For God’s sake, what is going on? A young Pakistani girl is shot in the head for trying to educate herself and others like her. A 23-year-old Indian female medical student is beaten, gang-raped and thrown out of a bus like a piece of old rubbish in New Delhi and subsequently dies. And these are just two of countless stories told and untold.
Here too it seems not a day, and certainly not a week, passes without our stomachs being turned by appalling news of women cruelly abused, beaten and, often enough, murdered in headline – hot, red blood.
Is this something new and terrible in our society or has it always been so but only now revealed by a more alert public, more concerned government services and a more vigilant media?
Whatever the case, the prevalence of this cowardly and gruesome abuse of women is a standing indictment and grievous affront in any society. Government and community action to reduce towards zero this scourge must clearly continue to be a priority.
But underlying the physical abuse of women is a larger, universal problem affecting the status