Many Sri Lankans keep a demon (mask) in the house to scare other demons off.
Saw the local news last night. It’s madness. I should watch more TV. First off, people are literally running through the streets over this Grease Yaka scare. What struck me was another story. Village girl ran off with a guy. Guy was douchey, abusive, whatever, she comes home. Guy comes looking for her, mother protects the kid, guy gets pissed off and leaves. Comes back, burns down the house, killing the mother and another daughter. WTF.
Beneath the surface of smiles there’s carnage out there. A lot of relationships are abusive. Within families, within marriages. The Grease Yaka scare is about greased up strangers jumping into houses, assaulting women and slipping away, but what about the demons in the house? What about the abuse within the home, within families, within marriages?
Of 4,000 cases pending before the high court, Milinda Moragoda found that 30% were for child abuse. If you want to see abuse of women, just walk down the street.
Is Sri Lanka a bad place for families or marriages? No. I know a lot of healthy supportive people with the usual struggles. There is, however, a lot of (economically driven methinks*) abuse and crime that goes unpunished, un-investigated and unchecked.
During the war the job of the security forces was to stop the buses from blowing up and prevent general terrorist carnage being unleashed on the streets. Now they police are having to face the actual underlying problems – problems which cross ethnic boundaries – and they’re not doing a very good job. Yet.
* I say economically driven because, think about it. If a woman can work and rent a place on her own she’ll leave a bad family situation. If she can do that plus get childcare, she’ll leave a bad marriage. That’s just one case, but money gives you the ability to get out of a bad situation before it gets much, much worse.
The police spokesman was saying on TV that the first ever grease yakka victim (From Avissawella I think) had later confided in the doctor who attended to her bruised neck, that it was her husband who had inflicted the injuries and she had lied to prevent him facing any trouble.
Why on earth are child abuse cases left pending? The kids would be left vulnerable to more abuse or neglect at foster homes. It must put them in a worse plight.
Sri Lanka actually has a higher rate of homicide per 100,000 people than the US and most countries in the west according to the stats. I’m sure our incest and child abuse rates are quite high as well though completely under reported. None of these issues are taken up really because Sri Lankans like to live the fairytale that somehow as an Asian country with 2,000 plus years of history and Buddhism and culture that we don’t suffer from such ills. Only the amoral, evil West does. I’ve actually seen someone I know who is a rabid nationalist express these sentiments on a fb posting of an article about some kid in the US who killed his parents.
The concept of acknowledging a problem so we can fix it sadly seems alien to most Lankans. Instead they prefer to live in a fools paradise. Those of us who point out the issues are branded ‘traitors.’
Btw if you think this mayhem and abuse is something new…it probably is not. Arthur C. Clarke’s Reefs of Taprobane from the 50’s states that though Lankans are a friendly people, they kill each other at an alarming rate going off news reports (paraphrasing cos I’m too lazy to dig the book out for the exact quote).
Could you please provide some hard facts to support your claim, as well as their source/s? Thanks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate
Incest/child abuse is under-reported…with our housemaid export being a major earner of foreign currency there appears to be plenty of it going around though.