When We In/visibilize Our Nobility

Hadith (qtd. in Bahá'u'lláh, The Call of the Divine Beloved) Un/becoming a Victim In October 2011, an international faithbased women's rights non-governmental organization (NGO) convened a press briefing for invited members of the United States Congress and their staff in the U.S. Cap...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Bahá'í studies 2020-10, Vol.30 (3), p.77-124
Main Author: Sattarzadeh, Sahar D
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Dehumanization
Domestic violence
Nobility
Ovarian cancer
Personal experiences
Post traumatic stress disorder
Printed materials
Sociocultural factors
Trauma
Victimization
Women
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Summary:Hadith (qtd. in Bahá'u'lláh, The Call of the Divine Beloved) Un/becoming a Victim In October 2011, an international faithbased women's rights non-governmental organization (NGO) convened a press briefing for invited members of the United States Congress and their staff in the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. The briefing was an advocacy initiative to address the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA)1 since its reauthorization had expired that year, and therefore, was again up for reauthorization for the 2012 fi scal year. Even when considering the purpose of our gathering and the title of the federal law, the Violence Against Women Act, for example, the emphasis clearly falls on the victimized body of women, disregarding the accountability of the perpetrators of that violence. The dichotomies of "victim" and "offender" used in the space are dehumanizing and diminish the possibility of any inherent nobility. [...]despite their good intentions, the program staffs efforts seemed paternalistic and surface-level at most, disregarding the diverse sociocultural contexts of the people they intend to serve. While I sensed a genuine collective desire to help those victimized by abuse, the program lacked sufficient, relevant educational and economic resources, and most importantly, it lacked any epistemic experience-or what Deer refers to as "the kind of knowledge we gain from experiencing something; a visceral knowledge that My former partner's abuse was fueled by evident preexisting insecurities that swiftly avalanched from the "intel" he collected during his frequent violations of my privacy, including reading my journal entries about my interrogations of uninvited advances from men and the details of a gang rape I had endured just a year prior to meeting him.
ISSN:0838-0430