What is “Honor” Killing?

To date, women’s rights such as right to vote and right to receive education has

been supported by many activists. Qandeel Baloach, an SNS influencer in Pakistan, was

one of them. She ventured to post videos of her in Pakistan, where there is a

conservative view on women. In 2017, however, she was killed by her real brother. Why

was she killed by her brother? To understand the situation, the concept of honor killing

is important to know. Furthermore, honor killing is a big issue not only because of the

number of annual victim as much as 5.000 but also honor killing’s widespread in the

Europe because of globalization. Then, this essay will give you basic information about

the concept of honor killing, situation in Pakistan, and activities against honor killing.

Honor killing is the practice in the Middle East area that family member kills

usually their female family member who regarded to commit “sin”. These “sins” refer

mostly having premarital and extramarital sex including rape, eloping with her lover

with having husband or fiancé decided by her family, and even helping other’s

elopement. For Qandel’s case it was posting videos of her dressing skimpily. When

gossip of these kinds spread in the local community, the family will get excluded from

the community. Then, this situation makes other family members have no choice but to

kill them because a local community in these areas plays a big role in the family’s

everyday life. By killing the “shameful” person they are thought to get rid of the

trouble. For those local rules, there has been the cruel custom of honor killing in the

Middle East area.

In Pakistan, there is a serious situation about honor killing because of both local

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and legal factor. Recently around 1000 women are killed in the name of honor killing in

Pakistan. As a result, according to GIWPS (The Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace

and Security) and PRIO (Peace Research Institute Oslo), Pakistan ranked in the second

most dangerous country for women to live. However, the actual number of the honor

killing case seem to be higher because some of the cases do not come to the surface.

Specifically, honor killings are often suppressed by the family or the local police.

Attitude toward honor killng like this are based on local customs as I wrote before.

Furthermore, loophole in the Pakistan law enables person who committed honor killing

not to get punishment. Under the law of Qisas and Diyat Ordinance: lex talionis a

perpetrator can beg victim’s family to forgive him. It is not hard to think that some

people use this law to escape the charge of the honor killing. So, not only local custom

but Pakistani legal loophole makes it difficult to crack down on honor killing.

To solve honor killing issue radically, changing local people’s way of thinking is

necessary. Even though a new law which sentences honor killing criminal to life was

made in 2016, still the situation is serious because whether the case will be an honor

killing depends on discretion of court judges. So, the belief that a family can recover

their honor by killing one who bring shame should be changed. Statistically speaking, it

is said that the lower education level of perpetrator and victim leads to the higher

possibility of honor killing. It is really important to raise education level though it is

difficult to realize. When it comes anti-honor killing movement through media, a movie

“A Girl in the River: the Story of Forgiveness” is famous. It describes an experience of a

girl who survived a honor killing attack. The movie was nominated for the academy

award of the year and presented the problem to the country. In this way, education and

media will be helpful to change the present situation.

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 In this essay, we saw that honor killing is a practice to recover family’s honor,

then the causes making it difficult to prevent honor killing, and finally possible idea to

change local view. Though this topic seems irrelevant to us, honor killing may happen

anywhere. For instance, there were honor killing cases in the UK, USA, Sweden,

Germany, France brought by immigrants. Finally, we should respect other cultures but

as for the brutal custom we should have to act to stop it.

720 words

References
1.Werft, Meghan “Pakistan Takes a Step Forward to End Honor Killings”
https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/pakistan-law-honor-killing-levelthelaw/

2.Utsumi, Natsuko “What is honor killing: Swedish recent anxiety”

https://www.fsight.jp/4895

3.Kuze, Kazuhiro “Honor killing in Pakistan becomes life sentence”

https://www.huffingtonpost.jp/2016/10/07/honour-killing_n_12384118.html

4.Gilani, Masroor “Men still killing women for 'honour' in Pakistan, despite new law”
https://news.yahoo.com/men-still-killing-women-honour-pakistan-despite-law-
032007544.html

5.Manzoor, Muna “Honour killing in Pakistan”

https://nation.com.pk/09-Jan-2019/honour-killing-in-pakistan