At least 11 rape incidents are reported in Pakistan every day, with over 22,000 reported police incidents in the last six years. But less than 1 per cent of accused are convicted, according to several national media outlets.
Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan’s comments on sexual violence drew severe backlash. As suggested in an interview with Axios’ on HBO, avoiding “temptation in society” is the way to prevent sexual violence. In April, during a question and answer session with the public, Imran Khan had said that the rise in sexual violence in Pakistan, particularly against children, was caused due to “fahashi” (vulgarity). It appears Prime Minister was arguing that his previous statement should have been viewed in the cultural context.
Imran Khan said, “…I said the concept of ”purdah”. Avoid temptation in society. We don’t have discos here, we don’t have nightclubs. It is a completely different society way of life here. So if you raise temptation in society to a point — all these young guys have nowhere to go — it has a consequence in the society.”
Answering a question if the woman’s clothes can provoke sexual violence, Mr Khan said, “If a woman is wearing very few clothes it will have an impact on the men unless they are robots. It’s common sense.”
When further prodded, he added, “It depends which society you live in. If in a society people have not seen that sort of thing, it will have an impact on them.” His statement may resonate with the postmodernist academics who claim that it is impossible for anyone to have objective and neutral knowledge of another culture. This view comes from the notion that we all interpret the world around us in our own way according to our language, cultural background, and personal experiences. In other words, everybody has their own views based on his or her social and personal contexts.
A typical criticism on postmodernism comes from the fear of extremely relativistic view. Critics argue that postmodernism will lead to nihilism because it does not assume a common ground of understanding.
