Honor killings in turkey 2020. Social Sciences Essay
Assignment summary: Students are expected to write a country report on human rights violations/issues in the assigned countries. Students can pick any topics/issues that are relevant to human rights issues. Some examples are a law that might criminalize queer people, police practices, unemployment, discrimination, disowning/honor killings, denial of freedom of expression and freedom of association, and death penalty. These are just examples. You can focus on a different issue that you might be interested in researching.
In order to write this paper, students are expected to do some research on the assigned country. The purpose of this assignment is to explore how different countries approach to different human rights violations/laws. The assignment will also help students to gain knowledge of basic research (e.g. APA)
APA/Style and Appearance: /10%
Cover page should include a tittle, student name & student number, instructor’s name, the university name, and the year (e.g. 2020). Appropriate use of citations/references: Students are expected to follow APA style writing.
Appropriate response length is 2700-word count. Times New Roman, 12 font size, and double space. The minimum expected response length is 2,600 and maximum length is 2,700. Your mark will be deducted if your paper is not in an appropriate length and/or style. General quality of writing (grammar, spelling, sentence/paragraph structure, and evidence of diligent proofreading)
Caution: The assignment without references will be considered as having no citations and will receive a mark of “-10.”
Structure
Introduction 10 %:
You should introduce your paper briefly. Readers should have a brief idea before they begin reading your body paragraph – what your paper is about? What is your thesis statement? What is your specific argument?
Half-page Country Profile 5 %:
Please assume that your paper will be read by someone who has no idea about the assigned country. Location, language, religion, population, etc. are important and helpful to include in your paper. (Please do not send the country profile separately. It must be in the same Word document, just under the country profile section)
Body 5 %:
In this section, you will provide a further summary about the specific human rights issue you will be working on. You can focus on one specific human rights issue in the chosen country and tell your readers why the issue is important and provide more details on that and tell your readers whether anything has done in the assigned country’s criminal justice system. For instance, if you are writing about a specific law that is against queer people then tell your readers whether anything has been done in the criminal justice system. How other NGOs see the situation etc. Providing different perspectives always help. Discussion and transition in ideas between paragraphs should flow well.
Conclusion (10 %):
This part is VERY important. Beyond simply repeating/summarizing what your paper has already said, reflect on the broader importance of your paper to specific one. The reader will be looking for an answer to “So what?!” in your conclusion. What are your suggestions or analysis about the specific issue that you have focused on/chosen? What are your recommendations?
Use of Evidence / Logic and Argumentation /5%
Examples and other evidence support the main thesis and fit cohesively within each paragraph. All ideas presented in the body of the essay flow from, and support the argument presented in the thesis statement.
Students must use at least two peer-reviewed articles and two International Non-Profit Organization (INGO) reports.
***Websites/sources such as Wikipedia, blogs/vlogs are not reliable sources for academic papers, and they are unacceptable!
PLEASE DO MAKE SURE TO COPY AND PASTE THIS RUBRIC IN YOUR ASSIGNMENT. The rubric will be excluded from the word-count.
Honor Killings in Turkey
Student’s Name:
Student Number:
Instructor’s Name:
Institutional Affiliation:
Year: 2020
Honor Killings in Turkey in 2020
Introduction
Infringement against fundamental human rights is a worrying trend. Globally, there are various forms of transgression against moral, ethical, and constitutional rights. This paper will be focusing on honor killings in Turkey, which constitute a threat to life and have raised grave concerns across various quarters, including civil society and government authorities. Honor killings involve the murder of a woman or a girl following various sexually-related offenses such as premarital sex. It is in this light that this paper demonstrates an intricacy surrounding the phenomena of honor killings by arguing that honor killings are oppressive patriarchal, discriminative, and inhumane acts that go against the basic tenets of human rights ethic and morality, only to befit the male and families in the society at the expense of women and girls. The paper demonstrates weak perceived benefits associated with honor killings by critical, rhetorical, and in-depth interrogation of reasons that occasion these phenomena. The article is capped by concise presentations of a collaborative approach to taming honor killings.
Country Profile
Turkey is a unique country that lies partly in both Europe and Asia. In 2015 population statistics, Turkey’s population stood at 78,741,53 people, with 1,592,437 being born abroad and about 3 million refugees, primarily from Syria (De Bel-Air, 2016). Historically, modern Turkey was established in the 1920s by nationalist Kemal Ataturk as a center of the Ottoman Empire. It exists as a midline separating the two continents. Thus, it is strategically positioned in an important locality, which greatly influences Europe and Asia due to its control over the Black Sea. The desecrated movement and growing economy were disrupted following Ataturk's death in 1938. Consequently, the army assumed the role of custodian of the constitution – leading to recurrent ousting of governments that were perceived as challenging secular values. Its membership in the European Union has been controversial due to its track record on human rights. For instance, Kurds, who contribute about 20 % of Turkey's population, have cause instabilities in Turkey, specifically, the Kurdish separatists who have continually wage a guerrilla war since the 1980s accusing the government of destroying their culture.
Contextualizing the Meaning, implications, Culture and Managing of Honor Killings
Honor-related killings of women and girls are often committed by family members when they perceive female family members' behavior as disgracing the family and needs to be sanctioned (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), 2019). This killing is a product of men’s dominating relationships with women. The typical behavior observations that transgress strict patriarchal gender roles include a young woman eloping with a man not chosen by the family and involving in premarital relations. Besides, honor killings have featured female rape victims killed to get rid of the shame associated with the stigma of sexual violence suffered by unmarried women (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), 2019).In 2000, the United Nations findings showed an approximated value of 5,000 honor killings every year, which is reasonable for Pakistan alone, but globally the figures are higher (Chesler, 2010). One of the studies showed that honor killings increased substantially in a 20-year period between 1989 and 2009 (UNDP Report, 2015). This accelerated growth in honor killings may have been duet to genuine escalation, rising Islamic fundamentalism, jihadist extremism, or accurate reporting and prosecutions.
The quantitative and qualitative data on the incidence of honor killings remain scanty due to insufficient accurate case identification underpinned by underreporting and misreporting, where deaths are often disguised as disappearance, suicides, or accidents (Kulczycki & Windle, 2011). Furthermore, the authors postulated that challenges occur because people with information on the killings may not like to share due to privacy, the sensitivity of the matter, and fear of reprisals
Honor killings historically happened in deeply patriarchal cultures and societies, such as the Balkans and some sections of Mediterranean Europe (Kulczycki & Windle, .2011). The victims of honor killings are often young, unmarried, low socioeconomic class women or girls who live in a rural/isolated region (Kulczycki & Windle, 2011). The perpetrators of honor killings are frequently the youngest victim’ brother or a male cousin, especially from the victim’s side of the family, who are picked to implement the sanction of honor killing by a family council. The selection of young males is based on leniency in criminal sentencing owing to age, considering the necessity to retain the higher income potentiality of older males in the family region (Kulczycki & Windle, 2011). There is also a high chance that when an unmarried, young, and childless man is imprisoned, he will easily start life the moment he is released. The young brother or cousin can often be presented as the perpetrators, but he might have also committed the vice with others.
Honor killing refers to the murder of a woman, lady, or girl by male family members due to dishonor or shame caused by the victim. The sense of disgrace is perceived as a threat to the family’s reputation and prestige. Honor killings constitute violence against women. The prevalence of honor killings is relatively high in patriarchal and hegemonic societies, where males, including brothers and fathers, dominate women and girls. The victims of honor killings are often accused of engaging in sexual encounters that are considered immoral or discreetly engaging in ‘sexual conversations or participating in sexual activity outside marriage. Honor killings are done to remedy offenses associated with the perceived misuse of female sexuality, primarily marital infidelity and premarital sex (Kulczycki & Windle, 2011). Other unacceptable behaviors include contacting persons of a separate religion, initiation of divorce or partner separation, being a victim of rape, and other misdemeanors like flirting, leading to soiling of family honor (Kulczycki & Windle, 2011).
When broadly defined, honor means the quality of knowing and implementing what is morally correct. From a social viewpoint, honor denotes worthiness that influences individuals and groups. Thus, behaving with honor raises an individual’s self-worth and provides him or her with respect. Honor is not a preserve of the community: it applies in the family where any issues that concern honor may be focused on the whole family, but not as an individual. The other forms of honor in Turkey include seref, onur, haya, Izzet, and ar, representing certain social values (Cetin, 2015).
The honor killings may be traced to the definition and implication of namus, which is a Turkish word that can denote chastity, fidelity, and honesty in the context of female sexuality. More often, Namus need to be protected by men and women because it cannot be recovered once it disappears. When namus is lost, it can be remedied by marrying the person who destroyed namus, though a family whose namus has been destroyed cannot be restored even if it is remedied by marriage: such a family will be called namussu. The actual namus can only be restored by death, where honor killing becomes the feasible way of restoring family grace and reputation. Honor killing permits the family to maintain its existence in society again when namus is lost. Failure to restore namus can lead to family expulsion from its home. Thus, honor killings assume the ultimate namus restoration approach anchored on cultural customs, traditions, norms, lifestyle, and practices (Cetin, 2015).
In Turkey, “honor killing” and “töre (custom) killing” reflects homicide-related tradition with a powerful connection to the traditional cultural frameworks (Cetin, 2015). For example, when a man murders his wife for adultery without trading input or societal directions, this can be classified as an honor killing but not a töre killing. Töre killing does merely center the killer alone, but also the whole family, who plan and decides the fate of a woman in question. The community of the family determines who will kill the woman and prescribes the process of murder. This culturally anchored phenomenon underpins the justification of inhumane murderous acts (Cetin, 2015). These murders are rooted in social standing, cultural norms, and institutions, leading to a situation where the concept of family honor provides a socially sanctioned justification for killing because a woman is perceived as the family's icon of reputation (Kulczycki & Windle, 2011).
Honor killings are indisputably harmful to the victims and can be compared to female genital mutilation and infanticides. Honor killings exist due to deeply entrenched societal values and cultural practices. As witnessed in the patriarchal and patrilineal communities, the primary reasons underlying honor killings are a mechanism for maintaining control over women and girls, their reproductive power, and a structured familial power system. Honor killings attempt to remove and eradicate liberal rights amongst women and girls to limit the capacity to express their sexuality. Thus, honor killings are oppressive, violent, and discriminative practices, which drive well in male-dominated societies.
These murders are expresses differently from psychopathic homicides, serial murders, crimes of passion, retaliatory killings, and domestic violence (Chesler, 2010). These killings are inspired by morality and behavior features in some cultures. The morality and behavioral beliefs that support fundamentalist religious dictates support honor killings.
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