touch of intimate affection. Both deviants accept this as normal as
does the Muslim who beats his wife or the terrorized subjugated
woman who accepts the intimidation as ‘normal’.
Hence do “the worst of Muslims” continually violate their source of intimacy,
and hence do women and children learn to submit to what they've been
traditionally taught is normal, much as do children from alcoholic
communities where drunkenness is the norm – so great is the human need for
touch and affection no matter the cost (the price of its loss). But its real cost
is the loss of faith and the adab that assures peace and security through
actualizing justice which includes the wali, the family and communal legal
system that all fail to hold abusive men accountable. Misogynist behavior is
now an institutionalized form of pseudo-sado-masochism.
Most confirmed sadists are males who derive pleasure from touching the
person they have intimidated, humiliated and subjected to some form of
violence (including psychological intimidation). Their relationship with the
victim is a sort of consensual rape under violent threat or overt acts in which
needs for intimacy are met by both parties through terror (fear), without
which neither can achieve orgasm.^63
Rather than be abandoned and out of fear of rejection, a young child will
actually ask to be beaten in order to experience touch (close proximity) at the
hands of its love object: parents. Hence we have an association of guilt,
violence and pleasure with the reaffirmation of the vital element of trust
manifest in these perversions. Amongst many Muslim societies, this anti-
social behavior on the part of men is considered a ‘right’ and has become
normalized. But it is as far from the taqua of marriage as is the East from the
West and the repercussions on any developing embryo/fetus/child are
certainly teratogenic both physically and metaphysically, and cannot possibly
63
Sadomasochism : It is usually agreed on by psychologists that experiences during early
sexual development can have a profound effect on the character of sexuality later in life.
Sadomasochistic desires, however, seem to form at a variety of ages. Some individuals
report having had them before puberty, while others do not discover them until well into
adulthood. According to one study, the majority of male sadomasochists (53%) developed
their interest before the age of 15, while the majority of females (78%) developed their
interest afterwards (Breslow, Evans, and Langley 1985). Like sexual fetishes,
sadomasochism can be learned through conditioning — in this context, the repeated
association of sexual pleasure with an object or stimulus.