I am puzzled by the reaction to this post.

First, the description of the programme was in fact almost verbatim as it appeared in the "Australian" newspaper Media section ( - this being the only national circulation quality daily newspaper in Oz). Indeed the Sydney Morning Herald review was to similar effect. No doubt quality US (and Canadian) newspapers have or will have reviews or commentaries in similar vein, assuming it is shown or has been shown there.

Secondly, honour killings are a phenomenon of which I was only very vaguely aware. It seems that others on the Board are/were in a similar position. Is ignorance preferable here? No doubt the several thousand women who suffer this fate (or similar) every year feel not a little offended by the practice too, and no doubt they would prefer such ignorance. I know people who just cover their ears when Amnesty International tells them what may be going on in other countries.


A key and crucial aspect of the programme is that the perpetrators are poor, ignorant and ill-educated. These events don't happen in rich, suburban Karachi. If "civilised" western countries are to help them be stopped or at least diminished in frequency, it is necessary for us to know that they happen.

The ostensible reason why the husband treated her thus doesn't really matter. (In one case the man did it for the reason that his wife spoke to another man, for example.)

The point about the programme was the extraordinary tenacity and inner strength of the woman. (In an unprecedented legal development, she and her brother pursued and secured prosecution of and a 14 year gaol sentence for the man.) It was a remarkable testament to her inner strength, and extraordinarily inspiring, that she otherwise just got on with her life, quietly bringing up her children as before. The programme is harrowing, but there is violence depicted, only the end-product of it. I was very uplifted and moved by it and the woman radiates peace and calm and exemplifies the indomitability and everything else that is finest about the human spirit.

We're big boys and girls on this Board. Life is not always pleasant. I felt that anatomical details about internal examinations in the recent "squamous" thread were more information than I needed to know, but I would never ever dream of trying to censor someone's right to make such an observation - one just shrugs and moves on.

I am specifically not making a religious point here, as the programme emphasises that honour killings are NOT condoned by Islam; nor are they confined to Pakistan, though this is where they take place most frequently.

In my experience marking a post in red and flagging that it contains strong graphic violence is an invitation to the wrong people to read the post, and for the wrong reasons.
jj

"For evil to flourish it is necessary only that good men do nothing."