Honor Killings, Crimes of Passion, and Tribal Practices

I knew Dymphna was asking for trouble last night when she posted about the honor killings in Texas.

Some of our commenters think I should pressure my wife not to post certain opinions. That would not only be a foolish thing for a husband to do, it would be inconsistent with Gates of Vienna policy. If I let Fjordman, Paul Weston, Mr. Smith, Kepiblanc, and others contribute pieces for this blog with which I do not entirely agree, how can I justify suppressing my own wife?

Which I couldn’t do anyway, even if I tried.

For the record: I don’t consider “honor killing” to be a crime of passion; it’s cold-blooded premeditated murder.

As for the possible prevalence until recently of the same practice within European culture, I can’t venture an opinion, since I lack data on it. If any more knowledgeable readers want to weigh in on the topic, please feel free to do so. Leave links, if you can, to help people investigate further on their own.

However, I think it’s important to recognize that honor killing is not specifically a Muslim phenomenon. It is widespread in other tribal cultures as well. Take, for example, the recent Hindu honor killings in the Chicago area as pointed out by Esther:

The Hindu caste system was outlawed in India years ago, but prosecutors say that system played a role in the mind of the man who set the fire that killed his own pregnant daughter, 3-year-old grandson and the son-in-law prosecutors say he didn’t like.

– – – – – – – –

[…]

In a hearing at the Markham courthouse Tuesday morning, Cook County Judge Martin McDonough ordered Oak Forest’s Subhash Chander, 57, held without bond in connection with the arson and killing of Chander’s pregnant daughter Monika Rani, 22; her husband Rajesh Kumar, 30; and their son Vansh.

This was the third Chicago-area case in one year involving an Indian family, domestic violence and fire. NBC 5 asked counselors who serve the Indian community about that on Wednesday.

Other barbaric customs that are practiced by Muslims are not specifically Islamic. Female genital mutilation, for example, is an African tribal practice which has gained Islamic sanction over the centuries. But it’s not universal in Muslim countries, nor does it find its origins in the Koran.

Islam’s role in these barbaric atavisms is to fix them in place for all time. When any given culture is taken over by Islam, its prevalent customs — provided they do not directly contradict the basic tenets of Islam — are absorbed into sharia and given Koranic sanction.

Once that happens, they cannot be changed. The legitimacy of the Prophet’s words is laid upon them, and restricting them becomes a crime against Islam.

This is one of the characteristics that makes Islam so dangerous to the rest of us — it preserves as if in amber the repugnant practices of a thousand years ago. Slavery, mutilation, murder, pillage: all are justified by scripture, and any modification by mere human beings is heresy.

Hindus living in this country can, one assumes, be eventually assimilated to our way of life and deterred from such barbarous behavior, just as Mormon men learned to make do with a maximum of one wife apiece.

But Muslims have a built-in command structure that requires them to resist such changes, and the barbaric ideology known as “Multiculturalism” requires us to tolerate their ways.

It’s a circle that can’t be squared.

20 thoughts on “Honor Killings, Crimes of Passion, and Tribal Practices

  1. Yes, it would be a foolish thing to tell your wife what to do, just as it would also be a foolish thing to not do that our wives tell us.
    As Lincoln said, a woman is the only thing I am afraid of that I know cannot hurt be.

  2. Sura 4 Verse 34
    “Men have authority over women because God has made the one superior to the other . . .Good women are obedient. . .As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and. ..beat them.”

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9H5OdjZLEQ

    Types of Honour Killings
    http://www.karokari.com/types_honour.html

    Maryam Namazie discusses the act of ‘honour killing’ applied for acts incompatible with chastity.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_3VvZkwujI

    Stopthehonorkillings.com

  3. Robert Heinlein–Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.

  4. Wow, the Baron and Dymphna don’t blame EVERYTHING on the Muslims and Islam, and look what happens? They are excoriated and shunned by the died in the wool Islamo-haters.

    I’m taking this as evidence that Dymphna and the Baron are intelligent human beings that can see beyond surface prejudices for a larger pattern. I hope the Gates of Vienna readers don’t turn tail and run for what they think is the next “true-blue” Islamohater site.

    By the way, “Dymphna and the Baron,” it sounds like a 1970’s sitcom title! (as in “Nanny and the Professor”)

  5. In my own family ALL major decisions are made by me. Why I wouldn’t consider allowing my wife to make a major decision – that would be ludicrous! One thing to bear in mind however: in over 30 years of marriage there has not been a single “major” decision made.

    All credit for this comment goes to the “Reverend” Jesse Jackson.

    All kidding aside, I was shocked by the Dymphna’s post. Perhaps I have not read her as carefully as I should in the past. Had I done so, and had her perspective been evident to me, I would not have bothered to read her post. Too little time to waste on silly poorly thought out drivel. I’ve little time and less patience for such an utterly flawed perspective.

    Baron, I do not mean to insult your wife by my words but merely to point out that should her perspective not allign more closely with the Truth that I will not be reading her posts any more.

    Until reading her post I had assumed that you BOTH were working in concert and had created what I consider to be one of the very most valuable resources on the internet in our war against Islamic jihad. It would seem I gave Dymphna too much credit.

    I’ve got to believe that her thinking is basically sound based on the overall content of this blog which, as I’ve clearly indicated, I consider to among the very best.

    Please, keep up the good work. The sort of mushy moral equivalency swill that Dymphna served up ill serves our cause. PLEASE do not become yet another LGF whom I regard as foul and loathsome.

  6. PFKG,

    We will, at the end of the day, need plenty of hate to defeat the Islamic swine. We will need the clarity of mind that can only come from clear headed characterization and understanding. Your sort of “nuanced” relativistic perspective reeks of post-modernism.

    I am not familiar with you but can only assume that you are a fool to so characterize the dismay with which the posters have met Dymphna’s post.

  7. Yes – honor killings are not unique to Islam and are, instead, a barbarity found in many tribal cultures.

    Yes – tribal Muslims use the Koran to justify them.

    No – we do not need hate to battle Islam. Just clear firm resolve.

  8. I’m glad to see someone else sees the tribal aspect. My problem with the ‘anti-jihad’ blogger movement is that they are want to blame ALL the actions of Muslims on their religion even when race, tribalism, and other factors are often a more important factor.

    The most obvious example of this would be the French riots. The rioters were often black, not Arab, and from non-Muslim backgrounds. They and the Arabs did not lash out at French Christians or infidels, but ‘Gaulois’. On the first day of rioting there were even press reports of a tear gas attack by rioters on a suburban Paris mosque. Yet the anti-jihadists and neocons were determined to make the riots exclusively religious. Perhaps an example of PC liberalism? As in, better to talk about a non-PC religion and avoid mentioning race and ethnicity.

  9. Islam’s role in these barbaric atavisms is to fix them in place for all time. When any given culture is taken over by Islam, its prevalent customs — provided they do not directly contradict the basic tenets of Islam — are absorbed into sharia and given Koranic sanction.

    Once that happens, they cannot be changed. The legitimacy of the Prophet’s words is laid upon them, and restricting them becomes a crime against Islam.

    This is one of the characteristics that makes Islam so dangerous to the rest of us — it preserves as if in amber the repugnant practices of a thousand years ago. Slavery, mutilation, murder, pillage: all are justified by scripture, and any modification by mere human beings is heresy.

    Baron, I’ve seen few better summations of why Islam is so loathsome and hazardous to Western civilization. The archaic and hidebound mentality it carries forward into this modern era is so iminical to individual freedom that few, if any, greater dangers have ever confronted our world in recent times.

  10. I think one should consider using the phrase “Henna Belt” to describe a cultural ecumene that encompasses most of Islam, all of Hinduism, and some of Judaism. Henna is also embraced by the “New Age” movement.

    Child marriage, arranged marriage, cousin marriage, polygamy, “honor killing”, sati, a legacy of sacred or quasi-sacred prostitution, fanaticism, and young men acting strangely are all endemic in regions where it is customary for women to wear henna. Although the use of henna by women is not necessarily connected to these practices, it is a cultural marker that demarcates the Near Orient. It is worthy of note that the use of henna was outlawed by the Spanish Inquisition.

    The principal reason why westerners don’t feel as threatened by barbaric customs carried by Hinduism and Judaism as we do by Islam is that Islam proselytizes while Hinduism and Judaism generally do not. Not only do Islamists seek our conquest and destruction, but they also seek to erase our minds of western cultural achievements for the past thousand years so we can turn into barbarians just like them.

    Remember, Welsh law is tribally based law that could easily be incorporated into sharia. In contrast, Anglo-Norman law is based upon the principles of state sovereignty and individual responsibility; as such, it tends to undermine any tribal structure it comes into contact with. As proud as I may be of my Cymraeg heritage, I do not particularly desire to live under the clannish basis of the old Welsh legal system.

  11. Differences, radical differences, in how Muslims and Westerners regard and treat women go back literally a thousand years.

    Bernard Lewis writes of Crusaders, themselves little more than thugs with swords, in the early 1100’s being appalled at the way in which Muslims treated women in the Levant. And how Muslim ambassadors to Vienna in the 1600’s were appalled that even royalty would stop and doff their hats for women crossing the street.

    What Islam does is codify they system of: tribalism “Big Man” rule where the few tribal big men hoard all the women, and must constantly guard against young lions taking from the old or overthrowing them. A few men get all the women and the rest sit in the bush/desert plotting. Wow. Who would a thunk it that such a system would produce honor killings and Female Genital Mutilation.

    Europe prior to Christianity was either tribalistic along the lines of say Saudi Arabia now, or Roman, starting with small-holders and ending up with Roman Emperors, slaves, and not much in between. With Christianity, enforced monogamy, even someone like Henry VIII had to go through the motions of divorcing/executing his formal wives. He could only have one at a time, legally.

    Meanwhile a host of social controls had men reasonably assured of paternity. Thus no need to control/hoard women as a resource that other men can take.

    The difference between the two systems, Muslim and Western/Christian, come down to how each society organizes family. And that flows from fundamental differences between theology.

    Note that the idea of romantic love, and a dislike of arranged marriages, can show up quite early. Various romantic love stories can be traced back to the 1300’s. Shakespeare of course goes back to the Elizabethan Era (Romeo and Juliet). Romeo and Juliet is to Western Audiences 400 years ago was a tragedy. To Muslims today a sensible arrangement.

  12. “Honor” killings (I call them dishonor killings) are believed to have their origins in misinterpretations of pre-Islamic Arab tribal codes. Crimes of passion are something else altogether and have occurred throughout time and across cultures.

    Ellen R. Sheeley, Author
    “Reclaiming Honor in Jordan”

  13. Honour killings are made just the same if the girl had been raped. It’s like shooting a horse. The reason why the Muslima/horse is no longer useful (whether it was by own guilt or not), does not enter into the equation. Muslimas/horses are not seen as having fundamental human value. And when whatever value of usefulness they had is gone, they have to be shot.

    Of course there is no similarity with even the most vile treatment of women in the West. Islam is to us what anti-matter is to matter. Their concept of honour is the anti-matter of our concept of honour. Quite as their heaven is the anti-matter of our concept of heaven. The Muslim heaven is a place for wine drinking, porno movie style lustful sex (and gay sex too actually). So much for saintliness and moral elevation.

    Regarding female genital mutilation it is “recommended” in Islam. And this is an eternal law and very much in practice. The finer the girl the more likely that she’s got her clitoris cut off. And this is true of higher class women all over the Muslim world.

    Naturally it’s hard to find evidence for this. But I have one method: win the confidence of a Muslim and he will tell you a lot. The Muslims where I live like me very much. They respect me because I’m “not like other Swedes”. I’m not easily fooled, speaking in airhead platitudes. I’m interested in their culture, and know stuff, and can say greetings in their languages (there are several ones to keep track of).

    This young Kurdish guy confided in me. He was hanging out with the people of the Leftist Party. But when him and me where alone he told me he came from an aristocratic family down in Kurdistan. And that he only adapted communism while in Sweden, and that he wouldn’t give away an inch to anyone down there (Muslims have no problems with double standards; their whole “morality” is based on that; another anti-matter example). This was interesting since the way he looked, dressed and acted he was the perfect poster boy for the multicultural leftists.

    He also told me that his mother had her clitoris cut off, and that this was common among higher class Muslim women. (I guess this was something his father had told him proudly).

  14. The value of a Muslim girl that I am referring to is in her virginity. If she’s no longer a virgin she’s useless and will therefore get killed. She has become a burden to the family. It doesn’t matter how she lost her virginity. It’s conceivable that a father first rapes his own daughter and shoots her to save the honour of the family.

    There is not even the remotest moral equivalence between this and anything ever in the history of the West.

    I also recommend my article:
    Islam—perverted parasitical psychopathy

  15. Dymphna merely proved how vexing freedom of speech can be. Seems sooner or later someone will say something that goes against the grain of “true believers”.

    Darn! Why can’t everyone spout the party line on command? The nerve!

    And after two failed marriages and closing out the tenth year of my third I tip my hat to the Baron for his wisdom in marital affairs.

    The husband should always have the last words in any argument, those words should be, “Yes dear”.

  16. I still can’t believe I’m agreeing with Baron & Dymphna on posts at GoV. I just love the fact that Dymphna posts on how it is not merely Muslim men who try to control their female relatives in everything they do, and what happens but several loyal GoVers show up to tell Baron that he needs to control his wife! HA!

    No equivalence though, never that. ROFL. I do have the same fear that Gordon expressed, however. Who will cut & run now? Maybe 1389 will try and take over next.

    One last note: have you noticed yet that the commenter called “Charles Martel” is not me yet?

  17. (Reposting this here in case anyone missed it.)

    It has been distressing to see Dymphna get flamed over her post on the Texas “honor killings,” for I am aware of a dolorous aspect of her personal history that makes her perception of it more understandable. The other day, in a moment of idle curiosity, I read the first post ever made at GoV in October 2004 – and in a comment she made, learned of the death of her daughter by a previous marriage, a death in which abuse in childhood was apparently a factor. Her view of the Texas atrocity is accordingly not the result of multiculturalism, dhimmitude or moral relativism but of cruel experience – experience that is as foreign to most of us as Arabic script. While I don’t entirely agree with her contention that “We don’t have too much room to judge on this one,” she is undeserving of either my scorn or yours. Lay off.

  18. Lex: what happens but several loyal GoVers show up to tell Baron that he needs to control his wife! HA!

    Damn fine point, Lex! Let none of us sample even a smidgen of the Islamic gander’s sauce.

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