Qandeel Baloch

Honor Killing? Histrinoic Personality Disorder? Media? 

Who to blame? 

We are trained to walk on egg shells. As long as something is not affecting us we choose usually to refrain ourselves from speaking about it.

Qandeel Baloch was recently strangled by her own brother apparently for honor. I am not sure how it took years for a brother to speak up now about his sister's acts, which made him uncomfortable. Well, I don't want to touch the political and legal side of the case as I am not much aware of it. 

However, I am interested to understand the making of Qandeel Baloch and her brother Waseem. Immediately, after the news of her murder, I started reading and researching about her. In my search to understand the situation I tried to read stories from different perspectives. I happened to watch her audition on "Pakistan Idol". All the judges were speaking with her with utmost disrespect. Would they have treated their President, or any other country's president or any other other person who was respectful in their eyes. No? Yes? Any thought? I just do not understand how people have the nerve to humiliate a fellow human being. After that video, everything became history as the girl tried and struggled to get attention, her own way. For a person, who is trying to get publicity both negative and positive attention is reinforcing. 

How come, our media does not take responsibility of creating her and ultimately participating in killing her. No one ever spoke up or tried to get security when she cried for help. Was it not important? 

Observing her behavior on TV and her videos. I also assessed her probably as an individual having symptoms of Histrionic Personality Disorder. Some of the symptoms could be identified in Qandeel's personality such as 

1. A person gets uncomfortable in situation where he/she does not get attention. 
2. Sexual, seductive and provocative behavior
3. Shallow behavior where emotions are shifting 
4. Behavior where there is no depth and detail 
5. Physical appearance dramatize to gain attention
6. Self-dramatization 
7. Consider more intimacy with people than in actual life (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders)

Nobody in our culture tries to assess based on psychological needs. They always judge people based on their perception of the situations, circumstances and their own idealogy of self-righteous and piousness. Piousness is subjective. What piousness means to me might not mean to another individual. Moreover, psychological issues also does not mean that an individual cannot function properly in a society. Individuals might have different psychological needs. Why no therapy is provided? It is sad how her family never felt that she might have had a psychological problem. Their lack of awareness, educational background and low socio-economic  status just led them to let continuous judgement of the society impact their family decisions. So much so that it ultimately led in a brutal step of killing her. 

One of the interviews, that I read stated how scared she was when her recent music video was coming out. However, she stated that once it was out, she was scared no more and was ready to face the world again. Well, I feel sad how this young woman had to lose her life,which could have been beneficially utilized if guided properly. She had no strong family background. 

She was a product of her struggles and circumstances. I am not sure who to blame. Her brother, who I believe himself was a product of the society. His courageous acceptance of his crime speaks a lot about his pride and awareness that the society accepts his acts. 

Well, she might not be able to "bounce back" like she said she will. However, her death definitely raised questions and awareness of the sensitivity of this concern in the world. 

Humans are different, they were raised differently, they will act differently to circumstances. However, even though they are different they should be treated equally with respect and honor.

#QandeelBaloch #HonorKilling #humanrights #media #responsibility #humanity #respect #understandingbehaviors