This week, I begin working as a volunteer with Women Against Abuse, an organization in Philadelphia that provides shelter, legal aid and other resources to victims of domestic violence and their children. At the orientation for volunteers, they emphasized that domestic violence encompassed all cultures, creeds and backgrounds. At the same time, our training materials mentioned the variety of attitudes that a culture can have towards domestic violence. They include but are not limited to: outrage, denial and acceptance. For as long as I can remember, I’ve placed Pakistani culture in the category of indifference/acceptance when it comes to the matter of protecting women and children from the effects of domestic violence.
As a child, domestic violence was an inextricable feature of the culture in which I grew up. My parents, who emigrated from Pakistan in the eighties, settled in a small town in New Jersey where we interacted little with the Pakistani Christian community. But I recall clearly the time I was six years old and we went to Philadelphia for some kid’s birthday party. I tugged at my mom’s blue dupatta. “Hey mom, what happened to Aunty N.’s arm?”
My mom looked at the aunty’s cast-covered arm and then at me. “Her husband broke it,” she said calmly. For the rest of the party, I kept peeking in shock and horror at Aunty N. and her husband, who I adored because even though he pinched my cheeks like the other uncles, he always followed it up with some candy.
I wish that was the last time I encountered something like that. It wasn’t. From my parents, I continued to hear stories of women whose husbands and fathers slapped them around. And when I went to high school, I heard similar stories from other South Asian classmates. But I’m pleased that Pakistan is (finally!) making a small step in the right direction when it comes to treating domestic violence as a punishable crime as opposed to a private family matter.
Pakistan moved towards outlawing domestic violence when lawmakers approved a bill Tuesday that will punish those found guilty of beating women or children with jail terms and fines. The law was passed unanimously in the lower house of parliament or national assembly, Yasmi Rehman from the main ruling Pakistan People’s Party told AFP, hailing what she called a “big day” for Pakistani women. It will come into effect after the senate, or upper house of parliament, approves the law and President Asif Ali Zardari signs it into legislation. Those found guilty of beating women or children would face a minimum six months behind bars and a fine of at least 100,000 rupees (1,205 dollars). “Domestic violence against women is not considered a major offense in our society. I hope this bill will provide protection to our women against all types of violence in their homes and living places,” Rehman said.
[Link.]
I hope so too, Rehman. I hope so too. It all depends on whether or not the police actually enforce it.
[quote from “Dr Amm…”] Oh, and two last things – In India (and I would assume Pakistan and Bangladesh), (I believe) Sikh and Jain personal laws don’t exist – they are lumped into Hindu personal law. Which seems like it should be an issue – those groups should have their own personal laws which are integrated into the broader system. [\quote]
You are right, we should definitely raise the issue of legal oppression in india against sikhs and jains. And, also, india-pakistan-bangladesh are exactly the same when it comes to legal treatment of different religous groups. Also, bangladesh is part of the greater middle-east and we need to send more arabic speaking americans there. Thanks for your inspiring and informed outputs.
A major problem with separate law codes, though, is that it tends to leave room for a type of arbitrage. There are quite a few philandering men who “convert to Islam” solely to maintain multiple wives. It disrespects Islam and it disrespects the spirit of the law.
Interesting you should say that. You are the first person to have equated the Directive Principles of the Indian constitution, the opinions of such radicals as BR Ambedkar and Ramachandra Guha with Hindu/Hindutva principles! Shabbash!
The Special Marriages Act of 1954 applies equally to every Indian regardless of religion. I should know because my marriage (not inter-religious) as well as a friend’s (Muslim man Hindu woman) are registered under that act. The Adoption of Children Bill 1974 was shelved following a strident mullah-led campaign. That is why Muslims in India cannot still legally adopt.
There is only so much laws can do, despite the incentives and deterrants they hold out. In India family and womens’ protection laws have been made to work by combination of means including increasing the number of women in the police force (Tamil Nadu’s all women police stations are an example) identifying exemplars among politicians and police officers and encouraging them, instant escalation of domestic violence incidents, a vigorously free press, etc., A few years ago in Tamil Nadu, a nightie clad newly wed walked out of her husband’s home to the nearest all-women police station and filed an FIR complaining against dowry harassment, bringing down the law upon the husband’s family like a ton of bricks. Politicians have also found that it pays to be mindful of women’s complaints since they have become politically active. There is still a v.long way to go. But there definitely is a great deal of momentum. Dowry harrasment and murder cases are now prosecuted aggressively and several precedents have been created that have made it harder for crooks to get away – no more questioning of complainant’s character, in-camera trials where required, etc.
he..he.. Well Dr. A thinks everyone who have different viewpoints are Hindutvadis. 🙂
Moreover it is amusing to see how “secular progressives” who think all of South Asia is same somehow differ in the respect they accord to different so called “holy books” of .
Look what Dr. A says here
and here
Imagine if the same BS (that justifies polygamy) you find in Quran is found in Gita/ etc..etc.., and some Hindus claim that as basis for demanding polygamy rights “secular progressives” would be the first ones to pounce on it and ridicule (which is very much valid in my opinion).
I just want them to apply the same standards everywhere. 🙂
There are Muslims in Indian Parliament and they have participated in legislation processes that affected non-Muslims. Bete that is how a secular democracy works. I think slowly you will get the idea.
But do you see a reason to “reform” Muslim Personal Law in India ? You were trying to invent equivalance between sad state of Muslim Personal Law in India and Hindu Personal Law in Pakistan – remember???
Ikram – Sometimes I think are you just messing around wih us. Are you ?
Pagal_Aadmi_for_debauchery on August 7, 2009 11:32 AM · Direct link Ikram: At some level, you do need to harmonize the personal laws with a minimum floor of basic rights. You do not need to legislate on cousin marriage but the rights of women, children have to be protected. For example, pre-nupital agreements (maher) are woefully inadequate in protecting the rights of women. Some form of American style alimony laws are necessary for Muslim women.
To the best of my knowledge, Islam requires the ex-husband to support the ex-wife for a period of time after the divorce called iddat. This is separate from the mehr, which is a gift the groom presents to the bride before the wedding. It’s often money, but it’s whatever the bride asks for. Which rights of women are not protected by mehr…?
To Ponniyin Selvan: “BS (that justifies polygamy) you find in Quran” that wadnt cool, boo. that wadnt cool at all. If you make people defensive about their religion, your point gets lost in hurt feelings and stuff. And then you get labeled Beatrice the Bold. which is an awful, awful name. tax evasion sort of name.
And, finally, about the domestic violence post :p!
When the law has to step into your home to sort out your own spouse’s behavior, you’ve already lost. This is not to say that the extreme cowardice and nalaaiqness of wife beating should not be treated by the law as just that, an extremely cowardly crime. But you as a woman have to understand that though you’ll never be as strong as a man, you can be ten times crazier. Don’t let the police be the authority figures in your home. Break a milk bottle on the side of the kitchen sink and have it handy next time your man’s under the mistaken impression that you’re afraid of him (or anyone else), and not prepared to defend yourself. I guarantee you, you will be the last person on his list of People I Can **** With.
The question of whether or not you want to stay with someone you have to get all barroom brawl with just to keep your bones intact is for you to answer. But don’t let him think you’re not prepared, and you need a government employee to sort him out.
Bogus Trend Alert! Statistics please!
Sulabh — I am always messing around with you Others, not so much.
Yes, there is a need to update and reform MPL in India, and HPL in Pakistan. I do not think the current status is adequate, progressive, or sufficiently feminist. Given the distrust the minority communtiy in each country has for its government (to varying degrees), I don’t think the type of government-led commissions and reform that resulted in the 1955 updates to HPL in India and the 1961 updates to MPL in Pakistan are possible.
The only alternative to a government-led process is a community-led process, simialr to that which resulted in the 2001 reforms to the Christian Marriage Act in India (reforms that came about more than 100 years after the parallel reforms in the UK). There are strong signs of this in India, where the religious authority is fracturing and initiatives like the AIMWPLB’s more feminist “model” nikah contracts is now underway.
Paagal is right that statutory minimums are necessary (I’m not sure about “american-style”?), but I don’t see a way either legislature could pass a law on this that the minority community would see as legitimate, regardless of how “secular” the legislators proclaim themselves to be.
Sorry bro, I’m not a “secular progressive” to act so, I quoted Dr. A who can be sarcastic about Gita but all reverential about Quran. If you start talking religious stories why privilege / denigrate one over the other.
I think hurting “religous feelings” can be a good catalyst for forcing people to think about religious stories.
I concur, Ponniyin. Scripture denigration is for squares, anyway.
But I diasgree with the catalyst idea. Cuz I think if someone has a real n cogent point to make, he or she won’t have to dis anyone’s creed to do so. Or maybe it was all the “Share Your Lunch!” conditioning we underwent in first grade :|. At this point who knows?
Our religion and tradition have evolved to perfection after thousands of years. There is nothing wrong with taking a misbehaving wife to task. You upstarts need to understand the richness of the culture you came from. Perhaps a well deserved beating is in order to slap the naive amreecan out of you.
Um, no I’m not. I’m the first person to acknowledge that what was a Direct ive Principle in 1947 has become an unsophisticated Hindutva talking point in 2009. If you want me to acknowledge that it’s in mission statement of the Constitution of India – hurrah! here you go! Congratulations on getting a marginal radical to acknowledge that Amebdkar was overreliant on statist legal codes..
Aside from everyone who doesnt’ marry under it, which is most people, to the best of my knowledge.
and on to substantive commentary:
I don’t think the issue is the eccentrities of one patriarchy vs. another. I think the issue is that they’re all f”£$king over women and children and using the personal law divide as a mechanism for distracting from that. I have no problem with maintaining separate personal laws as long as there’s an organised feminist mov4ement in eqach ‘community’ demanding such a thing. It’s in fact none of my business.
it may or may not be a trend, but it’s enough to rise to the level of several court cases 🙂 There was one in which a guy converted to Islam and then converted back to Hinduism in order to ditch his second wife, to the best of my recollection. Anyway, point being, as usual, many men are a$$holes.
/end presonal code debate
Dr. Am
I haven’t posted or bothered to read the comments in a long time, and since there is another Rahul who posts quite often echoing very similar points I would’ve made – I’ve been rendered redundant. But I just wanted to chip-in and say that I’m disappointed at how hypocritical your talking points have gotten over time. You seem to call everyone who disagrees with you a Hindutvadi…Thats kinda sad.
But then again, just like Thomas pushed O’Connor to the center…maybe it was just a natural swing.
R
My husband was violent. I left him asap but already had a child and no money. So imp never ever to be in that position. Yes, children tie you down. Hence many women keep quiet, nowhere to go with children. Yes, and husband converted to Islam to avoid divorce and marry a rich UGLY lady. Sensible! I never bothered with the law, simply found a nice blue eyed blond man who adores me and is a good father. Why worry about suing, spent that effort looking after my child. I left my money, ran and have been happy in India. My blond loves India but then he is not ABCD.
Muslim laws in India can be changed only if Muslims want to. Ditto with Christians, etc. No one else is allowed to do that. Parsis adopt and get divorced regularly, may be in reverse order. Law in India seems to be cultural, hence we Jains (Buddhists and Sikhs) are quite happy as is. All communities in India can choose to get married in secular way and then the law of the land applies, not Nikah or whatever.
From NYT Women are subjugated, harrassed, beaten, raped, and tortured. There is no respect for women, not in many countries, and not in the US. Every two minutes a person in the US is sexually assaulted. When survivors attempt to get the services they need they are met by disbelieving cops, callous hospital workers, and overworked social workers.
I was assaulted repeatedly by my husband in UK and the doctor, yes nice English DOCTOR called Falconer would not help me just stared at me.
While I weep for everyone attacked, the stats are no different in just about every western country. There is nothing per se re Ind culture but plenty in Victorian law and attitudes that took away colonized women’s right to their own names, earnings and property. Until Brit times, streedhan, including land, was an accepted part of a woman’s inheritance all over India. In traditional law, no one could take away her right to streedhan, married or not. The Brits did not want women to inherit as per their laws and hence today we have women with no money and the resulting violence/ dowry disasters. Ok for sons to claim family property, shameful for a woman to claim anything, even today. Money was required to pay Britrish tax and in an almost cashless society, the daughter in law was desired for her money to pay tax, just trying to keep the property in the family. Hence many sons and their marriages were seen as beneficial and dutiful and a daughter’s marriage as a burden.
There is no mention of dowry deaths or disasters before colonial times as best as I know.
Marital rape is not recognized in Islam as best as I know.
Stats in the west re incest/dom violence are also similar, accounting possibly for a lot unreported.
Can we go back to talking about DV and related issues now?
“Um, no I’m not. I’m the first person to acknowledge that what was a Directive Principle in 1947 has become an unsophisticated Hindutva talking point in 2009. “
Surely you must have meant no derailment….
Well I can rephrase the gist of your common concern thusly: “If Hindutva the new Nazism? …Then who is the new Mike Godwin.”
he..he… you must be a “secular progressive”. 🙂
Reading all the hindutva discussions on SM, I beginning to view my Hindu friends with a lttle suspicion (God knows what they are cooking up behind closed doors!). Its very unfortunate, actually.
So the efforts of all the liberal-secular-progressives were in vain, then. They must be crushed. Anyway, welcome to the world of suspicion. A good friend of mine had actually worked with one of the above gentlemen. Just thinking about it gives him goosebumps.
The thought of my culinary endeavors keeping you up at night makes me cry. Let me ease your mind, I did not soak my channa overnight and as result my poor dog has been emitting all kinds of vapors (OK…it’s actually me, but it was over the top to involve the HOA board maybe?).
You really want to get into this, huh. Derailment from what? The conversation shifted to a discussion of personal law systems in India and Pakistan starting with comment 18 and then the response at 20, which I did not enter until 41. This comment at 18 ran thusly:
which a) implicitly criticises the existence of separate personal laws for Muslims and b) argues that it undermines ‘social reform’ though it doesn’t quite spell out what is meant by that. The reason I use the words Hindutvavadi and Hindutva a lot is because there are a lot of Hindutva commenters and comments on this website. If you want to deny that, go ahead, but it’s still going to be there even if you don’t name it until someone does something about it or something changes structurally in the internet space that South Asian Americans inhabit.
Also I wasn’t saying that you were trying to derail the converseation – I was saying that the conversation had gotten so far derailed that it’s gotten to this point, which is how often or accurately I use a particular political label as a commenter on the site. That’s some distance from domestic violence in Pakistan and South Asian American communities.
Not that the criticism was fair, to begin with. the idea that I label everyone i disagree with hindutvavadi when I have disagreed or criticised in this thread alone with quranic literalists for exegetical or legal purposes, the entire concept of a legal system based on the quran, all sides in the uniform civil code debate including most of India’s politicians and judiciary except for feminists in all of the ‘communities’, the british involvement int he construction of Indian law, and a variety of people on matters of fact.
The difference is that there aren’t actual Nazis arguing on most blogs, whereas there are hard and soft supportesr of Hindu right politics very present on this one.
Okay, that’s all I’m writing about this. I want to go back to talk about DV now.
When I was 3 years old, I was thrown several feet up against a wall by my father. Because i was so young, I wasn’t sure whether it had really happened or it was a dream of some kind, which I wanted to think. It took me until two years ago to confirm that this had happened to me
And I consider myself lucky because of the minimal abuse I faced – at least physically. Every few weeks, I hear another story about someone or another who was sexually or physically or emotionally abused as a child or in a so-called partnership. And I think I have developed abusive tendencies too, which I have to do my best to deal wtih the best that I can and that doesn’t come easy either. A friend of mine once said to me that every South Asian person she knew on a personal level had faced abuse of some kind or another as a child.
it’s all shit. It is nice that there are organisations out there who are doing work to support this, but this is an issue in South Asian communities that needs MUCH more attention. This includes support for the people who are supporting DV victims – whether professionally at organisations like the ones listed above or on a personal level or thorugh social networks. this is something that actually does affect all the South Asian communities I can think of, no matter what the citizenship, nationality, class, diaspora or desh or anything else. It’s there – constantly.
Here’s a list at SAWNET to go with what was posted above. http://www.sawnet.org/orgns/violence.php. It doesn’t have any resources in any South Asian countries except India and several diasporic countries, so perhaps if anyone has some of those they can post them, especially since those post was about a domestic violence bill in Pakistan.
Thanks for sharing, Dr. A.
Thanks for giving me the space to do it in 🙂
yes thanks for sharing.
Big fat hug from NY, Dr. A
Dear Dr. A and all interested bloggers who asked/inquired about a blog that focuses on domestic violence issues. Such a blog and organization does exist! (we’ve actually been written about on Sepia Mutiny before)
Out Against Abuse (www.outagainstabuse.org) is a non-profit organization focused on providing interactive online resources to bring together activists, volunteers, survivors and members of the South Asian community to encourage the discussion and understanding of gender abuse.
Our website also serves as an online hotline for survivors, allowing them to anonymously ask questions and to quickly connect to the most appropriate resources.
Please visit our recent news section to read more about recent domestic violence news and legislation: http://www.outagainstabuse.org/category/recentnews/
If you have any questions or comments, please email us at contactus@outagainstabuse.org
Regards, Out Against Abuse
Hi, very nice to hear people talk about this issue. if so many women see this growing up, maybe they’ll turn away from their own south asian male population and look for mates elsewhere.
Dear Out Against Abuse folks,
Thanks very much for this link – it’s enormously useful to look at. Will take a closer look when time allows.
Best, Dr A.
Here’s a South Asian shelter in IL but with a 1-800 # and many services:
http://www.apnaghar.org/indexnew.shtml
Dr Amonymous, not to take away from your personal experience or anything, but I have a bone to pick with you over one particular statement you made. I really sympathize with your situation, and wish that you didn’t have to face even an iota of abuse when you were growing up. I think it’s great that you’re trying to raise awareness about DV in South Asian communities, and I agree that this problem needs addressing. However, this is the statement I am concerned about: “A friend of mine once said to me that every South Asian person she knew on a personal level had faced abuse of some kind or another as a child”. This is your friend’s experience, to be sure, but I have to take a diametrically opposite view on this. I do not know of even one South Asian person who faced abuse growing up as a child. I know that my views are neither the absolute truth, nor do they represent South Asians in entirety, but I cannot help but feel that such blanket statements only hinder frank discussion of DV related issues.
P.S. Yes, I’m South Asian as well. 🙂
From #59
There’s Dharmendra (the hindi actor) who is now BJP–so much for conversion.
“A friend of mine once said to me that every South Asian person she knew on a personal level had faced abuse of some kind or another as a child”.
Dr. A, thanks for sharing a painful part of your life and I hope that you never have to face such abuse again. But I also like Mr. Wise, had a problem with the above statement. It connotes that dv is more prevalent in South Asian culture than in other cultures. And as far as I know there aren’t stats to show that, plus abuse is a difficult thing to statistically document.
However we do know there is plenty in South Asian interpretations of cultural and religious values that support strong women, equality in sharing power in intimate partnerships, respect for couples in marriage and then there is plenty in South Asian culture that support patriarchy and misogyny. I think the thing is not to stereotype our dynamic and diverse culture, but to recognize that there are different interpretations of that culture by individuals.
The reason why many of the organizations that support survivors of abuse in South Asian families exist, IS NOT, b/c there is proven to be a huge prevalence of abuse in our communities (as compared to other communities), but rather there are many unmet cultural, linguistic, and legal needs in mainstream American organizations; many times mainstream organizations do not have the staff and facilities that can support the specific problems that many immigrant women from South Asian cultures may face.
but rather there are many unmet cultural, linguistic, and legal needs in mainstream American organizations; many times mainstream organizations do not have the staff and facilities that can support the specific problems that many immigrant women from South Asian cultures may face.
The problem is that when it comes to abuses of women from south asian/middle eastern background in western countries, mainstream women groups really can’t help. Alot of these mainstream women groups suffer from alot of white guilt and are afraid of speaking the truth, cause they will be called racist for speaking out against backward 3rd world treatment of the women that don’t belong in the west.
Why? Is there a reason Muslims be antagonistic to the BJP?
Seriously, though, yes, there are examples that make headlines, such as the minister in Haryana, or Dharmendra, but that does not a trend make. And there are non-Islamic polygamists such as Boney Kapoor or Karunanidhi, who are not prosecuted either. There are good reasons for uniform civil codes, but claiming prevention of polygamy as religious arbitrage is a 3 am phone call.
Actually I have heard the opposite. I don’t know of any SA women’s shelters, but I have a Hispanic friend who works for a conventional one and she complains that there is often a patronizing attitude towards Hispanic women who go in there as her colleagues tend to essentialize about Salvadorian (her shelter is in a Salvadorian neighborhood) culture based on whatever article about machismo they read recently.
It may be easier to “blame the system” since it lets you dissociate from the people in front of you, but the fact is the job of these shelters is to provide a source of support and safety for women in a bad way. We could benefit a great deal if we focused on helping them do their jobs better rather than embarking on grad social engineering projects that do little to fix the problem and just end up funneling resources away from the actual community outreach and into glossy brochures for lobbying politicians instead.
Religious arbitrage is the problem. Polygamy is one manifestation of it. Generally polygamy is only practiced by people rich enough to support multiple wives anyway (and among non-Muslims, people powerful enough to disregard social convention.) In a country like India, that kind of money sadly, puts you above the law in many cases.
That does not, however, mean society is well served by having loopholes open and begging to be exploited. I said nothing about there being a huge trend, but it doesn’t need to be for my point to be valid. I don’t like the idea of having laws in the books that encourage flagrant disrespect for the idea of the law. The best way to do that is to not have legal systems that treat people differently based on difficult to verify categorizations.
Consider Madison’s Federalist paper #10. He points out that the smaller a voting group you have the more likely it is that a single dominant faction will monopolize power and trample on the people’s liberties. The solution was to create a large republic with lots of veto players which guarantee that the government will never be dominated by any single faction for long. India did not take this lesson to heart. Its statesmen are bent on consistently subdividing the republic into smaller and smaller groupings. This does not guarantee freedom for its citizens. Rather it ensures that only the most powerful and retrograde forces within in each community rise to power. We have all the bad points of a large republic (deadlock, too many veto points to push an agenda) and none of the good (protection of the people’s liberties.)
Please understand that the two points you’re making don’t necessarily move in tandem–i.e., it’s perfectly logically consistent that (a) South-Asian-specific dv groups are necessitated by specific cultural/linguistic needs unmet by “mainstream” groups and yet (b) dv is in fact more prevalent in South-Asian American groups than in the broader culture at large.
You seem to want to deny (b) without offering any evidence to counter-act what I take to be widespread impressionistic conclusions to the contrary. I guess you may just not want the light shone on certain facts. For some evidence pointing in the direction of (b) being true, see, e.g., Narayan, “Male-Order Brides,” 10 Hypatia (1995) (“women whose immigration status is dependent on their marriage face higher risk of domestic violence”); Dasgupta, “Charting the Course,” 9 J. Social Distress 173 (2000). Or, on a more anecdotal basis, just ask anyone who’s worked in an ER to guesstimate the relative frequency with which the wife of a Jewish male doctor versus an Indian male doctor appears seeking treatments after having “fallen down the stairs.”
Having mistresses is a very common, and loosely socially sanctioned, practice in Tamilnadu among people of various economic strata. The examples cited are obviously of well known people, because the activities of well known people tend to be, well, well known.
It was rather common for couples to have such “understandings” here in the US up until the late 60s or so. If that’s what people are into that’s their deal. But I still don’t like the idea of legitimizing these informal arrangements through the law.
Yeah.. well… you know, That’s, just… like… your opinion, man.
I mean that seriously.
Where did you get this data from?.
it’s perfectly logically consistent that (a) South-Asian-specific dv groups are necessitated by specific cultural/linguistic needs unmet by “mainstream” groups and yet (b) dv is in fact more prevalent in South-Asian American groups than in the broader culture at large.
Did I say that it wasn’t consistent? No. Please tell me where you see statistically it’s shown that that Asian or South Asian American communities experience more dv than other communities. I’ll pull up if I can find some stats on surveys done on asian Americans and the dv stats in their communities. There isn’t anything concrete that shows that it’s more prevalent in Asian communities than others…let me find it.
Please state the overwhelming dv in the South Asian Am community as opposed to other communities to my sister who during her residency often had to make the rounds in a hospital that had many hispanic families and lots of instances of dv. Please tell that to my dad, who while working in an inner city hospital in DC in the early ’80s experienced his patients bruises or gunshot wounds from intimate partner violence or other types of violence. Please tell that to me, who having grown up, primarily among white people in the south, readily heard the in the gossip mill about the most horrible instances of disrespect and violence among white people that we’d meet or I’d over hear my parents discuss things from friends they knew – it didn’t matter if it was the maid that worked for us, or a doctor’s wife…and oh golly, they weren’t Indian.
I don’t like to deny problems in my community or in any community – by denying the problem it denies people that I love the chance to get out of a dv situation. But I don’t like blatant stereotypes, which are useless and continue the violence that minority women may face. When I do have the opportunity to speak to about dv in Asian communities, I’m often faced with people, who are Asian, Af-Am, Latinos, or Whites, who has me “um, does dv occur in the asian community?” and I have to say to them why yes, it’s a problem that many in the Asian community face. Nothing I’ve read from Shamita das Dasgupta, has supported that stats are more prevalent in the south Asian community than in others. the stats nationally and internationally show that 1/3 women will experience dv in some form in their lives. What I can’t stand, is might I say, your stupid anecdote about the Jewish doctor’s wife and the INdian doctor’s wife. That’s exactly the shit I can’t stand. This is ur anecdote and anecdotes in such situations are useless if you are trying to state S.As Ams experience more dv than other communities. What is known is that it exists and there are barriers to the a women (generally most dv is experienced by women) receiving help that can include immigration status, linguistics, culture, etc and that is what needs to be focused on.
Oh and I’m South Asian American, who has experienced dv in her house and knows many Indians who are appalled by it and seem to having loving intimate partner relationships and many South Asians Am families who have experienced abuse.
Thanks for your comments and sympathy; they’re appreciated. Just to clarify, I was not saying that every South Asian has faced abuse or that South Asians are more likely to face abuse than other communities. This issue is too important to f”£k around on and make claims like those. My point was just to convey another person’s experience that it is widely prevalent because there are too many arguments that people offer to deny that it shoudl be confronted seriously, now, and forcefully (not violently, forcefully). I imagine that there are families – South Asian and not – in which these incidents don’t happen, but right now we don’t have enough open dialogue to even know exactly how widespread the problem is.
But my personal experence with people I know is enough. Let me recount to you what I have witnessed or heard firsthand from people who I am familiar with but are not me: a husband who hit his wife just once; a mother who broke her son’s toys out of spite; a five year old grandson who was hit by his grandmother so hard that it left an imprint on his back; a son who was smacked down so hard by his father at a puja that he hit the floor – at a f”£king puja!; a niece who was sexually abused by her uncle which may or may not have been witnessed by his son and which was disbelieved by her mother; a child who was sexually or physically abused by a domestic servant; a woman who was stalked and harrassed by her ex; a woman who was raped by her partner; a son who was hit with a belt by his father on an ongoing basis.
I can’t remember all of them. I have started hearing more stories lke this since I have started engaging in more conversations lke this, and I think the more we do, the better it is, because it allows us to frankly and honestly discuss what the causes are in our families and to say – there is a serious problem that we can’t brush under the carpet any longer. Preferably in a way that doesn’t just focus on the issue as one of right and wrong but also of one of needs being unmet and support not being given, on all sides. of the people who committed violence in the list above that I know, I know that many of them too were victimized in some way at some point in their lives.
I’m not calling for paranoia or condemnation of South Asian communities but for opennness about this issue so that it can end.
PS, what provoked me to respond to you is the aggressive repetition of the falsehood that dv isn’t a particular (i.e., as opposed to other groups) in the South Asian community. This is some sort of clap-trap that someone has sold you on, and it appears you’ve never bothered to look into it. I have no taste for getting into some long statistical dispute with you, but in the interest of reproducability I typed “domestic violence statistics ‘south asian'” into google, hit the first response, and found the following claim: Two out of five south asian women have experienced partner violence. A rate disproportionately higher than that of other minority groups.
His girlfriend’s boyfriend’s wife.
Rob, I believe I have the print out of the study that you cited….I don’t have my file with me, but I’ll get it. I’m sure you noticed that the survey you cite (and unfortunately I think that dv resource that stated dv is more prevalent among south asian americans w/o the details of the research they site is misleading) is limited to a survey done I believe among south asians in boston. Ever wonder nationally what the stats show? DV is difficult to document, Afric Americans and Latinos have higher rates of dv nationally, but that’s not to say it’s more prevalent in their communities b/c we just don’t know how and if people are responding to surveys. For ex Latinos it has been cited as high as 70 percent (based on a national research I believe but u can look at up, or I’ll look it up later). There is strong correlation of dv and one parent households, low income households, low educations. Some of these factors are less prevalent among Indians, but more prevalent among other asians – cambodians, bangladeshis, vietnamese, hmong. There are numerous factors that can play on someone experiencing dv…those factors unfortunately are not just found in the s. asain population. There isn’t anything particular about s. asian culture and dv and as much as you want to keep trying to say that, well you just ignore cultural factors in other communities, whether it’s white americans, cambodians, japanese, african americans, latinos etc. To address dv and raise awareness in DV in a particular community, you want to try and be aware of particular dynamics, but unfortunately to you that means, well of course dv is more prevalent in s asian culture…b/c we’re so umm…patriarchal ; anyways when I do have the energy I’ll bring up the stats that you cite, the one in boston, and actually if I’m correct, the information that I’ll provide will show community-wide surveys from not just boston but other cities for many asian groups.