This sobering CNN video takes us into one of only a dozen women's shelters in Kabul, Afghanistan. According to nongovernmental agencies, 90 percent of Afghan women are victims of domestic abuse.
One woman is at the shelter trying to escape 15 years of abuse from her husband for not being able to conceive a child. As she speaks, a slash on her throat is visible and highlighted by stitches. She would like to see her family again, but she fears she will be killed if she goes home. Another woman has tried to kill herself three times to escape the abuse of a man who often chained her to a wall, setting her free only when it was time for her to cook. In a country where women are viewed as property, even children aren't spared. A 9-year-old tells her story of being raped at age five.
Manizha Naderi, the director for Women for Afghan Women, risks her life to take them in. Listen to her explain the way that the expectation for how women are treated is handed down from generation to generation. By providing a safe space, Naderi lets them know they have an option.
Issa
Horrible and unbelieveably sad.
1This is awful! No woman is the property of a man - no matter where you live, what culture or religion you follow. This is just down right a violation of her rights as a human being. I just don't understand how these men can do this to their wives/daughters. The person who will give birth to the son (with sons meaning the world to these men) is treated as less than a human being - as property? Without their wives - there would be no sons born to them.
It's one thing to keep cultural traditions alive, but another to allow cultural abuses passed down from generation to generation. It's so sad that this kind of mindset is being perpetuated in parts of the world and that it's going to be nearly impossible to change this within a generation. You can teach the women that they have more rights, but in a country where a man can kill his wife for the slightest reasons, you won't make a dent in improving the women's lives until you teach the men that women and girls are equal to them and are not property to be abused at their whim.
2I can't watch the video clip because I'm at work. This is makes me sick. No one deserves to be treated like this.
3I wonder how you solve this problem? If the western world tries to intervene and show that this is wrong, an abuse, that women have equal rights, the men will resolve even more to hold on to their "traditions" because they'll believe we are attacking their traditions and trying to "westernize" them, rather than trying to make lives better for the millions of women suffering from these traditions. How do you make someone who doesn't even view someone as a person, but as property, believe that they are wrong and need to change their whole outlook? I understand that this is a cultural thing, that boys grow up seeing their father's treat their mothers and sisters like this so the new generation will have learned this violent behavior/attitude also and will think it's acceptable.
4Very sad. Domestic abuse in any form is all too common, even in the States. It should never be acceptable, IMO.
5You can't think someone is human, and do this to her.
6You can't police every single residence, so there is no way to stop this.
Did anybody read A Thousand Splendid Suns?
In all honesty. This doesn't surprise me, I've seen many documentaries on the issue and I knew that many many women were abused. I wish that these women didn't have to endure this at all, from anyone, and I don't think anyone has the right to hit their spouse or child in anger. (In discipline, it's a grey area for me)
Unfortunately there isn't much we can do without being accused of westernization, all we can do is hope that the people running womens shelters continue to make a different and donate to the shelters.
7I despise it when abuse happens, 90% is far to large. Hell, 1% is to large.
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