Murder in the Name of Honor by Rana Husseini

The novel in reading “Murder in the Name of Honor” by Rana Husseini is very inspiring. The novel discusses the violence and alleged heroism that is taking place in Jordan. Women and daughters are all being killed “in the name of honor”. When a daughter is raped, or sexually active, or when a wife cheats or choses to disobey her husband, she is murdered so the men can restore their pride and they can gain their family’s honor back and be looked at like hero’s. This whole thing is sick and twisted. When a women is raped, why should kill her? Why wouldn’t you go after the rapist and kill him? These are your family! This is your wife, your sister, your daughter. How can lives have such little value to you? These are the people whom you are supposed to love and cherish and protect. I’m disgusted at what is happening in this country. The author of her book tells of her journey for justice for these women. Many people in Jordan marched, signed petitions, tried to enact laws to protect these women and the Jordan parliament completely rejected all that these human activist were doing. Without even a second glance the parliament rejected the 370 bill not even thinking twice of all the lives they could have saved. Days after the bill was rejected, their prince came and initiated a march for women’s rights where thousands of people gathered to and marched together for all one cause, justice. It was one of the largest grouping of protesters many Jordanians have ever seen. Journalist from all over came to interview and cover what was happening down at the march. The march was huge success and brought the human activist a step closer to finding justice for all of these women who are victims of “so called honor crimes.”

Invisible children

Deerfield high school is raising money for the invisible children in Uganda. After I saw the documentary on Invisible children I found it extremely heart breaking that it’s taking so long to get these children help. This is genocide. The world should be coming together to help other people just like us. Living in Deerfield many of the people out here make plenty money to spare. I’m sick of hearing that our school chest fund raising money should be used locally because we need help too. Do we actually need help? With what? Road construction? Fixing up more schools? People in Uganda are dying and being tortured everyday of their lives. They are the ones who actually need help. Our road construction and fixing schools here can wait. You know why? The things that we need here locally always get fixed. We know that we are privileged and whenever we need help, help comes. People in Uganda are fighting this alone. This is something that people in the United States will never have to face. We don’t all live in constant fear that we and or our children will be abducted and forced to be soldiers who will be trained to kill and massacre villages. If we need help locally people here have the money to spend on it, the fact that those who have money and don’t want to spend it locally and would rather spend it somewhere else shows that they know there is a better use for their money that can go to a great cause. We’ve had local problems for years, many people never contributed to it, but once those same people heard about invisible children they were willing to help. This doesn’t mean that we are taking away money that could have been used to help us locally, because the people who live here could have donated their money whenever they wanted to help our local community. They chose not to and they chose to donate to the invisible children. So the money was never “there” locally so there’s no money that is being taken away. Plus living in such a privileged community we know that were safe, we will have food, we can live without fear. Children and families in Uganda have never had a day in their lives where they have not feared the LRA, or that they have not felt hunger. Our small problems can wait. Our problems are not life or death problems. The people living in Uganda NEED our help. The people in Uganda need to feel peace, harmony, and safe. The same feelings many of us in the United States take for granted every day of our lives. The priorities here need to change. Lives are more important than any “local problems” we might have.

Muder in the Name of Honor by Rana Husseini

In the novel Muder in the Name of Honor by Rana Husseini, a women activist tells of the stuggles of her journy that she encountered during her "honor killing" interviews. these honor killings take place when a family member kills a family member to clense their familys honor, for instance when a women is raped it is her fault for seducing the man so she must be killed, or if a women talks back or doesnt clean the house up to her husbands standards. One of the many stories Rana dicusses spoke out to me more than others. it was a story of a couple who fell in love when they were young but were not allowed to marry. the girl was forced to marry a man who beat and raped her almost daily. The couple came up with a plan to escape and take train far away and get married. The couple in the dead of night were caught at the train station where the couple was stopped by the girls father who began shooting at the couple. both were shot and hospitalized. but that didnt stop the live that the couple had for eachother. Leaving your husband is a crime and when the girl nursed back to health she was put in jail. while in jail she had a restraining order against her family to protect herself from another family member coming to kill her  to replace their familys honor. after 3 years being inside jail and writing apoligizes to her family she became desperate to gain their love back. Many members of the family wrote to her promising they would not harm her and that missed her, they were sorry for what they did to her and they want her to come home. the girl was convinced that she was safe and she was released to her fathers custody and right as she walked outside those jail walls, she saw her uncle who shot and killed her and then turned himself in. He was later a considered a hero for clensing his familys honor. so many of these stories take place and it needs to stop. The betrayal of loved one, people dying for unjust causes. The real perpatrator needs to be prosecuted. Many of these honor killings happen with in people with middle/ lower income and in rual areas where pride and honor are all they have and they will stop at nothing to keep it.