News:

According to a new US study, many girls who are sexually assaulted do not report acts of sexual violence, because they regard them as "normal". Interviews with 100 youths between the ages of 3 and 17, conducted by Marquette University's Children's Advocacy Center, revealed that girls do not see themselves as victims as they regarded sexual violence against them as normal. This is why also 60 per cent of sexual assaults are not reported to police. The report laid open that the young women experienced forms of sexual violence in their everyday lives including sexual harassment, objectification, and abuse. They often rationalised these incidents as normal. They doubted if anything outside of forced intimate relationships counted as an offence or rape. The reasons why young women do not report sexual violence are several. According to the analyses girls believe the myth that men can't help it, and are unable to control their sexual desires, as well as they fear of being labelled or accused of exaggeration or lying by both authority figures and their peers. That is why they internalised their position, and therefore any kind of sexual violence as something to endure, ignore, or manoeuvre around.

Comment:

This report reveals openly the decadency of the capitalist liberal values which enhance personal freedoms and thus the satisfaction of all carnal desires and lust as the key to achieving happiness in life. The main rule herein is that the human ration is able of distinguishing what is good and what is bad, and therefore of distinguishing what is right, justice and injustice. However, the outcome of man-made systems is that the strong one defines the rules over the weaker ones. Even if individual persons, male and female, parents and authorities try to teach that sexual violence is not acceptable, the whole capitalist system works against them, through its media and the norms established in the community. So as long the system, which enables and empowers values that diminish individuals to their carnal desires and lusts, be they male of female, is not replaced by a superiour system, women will continue to internalise the idea of being only objects to satisfy the uncontrolable desires of men.

Islam is a superior system revealed by the Creator, Allah (swt), Who is superior to all of His (swt) creation. Allah (swt) and His Messenger Muhammed (saw) have declared women as an honour to be protected and to be respected. This reaches that far, that men are even not allowed to stare at other women.

((قُل لِّلْمُؤْمِنِينَ يَغُضُّوا مِنْ أَبْصَارِهِمْ وَيَحْفَظُوا فُرُوجَهُمْ ذَلِكَ أَزْكَى لَهُمْ إِنَّ اللَّهَ خَبِيرٌ بِمَا يَصْنَعُونَ))

Tell the believing men to lower their gaze and to be mindful of their chastity: this will be most conducive to their purity - [and,] verily, God is aware of all that they do. [An-Nour: 30]

A man is not allowed to assault a woman even verbally, while touching a woman requires a heavy punishment. Insulting a single woman was reason enough for the Prophet (saw) to ban a whole tribe from Medina. The only system where women will be taught their real rights and where they will continue to be protected and respected if they bring any kind of insult against them to court, is the life and judicial system of Islam, which has proved in history numerous times that it is the protector of women of every age, every level of society and every religion.

((فَبِأَيِّ آلَاء رَبِّكُمَا تُكَذِّبَانِ))

"So which of the favors of your Lord would you deny?" [TMQ Ar-Rahman: 13]

Written for The Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by

Umm Khalid

Member of The Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir