One of Beliefnet's rules is that the same post not be broadcast across the boards.  There is a video posted this morning in another board that, I'm very pleased to say, Beliefnet staff has decided merits attention across the boards.  Given the Faith's writings about the importance of education for ALL children, but especially girls as the first educators of each generation, this non-Baha'i video speaks directly to that issue:
It Only Takes a Girl

"Education holds an important place in the new order of things. The education of each child is compulsory. If there is not money enough in a family to educate both the girl and the boy the money must be dedicated to the girl's education, for she is the potential mother. If there are no parents the community must educate the child. In addition to this widespread education each child must be taught a profession, art, or trade, so that every member of the community will be enabled to earn his own livelihood. Work done in the spirit of service is the highest form of worship."  ~Abdu'l-Baha, Divine Philosophy, p. 83

.... those present should concern themselves with every means of training the girl children; with teaching the various branches of knowledge, good behaviour, a proper way of life, the cultivation of a good character, chastity and constancy, perseverance, strength, determination, firmness of purpose; with household management, the education of children, and whatever especially applieth to the needs of girls -- to the end that these girls, reared in the stronghold of all perfections, and with the protection of a goodly character, will, when they themselves become mothers, bring up their children from earliest infancy to have a good character and conduct themselves well.  Let them also study whatever will nurture the health of the body and its physical soundness, and how to guard their children from disease.  ~(Abdu'l-Baha, Selections from the Writings of Abdu'l-Baha, p. 123

world citizen, moderator
Baha'i Faith forum

Hi Seefan!

I thought it was really put together well, and am pretty sure it was produced by a young woman (possibly a teenager).  Sadly, those cultures who need the message most probably won't have access to it.

Dec 18, 2011 -- 8:38PM, world citizen wrote:

Hi Seefan!

I thought it was really put together well, and am pretty sure it was produced by a young woman (possibly a teenager).  Sadly, those cultures who need the message most probably won't have access to it.

Dearest WorldCitizen,

Thank you for the video and thank you doubly for the verses. Nothing is more important than the education of girls if mankind wishes to prosper and live in peace. Since development is my field of work, and Bahá'í Faith my faith, it is heartening to keep stumbling upon countless of studies and evaluations on development programmes which prove the veracity of these century-old statements by 'Abdu'l-Bahá. And to think He was a Middle Eastern man and a prisoner.

In all honesty, though, I must also say that the video offered a palpably Western and biased perspective which irked me somewhat. It reinforced negative stereotypes about men and women in the "developing world". It also, unwittingly, sent the message that the West is somehow radically better.

The reality is much more complex. Here is a little something I wrote when I was working in Afghanistan in 2007-9. My purpose in writing the following was to look at the complexity of the issue. Not to deny the problems.

With kind regards,

LilWabbit

 

AFGHAN WOMEN - MYTHS AND FACTS

Note: Some of the figures below indicating the status of women in Afghanistan remain comparatively large and hence a great source of concern. However, they do not justify the exaggerated general impression of absolute predicament of Afghan women reported by the international media. The following figures are gathered by the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission which represents the only independent organization operating in Afghanistan equipped with reasonably good resources to investigate human rights abuses against women across the country.

1. Myth: The majority of women in Afghanistan are forced to marry against their will or consent

Fact: A minority of Afghan women are forced to marry against their will. The minority, however, is relatively sizeable. According to research conducted by the AIHRC (Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission), 38 % of Afghan women are forced to marry against their will or consent. Many of the married women are under 16 years of age. The actual reported cases of forced marriages remains only in the several hundreds per year nationwide. However, remote rural areas remain largely inaccessible for systematic study. The given percentage therefore indicates AIHRC's estimate of the true figure based on a statistical analysis of a sampling of cases.

While the situation in Afghanistan is worrisome, Afghanistan cannot be singled out as the only nor the worst country in terms of forced marriages. Forced and early marriages are rather common in South Asia and certain parts of Africa. According to a survey in Rajasthan, India, 56 % of women were married under the age of 15 and 17 % before their 10th birthday. In Ethiopia and parts of West Africa, marriages involving children aged 7-8 are not uncommon. Two ICRW (International Center for Research on Women) reports indicate that the 50 % of Ethiopian girls marry before they reach the age of 15. In cases of very early marriage, the notion of "consent" becomes rather irrelevant, making it justifiable to refer to them as "forced marriages".

2. Myth: A huge number of Afghan women commit suicide due to domestic abuses

Fact: A small minority of women in Afghanistan commit a suicide. In the last few years, the AIHRC annual survey on self-immolation has reported several hundred self-immolation cases nationwide per year (637 in the year 2006). The AIHRC is still investigating the causes of self-immolation but cites forced marriages and domestic violence as common causes. According to population estimates, in the year 2006 the number of women in Afghanistan between the ages 15-64  (the overwhelming majority of which are married women) was 8,008,463. A figure of 637 cases of self-immolation represents a small minority of the 8 million married women in Afghanistan.

3. Myth: The overwhelming majority of women in Afghanistan suffer from domestic violence.

Fact: According to AIHRC estimates, 50 % of the women in Afghanistan have at some point in their lives experienced physical abuse from their intimate partners. This figure remains a great source of concern even though it implies that another half of Afghan women do not suffer from physical violence at the hands of their partners.   In global comparison, the equivalent figure is 67 % in Papua New Guinea (WHO), 60 % in Peru (WHO), 58 % in Turkey (WHO), 52 % in Nicaragua (WHO), 50 % in Ethiopia (WHO), 47 % in Bangladesh (WHO), 44 % in Finland (Amnesty International), 30 % in United Kingdom (WHO), 27 % in Canada (WHO) and 25 % in the United States of America (US Department of Justice).

4. Myth: The abuses against women in Afghanistan are due to Islam or its particularly narrow interpretation in Afghanistan

Fact: The abuses against women in Afghanistan are due to time-honoured cultural and ethnic traditions and customs which predate Islam. In fact, these traditions often represent a flagrant violation of the official Hanafi interpretation of Islam common amid the Sunni clerics in Afghanistan. The Sunni Hanafi jurisprudence, like all other Islamic schools of law, recognize the explicit Quranic injunction that women have the right to refuse a prospective husband; that women have the right to divorce in certain cases; that women have rights after divorcing their husbands; and that women have the right to own and to inherit property. While conservative by modern standards, the Quranic injunctions, as well as their official interpretation within the Hanafi legal framework, represent a stark contrast to the repressive cultural habits still prevailing in many parts of Afghanistan.

Many of the rural mullahs are illiterate and sanction ancient cultural habits in the name of Islam. Such sanctioning, however, does not make these cultural practices Islamic nor representative of the official Hanafi jurisprudence prevalent in Afghanistan. Some of the more educated mullahs express their disapproval, in the name of Quranic teachings, of many of these repressive cultural practices and call for the intervention of the ulamas (Islamic clerics) to curb the free reign of such "un-Islamic" cultural modes.

Only during the Taliban era were many of the abuses against women also due to the official interpretation of Islam which, in the case of Taliban, represented an extremely rigorous and distorted version of Hanafi jurisprudence.

5. Myth: The abuses against women in Afghanistan represent cultural evils, sanctioned and perpetuated by cruel men. Unquestioned observance of ancient traditions should be done away altogether.

Fact: The comparatively greater abuses against women in Afghanistan are largely the consequence of a misguided expression of loyalty - namely loyalty to time-honoured traditions that are unfavourable towards women. Loyalty, in itself, remains a very positive value if expressed properly. However, blind and unquestioned loyalty to received traditions and customs, in the case of harmful and destructive customs, can be very detrimental to society. Blind loyalty to tradition largely stems from ignorance or, in the event a person is aware of their harmfulness, from the fear of denunciation by peers or elders. There are no factual grounds to believe that the Afghan men exhibit, by nature, any greater tendencies towards violence and unruly behaviour than their Western counterparts. However, the cultural values in Afghanistan give unruly and violent Afghan men much greater freedom to give vent to their impulses than a system grounded in the recognition of basic human rights supported by competent law enforcement. In other words, there are no more bad men in Afghanistan than there are in other countries. In Afghanistan, however, bad men have more freedom to operate due to prevailing cultural beliefs.

Rather than obliterating the virtue of loyalty from the society by blindly imitating Western notions that view self-regard as a major cultural value, loyalty to tradition could rather be transformed, with creative educational interventions, into loyalty towards the laws of the country promoting basic human rights for all, and loyalty towards healthy and humane Islamic values.

6. Myth: The status of women in Afghanistan can be mainly improved by boosting the women's shattered self-confidence, increasing their awareness of their own rights, and thereby helping them stand their ground against the men.

Fact: Since men hold the reigns of power in Afghanistan at every level of society, women cannot fight for their rights and pose any direct opposition without detrimental consequences. The damage would only be exacerbated if the women are aided by foreigners to fight for their rights.

While the education of girls and the increased provision of opportunities for women in areas where men are not so vehemently against are important, the status of women in Afghanistan cannot ultimately be changed without men of some influence in the society -- whether clerics, politicians, elders or strongmen -- who dare to raise the issue of women's status increasingly in public discussion, and to endorse educational initiatives, whether formal or parental, which aim at imparting healthier attitudes towards women among young boys. Attempting to change the present generation of men is unrealistic and will be met with fierce resistance. Identifying potential human rights collaborators among influential men and emphasizing child education hold more promise than any proposed direct intervention.

Dear Lilwabbit ~

In all honesty, though, I must also say that the video offered a palpably Western and biased perspective which irked me somewhat.

In all honesty, I think that a similar video made by a female student in India might possibly have offered a palpably biased Asian perspective.  This was a project by an American student.  What other perspective might she have?  I did note that she made a point of using "actors" from a number of different races/cultures.

It reinforced negative stereotypes about men and women in the "developing world".

I thought the point of the video was to bring to light the mistreatment of young girls in locations where the attitudes toward them by some men remain in the Dark Ages.  If negative stereotyping exists, what could possibly have brought that about?  Perhaps the fact that such shameful behaviours continue to exist, in effect self-reinforcing the stereotyping.

It also, unwittingly, sent the message that the West is somehow radically better.

It's a given that many Western women are also physically abused by husbands but where amongst western thinkers do you find genital mutilation, sexual slavery, forced marriages, "honor" killings, etc. of young girls?  These cultural mores should, prayerfully, eventually disappear with acceptance of Baha'u'llah's teachings, most especially that of education of both the sexes.

Were there no educator, all souls would remain savage, and were it not for the teacher, the children would be ignorant creatures.  It is for this reason that, in this New Cycle, education and training are recorded in the Book of God as obligatory and not voluntary. That is, it is enjoined upon the father and mother, as a duty, to strive with all effort to train the daughter and the son, to nurse them from the breast of knowledge and to rear them in the bosom of sciences and arts. Should they neglect this matter, they shall be held responsible and worthy of reproach in the presence of the stern Lord.  This is a sin unpardonable, for they have made that poor babe a wanderer in the Sahara of ignorance, unfortunate and tormented; to remain during a lifetime a captive of ignorance and pride, negligent and without discernment.  (~Abdu'l-Baha, "Tablets of Abdu'l-Baha, vol.3," p. 578)

Dec 20, 2011 -- 3:19PM, Lilwabbit wrote:

  I can understand, though, that from the point of view of those who have never had the opportunity of daily interacting with dirt-poor average villagers in the developing world, it is quite easy to come up with a school project that (unintentionally) fuels prejudice while rightly alerting people about obvious injustices. Nobody disagrees with the message. But it's much easier to express concern at a distance and getting half the Western world to nod in alarm, than to offer actual solutions by working with the misguided men and women in these societies. In my experience, it is precisely the dismayed feminists who are the worst at actually helping the women at the grassroots where a completely different set of skills and attitudes are required: An ability to overcome personal shock and look at the situation coolly, practically and even with a dose of sympathy and love towards these misguided men. Pardon if I sound "radical" or "cynical" but it's just that I've seen this too much.

An Asian man who is taught by tradition to "keep the wife obedient", despite the evident injustices of such a tradition, is actually doing something he erroneously believes is the will of God or gods. Like the Universal House of Justice write in one statement on human rights, "most human rights abuses are a misguided expression of loyalty". These traditions have to be seriously but patiently addressed without demonizing these individual men. The moment they sense a personal attack, it's a lost cause. A Western man who comes home drunk and beats his wife to a pulp is actually a whole different story. It has less to do with culture and tradition, and more with voluntary choice and deliberate neglect. And this is not to deny that you don't have bad men in Asia! I'm just saying this to put things in perspective.

How does one change tradition? Do the Baha'i in these societies act in the same manner?  If not why not? 

I think the video is, howbeit a rather small effort, a positive effort in educating Western society and anyone who has access to the internet whether in the West or the East. And the 'words and ideas' travel! As WC indicated, education is a powerful tool. Rather then believing this video "unintentionally fuels prejudice" and unfounded bias, as well as "stereotyping" a whole society, I think this video, as well as other such efforts, has the potential for change. Isn't that how the Middle East got its momentum to effect recent changes still taking place as we type?

Just an opinion and subject to change with a better understanding presented ...