OxBlog

Tuesday, September 16, 2003

# Posted 8:47 PM by Ariel David Adesnik  

IRAQI WOMEN SUFFER: This NYT op-ed describes the harrowing ordeal of women in those areas of Iraq where law and order have broken down. It also makes the valuable point that focusing on women's rights and security can have an extremely beneficial effect on the democratization process.

But the NYT op-ed is also very frustrating because it briefly notes that no reliable crime statistics are available, then goes on to imply that the sort of brutal crimes it describes are pervasive -- and that under Saddam things were much better. Admittedly, that seems to be the trend in most big media articles on Iraq. Still not good.

The article also hurts itself by including such perverse comments such as "A formerly first-world capital [Baghdad] has become a city where the women have largely vanished." Well, at they're indoors instead of being beaten and raped by Saddam's henchmen.
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