Control freaks

With a nod to Dammit Janet and blogger deBeauxOs:

Here is an awesome blogpost by Dennis Gruening Gruending, an Ottawa-based author, consultant and former NDP MP, on the recent drownings in Kingston, the media and the ''honour killings'' hysteria. (I added the boldface.)

There is no doubt that Muslim fundamentalists connect their domination of women with what they perceive as the truth of their religion, and the consequences can be dire – acid thrown in the faces of girls attending school in Afghanistan, and yes, honour killings.

The unfortunate truth is that men have used the power of religion for millennia to force women into submission. Some fathers of the Christian church, including Pope St. Gregory, Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, said women should be ashamed of themselves for merely being women, that they were slow, unstable, naïve and useful only for “animal sex and motherhood.”  Some will argue that Christian churches don’t hold those views today. I would respond that while most Christians do not view women as inferior, a fundamentalist minority continues to do so. I would argue, as well, that most Muslims in Canada likely cannot be described as fundamentalists. The problem is with fundamentalism more than with religions, although most religions still have a long way to go in promoting gender equality.

And what explains the deaths of so many other women at the hands of men in Canada? I recall the case of a young man in Ottawa who murdered his former partner using a powerful crossbow. There was another Ottawa case where a man strangled his companion, a young medical doctor, and later hung himself in his prison cell. There is the medical doctor in Windsor who stalked and murdered a nurse on his hospital staff, then took his own life. There was no reportage about the religious affiliation of these three men and most likely religion did not play a part in what they did. These are sometimes described in Canada as crimes of passion but they are as senseless and gruesome as honour killings and the victims are every bit as dead. This is all about men who believe that they can or should have total control over the lives of women.

So, the next time we hear nonsense in the media about Muslim men murdering women in any greater number than white men murdering white (or native) women, consider the source.

And the motivation. (So many women get killed after they leave their abusers.)

And the pattern. (It happens all the time.)

Speaking of which, here's a story from Montreal that set me off today. My translations are in italics, and  the accompanying photo is from La Presse.

Naïma Naboulsi est arrivée au Québec en mai, visa en main. La femme de 54 ans, originaire du Maroc, entend rester à Montréal jusqu'à ce qu'elle ait atteint son objectif: récupérer la garde de sa petite-fille, orpheline depuis le mois d'avril.

Naïma Naboulsi arrived in Quebec in May, visa and all. The 54 year old woman from Morocco will stay in Montreal until she achieves what she came here for: to win the guardinship of her grandaughter, orphaned since April.

La petite Yasmine, âgée de un an et demi, a perdu ses deux parents dans des circonstances qui peuvent difficilement être plus tragiques. Le père de l'enfant a présumément tué sa mère avant de se suicider quatre jours plus tard.

Little Yasmine, aged one and a half, lost both her parents which couldn't have been more tragic. Her father presumably murdered her mother before killing himself four days later.

Naïma Naboulsi est la mère de la victime, Lamiâa Bouchekkif. Elle souhaite entreprendre un recours en Cour supérieure dans l'espoir de ramener l'enfant au Maroc. Le présumé assassin, Alirio Herreno Lopez, a confié la tutelle de sa fille à son frère quelques heures avant de s'enlever la vie.

Naïma Naboulsi is the mother of Yasmine's mother, Lamiâa Bouchekkif. She hopes to go to court in order to bring the child to Morocco. The alleged killer of her mother, Alirio Herreno Lopez, gave guardianship of his daughter to his brother a few hours before offing himself.

Pour Naïma Naboulsi, il est insensé et hors de question que l'enfant grandisse dans la famille d'un présumé assassin. «J'ai perdu ma fille, mais je n'accepterai pas de perdre ma petite-fille», souffle-t-elle.

For Naïma Naboulsi, it is outrageous and out of the question that her granddaughter be raised by the family of the presumed assassin. "I lost my daughter, but I will not tolerate losing my granddaughter,'' she said.

The rest of the story discusses how the dead mother had complained of abuse from her estranged husband plus the legal implications regarding custody. 

Guess what? The grandmother faces a battle.

Even from the grave, this man maintains control.

Stunning -- but not surprising.

Comments

[sooey]

I was going to ask where are all the moderate men to respond to violence against women, but there - you found one.

[the regina mom]

That be Gruending, with a "d" who was once the morning show host on CBC Radio in Saskatchewan and who is one fantastic fella!

[glenfitz]

Science may have something relevant to say about that aspect of human behavior in males which leads them to think they have to possess, "total control over the lives of women."

I recall from my freshmen days the past studies which purported to show that women tend to rely more on the right hemisphere of their brains or that side which is more given to conceptual abstraction, hunches, imaginative exercises, and non-verbal behavior.

By comparison, studies showed men to be more reliant on the left hemisphere---that part of the brain given to processes logical, analytic, and verbal.

And it has always been my suspicion that if you really think about the differences between the two hemispheres, you have to ultimately conclude that the left hemisphere should result in behavior that is more predatory---or "control" prone.

Is there a biological or perhaps even an evolutionary basis for male behavior that is more focused on control of a man's social environment? I wonder. Did mens' reliance on the left hemisphere evolve over time to enable them to more successfully fill the role of a hunter in a primitive society?

Regardless, though, of the biological root for male predatory behavior, of one singular truth I remain absolutely certain.

Because both genders equally define humanity, it is absolutely essential for the progress of human civilization that women become the fully equal partners of men. If one gender (in the case of we humans, the male) depreciates and undermines the survival of the other the chance becomes weakened that the species will survive.

For the sake of human survival on this world both human genders should be included in the ranks of feminists.

[glenfitz]

Well, here's another thought regarding my just prior post.

A woman from the political science department just told me that the idea is considered by some feminists to be sexist that gender behavior can be split between left and right hemisphere functions.

That idea, apparently, can be used to discourage women from entering disciplines in the maths, sciences, and engineering. Although, she did say that the issue is still open ended for discussion.

So, consider this science guy told. LOL.

[...pat.]

Glenfitz: some analysis of the research has shown that any sex–based differences, such as 3D spatial ability, language ability, etc. fall within the range expressed by either sex. When standard deviation is calculated, it's pretty much non-existent.

[MensRightsNow]

The majority of people murdered are men. Why does race or gender matter so much? Murder is murder.

Sooey...violence against women is no more important than violence against anyone else. Why can't feminists wrap their brains around this?

[The Stygian and his Shemitish Dogs]

Esteemed and Beautiful Moderator, Sooey Sweetie, Queen Mother, Glen Fiddich (and De Frum Oase from the other post),

Nice try, but it still really won't do. Nowhere does Gruending mention the element of premeditated plotting by family members, frequently involving the selection of one of their less bright elements to do the deed, by which honour killings can be defined. This is usually absent in other, superficially similar, types of heinous murder.

It is in such cases that the Danes have started putting whole families on trial.

Attempts by honour-killing-deniers to muddy the waters here are reminiscent of a similar blurring that Soviet apologists used during the Cold War.

[The Stygian and his Shemitish Dogs]

Oh, and Glen Fiddich,

This is a losing battle, but, in the context you cite, "sexes" makes much more sense than "genders".

After all "both genders" is a sort of nonsense phrase in, e.g., the context of the Esteemed and Beautiful Moderator's own Greek.

And this "linguistics guy" would not have considered himself "told" in an area he knew a bit about by anyone from an unrelated department.

[sooey]

So we're agreed, violence is perpetrated by men against women - and men.

[The Stygian and his Shemitish Dogs]

"any sex–based differences, such as 3D spatial ability, language ability, etc. fall within the range expressed by either sex."

Pat Pet,

So this means that men should get pregnant from time to time .....

Interesting implications .....

[...pat.]

Styg, Glenfitz was discussing brain hemispheres and sex-based differences. Give me a break.

[glenfitz]

Message to Pat:

I will attempt to do more research into the sex-based differences which hypothetically might account for behavioral differences. The whole issue perplexes me because it does seem to me that predatory behavior (manifested also in sexuality) in males is innate.

And it's left-hemisphere activity of the human brain, given to logic and sequential reasoning, that should account for that type of behavior. I've long suspected, and can argue, that logic evolved in humans to help them create smart tactics for the successful hunter.

At the same time, a few political science people have pointed out to me that the whole basis of sexism is to confine women to traditional categories and roles (ie: the genetics of men cause them to innately fill the role of the hunter or its modern counterpart).

So maybe it cultural conditioning rather than genetic programming that has given males a propensity to use the left hemisphere--the hemisphere which leans toward for logic and innately predatory behavior. Certainly, cultural conditioning over many hundreds of thousands years would start to gain the appearance of instinct (innate).

I simply have to think about this issue more.

glenfitz

[mozo]

Back to the essence of the blog, that the alleged murderer's family has guardianship of the child. Certain things are not given in the portion of the article quoted, perhaps Antonia can elbaorate if she has the info.

1. Was there any indication that Alirio's family conspired in the murder of Lamiaa, or provided encouragement?
2. Is there any indication that Alirio's family is unfit to look after the child?
3. Are there any legal issues with the guardianship papers?

While I have full sympathy for Lamiaa's mother and agree with her wanting to win custody, I won't agree that Alirio's family has no rights or say in this matter. Unless you can answer yes to one of my questions, I see no legal impediment for immediate family to gain at least temporary custody. Lamiaa's mother was not nearby at the time of the murder, the alternative would have been foster care. It is not surprising she faces a battle since I presume she would take the little girl back to Morocco.

I would say that the one silver lining in this case is that the baby was not murdered with her mother.

[glenfitz]

Mozo, the essence of the blog concerns males' propensity, sometimes chronically compulsive, to achieve control of women, hence, Antonia's title for the blog entry is, "Control Freaks."

Also, you've asked the wrong question ( Is Alirio's family unfit to look after the child?). The question you ought to ask is whether the brother of the mother's killer, Alirio Herreno Lopez, is a fit choice to be the child's guardian.

And THAT question can only be answered, at least partly, through the brother's condemnation of the murder.

Moreover, the real question here ought to be whether Herreno had been in a state of mind to objectively determine his daughter's welfare right before he offed himself.

And the court's answer to that latter question should be obvious. Maybe Herreno's brother is the best choice as guardian, and maybe not. But the courts must make sure that question is NOT answered in defacto fashion by the mother's killer.

glenfitz

[MensRightsNow]

sooey...very good, hence we don't need stupid words like femicide!

[PaulR]

"So we're agreed, violence is perpetrated by men against women - and men." --- sooey
---------------
Sure, though the recurring issue, in a general sense, is why the relative minority of women killed gets far greater attention than the majority of men killed. It suggests that it's considered more heinous to kill some humans than others - which is not a totally objectionable notion. The more helpless the perception of the victim, the more brutal the attacker seems. A child killer, for instance, would get a great deal more attention than someone who is non-discriminate.

If we drill down to just DV and rape stats, the actual numbers of violent attacks are similar, back and forth, at every level of severity up to an including murder. Certainly the ones involving murder are so rare that they are on the level of lottery jackpots and getting killed by lightning. Always pay attention to the advocate's trick, switching between percentages and real numbers. For example, "twice as many" might simply mean a jump from 11 to 22 murders, which, out of a sample of 30 million, conveys unwarranted panic.

If we are going to cry at the outrage of a certain number of women killed, the implicit message is that this is a disporportionate number, than the number of men. In looking at a gendered stat like that - we need BOTH sets of numbers to venture a statement that the murder rate represents a "war on women".

[Antonia]

Really, Paul.

The number of women killed by their intimate partners equals the number of women who murder their intimate partners? Did I read that right?

I wonder if you might be able to back that up.

I also wonder if you might also back up any suggestion contrary to the facts that

(1) more women are killed by their intimate partners than by strangers and

(2)that more men are killed by those other than their intimate partners.

[PaulR]

Antonia, we've had this conversation before. I simply read further into the StatsCan study you skimmed and quoted in support of your own article. It was data you cited to me.

Here's the GSS data by itself:
http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/050714/dq050714a-eng.htm
You'll note that it is not as one-sides as you continue to portray.

When you remarked on the actual numbers of deaths in the endcard of a British anti-DV-against women video a while back, I took those figures at face value, and offered them as a % of the British population that they were being compared to. Again, while the intent was to portray this as a wide reaching and common social issue, the data (which the anti-dv advocate offered) indicated it to be equivalent to random occurrence - lightning strikes and lottery jackpots ---IF ONLY the person using those stats has the ability to extrapolate their significance.

http://www.booksincanada.com/article_view.asp?id=1382
I'll try to step back from my usual ascerbic online personna for a moment because I really want to reach you with this. I'm not here to criticize you, nor to detract from women's advocacy, nor to mock DV against women, men or anyone else. I believe am an advocate for women's rights, and I believe I am perhaps as much as you are.

In particular, I am interested in the topic of DV. I maintain that any Canadian interested in that topic, and especially who has some background in statistical analyses (another thing we have in common) should read the book I've linked above - which is an in depth analysis of all the violence studies done in Canada up to the 90's - which still form the founding assumptions of pretty much everything you've ever said on DV (and everything I said, until I read that book.) I understand why you think what you think - I used to think the same thing. I'm asking you to try Dr Fekete's book - a book about anti violence research and advocacy. If you want, PM me your response when you've read it - I won't come here and demand that you respond to me. I'm asking, becaue this BBS format just isn't suited to reconstructing and laying out point by painstaking point, the methodology issues in multiple studies (there are over 100, though this book concentrates on the most influential ones). As a person with an MA in analytics of this type, you'll at least find it fascinating on that level - and it's a damned good read otherwise.

[PaulR]

(1) more women are killed by their intimate partners than by strangers -Antonia
--------------------
Sampling issues here. We go back to the original sample frame - the general population. SMALL numbers of women are killed through violence at all, and when representing small numbers accurately, we need to be extra careful that we don't obfuscate the data by converting it to percentages without a real reference point.

It is almost certain that more women are killed by intimate partners than by strangers. More men are killed by strangers than their partners. BUT
What is the REAL number (not percentage) of men and women killed by their partners per year? Keep in mind, we are a country of some 30 million people. You can get huge differences in percent and comparative rates of violence when discussing these things, when really, all we are talking about is a difference that amounts to a handful of actual people.

There is a higher rate of female death from obesity than their is from IPV.

And of course, you'd need to factor in the gay IPV data too, lesbian and gay male - which again supports the same conclusion that UBC psych prof Don Dutton -- a world expert on IPV proved over and over again. Check his 2006 book, Rethinking Domestic Violence -- that the tendency to violence in intimate relationships is bilateral and rooted in individual dysfunction: Men and women with personality disorders and/or family histories of violence are equally likely to be violent themselves, or seek violent partners.

[PaulR]

Family Violence in Canada: A Statistical Profile
2008Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics
http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/85-224-x/85-224-x2008000-eng.pdf

Here it is - the study you originally cited to me.
p39 shows the actual number of IPV deaths for women at about 6 or 7 in 2007 and men at what looks like 3. Out of 30 million. So we are talking less than a one in a million chance, which is a commom term for saying No chance at all.

So yes, around double or triple the rate of women are killed in IPV (though not always by men - the figs. include same sex common law couples. And that difference amounts to around 4 people. The difference of 4 more deaths of women than men in a population of 30 million, doesn't seem to me that it should warrant such a lopsided view of the way IPV works.

[Antonia]

Um, Paul?

YOU wrote:

''Here it is - the study you originally cited to me.
p39 shows the actual number of IPV deaths for women at about 6 or 7 in 2007 and men at what looks like 3. Out of 30 million. So we are talking less than a one in a million chance, which is a commom term for saying No chance at all.''

Better refresh your stats homework.

That's PER MILLION spouses! No per total population. Hello, Mr. Statistics?

''Women are more likely than men to be victims of spousal
homicide. The rate of spousal homicide against females
has been between 3 and 5 times higher than the rate for
males during the 30-year period from 1977 to 2006. It is
important to note that 2006 saw an increase in the rate for
male spousal victims (Table 4.1).''

[PaulR]

Yep - thanks for the correction - I made a mistake there and you caught it. You are right to call me out on that, and it's why I e-mailed you privately to correct it first. I don't blame you for taking it as chum in the water instead.

Let's see how what this means though, as it pertains to the general point I was making. 30 million people, around 15 million each men and women. Comparing your numbers against the general population, that gives each woman a a 0.00017% chance of getting killed by her partner in 2007, and a man 0.000043% chance.

So, fixing my mistake, using your data that gives women a 1.7 chance in a million. and men a .4 chance in a million. Again, we are talking about a rate of death that is not significant as a societal scourge. If we are going to treat it as significant from a societal standpoint anyway (as opposed to an individual standpoint), then we are talking about a real difference of only 38 murders (again, against a population of 30 million) between men and women, and that paltry difference is being amounted to a WAR on Women, while men in the same boat are ignored.

That, Antonia, is ridiculous. Even IF you only have enough compassion for the female souls in that bunch, for your own reasons, anyone serious about stopping DV would want to look at the common roots on all sides of that equation, rather than seemingly demonizing one gender. Anyone serious about DV would at the very least be CURIOUS.