking, etc., that the practice provides even the lowliest subjugated person and work to replace those beneifts with other support systems.

Actually, I read an article written by a woman who was educated in the US but was from a village where they practice the middle form -- removal of clit and lips. She willingly returned to her village to have the procedure done and interviewed women about their views of the practice. She reported that, in her own experience and those reported to her, sexual pleasure was not diminished. She explained the cultural logic of both male and female circumcision -- removing the outer, "male" genitalia from women, making them unambiguously female, and removing the sheath from males that hides their penis like a "female" innie, making them unambiguously male. Nobody that she talked to reported it as being even vaguely related to controlling women to keep them from straying. And, remember, this is not some white anthropologist, this is a native African woman in her own natal region talking to cousins and neighbors.

As for the male role in supporting this -- I would assume it varies from place to place. However, this is another simplification Western feminists like to make -- if women don't have outward power, they must have no power. In many cultures around the world, the wife or sister may have little or no influence, but the mother reigns supreme over her children. The ethnographic evidence I've read about this practice does not support your claim that the procedure was forced by men. The accounts I've read show that the procedure was forced by elder female relatives so that a man's mother would allow him to marry her. Again, the mother, not the man involved, insists upon it.

 

Just because it is a person's right to not have something done doesn't mean they can't waive that right by choice.

 

On the menstruating thing... my own religion discourages menstruating women from entering a temple or being in formal religious ceremony. It's not because menstruation is dirty or wrong, but that blood attracts nasty things (in a spiritual sense). Men who are bleeding and people with certain types of illnesses are discouraged from ceremony, too. Compared to some religions which aren't menstrual-phobic, my religion is downright feminist.

I have a huge problem with people "treating" children in order to normalize them. In any culture. In the US that includes sex reassignment surgery for intersexed children, circumcision, and certain psychological treatments. In other countries, that includes FGM, foot binding, and all that other good stuff. You are mutilating people who have no way to defend themselves and usually aren't even old enough to have been educated about the consequences. Taking away the harmful parts of a society will not destroy that society's culture, it will make that culture a valuable thing for -everyone- instead of only a few.

I don't think "taking away" has to be the same as outright banning a practice. I know a person in the US who wanted a procedure which, for her doctors, was far too close to FGM to allow. But if it's her choice, why on earth should it be discouraged? Choice goes both ways, so just as it should be a person's choice what isn't done to their bodies, it should also be their choice what -is.-

 

If a woman wants to mutilate herself when she's of consenting age, by all means, let her have at it. We let people mutilate themselves in this country all the time.

This is just ONE issue. Things like stoning to death for adultery, women who are forced to marry to appease family disputes, etc. I dont think these are things we should tolerate. Yes, just 'banning' it does little good. You need to educate them about human rights to truly change culture.

 

I never once argued for stoning people to death. I merely said that if a consenting adult wants to continue a cultural tradition in Canada (ie: FGM) she has every right to.

 

fair enough, i agree.


Here is another example, probably more towards what the op was asking.

In New Zealand, Maori often perform a 'powhiri' to welcome guests. In most instances, women have to sit at the back and are not allowed to speak. It has caused problems recently....a politician complained that she had to sit behind men even though she was an honored guest at a school. Another woman refused to sit in the back at a ceremony that took place at HER work. Not only did she have to sit behind men, she had to sit behind inmates. She was verbally attacked by not only Maori but by her superiors as being disrespectful. When she went to the media about her mistreatment, she was suspended from her job. Her employer has since changed the rules after a public outcry. However, thats only at that place.

I have no problem with these protocols when they take place on private property. If you don't like it, dont go. However, once it comes onto state property then the rules of equality must be followed.

In my mind, it is very much akin to blacks sitting at the back of the bus. It's segregation in the name of culture...

 

Huh? do you have any reports or statistics supporting this? The real fact is that Sati was practiced in 1800s in India, and it as banned by the British when they were ruling it. Your statement about Sati is equivalent to saying "slavery is culturally accepted in America". In modern India, it is ancient history, now I don't know how much you know, but from what Ive known, it is accepted only in Indian scriptures. For example, the King Pandu's second wife in mahabharat sits and burns at his pyre in Mahabharat...and there are other instances in Indian scriptures projecting the idea of "Pativrata shiromani" attitudes - the "devoted wife who views her husband as her God" attitude.
If you think killing of babies as sati, No, it is not sati sorry, it is entirely different. And If you think killing of babies is culturally accepted in India , you are wrong again, it is accepted through desperation. It is not a cultural practice in India to kill girl children, but because of poverty, the people living in rural places want a boy so that they can use him to work for them, than a girl , who has to be "protected" . The girl is viewed as a nuisance in the rural places because you have to take care of her until she gets married and then she leaves, she does not stay with you like the son usually does.

 

the most recent was 1988 i believe.

But please, lets not get caught up in the semantics and forget about the substance. Rights of humans' are abused based on culture all the time. I'm sorry for bringing up that example, but it is an extreme example.

 

The bus thing came to my mind too.

I agree if it's private property then follow the traditions. However, if a woman is invited as an honoured guest than she should be treated as such, there should be allowances made for her to sit in the front.

About menstruation and temples, to be honest if I was in that situation i'm sorry to say but i'd probly just go in.

 

Show me the article. You can't just claim things. I can claim that the traces of slavery still exist. Rich American business owners buy latino boys and girls and raise them as their slaves. But such things can do nothing but create anger... thats about it. So always try to back it up.

 

Recent incidence

Sati still occurs occasionally, mostly in rural areas. About 40 cases have occurred in India since independence in 1947, the majority in the Shekhawati region of Rajasthan. The last clearly documented case was that of Roop Kanwar. However there are claims that other more recent deaths have also been cases of Sati.

Roop Kanwar, a childless 19-year old widow, committed Sati in 1988, some allege forcibly, dressed in her red wedding dress, in Rajasthan's Deorala village. Several thousand people were said to have been at the event. The event quickly turned into a national case of outrage, pitting a modern Indian ideology against a traditional one. A much-publicised investigation led to the arrest of a large number of people from Deorala, said to have been present in the ceremony, or participants in it. Eventually, 11 people were charged. On January 31, 2004, a special court in Jaipur acquitted all of the 11 accused in the case, observing that the prosecution had failed to prove charges that they glorified Sati.





from wikipedia.