Language reform
Really, there is something faintly disgusting about all the serious newspapers talking about bin Laden’s three “widows.” For one thing – three? Three widows? If there are three, they’re not “widows” in the usual sense of the word. It’s too much “respect” for polygamy to call them widows (or wives) – you need different words for a system in which men can have lots while women can have no more than a fraction of one.
For another thing – widows? That assumes they were genuine wives first, having been genuinely married. In fact, from what I’ve read, at least one of them was simply given to him by her father or some other Important man, like a bottle of vodka.
Come on. These women weren’t wives or widows, they were slaves.
In thinking about I would handle this as a journalist, I think I’d hesitate to refer to these women as slaves, as that would seem to diminish the plight of others held in slavery. Which would leave you with what, then? Captive wives?
Are you arguing that the words “wife” and “widow” should not be used in polygamous contexts?
“Solomon had 700 wives”, like it or not, conveys different information from “Solomon had 700 female slaves”. To change usage here would be to invite confusion.
Your point is well taken and fairly describes their status in their world.
Are we then to not follow the standards of our own world in deference to them?
Let me be clear that I am not defending the newspapers or governments in any way. I do not know what they are doing or why or how. But I wonder what response you would prefer, since you dislike the one in progress.
Should we ignore these women? If so, why? Because they were slaves and not wives? Because there are three of them and not one? If we don’t ignore them, what do we do?
I think our responses should reflect our values, not theirs. We should be consistent in our reaction to slavery, to religious repression, to state-sponsored torture and so on. We should also try to be consistent in our treatment of victims regardless of their nationality, gender, religion or social status. There are probably no good existing standards for this. “Protocol for widows of enemy warlords” is probably not extant.
How bizarre – two of you so far actually think women handed over to men with no say of their own are radically different from slaves? In what sense are they different?
They are not. But that is not to say that a fair and balanced polygamous marriage can’t exist, and such a case both the leftover parties would be widows and/or widowers. If a suitable contract can be set up, I don’t see more reason to outlaw polygamy that gay marriage.
I only said I’d hesitate to use the word in reporting, but I’ll bite.
These women are slaves to the extent that their freedom has never been respected. That is the condition of many women who would not recognize themselves as slaves. By this criterion, Marie Antoinette was a slave.
We may well see it that way, but I’m certain that the relevant documents do not record it that way. It is likely, as well, that these women, along with their children, possess property rights. Is there, perhaps, a difference between being treated like property and literally being treated as property?
I had a joke all planned out here, and then I saw the comments made here. Now I’m not laughing.
I’m not sure in what sense it would be disrespectful to other forms of slavery to include sexual slavery in the list. In my mind, it would be less horrible to be enslaved for forced labor than to be forced into “marriage” for the purpose of gratifying the desires of some sick old man. Not to mention that you’re forced to have children who may be abused or given away to other sick men for their pleasure.
Yes, a fair and balanced marriage with more than two spouses can exist. I know people who are doing it. But they aren’t recognized as married by (for example) the state of New York, which will only recognize one spouse at a time per person. And I somehow doubt that what bin Laden was doing was even close to that.
There are reasons my friends and I prefer the term “polyamory,” and it isn’t just that the concept is broader than “this person has two husbands” or “he has a husband and a wife.” It’s to distinguish from patriarchal styles of polygamy, most of which would be okay if a man has two wives, but not if a woman has two husbands (or a wife).
From a reporting/descriptive point of view, how far do we want to go? If those women aren’t bin Laden’s widows, many other women who are called widows, past and present, also need to be called by some other name. “The six slaves of Henry VIII”?
I read somewhere that he had another ‘wife’ who divorced or left him 48 hours after their wedding.
Sili, fair and balanced polygamy is like a square circle. Polygamy means the man can have lotsa women. Period. It doesn’t mean a spouse can have lotsa spouses. It’s not gender-neutral.
In the Islamic world, by and large, the words “woman” and “slave” are interchangeable. The Western concept that women aren’t property is pretty new. But to say that these women are “slaves” as opposed to “widows” denies them even the questionable success of being able to say they were once married to a man of power. Alas, that’s all they’ve got in their world — a tiny bit of respect by proxy.
As for slavery – improb Joe has it right, in my view. Forced marriage is slavery. What else would it be?! What does “slavery” mean if it doesn’t cover forced marriage?
Maybe people are reasoning in the wrong direction? Women aren’t really free or autonomous in the first place, so they don’t lose, in being forced into marriage, what a man would lose in being forced into “real” slavery – is that it? Women are always kind of slaves so they’re not much more enslaved once they’re forced into a marriage?
Karen – I would turn it around. To call them widows instead of slaves denies them the right to have rights that, for instance, I have.
More prosaically…calling them widows in the media really obscures what their status in fact is. It normalizes it. For all we know they were outright prisoners in every sense; just as much prisoners as any girl snatched off the street and locked up in some guy’s garage for 20 years. There’s very little reason not to think that’s how it was, or at least to assume it was very different from that.
The term “polygamy” has all the emotional weight that you put into it. I see nothing wrong with the practice of polygamy as well as polyandry or any mixture of the two. If two women want a relationship with the same man as well as each other it doesn’t mean they’re slaves to the man. The relationship is what they make of it. Does a polyandry relationship make the men slaves of the woman?
Yes, it is likely that the three women who were married to bin Laden were treated as chattel with no rights whatsoever. But this does not mean that there can’t be polygamous relationships in which all are equal. I’m sure that in many such relationships work quite well with one of the women more dominant than the others. It’s the culture that’s bad, not the framework of the marriage.
Next up in tortured verbiage, Elizabeth Smart as the Runaway Bride.
I don’t think it helps anything to compare the sexual slavery of women in fundamentalist Muslim countries to consensual poly relationships in the West, even if you don’t mean to justify the former by bringing up the latter. Thats like commenting on physical spousal abuse by invoking the existence of consensual BDSM relationships, or those “mens’ rights” jackholes who respond to every mention of female genital mutilation by whining about their long-lost foreskin. There’s a difference in kind here, not just degree. So invoking more benign situations sounds like a rationalization for the malignant behavior.
“Sister wives” on American reality shows can usually just walk away when they get sick of the situation, and the law supports their ability to do so. I seriously doubt that these “widows” could have called Osama bin Laden a limp-dick asshole, then packed up and rented an apartment together without him until they worked out more permanent living arrangements.
Why not use the word ‘slave’? It identifies the status of these women exactly. Were they free? Could they leave if they wished? Could they decline the demands of their master? No, No and No.
I’m not sure I think it’s wrong to call them widows, which to me means that they were married to a someone who died and carries no particular moral weight. It’s just a factual description. I also have no problem with raising the issue of forced marriage and calling it a kind of slavery, because I agree that it is, and I think it goes to the root of why it is important to fight these extremist groups (and not just Islamic extremism — Christian, Hindu, and political extremism as well).
If I was a wealthy, powerful man and I was offered a woman as a bride without her consent, I would be disgusted. The fact that bin Laden was happy to accept such a woman, presumably for sexual favours and/or domestic duties, as a gift from another man says everything one needs to know about al-Qaida’s morality.
Given to him, like in almost every wedding ceremony. I know it’s “just” symbolic. That symbolic bit is the bit that bothers me. It doesn’t stop bothering me because the women aren’t really at gunpoint.
And no, this doesn’t mean that I hate celebrations and ceremonies in general. I also think that marriage is a nice thing.
(Just clarifying what my complaint is about, and not about, to save time on misunderstandings.)
@Svlad Cjelli: many wedding ceremonies these days don’t have this “giving” of the bride to the bridegroom. Mine certainly did not. Like having the bride vow to “obey”, it is all quite passe except among the very religious.
Improbable Joe–
I didn’t mean to justify what bin Laden was doing by contrasting it with polyamory. If my comment had that effect, even in part, I’m sorry. What I meant to say is that the problem didn’t start when bin Laden took his second “wife”: in a situation like that, monogamy does not protect a woman or give her legal rights.
I know “widows” is in a sense just a neutral factual word…but in other senses it isn’t. (I don’t really think the newspapers should or could have said anything else though; I’m just analyzing the implications.) It has overtones.
For one thing it implies married, and to us married means voluntarily. It hasn’t always meant that, certainly, but it sure as hell does now. If a guy kidnaps a little girl off the street and gets a priest he knows to perform a marriage ceremony, we wouldn’t consider the little girl “married.” That’s not what the word implies, to us, now.
For another, and as a consequence, it implies at least some mourning. That’s less solid, because an estranged wife can still be a widow…but it does contain a kind of shadow of love and choice somewhere along the way.
In short, the word is accurate, literally, but it’s misleading. It has baggage that doesn’t belong there.
My apologies. I was trying to recall the gender-neutral term, but obviously failed.
Ophelia said:
Er, I think you are confusing “polygamy” (the practice of having more than one husband or wife at the same time) with “polygyny,” which specifically refers to the practice of a man having multiple wives, a contrast to “polyandry,” where a woman has multiple husbands. I don’t know what the name of a communal marriage (i.e. one that does not center a particular person) would be.
@Sailor1031 Excellent.
@SoRefined I’ve heard polyamory, but it still sounds vague.