Honor Killings... lies, damn lies and statistics.

October 23, 11:51 AMSF Muslim ExaminerDavi Barker

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FBI Expanded Homicide Data

To help my own understanding I like to check footnotes and crunch numbers. You've all heard it right? It's all over the blogosphere. It's in all the Rifqa Bary articles. Atlas Shrugs knows it. Jihad Watch knows it. The United Nations Population Fund estimates that 5,000 Muslim women are victims of honor killings annually. Wow! That's a major problem.

Let's start with the footnote.

UNFPA: Chapter 3: Ending Violence against Women and Girls

"Throughout the world, perhaps as many as 5,000 women and girls a year are murdered by members of their own families..."

It's not 5,000 Muslim honor killings. It's 5,000 women and girls murdered by members of their own family. Huge difference! Women murdered in America would be included as part of that statistic. The report does say many (not most) of them are honor killings, and the majority of honor killings are in Muslim majority countries, but it makes no estimate as to how many that is. I'm not trying to diminish the issue, just refine the statistics. Honor killings are a major problem.

Now, let's give it some perspective.

Let's accept the 5,000 number as our first sample, flawed as it is. We'll presume all 5,000 women and girls murdered by members of their own families are Muslim, even though we know that's not true, and put motive aside for the moment. A recent report from the The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that there are an estimated 1.57 billion Muslims in the world, which is approaching 25% of the world population. We'll use that as our second sample. That's 3.2 per Million Muslim women murdered by their family annually.

Now, lets look at America.

According the FBI Expanded Homicide Data There were 14,180 US murders in 2008. Of those, 930 were women and girls murdered by their own families. We'll use that as our first sample. According to The Bartleby World Factbook for 2008 the United States had approximately 301 million people the year these statistics were gathered. So, let's accept that as our second sample. That's 3.1 per Million American women murdered by their family annually.

So the difference between the rate at which Muslims murder women in their family and Americans murder women in their family is 1 per 10 Million. That's a statistically insignificant difference, especially considering we know the 5,000 sample would actually include the 930 American murders.

But, let's talk about another 5,000 people who died in the name of Honor. Take a look at this exchange between Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee during the last Republican Primary debates.

According to Ron Paul, at that point in the conflict we'd lost 5,000 American lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. It's much more than that now, and that doesn't include civilian casualties. Huckabee's argument for staying in the conflict was, "We’ve got a responsibility to the honor of this country, and to the honor of every man and woman who has served in Iraq, and ever served in our military to not leave them with anything less than the honor that they deserve.”

I'm confused. I guess John McCain understands honor, and Mike Huckabee acts like he does. Maybe it’s me. Maybe I don’t understand honor. Let’s ask Google.

1. “Honour (or honor) is the concept of a direct relation between one's virtues (or "values") and their status within society. Accordingly, individuals are assigned worth and stature based on a harmony between their own code of honour and that of the society at large.” (Wikipedia) 
2. “the quality of will that enables a person to confront fear or danger regardless of the consequences; bravery” (Veterans vocabulary)
3. “For the Greeks honor was a central virtue; honor was the respect which was due according to one's reputation and rank; it also suggested a keen sense of right and wrong.” (Iliad Glossary)

Ok… now that we know what honor means, let’s examine Huckabee's argument. We’ve got a responsibility to the honor of the people who broke Iraq not to leave Iraq without the honor they deserve… I don’t think that means anything. But he’s implying that if we leave Iraq it will dishonor America, especially the military. The first definition ties the virtue of the individual to the values of society. By this definition invading Iraq in the first place is dishonorable, and coming home is the honorable thing to do. In the second definition, the veteran's definition, honor is bravery. So, maybe on an incredibly superficial level the warmongers see coming home as a cowardly retreat. In this case coming home with honor means coming home with military victory. The Iraqi military was defeated in the first few months of the conflict. So, the only military victory left is against, “the terrorists.” But they won’t come to the battlefield. So, "honor" for the warmongers really means staying over there and killing more innocent civilians… Is that honor? I think it’s important to stress the Greek definition. Honor is the respect one earns for taking right action.

It's clear Huckabee and McCain don't know what honor means, and neither does most of the audience. To them honor just means wining every fight they get in. It's not about right action, or the values of our society. It's just stubborn stupid bravery. But, it's also clear that for the Americans who support these wars of foreign aggression a central motivation is the preservation of their national honor, and all the civilian casualties they callously call, "collateral damage" are honor killings.

 "Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?" (Matthew 7:3)

So, I hope that's been helpful, or at least been thought provoking. To be clear, honor killings are a disgusting barbaric practice and I fully support the death penalty for these savages, whatever their creed. I find no basis for it in Islam. My heart is with the victims and their families. But sometimes I think we just need a little perspective.

May Allah put tranquility in the hearts of those who have lost loved ones. May He grant abundant mercy upon the souls of those taken from us. And may He visit His eternal justice upon these monsters. Everything right and true is from Allah. Any mistake is from myself. Astaghfirullah, wa alhamdulillah, wa lahaula wala quwata illa billah.