Broken lives: UN book paints a horrifying picture

[Guest guest]

JANET BAGNALL, The Gazette

Published: Friday, February 03, 2006

 

The book Broken Bodies, Broken Dreams: Violence Against Women

Exposed contains a photograph of a woman who was abandoned on the

steps of an Indian hospital.

 

She was burned from head to foot because she failed to provide a big

enough dowry for her husband. Her last words before she died were to

beg the photographer, part of a documentary film crew, " Please look

after my baby girl. "

 

The United Nations has published this 252-page book of photos,

testimony and facts in the hope it will be a force for change. For

Jan Egeland, the UN's under-secretary-general for humanitarian

affairs, Broken Bodies, Broken Dreams is a call to action.

 

" History will judge us harshly, " he wrote, " if once aware of the

nature and scope of this violence, once outraged by its injustice,

we do not choose to act against it. "

 

The following facts give some indication of the nature and scope of

this violence:

 

An estimated one in three women around the world has been beaten,

sexually assaulted or otherwise abused in her lifetime.

 

There are areas in the world where abortion, infanticide and fatal

neglect of girls have resulted in the loss of between 50 million and

100 million girls. That is the number of children who would have

been born were it not for prejudice against females.

 

Girls are estimated to be as much as three times more likely to be

subjected to sexual abuse than boys. As many as 90 per cent of the 2

million children forced into prostitution and pornography around the

globe are girls.

 

Eighty per cent of the 500,000 human beings who are trafficked every

year across international borders are girls and women. Most of them

are sold into the sex industry.

 

According to a 1998 report in the Economist, the global sex industry

generates about $20 billion a year, with about $5 billion of that

from child prostitution.

 

Other child prostitutes end up in the sex trade because they have no

other option. Most child prostitutes in Sierra Leone had lost both

their homes and families to war. Alone, without resources, they were

easy to exploit.

 

Five Indian women a day are killed on average in " accidental "

kitchen fires, according to a 2000 UN report. Husbands or in-laws

determined to force more dowry money out of the women's families set

these fires.

 

Any illusions that violence is not serious in developed countries is

dispelled in this book. In 1997, the U.S. surgeon-general said

violence committed against women by their husbands or boyfriends was

the single greatest threat to American women. It inflicted more harm

than rape, muggings and car accidents combined.

 

In Europe as well, domestic violence accounted for more deaths and

health complications among women than cancer or traffic accidents,

according to an estimate by the Council of Europe. Violence by

partners is the major cause of death and disability for European

women age 16 to 44.

 

Broken Bodies, Broken Dreams also records the voices of both the

victimizers and those who bear the brunt of their ignorance,

stupidity and violence. Here are some examples:

 

" If we kill female babies immediately after their birth, the chance

of having a male son is very high. " A father, India.

 

" I was raped by three men and my (4-year-old) daughter was raped by

the other three at the same time, lying next to me on the ground.

While one raped each of us, the other two would point their guns and

hold us down with their feet. " A survivor of rape by militiamen in

the Democratic Republic of Congo.

 

In Kenya in 1991, a gang of male students killed 19 schoolgirls and

raped 71 others. The deputy principal said: " The boys never meant

any harm against the girls. They just wanted to rape. "

 

Violence against women and girls is the " most universal and most

unpunished crime of all, " said Roxanna Carrillo, special adviser on

violence against women, UNIFEM.

 

This violence, she wrote, is " perpetrated by men, silenced by

custom, institutionalized in laws and state systems and passed from

one generation to the next. "

 

In theory, the way out of this terrible reality is simple enough:

Pass laws to protect women from violence and exploitation; give them

the right to an equal education; provide them with the tools to

become economically self-sufficient.

 

But if the laws are not enforced, they are worthless If women are

denied schooling, they cannot train for the workplace. If their

culture denigrates and despises them, nothing will save them from

the hell on Earth so many are consigned to.

 

We must choose to act against this violence. Never mind history's

judgment. It is today we must worry about. Five more women in India

will have been burned to death today. We don't have time to wait for

history.

 

Broken lives: UN book paints a horrifying picture

jbagnall

 

© The Gazette (Montreal) 2006