Stieg Larsson, My Friend - Kurdo Baksi [35]
“I’ll tell you why this debate is being buggered up,” he said, gesticulating wildly.
“Please do.”
“Some of the people taking part are adherents of a traditional pattern of explanation. According to them, Fadime Sahindal was killed for sexist reasons. In other words, her murderer’s ethnicity and religion are completely irrelevant.”
He leaned forward and continued.
“Then there are those who are completely wrong. Those are the ones who look for explanations in cultural anthropology. In their eyes Fadime Sahindal was killed because her murderer is a Kurd who grew up in a Muslim environment. They are defenders of ethnocentric cultural relativism. According to them there are different kinds of oppression of women. The cultural anthropological explanation only informs us about the form the oppression takes, not about the cause. Assaults on women on Saturday nights in Sweden, honour killings in Italy, the burning of women in India and the stoning of women in Iran in fact tell us the same thing: men in patriarchal societies oppress women.”
“What about the media?” I asked. “They want to devote themselves to comparative studies of female oppression. Which continent is the worst for women? In which culture or religion do women have the most freedom? The media try to simplify answers to provide headlines. Complicated explanations or answers don’t sell copies, do they?”
Stieg was able to go along with the suggestion that everybody, not least the pair of us, was trapped by the media’s constant search for striking headlines and simplified explanations. Nevertheless he dismissed that argument and continued his lecture, more het up than ever.
“The problem is that all this results in our falling into the right-wing extremists’ trap. As if ethnicity and cultural background decide a human being’s value. They thrive on racist concepts and national stereotypes. Racists maintain that European culture is superior to all others. That’s why they always talk about ‘us’ and ‘them’. According to them, immigrants don’t have an enlightened view of women, but Swedes do.”
It had become pitch black outside the window of our basement room. Another ice-cold January day was drawing to a close. I think we both knew that basically we were in agreement. But there was something in the situation that made Stieg want to continue plugging away at his argument. The only difference between hundreds of other discussions and this one was that his irritation was now directed at me.
“The fact is that only men oppress women,” he said. “Everything else is a lot of crap. You are letting the cultural chauvinists railroad the debate. The consequence will be that the Sweden Democrats will get even more votes and win more seats on the local councils. The debate about the murder of Fadime Sahindal can have terrible consequences. Feminism and anti-racism go together. That’s what you must make people understand. On no account must you accept that there is a special kind of oppression of women peculiar to Kurds. When immigrant men kill, they say it’s due to their foreign culture and failed integration policies. When Swedish men kill it’s because they’ve been drinking too much strong booze.”
“You’re right there,” I said. “If we were to follow the cultural anthropological argument we could just as well say that the murder of the police officer in Malexander was caused by the inherent evil of Swedish Christianity.”
“Exactly. Do you know what the best thing you’ve said in this debate is?”
“I didn’t realize that I’d said anything reasonable at all,” I said with a wry smile.
“It was when you said that Kurds didn’t have a monopoly on the oppression of women. That is correct, and illuminating. And I realize that you will have some trouble with Kurdish exile groups in Sweden. They are bound to ask you to tone down the debate on the oppression of women and honour killings.”
I nodded. He was absolutely right; I knew I was going to get into hot water. Even worse than usual.
Perhaps he noticed that, because he said, “I don’t envy you. Immigrants, Swedes