Honor Killing

I was reading an entry of one of the blogs that grandpa permitted me to visit and a post there was commenting on the honor killing in Texas. I turned to grandpa as he was reading his newspaper and asked

"Grandpa, what is an honor killing?"

"Boy, in our society it is a very despicable act but before we can understand what it means we first must understand the meaning of honor. There are many ways people will define honor whether it is personal, family, institutional or cultural. However, regardless of how it is defined it has one characteristic that is common with any definition. That characteristic is the fact of that it means being looked up to.

What makes this characteristic so important results from understanding what it means to be dishonored. Dishonor results from being looked down upon, deservingly, because of some behavior. It is with this understanding that honor is to be protected even if it means dying for.

Honor seems to be a characteristic that is more important to the male population than the female. Moreover, it appears to be a characteristic of men without regard to culture, religion, or time. Men are willing to die or kill for it. It involves living by a certain code, a very strict code of behavior. A man’s reputation and good name as known within the community is determined by how he is seen as living by this code of honor.

While I said that it is a characteristic without regard to culture or religion, the code of honor is dependent on both. It is the predominate religious beliefs of the culture that help to make up this code of honor. The reason for this is that it is our religious beliefs that determine the justification of our willingness to die or kill. Furthermore, it is those beliefs translated into the laws of a culture that determine our outlook of it.

Another aspect of honor it seems is that a man could be taken at his word. A man whose word was his bond is considered an honorable man and one to be honored. Moreover, the man who did not keep his promise dishonored himself along with the other who accepted his word of honor. This is exemplified in the term "honor system" that we hear so often in our school systems in regards to test taking or used in other institutions of society.

Historically, honor was an attribute a man should be willing to die for rather than kill for. The Japanese had the practice of what is commonly known as hara-kiri. Kamikaze pilots were another example of dying for honor. In the western cultures, duels were fought to protect one’s honor. Even in the old west, a man would die before he would allow his good name and reputation be tarnished. A handshake was all that was needed to consummate an agreement of business between men of honor.

Cultures treated women differently than what was expected out of men where honor was concerned historically. Even here there was a common thread between cultures. A woman’s sexual behavior determined her reputation. To a very real extent, it still does even to this day in all cultures. How a woman reacts to being raped shows how ingrained this is in her psyche along with how society is perceived to see her after she was raped. She is still a woman whose reputation has been tarnished.

Furthermore, it covers more than one religion. Even in the New Testament of the Bible, we see an example of this. Remember the words of Jesus, "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone." That was an example of an honor killing that was to happen but never occurred. The death of Jesus himself can be characterized as a death of and for the sake of honor.

Honor is an attribute, boy, which still is a very important one although in this society it is very seldom thought of in terms of its meaning except when we hear of these honor killings. May be it is time that we as a society did think about it more for if we don’t it will lose any meaning at all in time. There are times we use the term respect when in fact the term honor would be the more correct usage. Think about this for awhile."

I just nodded and could feel the wheels burning up my brain as it started thinking faster than it should.