top of page

Book Talks : Femicide : The Politics of Woman Killing

  • Writer: Ivani Yuhendra
    Ivani Yuhendra
  • Dec 4, 2020
  • 3 min read

Hola!





Months ago, I was searching on my Chrome's page and I found a tagline said "Femicide in Mexico".


What is Femicide?


I have been hearing Feminism numerous times. But, Femicide still sounds unfamiliar. Even in Indonesia, I think I barely hear this word. Or, probably because I didn't read enough about Feminism, therefore I don't know the meaning of this term.


So, I intended to find the right book to cure my curiosity, and -drum rolls- I found this book. Reading this book such a traveling into the unknown much because it provided me so many facts that I didn't know about the Feminism world.


Based on this book, Femicide or feminicide is the misogynous killing of a woman by men, the men refer to partner or husband, and the reason behind this act is because of her gender. Yes, I repeat it again. Shortly, you got killed because you are a woman. Because of your gender, you're worth it to be killed. Sounds nonsense, isn't it?


Femicide itself has been existing since a long time ago, it means woman already become a violent object for an uncountable time. The book gave an example: the witch-craze in the sixteen or seventeenth century. As we know, in every single movie or series, the witch character is always a woman. I've never seen a man witch. Therefore, I assume the portrayal character of the witch is a sly woman with manipulating character. Sacrifice anything for reaching something even killing by unknown magic and poison. This portrayal itself already gave a bad description of women. Therefore, I'm not really surprised when people equalize women with witches.


Besides the witch-craze, something common that we've definitely known about woman violence is domestic violence. There are a ton of cases of domestic violence that I couldn't count one by one. This book talks about the reason behind violence could have happened, it because we, women, are on the wrong side. So, if there is a tagline read "man always wrong", it's not 100% true.


If the husband beat his wife, his wife got hurt or even dead, it isn't his fault. It because of the woman itself. His wife made him do that. For numerous reason, started from an affair, jealousy, not capable take care of the children, and etc.


The violence not only is experienced by adult women but also by the baby. Just like what happened in India. Female infanticide is the act of killing girl babies. So, basically, discrimination begins at birth. Girl babies are considered bringing sorrow to family, especially when they are mature enough to get married, family needs to spend a lot of money to marry off them.


When the parent found out it was a girl, they will poison her until she spouting blood from nose and mouth and the parent just waits then bury her dead body. I can say, this book really gives me goosebumps. It talks straightforwardly and very detailed. Even, it descript the detail of violence really clearly, therefore, I read and visualize simultaneously. For you who can't handle pornography, fetish, and violence, I don't think this is for you.


However, this condition is exactly the same perspective in my environment. Mostly, parent around me considered boys are better than girls. Boys' babies get many privileges because the parent thinks boys can help family when they are grown up. This view becomes a normal situation, people even don't think of this as a form of discrimination.


One thing that I can't absorb from this book is there are numerous law terms. I do not come from a law major. I'm not a law student. So, it kinds of hard for me to understand every law term which appears in almost all of the chapters.


After reading Femicide: The Politics of Killing Woman, I just assume not all of the men are trash, but also not all of the women are a witch. This book can give me many kinds of perspectives about the man. It's based on me how I react to this book. However, I believe in one thing, we as women do not deserve to be killed, hit, beaten, or whatever any kind of violence, not even every single human should deserve to experience that. Moreover, if the reason behind the violence is our gender.





Comments


Post: Blog2_Post
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn

©2020 by Omongan Ivan. Proudly created with Wix.com

bottom of page