My goodness, how desperate are these young women?
Although Afghan women have attained greater freedoms since Western soldiers first arrived in their country in 2001, one imprint of the restrictions placed on women under Taliban rule remains: forced marriages. Now brides who find themselves in these hellish arrangements are resorting to a disturbing method of escape—they’re burning themselves to death. Earlier this month, it was reported that the Herat Regional Hospital burns unit in western Afghanistan had handled 51 cases of female self-immolation between January and July of this year. Of those cases, 38 patients succumbed to their wounds.
The doctor in charge of the burns unit, Mohamed Aref Jalali, said that the practice comes from Iran, which has one of the highest rates of self-immolation in the world, especially among Kurds living in rural areas along the border. Many Afghan refugees adopted the custom when they fled there during the decade-long war with the Soviet Union that ended in 1989, and continued it when they returned home in the 1990s. The popularity of burning oneself to death has since grown among poor, uneducated Afghan women who live in areas where young girls are traditionally forced into marriage.
Afghan laws stipulate that girls under the age of 16 should not be married, but an astonishing 60 per cent are forced into marriages when they are children anyway. Choosing death over marriage is a result of the stark daily routine of Afghan women: many are treated like slaves, kept inside and ordered to cook and clean, while others are repeatedly beaten or raped.
I have no idea what to do to help, but I’ll say this: As long as we continue to pretend that all cultures are equally valid, we will never get rid of that problem.
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In answer to your conclusion. You can not do anything to help. For a Muslim that lives what the Qur`an teaches they have but one quest in life. Make us all Muslims like themselves or eliminate us. There is no in between or negotiable parts to it. Their sole purpose in life is to have Islam rule the world and that lifestyle is their world. To a Muslim man a woman is no more than a possession like a slave of species of cattle. To a Muslim woman she accepts it as her fate given to her by Allah. If she deviates from it she will be stoned whipped or whatever to appease the honour of her husband that she more than likely married when she was from 7 to 12 years old.
Perhaps the Status of Women can help, cuz, like they care so much about “women in Canada and abroad” and stuff, and they are so concerned about really pressing issues like access to abortion and pay equity.
The subject of your post is truly horrifying. You are correct: all cultures are NOT equal.