The Telegraph and just about everyone else ran a story earlier this week about a Turkish girl who was buried alive by her family for talking to boys. It’s sad, it’s unnecessary, it’s frustrating, and it’s baffling that stuff like this still happens in the 21st century. Education levels are still low in many areas throughout the world, and clearly that’s something we need to work on improving.
I’ve been really disappointed at how many people have casually dismissed this incident as “yet another example” of “Islamic” violence, when in fact religion has nothing to do with it. Nothing in the story even indicates that this family is Muslim, and though they may very well be, there’s also the possibility that they aren’t. But there’s a good reason for it not to be mentioned in the article. Honour killings happen even in areas in Turkey where there is a mix of faiths, because the killing is not about religion— it’s about the cultural idea of keeping the “family name” and reputation unsoiled, which happens in many cultures around the world, regardless of the local faith.
When a Christian is found to be abusing his or her children, or committing any other violent crime, no one says, “oh, look, those violent Christians are at it again.” Generally we’re not even made aware of an offender’s religion, unless of course it happens to be Islam, and then Islam is automatically blamed for whatever the violence is. And it’s more than slightly ironic that many of the people who would condemn the beating of a young Muslim girl as an “Islamic” crime, live in countries where many conservative Christians would happily turn a blind eye, or even openly condone the action, if it were a local teenaged boy who was being beaten or killed for being flirtatious with other boys. Violent crime is violent crime, regardless of who the victim is, or who the perpetrator is, or what their faith is, or what the alleged “valid reason” is. This type of ignorance is not particularly a religious issue, it’s a cultural one, and if you think your own culture is immune to it… have a closer look.