Women Are Still Second Class Citizens and Property

On November 2, 2008, there was a small article in "Daily News," a New York paper. The title was, "1,000 watch as Somalis stone Girl, 13, to death." In the article the horrendous story was explained in detail.

A thirteen year old girl was raped by three men on the way to visit a relative. She reported it to adults, the Islamic militia, who immediately accused her of adultery and arrested her before sentencing her to death. In front of a thousand spectators in a stadium in Kismayo, Somalia, this young girl was buried to her neck and stoned to death by dozens of men while onlookers cheered, as if it was a sporting event.

The utter shock I experienced reading about this child's violent death still vibrates inside me. I'm an American citizen, but more importantly a woman with equal rights alongside men in my country. I can vote, speak my opinion, hold a job, be a supervisor of male employees, run for political office, and still in parts of the world women are still considered second class citizens. In some countries women are still property, no better than horses or oxen that perform farm labor.

This poor young female child did the right thing by seeking a responsible adult to tell them she was brutally raped by sick men. She sought help for herself and for some type of justice and punishment against these men. Instead she was dragged off and buried up to her neck with her arms trapped, unable to move and fight off the extreme agony of being stoned. The unknown terror she had to experience as she was pummeled until her screams of agony were muffled and finally diminished. Her parent's agony in having no defense against this extreme Islamic militia as they watched their child murdered for speaking out against men is heart wrenching. I could only vision their despair placing my own daughter in the same predicament, but thankfully I'll never have this concern living in the democracy of America. This young girl wasn't even married, and this incident occurred in a country being overrun by militants.

Sadly, the mentality of cruel men and societies who treat their women like animals still continues in many parts of the world today. In some countries if a married women is raped, her husband has the right to punish her, banish her from the village to live alone as a marked woman, or even slay her without any fear of retribution. No other man will ever accept a raped woman, she'll be soiled forever. If a woman happens to get pregnant from the act of rape, the infant is either slaughtered or if he or she lives, they're marked as outcasts.

Genital mutilation still exists in male dominated societies who believe sex is intended for male pleasure and procreation, and women have no right to experience pleasure. The men use mutilation as means of control to prevent women from straying outside marriage. What's even more shocking is that this tradition is so widely accepted within its society that women even perform this painful procedure on their daughters as a coming of age event. Women also have no say regarding who their husbands sleep with or even a say in the timing of sex. Men pass sexual diseases, Aids, to their partners by refusing to use condoms. If a woman develops Aids they're banished from the village without treatment, to die alone as outcasts.

This double standard is horrifying to me as a modern women with American freedoms regarding the severity of the double standards, as women have to accept their husbands committing adultery and the men suffer no consequences for the same acts that would cause a women her certain death.

Consider the fact that in our own country women couldn't even vote before 1920 when the nineteenth amendment was ratified under President Woodrow Wilson. Women joined together as suffragettes and fought against boundaries put in place by men. Women were also beaten, dragged away by their husbands, or even arrested when they held protests for equal rights. Due to these brave women we have the equality we have today in America.

But still today the act of violence or rape against women is a continued struggle in regard to defending ourselves, with the stigma of being a victim still looming over us. I even heard of an insane proposal to force women into paying for their own rape kits, which would initiate a giant step backwards in rape treatment, and even cause some women to refuse essential treatment.

Violent and unimaginable acts of murder are becoming more insane and more frequent with men not merely killing but butchering and torturing women, as if we are no more significant than disposable garbage.

How do we as women from all over the globe come together to stand up and support our less fortunate sisters who are bound by such archaic laws? How can we reach out across country borders and through cement walls erected by long standing traditions to condemn these outdated practices and educate women on equality and empowerment?

Horrific stories are being heard from brave women who step up to the plate, risking their life and limb to declare they're no longer second class or property to men in their countries. How much longer are we going to keep seeing and hearing of the horrific stories from brave women willing to stand up for basic human rights? We need to do more, not just read their stories and toss the paper aside, but to take action and find a way to assist and erase this travesty.