Editor&Publisher: When Is a 14-Year-Old Girl a 'Woman'?

[DeepModem Mom]

When Is a 14-Year-Old Girl a 'Woman'?
By Sarah Weber
Published: July 11, 2006

NEW YORK Ever since the case of the raping and killing of an Iraqi and the alleged murder of three of her family members by U.S. troops went public, the age of the rape victim had been in dispute, ranging from about 15 to 25. Two days ago, Reuters and others news agencies produced proof that she was 14, based on a passort and identity card. Most news organizations then started calling her a girl -- but some persist in referring to her as a "woman."

The girl was apparently born August 19, 1991. Yet a widely published AP story today by Robert H. Reid repeatedly referred to the girl, whose name was al-Janabi, as a “young Iraqi woman" and later again as a "woman." The story was in reference to the gag order being requested by attorneys of Steven D. Green, an ex-soldier who is one of the men charged with the rape and murders. It begins: "An al-Qaida-linked group posted a Web video today purporting to show the mutilated bodies of two Fort Campbell soldiers, claiming it killed them in revenge for the rape-slaying of a young Iraqi woman by American troops from the same unit."

A separate AP story today by Juan Lozano, on the soldiers' families defending them, also refers to the girl as a "young woman."

In today’s Washington Post, an article by Joshua Partlow refers to the teenager as an “Iraqi woman.” USA Today continues to feature the AP "young woman" story. The CNN site calls the victim a "young female" and a "woman."

Yet a full day earlier, and again today, The New York Times was calling her a "girl." The Los Angeles Times today referred to her as a "teenage Iraqi" and later as a "teen." Bloomberg used "girl" and McClatchy's dispatch chose "teenager." Reuters simply stated her age: 14....

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_di...

[Monkeyman]

1. She Was A Child

[Fierce]

2. Call her a teenager.

It's not hard.

[xultar]

11. She's a fuckin CHILD. If she were here they'd call her a CHILD.

Why is it they are trying to make her a woman?

Here they won't even let a 16 year old man pick his own treatment for cancer because he is a kid and doesn't know any better and there in Iraq a girl 2 years younger than he is a woman when she is raped @ 14?

No she is not a TEEN She's a child. A child was raped by members of our armed services and was shot and burned. Those members of our armed services also killed that child's her family.

[foreigncorrespondent]

40. And being a teenager...

...doesn't make one an adult. So your point?

[Fierce]

64. My point is the media should call her a teenager.

Since that's what she was.

[Avalux]

3. It's kinda like this.

She wasn't American, so she wasn't really a girl at age 14 and her life certainly isn't as valuable as an American's. I'm sure she didn't suffer as much as a 14 year old American girl would have suffered either.

[gratuitous]

7. I'll go you one better

A 14-year-old is a woman if she's raped; a girl if she's seeking an abortion.

[Love Bug]

19. And she's a woman if she kills someone so they can try her as

an adult.

[Kagemusha]

4. So what, the attorneys requesting the gag order said she's a woman?

A 14 year old woman?

Or are they disputing her age and demanding anyone in government or the military who wishes to suggest otherwise be gagged? Sounds like it.

[Pachamama]

53. When Elizabeth Smart was kidnapped, they never referred to her as a woman

...and she was 14....

I can't recall Natalee Holloway (who was over 18) being called "a woman"....

I truly believe that the references to Abeer as being "a woman" are intentional....they don't want people being outraged when they hear the truth...that she was a child....raped and murdered by US Soldiers and her little sister who was 5 and Mother and father killed too!

[sandnsea]

5. Priests molested children

Many of them were 14.

[CBGLuthier]

6. her entire life was spent under the evil policies of the

United States. We invaded her country while she was in the womb as part of a BS game to gain a foothold in the ME.

Our policies during the nineties ensured her life would be a hard one

and the final blow in the name of freedonm and peace.

Fuck Bush. Fuck Clinton. Fuck Bush the first and all the monsters who support them.

Oh, and fuck Saddam too although I think he may be the least of the evils in this lot.

[cgrindley]

8. They should just use her age

To use anything else is to make a culturally-oriented value judgment. To me, she's a girl. I have a 15 year old daughter and a 12 year old daughter, and they are definitely girls, not young women. But it doesn't matter really what I think, since the notion of what makes a girl or a woman is plastic between cultures. If the news media is going to choose a term, it should either be (a) what she would be considered in her own culture, or (b) what she would be considered by the jurisdiction in which those accused of her rape and murder will be tried.

[Ms. Clio]

16. In her "own culture" she was an underaged girl, just like the U.S.

not a woman.

[Ms. Clio]

17. self-delete wrong place

[Marie26]

32. No, it should just be

(c) what she would be considered according to the paper's stylebook. Every paper has one & it determines what language should be used.

[MorningGlow]

9. Easy answer: Never.

Not at 14. No way. Bastards.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

15. Young Woman Was Fine, Woman Probably Wasn't.

Young woman is used to describe teenage girls all the time. As soon as a girl hits puberty (i.e. has her first period)she can be considered a young woman.

Referring to her as plainly a woman is probably a bit more odd, as that would be typically 18 and older. But referring to her as a young woman was fine.

[NNN0LHI]

10. I learned a lot about our media in the past few days n/t

[11 Bravo]

12. In my edition of the Post, Partlow refers to her as a 15 year old girl.

[femrap]

13. How about young woman?

How is a 14 year old male addressed? Boy? I would think in the Press...where one is supposed to be objective....she would be referred to as a female....a 14 year-old female.

What is so damn sad about all of this....here we are off on a tangent about what she is called while the scum that did this to her is ignored.

Hopefully Karma will take care of these subhumans.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

14. My God These Semantics Are Plain Dumb. Young Woman, Child, Girl, Teen,

It's all the same fucking shit. The horror of the crime is the damn same.

And for the record, generally it is acceptable to use the term young woman as soon as a girl hits puberty. Referring to her later on as a woman though was a bit of a stretch.

[idgiehkt]

20. I agree, rape is rape.

I'm also disturbed by the whole argument because the thrust seems to be that if she's a girl she's seen as less culpable in it than if she's a woman. What's that about?

[Ms. Clio]

23. that's the argument the military tried to make by calling her 25

there's a huge difference, legally and emotionally.

[uppityperson]

39. again

There are 2 things going on here.

We are all outraged about what happened to this family (well, everyone except 1 freeper that got tombstoned). War is hell and people do bad things and this is a good reason to never ever go lightly into war. This does NOT mean that it is ok for this to happen, very much the opposite. Most of us here feel horrible about all the rapes, murders, tortures, mutiliatins that have happend in this occupation. That is one thing.

The second thing is either the military or the media, or both, manipulated the information they released. Why would they not call a 14 yr old a teenager or a child, but an adult? Because there are some people who would then write this off as just another war atrocity, that bad things happen to adults in war and if she didn't want to have this happen she should've just left. It is appalling, but there are people who would not notice this if this child were an adult.

2 things going on that we are upset about. The heinous crime. The coverup.

[dalaigh lllama]

62. Not less culpable

I know a lot of folks are bemused by the outrage over her youth, concluding that somehow such a view indicates that if she were 25, somehow the crime wouldn't be as severe. I think the rape and murder of anyone of any age is despicable, but I am invariably more upset when something awful happens to a child than when the same thing happens to an adult -- I think because a child who dies has had less time to enjoy life and its pleasures. I have a harder time at children's funerals than at adults' funeral, too, and it's not because I'm not saddened by an adult's death.

[Ms. Clio]

21. as has already been posted by those who actually know something

it is newspaper convention to refer to juveniles under 18 as "boys" and "girl."

[ismnotwasm]

24. Yeah, I'm not getting it.

A young FEMALE (how 'bout that?) was brutualy RAPED and MURDERED.

The crime was horrid, and horrible, and I hope those who participated get the punishment they deserve.

I'm not sure what the age qualifiers are for.

Now if in certain people's opinions, they consider the ones who committed these crimes child rapists or child molesters, then they can go for it by all means. Another type of brutal sex crime that needs to be STOPPED.

Generally a 14 year old is going to be considered a victim of rape, not child molestation or child rape. The rapist of a 14 year old is just as likely to rape a 22 year old or a 32 year old. One Reuters article about this incident on a recent post had the "age of consent is 14 in Iraq" So this makes a difference? (That was just disgusting, God I was pissed) She was still brutally RAPED and is now dead.

Rape is NEVER ok and NEEDS to be STOPPED.

And how did so many lose sight of the fact this young FEMALE (satified anyone) is dead? And we go on trying to figure out if she was a girl or a women. Bullshit.

[uppityperson]

Abeer was raped and murdered. Military/Media is manipulating facts.

There are 2 things going on here.

We are all outraged about what happened to this family (well, everyone except 1 freeper that got tombstoned). War is hell and people do bad things and this is a good reason to never ever go lightly into war. This does NOT mean that it is ok for this to happen, very much the opposite. Most of us here feel horrible about all the rapes, murders, tortures, mutiliatins that have happend in this occupation. That is one thing.

The second thing is either the military or the media, or both, manipulated the information they released. Why would they not call a 14 yr old a teenager or a child, but an adult? Because there are some people who would then write this off as just another war atrocity, that bad things happen to adults in war and if she didn't want to have this happen she should've just left. It is appalling, but there are people who would not notice this if this child were an adult.

2 things going on that we are upset about. The heinous crime. The coverup.

[LittleClarkie]

51. If she was 5 and people called her a woman

do you think folks would get it then?

I don't get what they don't get, myself.

Thanks for explaining it well.

[WinkyDink]

26. No, it is not, in one sense: pedophilia---CHILD RAPE---plus the murder

would cause more revulsion in the reader.
For good or ill, that's the way it is.

[I Have A Dream]

57. Yes, that's right. n/t

[dysfunctional press]

59. it is NOT pedophilia.

it's amzing that some people would consider this to be a case of pedophilia, because the girl was 15- as if age were the determining factor.

[Marie26]

61. Hello again. nt

[miss_american_pie]

60. Technically it would be pederasty

pedophilia refers to attraction to a pre-pubescent child, not an adolescent.

But I would hesitate to use either. This is about violence and power, not sexual attraction.

[Marie26]

29. Not for the press it isn't.

Newspaper articles are supposed to conform with AP style. And according to AP style, any female under 18 is referred to as a "girl", not a "young woman". Papers have tons of copy editors that are supposed to catch errors of style, yet no one caught this mistake? The language was left that way specifically because the semantics did matter, and reporters & editors were aware of the connotations of each term.

[LittleClarkie]

46. Then why is the AP trying to hide how young she is

They're downplaying the horror.

[Bosso 63]

55. Details make her human.

Generalities let her become a statistic.

[Ms. Clio]

18. so at least it's not just us talking about this now n/t

[uppityperson]

33. no, which is good. Reuters has it now.

I was getting a bit impatient here, you know? Still am, that people cannot see media manipulation as aproblem and accuse us who do of not caring that 2 children and 2 adults were gruesomely killed. We do care, massively. AND we care that media/military is manipulating this so other people do not care so much. onward, think I'll be on DU only a short time today.

[Ms. Clio]

41. thanks for saying it all for me, too, and yet so succinctly!

I found something sadly ironic that I thought you might appreciate:

From Amnesty International:

Iranian girl hanged for ‘acts incompatible with chastity'

“Atefeh Rajabi (name sometimes spelt Ateqeh), a 16-year-old girl, was executed in northern Iran in August for “acts incompatible with chastity”. Reportedly, she was publicly hanged on a street in the city centre of Neka.

(snip)

It was further reported that although Atefeh Rajabi’s national identity card stated that she was 16 years old, the Mazandaran Judiciary announced at her execution that her age was 22.”

[uppityperson]

42. you are welcome

I have started copying posts, repeating them over and over here, hoping that people will read at least the response THEY get if not the whole thread. I am so sad for all the children, all the people, young to old, that have been hurt.

Atefeh was mentally ill at the time of the crime (sex, consensual or rape?)and hanging? wtf?

[Ms. Clio]

43. I did just hear Amy Goodman call her a "teenager"

She said the details paint a "harrowing picture of premeditated brutality."

Amy showed her ID card and discussed the military discrepancies in the age.

That's a disturbing story about poor Atefeh, isn't it? Unbelievable.

[Benbow]

22. Riverbend has blogged about this today

http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/

[truebrit71]

25. My daughter is one year older than this poor child, and she is definitely.

....NOT a young woman....

The semantics and parsing going on in this case is disgusting. Do any of these foul apologists think for a SECOND that if the shoe were on the other foot we wouldn't STOP hearing about this "young girl"....

I don't give a flying fuck what part of the world this happened in, or under what circumstance, I hope the guilty parties rot......

[chill_wind]

27. She is not a woman!! This is just pure putrid state-sponsored media

semantic politics. Deliberately chosen.

If she were American they would not ever once call her a "woman".
They would NOT! They remain wholly beyond redemption.

[Marie26]

28. According to the AP Stylebook,

reporters are supposed to use the word "girl" until the 18th birthday, and use "woman" afterwards. The same policy holds for men - who are referred to as "boys" until they reach 18. The AP Stylebook is sort of the "Bible" for newsrooms - copy editors consult the stylebook to make sure that the reporter is using proper grammar & style. So, when the Associated Press calls this girl a "young woman", they are violating their own guidelines. This should be pointed out to them. Semantics do matter; that's why newspapers employ editors to ensure that the language is accurate.

AP Stylebook: "Girl - applicable until 18th birthday is reached, use woman or young woman thereafter."

[chill_wind]

31. Thank you for finding and citing that.

It is very evident that they are **actively choosing ** to employ this latest, twisted, political propaganda game right along with their task-masters.

They are beyond redemption.

[Marie26]

58. Sure

Yeah, I think it's clear that they're at least going against their own policy. I've worked as a copy editor & have an idea about how this works. An AP wire story is read by at least 2 editors before it enters the paper. The copy editors will revise the article & correct the spelling, grammar & style mistakes. If something doesn't conform to AP style, the editor is supposed to correct it. So, the word should have been changed to "girl", no matter what the reporter originally wrote.

If I were a copy editor, I would have changed the word to "girl" & it bothers me a little that no one bothered to do this. This story was published in over 200+ newspapers, and no one apparently changed it. That right there shows that this is more than a simple mistake. If words don't matter, why was the US press so careful to use the word "woman", when it goes against their own guidelines? If this were an American girl, I bet they would have corrected it. I'm not sure it's a conscious effort; but it does seem like an unconscious effort by the American press to try to soften the horror of this crime. No thanks.

[Ms. Clio]

44. yes, thanks!

I thought I had seen that earlier.

[uppityperson]

30. Reuters now has her as a girl, teenager, 14 yr old. Write AP

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L11482739.htm
"A group led by al Qaeda in Iraq released gruesome footage of two corpses it said were U.S. soldiers killed in June and said the act was to avenge the rape and murder of an Iraqi girl by U.S. soldiers...The alleged rape of 14-year-old Abeer al-Janabi raised issues of taboo and honour in Iraqi society which appear to have limited public mention of her killing, and those of her parents and her 6-year-old sister, in their home around March 12."

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IBO125561.htm
"An al Qaeda-led group posted video on the Internet of two mutilated corpses. It said they were American soldiers kidnapped and killed last month and claimed they died to avenge the alleged rape and murder of a local teenager by U.S. troops."

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N11126960.htm
"Fourteen-year-old Abeer al-Janabi was raped and killed. Her parents and 6-year-old sister were also slain.

Four other soldiers still with the 502nd Infantry Regiment also face rape and murder charges and a fifth a charge of failing to report it.

A group led by al Qaeda in Iraq meanwhile has released gruesome footage of two corpses it said were U.S. soldiers killed in June to avenge the rape and murder of the Iraqi girl."


Email address to AP [e-mail]

[w4rma]

48. Reuters has always been more professionaly than the AP in their reporting.

I, for one, don't trust the owners and political editors at the AP one bit.

[KoKo]

34. Woman or Girls...Rape is Rape and a Violation of one's Body ...be it

Male or Female ...the age is not the ISSUE...the Violation of Body ...the violation and stealing of Innocence IS!

And the Torture, Burning to Hide the Evidence, the Cover Up.

Rape is Rape is Rape is Rape.

No matter the age, the person the gender or anything. It was RAPE!!!!!

Parsing Words over this is abominable.

[uppityperson]

37. There are 2 things going on here.

There are 2 things going on here.

We are all outraged about what happened to this family (well, everyone except 1 freeper that got tombstoned). War is hell and people do bad things and this is a good reason to never ever go lightly into war. This does NOT mean that it is ok for this to happen, very much the opposite. Most of us here feel horrible about all the rapes, murders, tortures, mutiliatins that have happend in this occupation. That is one thing.

The second thing is either the military or the media, or both, manipulated the information they released. Why would they not call a 14 yr old a teenager or a child, but an adult? Because there are some people who would then write this off as just another war atrocity, that bad things happen to adults in war and if she didn't want to have this happen she should've just left. It is appalling, but there are people who would not notice this if this child were an adult.

2 things going on that we are upset about. The heinous crime. The coverup.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

45. This is not just rape

It allegedly involves the stalking of a child by adults and repeatedly hitting upon a child by these same adults for sex to the point where the girl was very afraid. It involves sexual predation on a child. It involves child molestation. It involves child murder. AND it involves child rape.

The fact is, stalking, molestation, murder, and rape of children is seen almost universally in our culture as being among the most depraved and heinous acts to which a perpetrator can descend.

[KoKo]

35. ANYONE who STILL "PARSES WORDS" over this HEINOUS CRIME

is a MONSTER!!!!

[DarkTirade]

36. Personally I don't think the age really matters...

Last time I checked, rape and murder were both BAD THINGS.

[uppityperson]

38. There are 2 things going on here.

There are 2 things going on here.

We are all outraged about what happened to this family (well, everyone except 1 freeper that got tombstoned). War is hell and people do bad things and this is a good reason to never ever go lightly into war. This does NOT mean that it is ok for this to happen, very much the opposite. Most of us here feel horrible about all the rapes, murders, tortures, mutiliatins that have happend in this occupation. That is one thing.

The second thing is either the military or the media, or both, manipulated the information they released. Why would they not call a 14 yr old a teenager or a child, but an adult? Because there are some people who would then write this off as just another war atrocity, that bad things happen to adults in war and if she didn't want to have this happen she should've just left. It is appalling, but there are people who would not notice this if this child were an adult.

2 things going on that we are upset about. The heinous crime. The coverup.

[DarkTirade]

54. It wasn't so much a cover-up as it was an attempt at

'spraying perfume on those turds', as Jon Stewart would say. They were trying to somehow make it seem 'not as bad'... but it's already about as bad as it's gonna get.

[bobbieinok]

47. some of you might find my earlier post of interest in this discussion

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

(I started the thread.)

Emmett Till 1941-1955; Abeer 1991-2006

Why do I put these 2 young people together?

Emmett Till was brutally beaten and murdered in Mississippi because he allegedly 'whistled' at a white woman; he was 14, the same age as my brother. Abeer was raped and murdered because she apparently 'caught the eye' of some US soldiers; she was 14 (almost 15, the same age as my niece ....who is the daughter of that brother).

Till's murder and funeral was one of the tragic events that opened the eyes of many whites to the horrific treatment of blacks in this country. It was so horrible that I blocked it out of my memory for a long time; only years later when I saw the name did I remember that horrible event. As terrible as it was, Till's murder/lynching was a catalyst that propelled the civil rights movement.

Abeer's rape and murder is an horrific event. Will it also catalyze change in the hearts of Americans?? I'm sadly just not too optimistic; 'we've come a long way, baby' in our acceptance of horrible treatment of those who 'are not like us.'

[DeepModem Mom]

49. Thank you, bobbieinok -- that looks like excellent thread. nt

[chill_wind]

50. For gods sake, NO ONE- NO ONE HERE is disputing the heinousness and

atrocity of this crime of rape and murder-at any victim's age, PERIOD.

There is the hideous fact of it. And there is ALSO the fact in giant blazing billboard letters 20 feet high that a faction of this media wants to go on PROTECTING this administration ANY WAY THEY CAN amidst this, even if they think ACTIVELY blurring or distorting the facts will help.

In example after example after example-- we see that They. Actively Choose. To help shield the full truth and protect this evil.

THEY. GIDDILY HELPED sell this "shock and awe" occupation.
THEY in their self-censoring cowardice helped it to continue unabated.
THEY are a participatory part of how we are where we are.

There is not just one set of utter evils here.
There are two very entwined sets.

TWO!!

[ChairmanAgnostic]

52. and from the other side, the dark side, we get a sense of this:

we are being unpatriotic and failing to support the troops. Several present and former military people, including that one exonerated of murder in Iraq, are being sent around the MSM to rally the people around the troops. The revenge issue is another concoction, as currently being handled by the DOD spin masters.

I am just so glad we have this island of sanity here.

[Swamp Rat]

56. in a few years

[IronLionZion]

63. Last I checked, rape was still horrible regardless of age n/t

[AngryOldDem]

65. WHY are they even having this discussion???

Nothing excuses the rape-murder of anyone at any age.

[Bretttido]

66. Age matters to many people and is an objective FACT

It is a specific detail that has been purposely distorted in some articles. If that detail doesn't matter to you, that's fine; but it matters to a lot of people. And it really matters is anti-choicers who think a single-celled organism is more important than any living woman.