open Democracy News Analysis - 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence - Comments

Not logged in on ""She was probably glad of the attention": tackling rape in the UK"

Not logged in — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 08:49:06 +0000

we should be aloud to wear want we want without men thinking they can shove their slimy dicks inside us and geting away with it.and how the fuck are women partically or fully fuckin responsible for being raped. we shouldnt be afraid of walking home by ourself. they should all have their dicks chopped off. if they cant use it properly then they shouldnt have one!!!!!!!!!!

Syed A Jamal on "The dark side of micro-credit"

Syed A Jamal — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 22:13:28 +0000

Great article on socioeconomic and cultural aspects of dowry.
Thanks
Syed Ahmed Jamal
University of Kansas
Lawrence, Kansas
USA

Oivia on "The UK's modern slavery shame"

Oivia — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 16:50:34 +0000

Dear Rahila Gupta,

Thank you for your article. I am experiencing myself the consequences of draconian immigration laws: my husband factually turned me in sex slave, and i can prove nothing. He collected my passport and forced me for sexual acts. He threatened to destroy me, if I won't do what he wanted to do. He told me I would not be able to prove anything, he has the right for everything as a born British, I have no rights at all. The following events confirmed he was right. Police could not even make him give my documents back. Now Home Office stopped my spouse visa on his demand. I also lost my Appeal court, as I don't have enough proves against him. Everybody I met (police officers, GP, colleagues at work) told me: women are protected in this country, what he does is illegal... There are so many organisations to help women, but if you are non-EU citizen, you have no rights. I fled home without any clothes, medicine, documents. I managed to collect my passport and marriage certificate. 7 months I am struggling on the level of basic physical survival, and can't see any light in the end of the tunnel. I don't think you will be able to help, but thank you for informing people, that slavery is in blossom and the legislation does not protect victims, but abusers, especially if they have British passport. Thank you. Olivia

Liz Gado on "Iraqi women refugees: surviving in Syria"

Liz Gado — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 17:20:20 +0000

I just can't beleive that war is still a word in our dictionary, what have we learned from the past... nothing.

Bajar libros

Nadejda Letat on "Iraqi women refugees: surviving in Syria"

Nadejda Letat — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:57:04 +0000

Nadejda Letat

I wonder if George Bush realizes what his invasion of Iraq has done to Iraqi women and children - the most vulnerable members of any culture. But the least Syrian Government can do is to protect these victims of Bush's war! By protecting & treating refugees of war more generously, Syria would be showing up USA for what it is - bully of the world! Don't have to go to war against USA - just shame them! If that is possible?

Nadejda Letat, Melbourne, Australia

Nadejda Letat on "Syrian Women's Rights: "the fight does not stop here""

Nadejda Letat — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:38:57 +0000

Nadejda Letat

I am pleased to read that men are joining women in their fight against violence against women and children in Syria, Violence against women and children is a worldwide crime and is not specific to a particular culture and we must all work towards gender equality and protection of children.

Nadejda Letat

Melbourne, Australia.

Nadejda Letat on "Enough: ending private justice and violence against women "

Nadejda Letat — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:10:38 +0000

Aspacia - you have lost before you have begun! Have more hope! Surely there must be some men in Lebanon who reject violence against women and children. And Hizbollah must realize that without women's support in what they are trying to achieve for their country, their job is going to that much more difficult.

Nadejda Letat
Melbourne, Australia

Jenny Allsopp on "Working for women's rights in Jordan"

Jenny Allsopp — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:50:34 +0000

Last Thursday I attended Femmes en Resistance (Women in a State of Resistance), a round-table discussion with representatives from female resistance movements in Burkina Faso, France, and the Maghreb. This event was held in Montpellier as part of The 19th Quinzaine des Tiers-Mondes, a fortnight of events highlighting the struggles of various minorities and resistance groups across the globe.

Although I am aware that each state has individual needs, the impressive degree of alliance and support which frames the female resistance movement across the Arab world, thanks to organisations like Karama, is something which has struck me for some time. Listening to Afaf’s podcast, I was therefore not surprised to find many common notes between her discourse and that of Rachida Haidoux, the representative from the Franco-Maghreb cultural association, Coup de Soleil, who offered a comparative view of the female resistance movements in Tunisia, Morocco and Algeria at Thursday’s roundtable.

The thread of consistency which binds their discourses together is recognition of the need to adopt a multi-dimensional approach and attack the root causes of the problem. Whilst Afaf recognises the key role of policy change, like Rachida, she also highlights the fact that policy changes must both stem from and be replanted back into the cultural and social soil. Afaf takes as her example the revision of the Mudwana, now frequently, and often symbolically, referred to as The Moroccan Family Code. She notes that 4 years after its revision only 1% of women were profiting from the amendment to guardianship law.

The progressive revision of the Mudwana has been celebrated internationally, and Rachida claims that today Morocco is the most ‘dynamic and interesting’ of the countries of the Maghreb. Yet Araf seems sceptical; the female resistance may appear strong on paper, but the aforementioned figure clearly shows that policy changes simply must be translated into grass-root currency before true success can be proclaimed.

At the Montpellian roundtable it was a Christine Delteil, a French representative of the CIDF, The Centre d’Information des Droits des Familles (The Information Centre for Family Rights) who really encapsulated the importance of awakening the social consciousness when she stated that ‘at the base of society, at the base of democracy, and at the base of equality, is someone who knows their rights.’

And this need to include the masses in the movement by making them aware of their existing and potential rights is something which Rachida did not leave unaddressed. In a country where 46% of women are illiterate, Rachida stressed the need to proactively inform women about their new rights, as well as reminding them, and in many cases introducing them, to their basic human rights: ‘this is the only way to combat violence and oppression’. And it is not just a question of targeting women. Naturally, men form an essential part of the equation too.

Rachida, like Afaf, is optimistic for the future. She retains a celebratory attitude and hopes to see a rise of initiatives such as the ‘women caravans’, teams which head out into Moroccan villages to inform people about the new Family Law; this certainly seems like the kind of thing which Afaf is talking about when she stresses the need to link policy change to attitude change.

aspacia on "Enough: ending private justice and violence against women "

aspacia — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 15:27:37 +0000

Hizbollah will never accept this law.

Rev EM Ukpong on "Hidden Crimes"

Rev EM Ukpong — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 10:47:12 +0000

Women are generally believed to be weeker sex, but that is not a right to over look the fact that women are also God's image.
It is certain that so many women are passing through difficult times in their homes, mostly in some parts of Africa.
In one of those homes I visited some time ago, a woman was unjustly treated by the in-laws because her husband put her in control of his business.
Again, the same woman who had given birth to three girls was further maltreated because she has no male child as a male child is believed to be the hier in the home.
African women are really hurt in their matrimonial homes and i want you to PLEASE look into the matter because women are also the foundation of the future.

Jameen on "India's silent tragedy"

Jameen — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 07:47:20 +0000

Dewdrops, thanks for your comments.

I have just arrived to specifically work on maternal mortality cases in India, with the Human Rights Law Network.We are currently preparing petitions to be addressed in high courts across the country, highlighting the gross violations of human rights.

Best, Jameen

dewdrops on "India's silent tragedy"

dewdrops — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 12:20:20 +0000

Just want to say well done! Brilliant article. Situation in India is getting worse for women, and we all need to get together to make the govt. do something about it.

Taj Hashmi on "The dark side of micro-credit"

Taj Hashmi — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 21:29:33 +0000

I would like to congratulate dr Santi Rozario for her excellent piece on the myth of microcredit, specially with regard to Bangladeshi poor women. My own findings are not that different from Dr Rozario's ones. It is time that the mythical and over-sold (and over-touted) microcredit (being glorified as "micro-finance" by mega banks and corporations in the West) as the panacea to poverty be exposed. I am pasting below a news report from daily New Age of Bangladesh (December 15, 2007) which tells us about a research finding in northern Bangladesh showing how the Grameen bank and other microcredit organizations are sustaining poverty and making money out of it. Cheers, Taj Hashmi Honolulu Microcredit Sustains Poverty________________________________________ BEA CONFERENCE Micro-credit sustains, cashes in on poverty, studies find Khawaza Main Uddin New Age, December 15, 2007 The state is responsible for nurturing poverty, allowing many organisations to cash in on the poor people’s plight, say economists, referring to research findings that the micro-credit acclaimed worldwide hardly contributes to improving the conditions of the poor in Bangladesh. Micro-credit has not changed the conditions of 77 per cent of the recipients and failed to ensure land ownership of 76 per cent, food security of 64 per cent and healthcare facilities for 84 per cent, found a study titled ‘Role of Micro-credit in Poverty Eradication’ that covered Nilphamari district. The research, conducted by two professors of economics at Rajshahi University, Mahfuz Arefin Chowdhury and Moazzem Hossain Khan, reveals that micro-credit has rather increased the overall indebtedness of the poor in 75 per cent cases. The poor in the monga-prone area have failed to prevent their children from dropping out of schools in 85 per cent cases, even after taking micro-credit which has only increased their use of mobile phones by about 50 per cent, according the survey findings presented at the biennial conference of the Bangladesh Economic Association on Friday. The researchers termed micro-credit a programme that nurtures poverty by continuing the vicious cycle of poverty by capitalising on the vulnerabilities of the poor. ‘Poverty is inherent in our policy, our culture. We have seen politics using poverty and profiteering by sustaining it,’ observed Jahangirnagar University Vice-Chancellor Khandaker Mustahidur Rahman, speaking as the chair of a session on poverty. Only 23 per cent of the micro-credit recipients can bear the pressure of loan repayment instalments and the remaining 77 per cent just fail to become successful due to the high rate of interests charged by the lenders, said Moinul Islam, a former BEA president and a professor of economics at Chittagong University. The rate ranges from 28 to 38 per cent, he pointed out. Most of the micro-finance institutions have become ‘profitable’ since micro-credit has proven to be a good business, Moinul told the meeting. ‘Micro-credit alone is not a panacea for poverty. We have to focus on social transformation.’ ‘Those who profess to send poverty to museum in reality try to hide the actual state of poverty in the society, instead of saying goodbye to it. It will remain an illusion, unless there is massive change in the overall policy,’ said Sanat Kumar Saha, a professor at Rajshahi University, presiding over another session on the third day of the four-day conference. The number of micro-credit recipients is shown in the reports of micro-finance organisations at 1.95 crore households, much higher than the number of poor families in Bangladesh, which has a total of 2.25 crore households, an economics teacher said, taking part in the discussion. The economists attribute such duplication of membership of individual borrowers with more than one organisation to obligation to pay back their loans in instalments. Another research, ‘A Case Study of Grameen Bank and BRDB’ conducted by Tapash Kumar Biswas, Khairul Kabir and Mihir Kumar Roy of the Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development of Comilla, has found that the benefits derived from micro-credit have not helped the recipients to cross the below-poverty line, the researchers said. ‘The amounts of credit taken by them [the study respondents] were not enough to generate effective income… In most cases, micro-credit helped in generating part-time self-employment that contributed little to poverty alleviation,’ they reported, suggesting that micro-credit programmes needed to incorporate human poverty-related indicators, such as health, sanitation, population, and nutrition. The researchers underlined the need for effective monitoring and assessment of utilisation of loans disbursed by the micro-credit organisations so that the beneficiaries could get the training necessary and generate income. The researchers of ‘Role of Micro-credit in Poverty Eradication’, Mahfuz and Moazzem, observed, ‘Micro-finance organisations are charging interest at rates much higher than the commercial banks do.’ They recommended that micro-credit institutions should immediately bring down their interest rates — a much-talked-about issue that most of the economists at the conference raised and demanded downward revision of interest rates to alleviate poverty instead of ‘creating poverty’. In a recommendation, the researchers said the Tk 50,000 ceiling on micro-credit should be relaxed so that the recipients could undertake viable income generating projects to get out of poverty.

sendtosadie@gmail.com on ""She was probably glad of the attention": tackling rape in the UK"

sendtosadie@gmail.com — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 15:36:18 +0000

Arakano, This is an argument that I often come across as an explanation for the low conviction rate. In fact, there is supporting evidence in 86.7% of charged cases of rape - so in the majority of cases it is not simply a matter of the victim’s word against the defendants (see this report: http://www.hmcpsi.gov.uk/reports/Without_Consent_Thematic.pdf). Supporting evidence could include: previous convictions or violent behaviour; forensic evidence (including evidence from the crime scene); evidence of a drink being spiked; supporting witnesses to events or behaviour surrounding the alleged rape. In many other crimes, there are no eyewitnesses to the event itself - rape is not in fact unique in this regard. What I'd argue is that far more could be done to make the gathering of effective evidence in rape cases a priority, and to ensure that the victim is in a position to give the best evidence possible. Cases aren't only dropped as a result of lack of evidence - in many cases, victims choose not to pursue the case, sometimes as a result of poor treatment by the police. And police often 'no crime', and so do not investigate cases where there is evidence of previous offences by the accused - see http://www.newstatesman.com/200704160015.

eeh100 on "Empowering women in the middle east"

eeh100 — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 19:20:16 +0000

Elie Elhadj - London Is Muslims’ Treatment of Women Islamic? On March 11, 2002, fire struck a girls’ school in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. The religious police locked the schoolgirls inside the inferno rather than let them escape without their head-to-toe cloak. The firemen were prevented from entering the school for fear that the girls would be seen without their covering. Fourteen young girls were burned to death and dozens more were injured. Is this treatment Islamic? To answer this question, a comparison will be made between the fine treatment that the Prophet Muhammad reportedly accorded to His first wife Khadija and the treatment of women that evolved under Sharia (Islamic Law). We are told that the Prophet’s first wife was the best born in Quraish, a successful businesswoman and, too, the richest. We are also told that Khadija employed Muhammad in her business, that she proposed marriage to him when he was 25 years old, and that she was 15 years his senior and twice a widow. For the 25 years of the Prophet’s marriage to Khadija, until her death in 620, He remained monogamous to her, that she was the one person to whom He turned for advice, and that Khadija was the first convert to Islam. The difference between the Prophet’s treatment of Khadija and the treatment of women under Sharia Law is stark. The Quran subordinates women to men [see, for example, Verses 2:228 (Chapter 2, Verse 228], 4:34, and 18:46). It decrees that one man is equal to two women when bearing witness in a legal setting (2:282), that a male’s share in inheritance is equal to that of two females (4:11), that a man can have up to four wives simultaneously, on condition of equitable treatment (4:3), that a husband can divorce his wife without giving reason, though the Prophet is reported to have discouraged divorce. A wife can divorce her husband only after establishing good cause such as impotence, madness, or denial of her rights. Allowing the Muslim male to marry four wives simultaneously and divorce any one of them at will without giving cause is synonymous with unlimited polygamy. Additionally, Shii religious scholars interpret Verses 4:4 and 4:24 as if men are allowed a temporary marriage contract (when traveling, for example), called Mut’a, for which a payment to the woman is made by the man in return for her temporary companionship with no consequent obligations. Sunni Ulama sanction the Misyar marriage. Under Misyar the man is not responsible financially for the woman and the couple live apart; the woman relinquishes her right to housing and support money and accepts that the man visits her in her family house whenever he likes, day or night. Misyar has no date certain for divorce. Misyar has been sanctioned by the Mecca-based Islamic Jurisprudence Assembly on April 12, 2006. The Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia and the Grand Mufti of the Al-Azhar Mosque in Cairo, Islam’s venerable thousand-year-old university, have both sanctioned Misyar too. Misyar and Mut’a marriages represent sanctioned adultery. Misyar and/or Mut’a permit couples desirous of an illicit affair to evade being charged with adultery, a serious charge punishable under Sharia Law by stoning to death [according to the Hadith (sayings attributed to the Prophet); but not the Quran, which specifies 100 lashes instead (24:2). The Prophetic Sunna (sayings and acts attributed to the Prophet) contains Traditions unflattering to Women as well. Sahih Al-Bukhari attributed to the Prophet saying that most of those who are in hell are women, that women’s “lack of intelligence” is the reason why a woman’s testimony in an Islamic court of law is equal to half that of the testimony of the Muslim male, and that the reason why Muslim women are prohibited from praying and fasting during menstruation is due to them being “deficient in religious belief.” Sunan Al-Nasai attributed to the Prophet saying: “People who entrust the management of their affairs to a woman will fail.” Sharia Law is not applied uniformly in Muslim countries. In extremist Saudi Arabia, Sharia means guardianship over and responsibility by the male in the family (father, brothers, husband) over the actions of the women in their charge. It also means strict segregation of the sexes at work, schools, hospitals, shops, public parks, elevators, etc. It means banning women from driving motorcars, traveling without the guardian’s written permission, and wearing a black cloak from head to toe to conceal not only their face and hair but also the side of their shoes. Al-Bukhari’s attributions became a common popular Saudi proverb: “women are light on brains and religion.” Saudi Sharia interpretations eliminate the potential political opposition of one half of the population to the government. By contrast, in Muslim non-Arab Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan, and Turkey, Sharia Law is interpreted in such a way as to give women more rights, including becoming presidents and prime ministers. Is veiling and covering women from head to toe Islamic? Orthodox overzealous Ulama think so. Moderate Ulama disagree. The Quran demands modesty only (24:31). Similarly, the Quran has no specific demand to segregate the sexes. The contradictions between the Prophet’s fine treatment of His first wife Khadija and the way Sharia evolved on the treatment of women need to be reconciled. Harmonizing Sharia with the Prophet’s way of life (Sunna) is all the more important because the Prophet’s Sunna has been made by the Ulama of the tenth century equal to the Quran as a source of Sharia Law. A meaningful first step here was announced in June 2006. Turkey has formed a committee of thirty-five religious scholars to study the removal of all Hadith references attributed to the Prophet that encourage violence against women.