NEWS FLASH

Link to Article: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/11/world/asia/11shelter.html?_r=1

News Flash #1: Afghanistan Women’s Shelters

These shelters create problems in families and homes, and they motivate girls to flee from their houses.

This quote comes from Hajji Neyaz Mohammed, a lawmaker in the Ghazni Province of Afghanistan in reference to potential new laws that would place control of women’s shelters into the hands of the Government. It strikes me as ironic that this lawmaker sees the problem being that women will be lured from their homes rather than considering why these women are so unhappy that they wish to run away from home. The article in New York Times by Alissa Rubin details the harrowing journey of starvation and homelessness that eighteen year old Sabra endured after she ran away from home. She left home because she was terrified at the prospect of being forced to marry a fifty two year-old man who already had five children. Her story certainly does not make it seem like leaving home would be a decision that any women in Afghanistan would take lightly. It is an endeavor that only the most desperate of situations would inspire a woman to undertake. Desperate situations are something that many women, especially in rural areas of Afghanistan, encounter throughout their lifetime. Example of these hardships includes arranged marriages for child brides, public punishments and mutilation of women. This article serves as a reminder that many women do not have to privileges that we often take for granted since the second wave of feminism. With the threat of losing control of these safety havens for abused women in Afghanistan it is clear why we need to fight against embedded feminism and how those of us living in the third wave of feminism need to help.

By placing these shelters under control of the Government I am reminded of the dangers of patriarchy for everyone in a society. While I am well aware that in the United States we still live within a patriarchal society, seeing a society even further under the control of men reminds me why it is important that we do not feed into the cycle of patriarchy. Jonah Gokova discussed in his article, “Challenging Men to Reject Gender Stereotypes” the way in which a patriarchy punishes not only women, but also the men within a society. This is evident in the struggles that are taking place in Afghanistan, where the oppression of women can tear families apart. If a woman rejects pressure from her family to marry a certain man and she runs away from her family, then she immediately becomes an outcast from society. From then on if she is ever reunited with her family, they experience overwhelming pressure from society to severely punish her or kill her for her revolt. This oppression of women hurts the men who are shamed by the rejection, the women who are then rejected by society, as well as the family who can be expected to take their own child’s life. In this situation there is no one who benefits from the pressure a patriarchal society puts on its members.

Even if it is obvious to those involved in a patriarchal society, such as Afghanistan that almost everyone is being hurt, the most difficult aspect is that patriarchy is a cycle. In his article, “Patriarchy, the System: An it, Not a He, a Them, or an Us”, Johnson discuss the way in which individuals feed into the system of a patriarchy and how that makes it difficult to escape. A system becomes so embedded within a society that even when people do choose to fight the system it can be almost impossible. An example of this is the proposed eight-member Government panel, which would be put in place by these new laws to serve as a judgment committee to decide on women’s cases. One of the issues that I see with this proposal is that the Government in Afghanistan is certainly subject to the pressures of patriarchy and is a male dominated body. This creates a situation where women are forced to bring their complaints against their oppressors in front of a group of more oppressors. Once again the cycle of patriarchy perpetuates itself and when women try to fight their battles within the limits of the law they become trapped. As a member of a country that does seem to have reached the third wave of feminism, it is important to examine how we feed into this system and how we can fight it.

As the world becomes more global rather than individual countries one of the ways that communication crosses boarders is through the media. In this article one of the main issues that men in powerful positions of the Afghani Government had with these shelters for abused women was the amount of negative media attention that they drew. They talked about the ways these shelters perpetuate an image that women throughout the entirety of Afghanistan are abused and they referenced in particular the case of Bibi Aisha. She was a child bride who was featured on the cover of Time magazine, whose husband cut off her nose after she attempted to run away from home. This public display of violence committed by men upon women stands in stark contrast with Douglas’ chapter on the media obsession with violence women commit against men. This discrepancy seems like an intersection between racism and sexism. The American media has no problem displaying Afghani men as monsters who regularly commit domestic violence, but embedded feminism in America tells us that we have progressed past that place. Afghanistan is portrayed as a backward place that needs America to come along and drag it into the third wave of feminism. The truth is that there are plenty of horrific instances of domestic abuse of women that take place within the United States and yet is ignored by the media. The media may think that they are doing Afghani women a favor by showing their battle, but in reality it only puts Afghani society on the defensive. The best possible thing that the American media could do would be to provide equal attention to the violence occurring in both culture and acknowledge that we all still have a long way to go.

Reading an article like this reminds me how lucky I have been throughout my life, while reminding me of the importance of continuing the fight against sexism. While some of the third wave arguments may seem trivial compared to the plight of these women, it is important to not settle back and give up the fight. With a never ending cycle of patriarchy it would be easy to lose the progress that we have made, especially when this kind of oppression still exists. It is necessary that we keep fighting our own battles in the United States, but it is also essential that we stay educated about what is happening around the world. This reminds me of a sentiment that Audre Lorde expressed in “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House”. She expressed her frustration that white women claim that they did not invite more black women to speak because they did not know who to ask. Lorde argued that part of the responsibility of being a feminist is understanding all the arguments not just those that affect you individually. If one is not aware of all the issues then they are at risk of committing the same act of oppression that their oppressors do.