Russia removed domestic violence laws years ago when a female politician determined that they were being used to break up families by making a big deal out of a little bit of slapping.
Beating someone up is already a crime in basically every country, so if you literally beat up your wife, you can already be prosecuted for it. Domestic violence laws are designed to break up families by turning any little slap – or even locking a woman in a room for a few hours to let her cool off – into some big deal.
President Tayyip Erdogan pulled Turkey out of an international accord designed to protect women, the country’s official gazette said on Saturday, despite calls from campaigners who see the pact as key to combating rising domestic violence.
The Council of Europe accord, forged in Istanbul, pledged to prevent, prosecute and eliminate domestic violence and promote equality. Turkey, which signed the accord in 2011, saw a rise in femicides last year.
No reason was provided for the withdrawal, but officials in Erdogan’s ruling AK Party had said last year the government was considering pulling out amid a row over how to curb growing violence against women.
“The guarantee of women’s rights are the current regulations in our bylaws, primarily our Constitution. Our judicial system is dynamic and strong enough to implement new regulations as needed,” Family, Labour and Social Policies Minister Zehra Zumrut said on Twitter, without providing a reason for the move.
Many conservatives in Turkey say the pact undermines family structures, encouraging violence. They are also hostile to the principle of gender equality in the Istanbul Convention and see it as promoting homosexuality, given its principle of non-discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation.
Critics of the withdrawal from the pact have said it would put Turkey further out of step with the values of the European Union, which it remains a candidate to join. They argue the deal, and legislation approved in its wake, need to be implemented more stringently.
Turkey is not the first country to move towards ditching the accord. Poland’s highest court scrutinised the pact after a cabinet member said Warsaw should quit the treaty which the nationalist government considers too liberal.
Obviously, no one supports brutally beating women, unless they do something to warrant it.
However, outlawing slapping is just outlawing basic discipline of a woman. Women and men are not equal, and women need discipline.
Removing the ability to slap a woman around every now and then when she is getting out of line is basically removing all authority from the father over his own family, and any family where the father does not have clear authority is definitely going to be destined to collapse. (See: entire Western world.)
Also, yes: “women’s rights” laws all promote homosexuality.
I don’t really like Erdogan, because of his agenda to conquer Europe, but I do respect him as a man who cares about what is best for his country, and his willingness to stand up against the global vagino-anal agenda.