Monday, September 04, 2006

UK: 1 in 10 "Asians" Support Honour Killings.

The BBC has published some results of a survey into the practice of honour killings in the UK. Let’s face it; we can’t expect any reliable information from the BBC since they are a bunch of biased liars so if they say 1 in 10 you can expect the real figure to be higher. But it is interesting none the less.

For those that are new to the concept of honour killing, it is the practice of murdering, usually a family member and usually a woman, for insulting the honour of the family. The insult may be the way she dresses, the person she falls in love with, the career she chooses, being disrespectful, avoiding her religion or any number of other “crimes” that the rest of us consider to be basic human freedoms.

Honour killings are not rare, even in the western world. Many are covered up as suicides and the police themselves, who cite 12 per year in the UK, have at times also suggested that the real figure may be much higher. It is no coincidence that the suicide rate amongst Asian women is almost three times that of the general population.

There were 5,906 adult deaths recorded as suicide in the UK in 2004. Working using the statistics for female deaths, the previously stated fact that suicide is three times as common in Asian females and that the UK population of Muslims is about 1.59 million, that means that we can estimate 286 "suicides" within that demographic when only 95 would be expected if inline with the national average.

It’s nice to see the BBC actually take an interest in the subject but a shame that they don’t publish it more prominently. It would also be nice to see some differentiation amongst the various Asian communities, but this is just the BBC’s standard ploy. The BBC has a strong tendency to avoid using the word Muslim with any negative connection. This has angered other Asians within the UK as they are understandably tired of Muslim terrorists being repeatedly called Asian terrorists since otherwise peaceful communities are being tarred with the same brush. Having lived in India I will not pretend that honour crimes are a uniquely Muslim affair because they are not. But having also lived in the UK I am aware that the Hindu and Sikh communities are really much more integrated so I’d like to see what percentage of each faith approve of honour killings. I’ll give you a clue. Every UK honour killing that I am aware of since 1999 was a Muslim crime. That doesn’t mean that all were and I don’t have the figures. But that, the BBC’s well known bias, and the fact that the BBC didn’t care to add more detail could be indicative.

Round up of recent high profile UK honour killings:

Samira Nazir (Pictured above, right.)
Was stabbed 18 times and had her throat cut by her brother and cousin in Southall, London because her boyfriend was from the wrong caste.

Sahjda Bibi
Stabbed to death by her cousin on her wedding day because she was marrying a divorced man.

Name unknown
A girl from West Yorkshire was taken abroad by her father and killed after a love song was dedicated to her on a radio station.

Name unknown
A girl from Newham, East London was killed by family after they accused her of bringing dishonour on the family by being raped!


Honour killing is a massive crime globally. I will probably write a more in-depth article on this sick practice very soon.

If you enjoyed this article please feel free to digg it down below.

7 comments:

Roya said...

The percentage sounds right as it is about "ASIANS" and not muslims. :)

I don't like popular media either. TOO MUCH PC. Actually too much political incorrect-ness as it is trying to brand Asians as all Fanaticals rather then accepting that it is Islam and muslims that are the problem.

chooseDoubt said...

Absolutely right - as if somehow saying Asians is PC-acceptable and not racist when the issue is an ideology anyway, not a race. I wouldn't brand all Muslims as fanaticals either, but the faith is certainly the motivation and justification for the fanatics.

Thanks or posting and thanks for visiting. Nice to see you here. Incidentally, I know you are interested in the the future from reading your blog. I'll be posting an article here soon looking at what I see as a possible (probable) near term future. I'd very very interested to hear what you think.

:)

Roya said...

CD, I read your suggestion about clicking on intelligent design sites and it seems that you have achieved in putting the site on the first page of google search results. Good work. :)

chooseDoubt said...

Cool - it's called a google bomb. I got it from VB over at desecrate holy books and he got it from a forum somewhere, so I can't take the credit. But it does work and I would suggest we try to do it for soem other key terms.

The main problem with atheists is that we are independent thinkers. Because we are independent thinkers we tend to feel that we don't have a great deal to talk about a lot of the time because the key issues don't appear to warrant discussion since the truth is obvious and arrived at by thought, fact and logic, not opinion or desire. So we don't organise very well. We should do so.

If you are interested in trying to bomb another term then I'd suggest that we coordinate and get other like minded individuals involved also. If we were really serious we could also write the content we promote so that we can ensure that it is powerful and direct to ensure a powerful impact.

I'm game if you are. :)

Roya said...

OK. I found a good link for ID on page 11 of google.

Intelligent design not science: experts - National - smh.com.au

Roya said...

This one is realy good.

http://www.talkorigins.org/origins/faqs.html

chooseDoubt said...

Thanks Roya,

I'm updating the "A request to bloggers" post with your suggestions.

Cheers,

CD