Soliciting
Rape
How do you get someone
to rape you? I thought that was consensual
sex. There is some news that takes more
than a double take. A re-read of Pakistani
women soliciting rape to make money
or obtain a Canadian visa ended up causing
quite the concussion.
General Musharraf during his visit to
the United States for the UN General
Assembly was interviewed by the Washington
Post on September 13 and stated: "You
must understand the environment in Pakistan.
This has become a money-making concern,"
he said. "A lot of people say if
you want to go abroad and get a visa
for Canada or citizenship and be a millionaire,
get yourself raped."
If this offense came from wild-eyed
fanatical mullahs one could understand,
but from Pakistan’s self-styled
Ataturk, the founder and beacon of “enlightened
moderation”?
And after the initial assault, the comment
cuts through his thin veneer, sharp
and short. For really had there been
a deep commitment to the rights of women,
or even humans, or just Pakistanis,
there would not be such glaring contradictions.
Women in the government as ministers
and ministers of state, and then a temper
tantrum when Mukhtaran Mai wanted to
visit the United States for that would
“besmirch Pakistan’s image
abroad”.
Pakistan, you see, must indulge in image-management
for the reality is entirely unmanageable.
People in the United States find it
entirely offensive that a woman in a
mini-skirt leaving a bar at 2 a.m. after
a few drinks is labeled as one that
was “asking for it”. Objectively
one can understand that behavior such
as that may not be judicious and quite
liable to fall into the cause and effect
basket. The resultant rape, however,
cannot be and in the United States,
is not, condoned.
Extrapolating the above to the conservative
society of Pakistan one is hard-pressed
to imagine women flagging men down to
rape them. And if that sounds insane,
it is crazier for the General to suggest
it. His comments imply a concerted effort
on the part of a money/visa hungry woman
in cahoots with equally avaricious NGOs
eyeing their prey, and after careful
planning getting their victim to somehow
dishonor them and rising from the rape
transplanted to Canada, wealthy and
none the worse for wear.
What is more painful is how totally
transparent this attitude makes the
General. It shows how he views women.
Not as honorable mothers, sisters and
daughters but simple sluts. How vacant
seem all the efforts to reform the Hudood
Ordinance now? Why would he? Not only
does he need to keep the MMA neatly
aligned with him, he even agrees with
them! That when a five year old got
raped and killed, she must have somehow
solicited it! When a woman is courageous
enough like Mukhtaran Mai to report
a rape, the tables of the legal system
turn on her and she is incriminated
under the Zina ordinance for committing
adultery, while her rapists walk free.
As incredible as Musharraf’s statements
sound, they are totally in line now
with the way he has handled the Mukhtaran
Mai and Shazia Khalid cases. When Mukhtaran
Mai was to go to the United States in
July 2005, a protracted drama played
by the government prevented her. On
the one hand was world pressure resulting
in the Supreme Court hearing her case
and on the other was her virtual house
arrest so that Pakistan’s precious
image could be safeguarded.
Shazia Khalid’s case is just as
heartbreaking. Musharraf, this time,
was self-styled judge and jury: when
an army officer was named as the possible
perpetrator, Musharraf came to a vigorous
and summary defense. The government
hushed up the case and essentially exiled
her, for that is one way to shut them
up. Shattered, she struggles in a strange
land, pathetic and poor. Nicholas Kristoff
of the New York Times wrote about this,
but public memory is not just short,
it wanders. Much to the luck of Musharraf.
What did 23 year old Sonia Naz get out
of her rape? Her husband’s disappearance
had led her to go to the police and
heartbreak of heartbreaks her rape was
ordered by the police superintendent.
Her husband now wants a divorce, forced
by the condemnation of his family. She
pleads to the cad to not destroy the
future of their children, not realizing
that her husband’s family sees
her through Musharraf-glasses: she “got
herself raped”. The rapist, Jamshaid
Chisti has been suspended and Superintendent
Abdullah, who ordered the rape, has
been posted elsewhere as Officer on
Special Duty. Naz meantime struggles
with the court system: the one man judge
appointed to hear the case, turned out
to be a close relative of Superintendent
Abdullah.
National and worldwide protests occurred
after Musharraf’s interview to
the Washington Post on September 13.
He told a news conference in New York
on September 15 that he had been expressing
a commonly held opinion rather than
his own. This smacks of moral cowardice.
To disown one’s stupidity only
compounds it.
Having practiced medicine for almost
20 years, I look at much of life through
the clinical prism.? Loose talk such
as this is unbecoming of the office
the General holds. Despite being a male
chauvinist and having a coterie of more,
and regardless of his view of Pakistani
women as having raging libidos and clamoring
for money via rape, such loose statements
to a respectable paper, may well point
to some emotional/mental or even physical
issues.
Pakistan’s is a patriarchal society
but why are the mullahs taking all the
credit? They primarily cloister women;
the General dehumanizes, denigrates
and sees them as chattel. To say that
rapes happen everywhere belittles their
enormity. True rapes occur in the United
States at a high rate; every two minutes
someone is sexually assaulted, but they
are committed by individuals and drugs
and alcohol are frequently involved,
with of course, overriding testosterone.
They are not gang-rapes ordered by panchayats,
neither are they condoned by communities.
The victim is given the full protection
of the law, not ostracized, imprisoned
or killed for staining family “honor”.
Canada’s Prime Minister Paul Martin
said he had raised the matter with the
Pakistani leader during a meeting on
the sidelines of the General Assembly.
“I stated unequivocally that comments
such as that are not acceptable and
that violence against women is also
a blight that besmirches all humanity,”
Martin told a news conference. He recommended
an apology, Musharraf denies that he
did.
We are all capable of putting our feet
in our mouths at sometime or another.
If Pat Robertson can publicly ask the
CIA to assassinate Venezuelan president
Hugo Chavez, Musharraf can talk to the
Washington Post thinking he was guffawing
with buddies over gross jokes. And now
that the damage is done, his apology
to women in general, Pakistani women
in particular and raped ones even more
especially, has to be immediate, sincere
and unconditional. In fact he can make
true reparations by using executive
authority to make the Zina and Hudood
Ordinances null and void. The millions
that he has offended may well feel mollified.
(Mahjabeen Islam is a physician and
freelance columnist that lives in Toledo
Ohio. Her email is mahjabeenislam@hotmail.com)
