Sexual Abuse of Women

by Haroon Saadiq

Everyday we come across people complaining about unjust attitude of Islam towards women. These ignorant people do not know that the rights given to women by Islam are much more beautiful and respectful than what their Western Ideals offer. If this was not the case then today many women should have been leaving Islam. But the fact is that more and more women are converting to Islam for the simple reason that Islam provides respect, love and security to them. See Why are so many women converting to Islam.

You may not believe me but I will still try my best to make you believe that Islamic injunctions regarding women's issues are very sensible. Below is an excerpt from a report by the Human Rights Watch, which drops a hint about the outcome of the system which many think is better than Islam.

Human Rights Watch Publications
Sexual Abuse of Women in U.S. State Prisons

Summary

This report examines the sexual abuse of female prisoners largely at the hands of male correctional employees at eleven state prisons located in the north, south, east, and west of the United States. It reflects research conducted over a two-and-a-half-year period from March 1994 to November 1996 and is based on interviews conducted by the Human Rights Watch Women’s Rights Project and other Human Rights Watch staff with the U.S. federal government, state departments of corrections and district attorneys, correctional officers, civil and women’s rights lawyers, prisoner aid organizations, and over sixty prisoners formerly or currently incarcerated in women’s prisons in California, Georgia, Illinois, Michigan, New York, and the District of Columbia, which is the nation’s capital.  Our findings indicate that being a woman prisoner in U.S. state prisons can be a terrifying experience. If you are sexually abused, you cannot escape from your abuser. Grievance or investigatory procedures, where they exist, are often ineffectual, and correctional employees continue to engage in abuse because they believe they will rarely be held accountable, administratively or criminally. Few people outside the prison walls know what is going on or care if they do know. Fewer still do anything to address the problem.

The United States has the dubious distinction of incarcerating the largest known number of prisoners in the world, of which a steadily increasing number are women. Since 1980, the number of women entering U.S. prisons has risen by almost 400 percent, roughly double the incarceration rate increase of males. Fifty-two percent of these prisoners are African-American women, who constitute 14 percent of the total U.S. population. According to current estimates, at least half of all female prisoners have experienced some form of sexual abuse prior to incarceration. Many women are incarcerated in the 170 state prison facilities for women across the United States and, more often than not, they are guarded by men.

The custodial sexual misconduct documented in this report takes many forms. We found that male correctional employees have vaginally, anally, and orally raped female prisoners and sexually assaulted and abused them. We found that in the course of committing such gross misconduct, male officers have not only used actual or threatened physical force, but have also used their near total authority to provide or deny goods and privileges to female prisoners to compel them to have sex or, in other cases, to reward them for having done so. In other cases, male officers have violated their most basic professional duty and engaged in sexual contact with female prisoners absent the use or threat of force or any material exchange. In addition to engaging in sexual relations with prisoners, male officers have used mandatory pat-frisks or room searches to grope women’s breasts, buttocks, and vaginal areas and to view them inappropriately while in a state of undress in the housing or bathroom areas. Male correctional officers and staff have also engaged in regular verbal degradation and harassment of female prisoners, thus contributing to a custodial environment in the state prisons for women which is often highly sexualized and excessively hostile.

No one group of prisoners appears to suffer sexual misconduct more than any other, although those in prison for the first time and young or mentally ill prisoners are particularly vulnerable to abuse. Lesbian and transgendered prisoners have also been singled out for sexual misconduct by officers, as have prisoners who have in some way challenged an officer, either by informing on him for inappropriate conduct or for refusing to submit to demands for sexual relations. In some instances, women have been impregnated as a result of sexual misconduct, and some of these prisoners have faced additional abuse in the form of inappropriate segregation, denial of adequate health care, and/or pressure to seek an abortion.