The Hindu : Women, a battered section of society

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Mar 09, 2004

International

International

Women, a battered section of society

By Vaiju Naravane

PARIS, MARCH 8. The Amnesty International Secretary-General. Irene Khan, releasing a report on Saturday dealing with violence against women, described the phenomenon as a `cancer' eating away at the core of every society.

According to the report, one in every three women suffers violence in her lifetime. The statistics in Europe are as appalling as anywhere else. In France, six women die each month at the hands of men who profess to love them. In Spain, some 100 women are killed each year by abusive spouses or boyfriends with over 30,000 complaints of severe physical violence, while in Switzerland, one of the wealthiest countries in Europe where "direct democracy" rules supreme, the number of women who suffer physical and psychological abuse tops 20 per cent. In Britain, one woman is killed by a partner every three days, one woman in four experiences domestic violence and attacks on partners account for a quarter of all violent crime.

In France, the subject became front-page news after the film actress, Marie Trintrignant, was beaten to death by her lover, singer Bertrand Cantat. The trial, on charges of first degree murder, being held in Vilnius where the killing took place, has riveted the country. Despite media campaigns and shocking statistics, domestic violence continues to be one of Europe's most under-reported crimes. On International Women's Day this year, France has had reason to ponder Amnesty's devastating report.

"It is not a death I would wish upon anyone. However, the case of Marie Trintrignant finally placed the spotlight on one of the most taboo subjects in Western democracies, that of domestic violence. We have a supposedly free press, a police and justice system reputed to be among the best in the world, several social and societal safety nets meant to protect our citizens. Yet, violence against women continues unabated in France, with an average of six women per month dying as a result. The unfortunate and much-publicised case of Marie Trintrignant has also highlighted the fact that violence against women is not restricted to a "lower social milieu" as many would have us believe. It affects every class of woman — the poor and under-educated as much as the rich and professionally qualified," said Lilliane Daligand, professor of forensic medicine and director a French association against marital violence called VIFF-SOS Femmes.

Says Marie-Dominique de Suremain of the National Federation of Women's Solidarity: "The real extent of the problem has been grossly underestimated. A study undertaken by the forensic services of the Paris hospital system indicates that over 60 women are killed annually by their partners in Paris alone. We have no idea of how many such killings take place in the provinces. No statistics exist on the number of women maimed or mutilated nor how many endure years of terror."

France commissioned its first comprehensive report on domestic violence in 1999. Published in 2002, it indicates women between 20 and 24 years of age are among the most affected. Women also tend to be persecuted by jilted lovers, former husbands or companions who stalk them, insult them, assault them and sometimes kill them.

"A strange link is that of love. Eighteen per cent of severely mistreated women told us they were still in love with their violent partners. In addition, there is an overwhelming feeling of guilt — of various types. Often women feel they deserved the beating because they had not been perfect wives or lovers. Or that they have failed to show enough sympathy or understanding to their partners for the trauma that they had suffered as children — for, most violent men have had a troubled childhood when they have been abused. Women have to fight these received images of themselves," says Ms Daligande.

Amina is French but of Algerian descent. She has a cut lip, huge bruises around her right eye and is living in a shelter of battered women in a northern suburb of Paris. "None of these women who talk about women standing up for themselves know what it is like out there in the ghettos," she says. According to Amina, there is unimaginable violence against women in north African immigrant ghettos. "Our fathers, brothers, boyfriends, husbands, all beat us. I cannot tell you how miserable it is to be a woman there, ignored by social workers, without help of any kind." The World Organisation Against Torture, in a report entitled, "Violence Against Women in France", has denounced gang rapes known as "tournantes" or passarounds, in which teenage girls or young women are handed over by their boyfriends to their buddies.

"Ni Putes Ni Soumises" (Neither Whores Nor Slaves), is an activist group set up to combat growing violence against women in the projects including gang rapes and forced marriages. Fedia Amare, a young second generation immigrant founded the organisation after the burning to death of a 19-year-old girl of North African origin, Sohane Benziane, in October 2002 shocked the nation. The group has come out in support of a controversial law banning the wearing of Islamic headscarves by girl students in state-run schools and decried women who have marched in favour of the right to wear the veil.

This year, the women's movement in France, one of the most vociferous in Europe, has seen deep divisions. Several thousand Muslim women have demanded the right to wear the traditional headscarf. They are seen as backward and retrograde by more radical women.

The National Collective for the Rights of Women (CNDF), which militates for women's rights in general, is concerned about "the erosion of social protection for women" by the current centre-right Government.

"We condemn the veil, but we say that the social assaults by the Government are just as serious," said Maya Surduts, a spokeswoman for the Collective, which is supported by the Opposition Socialist Party and left-wing groups.

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