Insomniacally watching a Panorama doco about this disturbing phenomenon.

At base, these are quite simply criminal acts - murders. Yet somehow, one almost feels that there must be something that could be done to change the twisted cultural value system that I understand, leads to these worryingly common murders.

I confess to being somewhat bewildered by this aspect of the phenomenon. In what awful, twisted, paralell universe can it be considered that violently taking the lives of women who are deemed to have "brought dishonour" upon a family is acceptable? What is the warped priority that considers that vindictively murdering a relative is somehow an "honourable" act, while the natural act of falling in love with someone "unsuitable" is deemed dishonourable, and not only that, but deserving of murderous punishment? Do the families who successfully perpetrate these killings boast that they have somehow restored "honour" to the family? If so, how is that even remotely credible?

The programme gets it - the key to eradicating this obscene concept of dishonour is, as in almost every other circumstance, education.

But this is still one of the things that make me despair for the human race.

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I'm a nasty, violent lefty. You cunt.

It's definitely a cultural divide. It's not something we have in our culture, therefore our understanding is limited. I believe - and I could be wrong - that a number of Islamic marriages are very much about politics and the position of one's family.

At the risk of sounding like a Mailite, this is definitely where the "our country; our rules" card has to be played. We have to, through education, make it clear that we do not tolerate such behaviour within this country. I won't speak for how it works in other countries, but it's safe to say I don't agree with it at all.

We give cultures and religious groups room to express themselves and to follow their own paths, but the law always has to come first - for the sake of all of us.

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Changin' avatars like there's no tomorrow

Good name in man and woman, dear my lord,
Is the immediate jewel of their souls.
Who steals my purse steals trash; 'tis something, nothing;
'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands;
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him,
And makes me poor indeed.


But we got over it, it was obsolete in 1603.

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Where there is great doubt, there will be great awakening; small doubt, small awakening, no doubt, no awakening.

Not a question of "our country our rules", really - murder is murder, a criminal offence however you slice it. There is no question of making exceptions for this, nor should there be.

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I'm a nasty, violent lefty. You cunt.

My reason for quoting Iago was that in Othello Shakespeare makes a profound point by making the Moor the modern man and Iago the throwback to an earlier age of honour and jealousy, spite and racism. That by the very early seventeenth century the more advanced and liberal thinkers could see that atavistic attitude as crude and primitive, denying the individual, and in fact inviting chaos whilst professing to fight it.

That is where such people are. They need to be reconstructed. Possibly for a long time, but there is a clear and absolute wrong that must be confronted and condemned wherever it appears.

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Where there is great doubt, there will be great awakening; small doubt, small awakening, no doubt, no awakening.

And I haven't said there should be an exception; I'm saying that we need to make it clear that in our country (I'm sounding dangerously Mailite here) we do not accept the idea of 'honour killings' and that we consider them murder.

However, I don't think we have any right to dictate what goes on in countries like Pakistan or elsewhere, where they may consider these killings acceptable. If given opportunities, we should pressure Imams and governments to make them illegal and to wipe them out.

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Changin' avatars like there's no tomorrow

Hear, hear, MA. Very well put. As I say, education -or indeed reconstruction - is the answer.

Which leads us gingerly onto the old Mailite favourite of the cultural integration and assimilation of immigrants and its nuances (numbering approximately one). A clue : it's to do with the supposed failure of multiculuralism.

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I'm a nasty, violent lefty. You cunt.

See also



In a sense all killings are killings, they share many essentials. The murder of Jews in Toulouse is a case in point, honour must be satisfied. Sarkozy's response to that was interesting, he saw it as a failure of integration, which in France means more or less total cultural and lingusitic assimilation. Which we shy away from, it is too prescriptive, it denies the rights of the assimilated to express their true selves. And yet, in absolute terms and in this area, French standards of moral development and behaviour are much advanced over those of Mohammed Merah, a man who allowed primitive superstition and self-indulgent, immature rage to outweigh the human rights of others.

When condemning such atrocities (and, of course, the atrocities that Merah was objecting to in Palestine) it is important not only to condemn but also to explain and adduce the reasons behind our condemnation. (I refer you yet again to Kohlberg, but I think Rawls also has something to say).

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Where there is great doubt, there will be great awakening; small doubt, small awakening, no doubt, no awakening.

The penal code in the UK is already unambiguously clear about murder. What would you suggest to make it clearer in respect of "honour" murders?



Well, yes, I was raising the issue in respect of the UK, not Pakistan or elsewhere. By the way, I don't think it is the case that honour murders are legal anywhere - though I may be wrong (I'm thinking Afghanistan or the gulf states here).

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I'm a nasty, violent lefty. You cunt.

I don't know, but we need to make it clear in some way that we do not tolerate it.


Again, I wouldn't know, but I would assume there is some legality to them somewhere or they might not be so prolific.

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Changin' avatars like there's no tomorrow

We already make it clear that we do not condone murder. It is a crime under law and carries a mandatory life sentence. Not sure what you could do to make it clearer that we disapprove of it.
Murder is murder. The circumstances may influence sentencing, but the crime is always the same, the wilful and conscious taking of life.

'Assuming' is not a strong basis for an argument...

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Where there is great doubt, there will be great awakening; small doubt, small awakening, no doubt, no awakening.

Wonkipedia's page on Honour Killings, in particular I've chosen to link it to the part about legality.

There's a section about Pakistan, and I think that's incredibly relevant to this discussion. There are laws against it, but they're weak and it's doubted that they've actually done anything.

And this is where my point about the Imams comes in, we need them - and other religious/cultural leaders - to do their part in curbing these crimes.

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Changin' avatars like there's no tomorrow

Which was Abers' and my point about development and education.

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Where there is great doubt, there will be great awakening; small doubt, small awakening, no doubt, no awakening.

So we're all agreed then?

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Changin' avatars like there's no tomorrow

I think you're wrong there. It's just not paraded as being because of a religion when a hooligan beats his wife to death because he thinks she's looked at some other bloke...