E/CN.4/2002/73/Add.2 page 7 12. As stated by the Human Rights Committee in its general comment 22, the observance and practice of a religion or belief may encompass “ritual and ceremonial acts giving direct expression to belief” and can also include “such customs as the observance of dietary regulations, the wearing of distinctive clothing or headcoverings [and] participation in rituals associated with certain stages of life” (para. 4). The list is provided by way of illustration only. This freedom to manifest religion or belief thus involves all practices relating to women’s status that are directly based on religion or stem from customs passed on from generation to generation. The entire problem arises from the fact that some harmful practices are perceived by those pursuing them as religious prescriptions or obligations. The examples are too numerous to be cited here but will be explored in chapter II below. Mention of some can nevertheless be made at this stage of the analysis: female genital mutilation,11 polygamy, inheritance discrimination, sacred prostitution, male-child preference and general denigration of the image of women, whose deeply rooted basis lies in the fact that women are in most religions perceived as inferior beings. This concerns a key aspect of the present study, namely the relationship between religion and the collective imagination and peoples’ and nations’ ways of being and living in the light of women’s status. B. Religion and culture 13. Discrimination against women is arguably not the invention of religions, women’s status being linked more to issues of social and cultural behaviour than to adverse religious consequences.12 To accuse religions of bearing the greatest responsibility for the debased position of women would without doubt be unfounded. Women’s subordinate status is primarily a cultural phenomenon and extends, in both temporal and geographical terms, far beyond religions, at least those which are traditionally blamed for keeping women in an inferior position. If accusations are to be made, criticisms should be levelled against men for having been unable or unwilling to change cultural traditions and prejudices, whether religion-based or otherwise. 14. It is a fact that the most distant civilizations did not hold women in higher esteem.13 Ancient civilizations created male-dominated polytheisms. Thinkers such as Aristotle and Pericles are believed to have had a very misogynistic view of women. Greek mythology tells us that Pandora, humankind’s first woman, who opened the fatal box of curses, spread evil over the world. Ancient Greece distinguished between two categories of women: faithful wives confined to roles of childbearing and housekeeping, and companions, concubines and courtesans intended for men’s pleasure.14 The religious historian Odon Vallet explains that one had to fight in order to govern in that era. Men held sway over women, who stayed at home and suffered a loss of prestige.15 15. Religions, including monotheistic religions, have generally been established in very patriarchal societies where polygamy, repudiation, stoning, infanticide, etc. were common practices and where women were regarded as impure beings destined to fulfil secondary roles as wives, mothers and external signs of wealth.16 Several religions have put an end to such discriminatory practices or attempted to limit their abuses by regulating some practices and banning others. In countries declaring scrupulous adherence to Koranic precepts, for example, one forgets that such precepts were laid down as measures aimed at women’s emancipation and liberation, by comparison with the practices of pre-Islamic Bedouin society, where women had no legal status and were an item of assignable and transferable property.