The phrase Honour Killing seems to me to be a perfect example of the societal form of Unspeak, since what it usually means is the murder of women by their husbands or fathers. The Observer reports today that
Last year 133 women were killed in Basra – 47 of them for so-called ‘honour killings’, according to the Basra Security Committee. Out of those 47 cases there have been only three convictions for murder. Since January this year, 36 women have been killed.
The statistics are numbing, and mask the fact that each murder victim was an individual, with hopes and fears like all of us. The Observer’s report looks at one case, the story of 17 year old Rand Abdel-Qader. "She was stamped on, suffocated and stabbed by her father. Several brutal knife wounds punctured her slender, bruised body – from her face to her feet. He had done it, he proclaimed to the neighbours who soon gathered round, to ‘cleanse his honour’." He has not been prosecuted for her murder, because it was an "honour killing". Words fail me.
Update 11 May 2008: Abdel-Qader Ali has no regrets about killing his daughter and he remains a free man.
Geoff Coupe's Blog 
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