Pakistan is rated the sixth most dangerous country for women and why
“Seven years ago a Thomson Reuters Foundation experts’ survey found the five most dangerous countries for women were seen to be Afghanistan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Pakistan, India, and Somalia.”
Source: Indy 100
As explains the description in the Reuters itself, “This year we set out to see if the situation had changed. We wanted to find out whether more was being done to address the overall risks faced by women, and specifically regarding healthcare, access to economic resources, customary practices, sexual violence, non-sexual violence and human trafficking. We expanded our poll to the 10 most dangerous countries with some surprising results.”
Source: Phone World
Sixth Worst
Pakistan is rated the sixth most dangerous country for women and fourth worst country in terms of economic resources and discrimination faced by the local women in the country. Let alone the terrifying risks that the women of Pakistan face from the strict and cruel cultural, religious and traditional practices performed, that are way too widely accepted and expected by the nation.
Source: The Express Tribune
All this on top of all the violence and outrageous acts of cruelty and misogyny like the so called honor killings and acid attack. Pakistan also mange get ranked the fifth worst on non-sexual violence category behind Yemen, including domestic abuse.
Source: tribune
Sexual Violence
Pakistan also managed to get itself ranked the 7th worst in sexual violence that includes harassment, molestation and rape as a weapon of war, domestic rape, rape by a stranger, the lack of access to justice in rape cases, sexual harassment and coercion into sex as a form of corruption. Moreover, The TRF did not rank Pakistan in healthcare and human trafficking category.
Source: Business Standard
Domestic Abuse
World Bank data showed that one in three married Pakistani women report facing physical violence from their husbands and/or their in-laws, although informal estimates of such violence are much higher because most women are too afraid to report the abuse and other women are so used to of the abuse that they don’t even consider it as something worthy of reporting.
Source: Dawn
The study estimates that 27% women in Pakistan suffer lifetime intimate partner violence or domestic violence and their perception of community safety stands at 51%. Lisa Hajjar, an Associate Professor at the University of California, rightly describes abuse against women in Pakistan as “endemic in all social spheres”.
Source: Pakistan Press Foundation
In an observational study published in the Pakistan Journal of Medical Sciences based on a sample of 218 women in the gynecology wards of three hospitals, 97% of the interviewed women said they had been victims of some form of assault, ranging from verbal abuse or threatened, to being subjected to beatings or non-consensual sex.
Source: Pakistan Today
A study by the United Nations found that 50% of married women have experienced sexual violence and 90% have been psychologically abused. Studies by the Pakistan Nation Women’s Division and Zakar et al. confirmed these statistics of high percentages of domestic violence in Pakistani households.
Source: Journal of Pioneering Medical Sciences
Son Bias
The report, published by the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security in partnership with the Peace Research Institute of Oslo, claims that 1.09 males are born for every female born in Pakistan, which is higher than the 1.05 natural demographic rate, meaning that Pakistanis have a son bias.
Source: The Express Tribune
Son bias is the horrendous discrimination faced by new born children. Meaning most of the children aborted are female, and most of the children murdered after birth, are also female. We basically hate the existence of women and responsibility of a daughter so much that we disrupted the natural order.
Source: Building Bridges
There have been around 500,000 “missing girls” in Pakistan between 2010–15, which basically explains that about half a million more female children should have been born in the country during the period were it not for the son-bias.
Source: Sydney Morning Herald
We structured and society so ugly and so cruel for women that we are now terrified of having to raise a female child in that society that we designed to hurt them. We did it in the name of culture and tradition and for the sake of power and privilege it provided for men to boost their egos and feel superior over bruised bodies of their child brides.
Education
Women’s average years of education in the Pakistan is only five years, moreover only 33% of Pakistani women know how to use cell phones. Meaning most of them are not allowed or are never taught to use a phone.
Source: The Express Tribune
Only 24% of Pakistani women are employed, while their share of seats in parliament stays at only 20%. Researches also states that 73% of Pakistani men do not find it perfectly acceptable for women in their family to work outside their homes.
According to Wikipedia an estimate of 5000 women are killed every year from domestic violence, with thousands of others maimed of daily basis or disabled through severe violence.
Source: pakoil.com.pk
Yes All Women
In an observational study published in the Pakistan Journal of Medical Sciences based on a convenience sample of 218 women in the gynecology wards of three hospitals, 97% of the interviewed women said they had been victims of some form of assault, ranging from verbal abuse or threatened, to being subjected to beatings or non-consensual sex. 97% so yes all women.
Discriminatory norms against women is estimated at a staggering 73% while son bias that is male to female birth ratio stays at 1.09.
Source: Unknown
General Racism Mixed With Radical Sexism Equal Evil
Research has also shown that the rates of domestic violence especially in rural communities and Afghani refugees living in Pakistan are significantly higher. A cross-sectional survey of 490 randomly selected women from a rural health center in Pakistan of reproductive age reported that 65% of those interviewed had experienced domestic violence.
Source: RT.com
A special report by the United Nations of the state about violence against women in Pakistan reported that Afghani refugees are basically left out of Pakistani services they deserve for being human and moreover, they are also usually left out of Pakistani statistics. The report noted that violence against women, just like child abuse and domestic violence in this country is considerably terrifying.
Source: News Gram
Dowry Deaths
Dowry deaths as have been defined by the United Nations is a form of domestic violence in Pakistan. Where women are often attacked, abused or murdered if their in-laws decides that their dowry have not been sufficient enough to keep the women alive.
Source: Fox 4
Dowry related violence in Pakistan usually involve bride burnings, also that is also locally known as “stove deaths”, are widely reported. In 1988 a survey showed that 800 women were killed in the country by burning, in 1989 the number rose to 1100, and in 1990 it stood at 1800 estimated killings.
Source: iPleaders Blog
According to the Progressive Women’s Association, such attacks are still, even in this time and era, a growing threat to Pakistani women. In 1994 on International Women’s Day, announced that various NGOs would join to raise awareness of the issue.
Source: The Express Tribune Blog
In 1997, the newspapers in Lahore in a six-month period reported an average of 15 attacks a month on women of Pakistan by the men of Pakistan. Women’s eNews reported that 4,000 women had been attacked in for dowry in Islamabad’s surroundings over an eight-year period, and that the average age range of victims was between 18 and 35, with an estimated 30 percent being pregnant at the time of death.
Source: Rebel Circus
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan reported that about four women are killed like that every day, by either family members or husbands. Shahnaz Bukhari, who runs the Progressive Women’s Association in Islamabad, has said of such attacks: “Either Pakistan is home to possessed stoves which burn only young housewives, and are particularly fond of genitalia, or looking at the frequency with which these incidents occur there is a grim pattern that these women are victims of deliberate murder.”
Source: DESIblit
Acid Attacks
Acid attacks in Pakistan came to international attention after the release of a beautiful documentary by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy called Saving Face in 2012. According to Shahnaz Bukhari, the majority of these attacks happen in the summer when acid is used extensively to soak certain seeds to induce germination.
Source: Political Vel Craft
Why this happens? Is any reason sufficient to justify such ugly norm? Well, the those animals use for such attacks include, trivial acts such as a woman dressing in a way that men don’t like or rejecting a proposal of marriage. The first known instance of an acid attack occurred in East Pakistan in 1967.
Source: Slide Share
According to the Acid Survivors Foundation, up to 150 attacks occur every year. The foundation reports that the attacks are often the result in an escalation of domestic abuse, and the majority of victims are female.
Source: Dawn
Honor Killing
A recent report discovered that one in five homicides in Pakistan are attributed to honor killings. Killing for so-called honor but mainly male-ego. The prevalence of such honor killings that have been reported are around 1100 killings every year.
Source: Slide Share
Overall, out of all homicides of both men and women in Pakistan, honor killings of women constitute 21%. Moreover, the perpetrator in most honor killings is the husband. But NoT-aLL-mEN right guys?
Source: Nbc news
One study found as high as 92% of all honor killings are committed by the spouse. Personal experience: Once my criminology teacher asked the class of murdering your wife for cheating is rational and the number of boys who nodded yes was terrifying.
Source: Ny post
The highest occurring reason in spousal honor killings was alleged extramarital affairs. Much of the data has been collected by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan through newspaper reports, however, it is clear there needs to be more systematic research by a health agency is utterly important to assess this public health crisis and finally look for solutions because too many cases go unreported.
Source: Pakistan Today
Another analysis of this research states that a possible explanation of the high rate of honor killings towards married women could be attributed to the generally high statistics of domestic violence in Pakistan. Obviously.
Source: CNN
Everyday Misogyny
Everyday misogyny includes psychological abuse generally involves yelling, insulting, degrading, harassing, controlling, and threatening women. In a study by Zakar et al., Among the 373 randomly selected married women of reproductive age interviewed in Pakistani hospitals, 60.8% reported as current victims of severe psychological violence with 15% having been victims in the past.
Source: Foreign Policy
The percentage of women going through current psychological violence far surpassed the percentages of women going through current sexual (27.3%) and physical (21.7%) violence. Moreover, more than half of these participants, 54%, reported being currently in a poor state of mental health.
Source: The Independent
Feminism
I don’t think it requires any further explanations. Now i dare you all, the educated men to look the women around you in the eye and tell them that they don’t need feminism, that they are free, that we protect our women, that we treat our women like queen, that this is enough. Its not. The only thing, women of Pakistan need protecting from, are the men of Pakistan.
Source: The Express Tribune
