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WOMEN AND LAW

Rethinking VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
ARIFUR RAHMAN
When it comes to violence against women, we make a conscious choice and turn all our focus on sexual violence. It is not necessarily because sexual violence causes women serious harm but perhaps because we consider, with rape or any other forms of sexual violence, a woman is robbed of her honour and chastity.
Rape is perceived not only as an indignity and stigma to a victim woman but also to her family and community. This dynamic applies not only to the everyday sexual violence that women experience in Bangladesh but also to those who survived wartime rape during our Liberation War. In the post-independence period, to address the stigma and shame these women might face due to the perceived “loss” of their honor, the then government ‘honoured’ them with the title Birangana . While the intention was to recognise them within the national imaginary, over time the title came to symbolise a loss of honor, which further marginalised and stigmatised these women. The honour-shame dyad captures all our attention in a manner that we seldom look at sexual violence against women as a violation of their physical and mental integrity.
Central to such conceptualisation is the over reliance on the idea of female sexual subordination and male sexual dominance that comes with its ensuing consequences. In this framework, women and sexual agency stand in opposition to each other. This regressive view perpetuates a constant state of fear that we often respond to by either punishing women who transgress the ideal women-like roles or overcriminalising sexual activities even when women consciously exercise their sexual agency.
Based on this conception of honour, our society tends to get fixated with sexual violence against women, especially rape, and turn to the highest form of punitive state measure to punish the perpetrators. In response to the widespread protests and public outrage over the growing incidents of sexual violence, the government, after all, approved the death penalty in 2020 for rape. While severe penalties can be perceived as a strong stance against the crime, they do not necessarily address the root cause of sexual violence or eventually result in its reduction. Instead, the imposition of harsh punishment can appear to be more of an act of vengeance by the state because it failed to protect (the “honour” of) women, rather than a meaningful solution to tackle the problem. In this process, other forms of violence/harm that women experience life fail to gain any considerable attention.
Furthermore, our fixation with sexual violence often loses sight of the overall framework within which such violence in fact takes place. Consider, for example, the issue of obstetric violence which generally implies the mistreatment of women in healthcare settings including neglect, abuse, and coercion, particularly with respect to obstetric and gynecological care. More than a case of medical malpractice, obstetric violence is understood as a form of gender-based violence that women face. A key example of obstetric violence is the performance of cesarean sections (C-sections) without informed and voluntary consent of the patient. As per the report by Save the Children, in Bangladesh, the rate of unnecessary C-sections surged to 51% between 2016 and 2018. Despite the severe consequences of obstetric violence on women, Bangladesh has yet to take the matter seriously. Obstetric violence is also closely connected with economic abuse by intimate partners or family members, along with sexual violence. Unfortunately, while these issues are equally urgent, our society often only thinks sexual violence occurs in a vacuum, and the broader patterns and systemic incidents of violence fall through the cracks.
Focusing on sexual violence against women is immensely essential, given the alarming rise of crimes such as rape in our country. However, it should not be the sole category of violence of concern so as to underplay other equally critical issues that have a profound and lasting impact on women’s everyday lives and that in fact are closely tied with and contribute to incidents of sexual violence. To develop a broader and more nuanced understanding of women’s experiences of violence, we must go beyond viewing sexual violence such as rape as a stand-alone or only form of violence.
The writer is graduate, NYU Law
Focusing on sexual violence against women is immensely essential, given the alarming rise of crimes such as rape in our country. However, it should not be the sole category of violence of concern so as to underplay other equally critical issues that have a profound and lasting impact on women’s everyday lives and that in fact are closely tied with and contribute to incidents of sexual violence.