SITUATIONS
IN WHICH MEN BEAT THEIR WIVES
The
ethnographic team was asked to keep track of situations in which
women were beaten by their husbands or others in the family.
Most of the cases that came to the researchers’ attention
involved men beating their wives. Although there were many
variations, the vast majority of situations involved
discrepancies between role expectations and actual behavior
and/or economic issues such as the woman incurring an expense or
asking for something for her, or the man attempting to extort
something from his wife or her family.
Falling
short of role expectations:
In
the study villages a man might beat his wife if he comes home
from work and finds that his meal is not ready, or she serves
him reheated rice from the morning meal rather than freshly
cooked rice in the evening, she forgets to do something, like
washing a shirt, or she does not respond quickly enough when he
asks her to do something, or he thinks she is neglectful in
caring for the children. Talking back when reprimanded, leaving
home without permission, and failing to obey the in-laws
(according to the in-laws) are other common examples of
women’s behavior that provokes their husbands to beat them.
Some women said that they were beaten for giving birth to
daughters. These examples suggest that violence against women is
perceived as justified (or perceived so by men) when women fail
to conform to traditional role expectations. Women are required
to be hard working and deferent and they are supposed to bear
sons.
A
man also may beat his wife when he himself falls short in his
traditional role of provider, particularly if his wife calls
this to his attention. In the six villages women were beaten,
for example, for urging their husbands to go out and seek daily
wage work, or trying to stop them from gambling. One respondent
said:
"My
husband often beats me. He can’t seem to earn any money. We
have many debts, and beats me the most when I ask why."
Another
said:
"My
husband wastes money playing cards. If he works and gets three
days wages he squanders it away in two days playing cards. When
I ask him to go to the market and buy food he beats me."
These
are some of many examples of men beating their wives for
pointing out their failure to fulfill the traditional male role
of provider. In two other cases described by the field team:
B
did not want to work and for several months claimed that he was
ill. [The interviewer and B’s wife seemed to doubt this.]
Because j. [his wife] kept insisting that the he go out and
work, they quarreled a lot, j. kept asking her husband to go out
and plow the fields, and he got very angry and hit her a few
times. In fear, she fled to her brother’s house, but B.
fetched her back and beat her some more.
Women
get beaten for various reasons, like if they try to stop the
husband from gambling with the money they get from selling
paddy, or if they try to stop the husband from borrowing money
for consumption needs and sitting at home.
One
of the men explained:
Women
in our village get beaten a lot because the men don’t want to
work. When the women tell their husbands to go out and earn a
living the men beat their wives. I don’t beat my wife because
I go out and work every day and my wife has nothing to complain
about.
Incurring
expenses:
Since
women are not perceived as economically productive, their
husbands and in-laws often feel that it is wrong for them to
incur expenses, even for medical care, as illustrated in the
following:
"I’m
not in a position to tell anyone if somebody in the household
gets sick. All I can do is nurse the sick one. Especially if I
get sick myself I never say anything to my husband."
"There
were some expenses when I gave birth to the stillborn child.
Everybody blamed me for this, as if I had intentionally killed
the child just to cost them money."
There
were many cases in which men beat their wives because they were
too ill to do housework and/or asked for medical treatment. The
ethnographers in one village observed:
There
is a relationship between women’s health and violence ___
...
if they want to stay in their husbands’ households they have
to [work constantly]. Women who are in poor health or weak, and
tend to fall sick a lot, are seen as a burden. They have to work
even if they are weak or sick, but their husbands are not
satisfied with their work and find fault with them. This happens
especially right after the harvest. If he has to hire someone
else for the post-harvest work the husband becomes furious. It
is a crime for the woman to get sick at that time. The husband
[may] by medicine for her to make her get well faster, but if
she doesn’t get well it’s her own fault, and she has to pay
by getting beaten up.
Failing
to perform household work and home-based productive tasks has
important consequences in a subsistence economy. Women’s work
although devalues, is essential to the survival of their
families. Illness that temporarily disables a woman may men a
missed meal or loss of income, especially around harvest-time
when home-based crop processing is done. As illustrated by the
quotations above, women are held accountable for any
expenditures or losses resulting from their illnesses.
Extortion:
As
in much of the Indian subcontinent, in Bangladesh, dowry has
come to be seen as obligatory compensation to the bridegroom’s
family for taking the bride off her parents’ hands. Since the
amount of the dowry generally increases with the bride’s age,
there are many cases in which desperate parents promise more
dowries than they can deliver, or promise to give it in the
future.
The
researchers in one of the study villages observed:
[The
struggle] to get dowry is the major reason that women are
beaten. At the time of the marriage the father can’t come up
with the whole amount and asks for more time. Usually the rest
of the dowry is paid only after the girl’s husband starts
beating her. Sometimes they send her back to her parents’
house to get the rest of the dowry.
A
mother told one of the researchers:
"My
daughter’s husband always beats her because when we arranged
her marriage we said that we get him a job, and we still
haven’t been able to do that."
In
rural Bangladesh (as in India) dowry has evolved into a system
of institutionalized extortion, often fueled by violence against
young wives. Violence and threats of further violence (in
extreme cases even to the point of murder) are used to extort
money or property from the young women’s relatives, sometimes
in excess of what was promised at the time the marriage was
negotiated.
In
addition to extortion of resources via the institution of dowry,
men in the study villages often seemed to feel that whatever
their wives brought with them at marriage, inherited, earned,
acquired, or even borrowed was rightfully theirs.
One
woman complained:
"My
husband likes to go to the movies, smoke and drink tea. When he
runs out of money he takes my pumpkins and chickens [and sells
them]. If I try to stop him he beats me."
One
member of the ethnographic team observed:
Men
and women disagree on how the wife’s money should be spent.
Men beat their wives to make them give up their money. For
example, M. had saved up 1000 Taka (about $25). She wanted to
invest it in dadan (lend it to a cultivator who pay it back
after the harvest in the form of paddy) but her husband wanted
to use it for rice trading. Her husband beat her to make her go
along with this, and then he spent the whole amount for
consumption instead of investing it in rice.
Some
of the women who join credit programs face similar problems. In
one village, which happened to be a problem village for the
credit program, the ethnographers explained:
Every
one of the husbands thinks the wife’s loan money is rightfully
his and this attitude [sometimes] gives rise to disputes. There
are no disputes if the men invest the loan money and [give
enough to the wife to] pay installments regularly. But those who
misuse the loans for gambling or pleasure, and do not have
regular earnings themselves, cannot pay the installments. The
[credit program staff] pressure the woman, she demands the money
from her husband, they start arguing, and it reaches a point
where he beats her up. The women never tell the [credit program
staff] about these incidents.
One
of the ethnographers reflected:
Women, who obey their husbands all the time, never object to
their husbands’ conduct, behave according to their husbands’
wishes and, above all, can fulfill their husbands’ dowry
demands are beaten less. But often when a woman is busy and
tired she’s off guard. She protests when her husband complains
about something.... forgetting that the consequences may not be
pleasant. In the repeated arguments and beatings she loses her
fear reflex. Nor is being beaten a shameful thing for her. It is
just part of her life.
more
in next issue......
