NYT Article: Sentenced to be Raped
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/29/opinion/29kris.html?ex=1097647858&ei=1&en=74bf4d0e959cd39b
Sentenced to Be Raped
September 29, 2004
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
MEERWALA, Pakistan - I'm still trying to help out President
Bush by tracking down Osama bin Laden. After poking through
remote parts of Pakistan, asking for a tall Arab with a
beard, I can't say I've earned that $25 million reward.
But I did come across someone even more extraordinary than
Osama.
Usually we journalists write about rogues, but Mukhtaran
Bibi could not be more altruistic or brave, as the men who
gang-raped her discovered. I firmly believe that the
central moral challenge of this century, equivalent to the
struggles against slavery in the 19th century or against
totalitarianism in the 20th, will be to address sex
inequality in the third world - and it's the stories of
women like Ms. Mukhtaran that convince me this is so.
The plight of women in developing countries isn't addressed
much in the West, and it certainly isn't a hot topic in the
presidential campaign. But it's a life-and-death matter in
villages like Meerwala, a 12-hour drive southeast from
Islamabad.
In June 2002, the police say, members of a high-status
tribe sexually abused one of Ms. Mukhtaran's brothers and
then covered up their crime by falsely accusing him of
having an affair with a high-status woman. The village's
tribal council determined that the suitable punishment for
the supposed affair was for high-status men to rape one of
the boy's sisters, so the council sentenced Ms. Mukhtaran
to be gang-raped.
As members of the high-status tribe danced in joy, four men
stripped her naked and took turns raping her. Then they
forced her to walk home naked in front of 300 villagers.
In Pakistan's conservative Muslim society, Ms. Mukhtaran's
duty was now clear: she was supposed to commit suicide.
'Just like other women, I initially thought of killing
myself,' said Ms. Mukhtaran, now 30. Her older brother,
Hezoor Bux, explained: 'A girl who has been raped has no
honorable place in the village. Nobody respects the girl,
or her parents. There's a stigma, and the only way out is
suicide.'
A girl in the next village was gang-raped a week after Ms.
Mukhtaran, and she took the traditional route: she
swallowed a bottle of pesticide and dropped dead.
But instead of killing herself, Ms. Mukhtaran testified
against her attackers and propounded the shocking idea that
the shame lies in raping, rather than in being raped. The
rapists are now on death row, and President Pervez
Musharraf presented Ms. Mukhtaran with the equivalent of
$8,300 and ordered round-the-clock police protection for
her.
Ms. Mukhtaran, who had never gone to school herself, used
the money to build one school in the village for girls and
another for boys - because, she said, education is the best
way to achieve social change. The girls' school is named
for her, and she is now studying in its fourth-grade class.
'Why should I have spent the money on myself?' she asked,
adding, 'This way the money is helping all the girls, all
the children.'
I wish the story ended there. But the Pakistani government
has neglected its pledge to pay the schools' operating
expenses. 'The government made lots of promises, but it
hasn't done much,' Ms. Mukhtaran said bluntly.
She has had to buy food for the police who protect her, as
well as pay some school expenses. So, she said, 'I've run
out of money.' Unless the schools can raise new funds, they
may have to close.
Meanwhile, villagers say that relatives of the rapists are
waiting for the police to leave and then will put Ms.
Mukhtaran in her place by slaughtering her and her entire
family. I walked to the area where the high-status
tribesmen live. They denied planning to kill Ms. Mukhtaran,
but were unapologetic about her rape.
'Mukhtaran is totally disgraced,' Taj Bibi, a matriarch in
a high-status family, said with satisfaction. 'She has no
respect in society.'
So although I did not find Osama, I did encounter a much
more ubiquitous form of evil and terror: a culture,
stretching across about half the globe, that chews up women
and spits them out.
We in the West could help chip away at that oppression,
with health and literacy programs and by simply speaking
out against it, just as we once stood up against slavery
and totalitarianism. But instead of standing beside
fighters like Ms. Mukhtaran, we're still sitting on the
fence.
A Postscript, Oct. 1: Readers have asked how they can help
Ms. Mukhtaran and her schools. If you send me a check, made
out to Mukhtaran Bibi, I'll make sure she gets it. My
address:
Nicholas Kristof
The New York Times
229 West 43rd St.
New York, NY 10036
Sentenced to Be Raped
September 29, 2004
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
MEERWALA, Pakistan - I'm still trying to help out President
Bush by tracking down Osama bin Laden. After poking through
remote parts of Pakistan, asking for a tall Arab with a
beard, I can't say I've earned that $25 million reward.
But I did come across someone even more extraordinary than
Osama.
Usually we journalists write about rogues, but Mukhtaran
Bibi could not be more altruistic or brave, as the men who
gang-raped her discovered. I firmly believe that the
central moral challenge of this century, equivalent to the
struggles against slavery in the 19th century or against
totalitarianism in the 20th, will be to address sex
inequality in the third world - and it's the stories of
women like Ms. Mukhtaran that convince me this is so.
The plight of women in developing countries isn't addressed
much in the West, and it certainly isn't a hot topic in the
presidential campaign. But it's a life-and-death matter in
villages like Meerwala, a 12-hour drive southeast from
Islamabad.
In June 2002, the police say, members of a high-status
tribe sexually abused one of Ms. Mukhtaran's brothers and
then covered up their crime by falsely accusing him of
having an affair with a high-status woman. The village's
tribal council determined that the suitable punishment for
the supposed affair was for high-status men to rape one of
the boy's sisters, so the council sentenced Ms. Mukhtaran
to be gang-raped.
As members of the high-status tribe danced in joy, four men
stripped her naked and took turns raping her. Then they
forced her to walk home naked in front of 300 villagers.
In Pakistan's conservative Muslim society, Ms. Mukhtaran's
duty was now clear: she was supposed to commit suicide.
'Just like other women, I initially thought of killing
myself,' said Ms. Mukhtaran, now 30. Her older brother,
Hezoor Bux, explained: 'A girl who has been raped has no
honorable place in the village. Nobody respects the girl,
or her parents. There's a stigma, and the only way out is
suicide.'
A girl in the next village was gang-raped a week after Ms.
Mukhtaran, and she took the traditional route: she
swallowed a bottle of pesticide and dropped dead.
But instead of killing herself, Ms. Mukhtaran testified
against her attackers and propounded the shocking idea that
the shame lies in raping, rather than in being raped. The
rapists are now on death row, and President Pervez
Musharraf presented Ms. Mukhtaran with the equivalent of
$8,300 and ordered round-the-clock police protection for
her.
Ms. Mukhtaran, who had never gone to school herself, used
the money to build one school in the village for girls and
another for boys - because, she said, education is the best
way to achieve social change. The girls' school is named
for her, and she is now studying in its fourth-grade class.
'Why should I have spent the money on myself?' she asked,
adding, 'This way the money is helping all the girls, all
the children.'
I wish the story ended there. But the Pakistani government
has neglected its pledge to pay the schools' operating
expenses. 'The government made lots of promises, but it
hasn't done much,' Ms. Mukhtaran said bluntly.
She has had to buy food for the police who protect her, as
well as pay some school expenses. So, she said, 'I've run
out of money.' Unless the schools can raise new funds, they
may have to close.
Meanwhile, villagers say that relatives of the rapists are
waiting for the police to leave and then will put Ms.
Mukhtaran in her place by slaughtering her and her entire
family. I walked to the area where the high-status
tribesmen live. They denied planning to kill Ms. Mukhtaran,
but were unapologetic about her rape.
'Mukhtaran is totally disgraced,' Taj Bibi, a matriarch in
a high-status family, said with satisfaction. 'She has no
respect in society.'
So although I did not find Osama, I did encounter a much
more ubiquitous form of evil and terror: a culture,
stretching across about half the globe, that chews up women
and spits them out.
We in the West could help chip away at that oppression,
with health and literacy programs and by simply speaking
out against it, just as we once stood up against slavery
and totalitarianism. But instead of standing beside
fighters like Ms. Mukhtaran, we're still sitting on the
fence.
A Postscript, Oct. 1: Readers have asked how they can help
Ms. Mukhtaran and her schools. If you send me a check, made
out to Mukhtaran Bibi, I'll make sure she gets it. My
address:
Nicholas Kristof
The New York Times
229 West 43rd St.
New York, NY 10036
