Who's To Blame?: Women's Violence in Global Politics

To what extent is women’s violence due to systematic reasons? Can we say it has patriarchal influences while simultaneously acknowledging women’s agency?

When you look up “violent women” on a search engine, or any combination of those two words, most often what comes up (on every scale: local, national, or global) is violence against women. In the context of violence, women are often assumed as the victims rather than perpetrators. While this may be primarily due to horrendous acts committed against women globally, I argue that a factor is that most societies don’t perceive women as capable of harm—subscribing them to the soft, gentle, and emotionally sensitive characteristics of femininity.

The most frustrating part about the labels placed on women who commit violent acts, as Sjoberg and Gentry discusses as “mothers, monsters, [and/or] whores”, is that those same characteristics are so deeply subscribed to that the agency of women is stripped away, even in the context of acting violently. It isn’t to say that I admire or support these acts, but this gendered perspective assumes that women are incapable of acting violently for reasons of self-interest, defense, or personal beliefs.

While I believe that the patriarchal system affects every aspect of life, on a personal and global scale, I think this can be acknowledged alongside the autonomy of women to make decisions, such as committing violent acts. In the case of land operations in militaries, in which violent killings regularly occur especially times of war, Sjoberg and Gentry mention female soldiers in Northern Ireland as abandoning their role as a mother when partaking in paramilitary operations (8). While there is a gendered history of nationalism (globally, but most often in developed countries) where women are expected to tend to the home while their husband’s fight in the war, I argue that this has little influence on a women, in today’s time period, feeling a sense of duty or obligation to her country, serving, and committing violent killings. This falls in neither of the categories of mother, monster, or whore. Even though this sense of duty is identical to that of men’s, they are still seen as ‘not soldiers but women soldiers” (9). Positions and acts of violence, entirely, are seen as a characteristic of men with this title.

In the case of suicide bombers, Bloom comments that “women generally become involved, at least initially, for personal, rather than ideological, reasons” (96). However, this rules out the possibility that women can feel strongly about, for example, religious ideologies that would guide their violent acts. For example, Bloom states that “while women usually become suicide bombers in response to a personal tragedy, some may also believe they can change their society’s gender norms through militant involvement” (96). This intent does not fall under either three categories but, rather, is solely the interest of the woman for herself or for society.

Not only are violent acts committed by women categorized and labeled, taking away their agency and, potentially, true intentions, but when they are assessed, they are often exploited, or stated specifically as an act of a woman (similar to “women soldiers”), rather than solely a violent act. Bloom included an editorial titled “It’s a Woman!” in which “it is a woman who teaches you today a lesson in heroism…it is a woman who has shocked the enemy, with her thin, meager, and weak body” (98). The suicide bombing was shocking due to the fact that the perpetrator was a woman, seeing her as a tool for a greater purpose.

There’s a balance to be found when analyzing violent acts committed by women. On one hand, there is the gendered perspective of acknowledging deep, historical influences of patriarchy. But on the other hand, the question to be asked is: to what extent can women make decisions on their own without external influences guiding their choices? While the system can be acknowledged, I feel that women should also be given the credit, and therefore consequences, of doing these actions, for example, in their self-interest, rather than falling into three strict categories—all which have a foundation of gendered stereotypes and characteristics.