Sweden: Girls facing honor violence

Girls who are taken into custody by the social services often come from families with honor traditions, according to a study by the Stockholm and Västra Götaland counties.  A third of the girls in custody have been subjected to violence, threats and surveillance, says professor Astrid Schlytter of Stockholm University.

Schlytter says that those girls don't have free time and that they're inspected in school, they don't get to use the TV, computer or phone without somebody overseeing them.  They watch TV together with somebody else or a brother checks up later what she's done on the computer.

They must be isolated at home.  All these girls have two parents who are born abroad, so there is a problem that had do with immigration, immigration patterns, says Schlytter.

Together with Hanna Linell of the social services research unit in Stockholm county, Schlytter reviewed 57 verdicts of youth taken into custody from 2006 in Stockholm and Västra Götaland counties.

In 18 cases (that is 1/3), the girl had lived in a family with some elements of honor criteria, that the researchers defined as threats, punishment or family arranged or forced marriages.  Other criteria are genital mutilation or a demand for virginity (ie, intact hymen).

But the social services are poorly prepared to deal with the girls' situation.  Often they are sent to the school.

The social services have been going to courses, go to training about the overall pattern, what it looks like, getting certain information.  But how they meet it on the individual level, how can they recognize it when dealing with a specific case?

Schlytter says that people are poorly prepared and the law doesn't say anything.  People try to develop their own methods but it's also very difficult.  They must have enough knowledge and awareness to be able to recognize it.

Schlytter says that there are some cases which are astonishing.  A girl who's been subjected to violence at home for two years.  There's been reports from the public health care service, from the school and from the psychiatric care and the social service still thinks that there are no problems in the conditions at home.

Source: Sweden Radio (Swedish)

See also: Sweden: Honor-related violence, Sweden: Honor related violence widespread

6 comments:

Mark Tapson said...

"Families with honor traditions"? I wonder what families those could be. This is yet another article about honor violence that doesn't even mention Islam.

Anonymous said...

It goes without saying at this point that the only people left on this planet who substitute "honor" for morality are Muslims. Even the technically "godless" communist Chinese typically demonstrate a high degree of morality (i.e., they're by and large very law-abiding, they take fantastic care of their families, they're incredibly hard-working, etc.; I also realize that China has a million Jews, and countless loads of Christians and Buddhists). Not surprisingly, China's lawless province is the Uighur, which is demographically you-know-what. We did away with all the other honor cultures when we nuked Japan and cut the Shinto Achilles' heel and the Germans got some Judeo-Christian sense knocked back into them. That is pretty much the fate of honor cultures, except that the Islamic culture is one which, left to its own devices, and (hopefully, someday) isolated in its own lands and deprived of foreign aid, will devour itself from the inside out just like it always has without new lands to conquer and jizya from the free world.

What on Earth does "inspected in school" mean? I imagine that that would not carry the typical American meaning, namely being sniffed by dogs, put through metal detectors, and often patted down and made to carry transparent backpacks.

webdawah said...

In repsonse to jdam13.

Honor violence has nothing to do with religion. It is cultural, and you would often hear of it in some cultures who just happen to be 'practicing' Islam. They, nor anyone can find justification for these acts from Islamic scriptures.

Peter said...

Hi Webdawah

But religion is just a codification of culture. This is the modern understanding based on classical sociological works. It might be news to you, but all those old Divine texts are actualy manmade. Unfortunately the codification of culture in Divine texsts makes it difficult to change the culture.

Anonymous said...
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webdawah said...

Late response to prl...

Religion and culture are exclusive. If you are talking about a certain religion in question, Islam for instance, Africans, American, Eurpoeans practice this without honor killing. The texts have nothing in them that support this practice.