Archive for April, 2009
Stop Porn Culture is planning our next training on how to present our feminist anti-pornography slideshow. The training will be held at Wheelock College in Boston on June 5-7, 2009. We are asking for a $50 donation to cover our costs, but this can be waived for those who need it. Limited scholarships for travel [...]
This year, at the United Nations 53rd Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), the GEAR Campaign launched a global petition (for individuals) calling on UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Member States of the General Assembly to create a new, stronger women’s agency that: * is led by an Under Secretary-General in [...]
A Palestinian woman fleeing her abusive husband in Gaza several weeks ago was stabbed to death by her enraged husband as the terrified woman sought shelter in her parents home. The unidentified victim was one of the rare statistics which made the headlines and where the police got involved. “This is just the tip of [...]
The UN Inter-Agency Gender Task Force (IAGTF), a mechanism for integrating gender concerns into UN policies and programmes, on 23 April published the results of a household survey on the needs and perceptions of men and women in the aftermath of Israel’s recent 23-day military offensive in Gaza. The survey was conducted through face-to-face interviews [...]
Interview with Yifat Susskind, communications director with MADRE, conducted by Melinda Tuhus Afghan women, long excluded from any public role, have become more visible in recent days. Legislation regulating family life for the nation’s Shiite minority was passed by the Afghan legislature and signed into law by President Hamid Karzai, even though critics — both [...]
Yesterday was a day to go down in history. It was the day that Hillary Clinton broke the political sound barrier. It was the day that someone, finally, after many years of dissembling by so many, stood up to the perpetual hot air balloon that is Congressman Chris Smith and revealed that he has no [...]
A bias in favor of male offspring has left China with 32 million more boys under the age of 20 than girls, creating “an imminent generation of excess men,” according to a study released last week. For the next 20 years, China will have increasingly more men than women of reproductive age, according to the [...]
In Sierra Leone village chiefs, community members and women who perform female genital cutting have signed an agreement stating that girls in northern Kambia district will not undergo genital mutilation – or ‘cutting’ – before age 18. The number of girls being cut during the December 2008-January 2009 initiation season in Kambia dropped drastically, according [...]
France launched a new campaign to warn potential victims of forced marriages and female genital mutilation with stark posters and booklets showing a wedding ring made of barbed wire. France is home to an estimated 55,000 victims of female genital mutilation, mostly of African origin, and some 70,000 young women who are at risk of [...]
Campaigners in Romania have very effectively used the media to break the public silence around the issue of domestic violence against women, and lobby for changes in laws. Over many weeks, public interest ads featuring celebrities, both male and female, from the world of music and the electronic media, with artificial bruises and scars, have [...]
The claim has been made by an international human rights group that visited New Zealand last year and compiled a report on how the country deals with domestic violence. The report*, issued in Wellington by the Leitner Centre for International Law and Justice at New York’s Fordham Law School, considers violence against women in the [...]
It was once widely assumed that children were better off with their mothers, especially after divorce. In part, that was because mothers did most of the child-rearing. They got pregnant, gave birth and did most of the heavy lifting – nappy changes, toilet-training and school pick-ups – as the children got older. The role played [...]
Emanuela Heyninck, pay equity commissioner of Ontario, speaks out against a threatened erosion of wage rights for Canadian women in traditionally female occupations. Canadians have President Barack Obama to thank for raising awareness about equal pay and gender wage discrimination. By passing the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act early in his administration, Obama extended the [...]
As the economic crisis continues to worsen, with capitalism unable to stop the spiral towards a global depression that will plunge millions into poverty, women will experience the negative consequences more rapidly and with more severity. While the ruling class — owners of banks, corporations and also governments — search for ways to make workers [...]
By the time she was 8, Amanda had been sexually abused by her father’s friend for four years. At 12, she was peddling crack. At 14, she was selling sex on the sidewalk. Her pimp beat her weekly to keep her working, stitching up her wounds himself to avoid questions at a hospital. Her average [...]
A Taiwan sex workers’ group has urged the government to legalize the sex trade, calling on lawmakers to back a bill aimed at decriminalizing prostitution. Campaigners believe they are just one parliamentarian short of getting enough signatures to get such a bill started in parliament. ‘We hope we can get backing from 15 lawmakers, the [...]
Iceland plans to introduce legislation criminalising the purchase of sexual services, the operation of strip clubs, and human trafficking, the government said on Wednesday. “This plan is long overdue,” Icelandic Minister of Social Affairs Asta Ragnheithur Johannesdottir, told AFP. “This has been a fighting issue for the human rights organisations, women’s organisations and many members [...]
The Italian Senate on Wednesday approved a law that introduces tough penalties for rape and makes stalking a crime. A total of 262 senators from the ruling conservative coalition and from opposition parties backed the law, while one senator voted against it and three senators from the libertarian Radical party abstained. The new law makes [...]
Eight women’s groups protested outside the offices of the Times Group — the publishers of The Times of India — accusing the Mumbai Mirror newspaper, also published by the group, of sensationalising the story of a rape victim and violating her right to privacy. A student at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences in Mumbai [...]
Recent postings- Towards a Future without Fundamentalisms: New Report Analyzes Religious Fundamentalist Strategies and Feminist Responses
- Statement on the Murder of Marisela Escobedo Ortiz, women’s human rights defender of Ciudad Juarez
- Sudan police arrest women protesting at flogging video
- UN Chief Leaves Women out of Year-End Summing Up
- Sex education is expelled from Egyptian schools
- Kurdish Parliament Turns Blind Eye to Prostitution
- Sexual harassment cases in Israel’s civil service rose 40% in 2010
- Women in south Sudan have been targeted in a string of abusive attacks by police cracking down on Western clothes
- Women and girls living in Haiti’s makeshift camps face an increasing risk of rape and sexual violence says Amnesty International new report
- Stand up against hatred and threats against LGBT in Malaysia
- new on womensgrid
- Tower Hamlets Residents Solidarity Campaign – Solidarity with women involved in prostitution in east London
- East London Fawcett: Free Gallery Tour ~ 12 May & Pay Gap Talk ~ 23rd May 2012
- The Light Bulb Moment and future of feminism Book launch and panel – Bristol ~ 15th May 2012
- Hollaback! Portsmouth launch event – Tuesday 22nd May 2012
- Run for Congo Women – Deadline extended to 25th May 2012!
- Fast fall in number of male-only FTSE 100 boards
- Why has the UK got so few women scientists?
- The Haven Wolverhampton E Bulletin May 2012
- 2 vacancies – Shakti Women’s Aid (Edinburgh) ~ 28th May 2012
- Volunteering for Dorset Rape Crisis Centre
- new on women in london
- Information added in March 2012
- Information added in February 2012
- Information added in January 2012
- Pro-Choice Public Meeting – Abortion Rights ~16th May 2012
- Fawcett on Queen’s speech: flexible parental leave / red tape challenge
- Policy and Campaigns Internship – Power and Agency campaign – Fawcett ~ 22nd May 2012
- Administration and Finance Worker – Women in Prison ~ 18th May 2012
- A Women’s Agenda for the Local Elections May 2012 – Survey Results
- Friends of the Women’s Library update on the future of the Library
- Women in Black, vigils and Facebook page
Is Pornography the New Tobacco?
27 April 2009 in North America, Opinion Comment, Pornography
Another curious reversal in moralizing Imagine a substance that is relatively new in the public square, but by now so ubiquitous in your society that a great many people find its presence unremarkable. Day in and day out, your own encounters with this substance, whether direct or indirect, are legion. Your exposure is so constant [...]