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An Eye for an Eye?

What are your thoughts are on the planned punishment of the man in Iran who threw acid in a woman's face 6 years ago, and will soon be punished by having acid dripped into his eyes? Do you think this is a fair punishment? In case the details of the case are unknown, I have included some text below.

I am disgusted by violence, and yet, have mixed feelings about this sentence. It is absolutely revolting that a man will be blinded as punishment, and yet, he purposefully ruined another person's life. My first instinct was that the punishment was barbaric and should not be carried out. However, after thinking about it further, and learning that it is relatively common for spurned men to use acid attacks as a means of retribution in the Middle East and India, I wonder whether it is worth the sacrifice of this one man (who frankly deserves a heck of a punishment) in order to save the lives of more women? Once this guy recieves his punishment, other angry men in Iran will have second thoughts before they throw acid in a woman's face as retribution, because they will have to worry about the same thing happening to them. I am leaning towards believing that this punishment is well deserved and that the lesson it provides to other people is worth it.

A Sharia court ordered the punishment based on the system of "qisas" or fair retribution, the Etemad-e Melli newspaper said.

The man, identified only as Majid, proposed several times but was spurned by the woman, known as Ameneh, the daily paper reported.

In revenge, he threw acid in her face as she left her work in 2004, it added.

She travelled to Spain for surgery to reconstruct her face but efforts to restore her sight failed.

On returning to Iran, she asked the court for retribution, the newspaper said.

"Ever since I was subject to acid being thrown on my face, I have a constant feeling of being in danger," she said, adding that Majid had also threatened to kill her in the past.

The newspaper published pictures of Ameneh's face before the attack and, still disfigured, after reconstructive surgery.

Majid was quoted as saying he did not regret his action but added: "I threw acid on her face so that she would be mine forever.

did not know that acid could have such an effect on her face.

Judges "unanimously decided to sentence the accused to 'qisas' of his body part, blinding by acid" and to pay compensation, the report said.

Judiciary officials could not be reached for comment.

The concept of qisas also holds in other cases in Iran, like murder.

A victim's family can demand the death of a convicted murderer or commute the sentence in return for financial compensation from the culprit.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-13401360

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Permalink Reply by Nicholas Nagao on May 16, 2011 at 3:24pm

Nicole,

Thank you for continuing to help us explore these humanitarian issues. I know it's not changing anything, but I think understanding the issues and exploring solutions will lead to change over time.

Personally, I'm not a supporter of the "eye for an eye" idea. I believe this type of thinking leads to an endless cycle of violence. I have also given a lot of thought to solutions to how we can achieve "justice" in these horrible situations.

While thinking about war and peaceful solutions to war, I realized one of the major reasons many people have difficulty seeing the peaceful solutions is because of our perception of TIME. Most people only look for the solutions which produce very quick results. When thinking about peaceful solutions to world political problems, like the conflicts in Libya, I realized the peaceful solutions will take a MUCH longer time (maybe generations). Similarly I think the "most just" solution in these cases are often not the easiest or quickest. For instance, if you could enforce a lifetime of work from this individual to help the person he hurt, it might not provide the immediate satisfaction that the "eye" would give, but over time, I think it would give both people the opportunity to gain more than having both individuals blinded for life.

I realize this is a very idealistic and difficult solution to implement, perhaps even more so in less developed societies, but I feel like it's better than continuing the cycle. Beyond the immediate problem that is boiling over, I think finding out what is causing these people to act in this way in the first place is worth looking into. Often times, we like to look at the symptoms of problems, and not the problems themselves. Like the other peaceful solutions I mentioned before, time is a key element here. Instead of just identifying problems when they come to a head, a change in society to foster a less violent, more cooperative group can be the best, most long lasting solution.

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Permalink Reply by ampat varghese koshy on May 22, 2011 at 3:16am

and eye for an eye ends up making the whole world blind - paraphrasing gandhi

i agree with nick

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Permalink Reply by Nicole on May 22, 2011 at 10:34am

I see your point and like the idea of a less violent solution that could actually contribute something to the world. Having this person work his entire life to support this person's family may be one way to resolve it. You raise another point as well, Nick, which is that over a longer period of time, a solution could be developed to reverse the this horrible trend of violent retributions against women. A massive campaign of education that violent retribution is not acceptable in any way may have some affect, especially on children. Probably if the government stopped making vats of acid available to the common buyer these acts would be less frequent in the short term.

I am not sure that I wholeheartedly believe that this punishment will not ultimately do the Iranian society more benefit than harm, and yet, it is helpful to see other perspectives that are well thought out and are more forgiving and human - and therefore more evolved. I know that even if I'm not there yet. I appreciate your thoughts on this situation. I have been thinking about this case since i heard of it.

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Permalink Reply by Nicholas Nagao on May 22, 2011 at 7:44pm

Nicole, I just saw a PBS documentary called "Freedom Riders". It really hit home with what we're talking about. It's about a group of Civil Rights activists that rode on buses from Washington DC to all over the U.S. testing seggregation laws (especially in the south). During this demonstration, groups of activists were severely beaten and law enforcement even provided alloted windows in which they would intentionally not make any arrests to allow people to harrass and attack these people. The governor of Alabama (I think it was Alabama) even sanctioned these horrible things. However, through all of this, the activists never resorted to violence and instead brought more attention to the things that were happening, eventually winning over the rest of the nation's support. It's a very difficult thing to do to "turn the other cheek", but one of the great quotes from the movie was from one of these young activists talking to a senior member of Kennedy's administration in which he was trying to get her to stop the demonstrations in fear of their safety. She was asked "Don't you know that your actions are going to get people hurt or killed?!", and she calmly responded "Sir, we've all signed our wills, and we simply refuse to let violence prevail over non-violence". It really put things in perspective for him, and I think it's an idea which more people need to value.

The thing they were standing up for was more than just civil rights at that moment. It was the idea that non-violence CAN prevail over violence, and that in itself is something worth standing up for. I think it also made it easier for the rest of the country to get behind, because no matter what your belief in civil rights was, the idea that non-violence should prevail in our country was the right thing to support.