The War on Women

[Burnt Hill]

Hi PW and thanks again for responding to me. I am still considering your response, and I will continue to do so.
Yes, on re-reading the thread with a different eye ,the hateful attitudes toward women are obvious.
I dont want to patronize], but I am sorry. I am really glad we have your voice on this forum.

[Allegro]

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^ Mass demonstration over women’s
rights in Tunisia | Published 14AUG12
IBTimesUK

YOUTUBE NOTES. “Equality, Equality in the rights and the duties” read these banners held aloft at night on the streets in the capital of Tunisia. Women’s rights here are under threat as the row grows over Islam’s place in the law. Some 6,000 women and hundreds more male supporters are protesting against a stipulation in a draft of the constitution which says women are only ‘complementary to men’. Activists are angry, they want the pioneering 1956 law that stated women are equal to men to remain untouched. Farah, who’s an Engineer, says: “Our goal is to show that Tunisian woman aren’t complementary to men because they are independent and equal to men. We’re here to show that we’re also hard working citizens and we’ll never accept being considered complementary to men.”

Hardline Salafi Muslims appear to be applying pressure on the ruling Ennahda Movement in Tunisia’s new coalition government to introduce Islamic law. Many fear doing that might drag the country backwards from being one of the most liberal countries in the Arab world. But the party’s promised not to impose strict Muslim rules and to respect women’s rights.

[Canadian_watcher]

http://www.healthzone.ca/health/article/1241749--cervical-cancer-screening-guidelines-change

The other day I heard a call-in show on CBC radio talking about the 'new recommendations' which say women should only get pap tests every THREE YEARS, and not at all before the age of 21 unless they are sexually active.

In that phone-in show, each person that I heard call in told a story of how they went from having a normal result one year to having cancer the next year. My own experience is the same. My sister in law got a bad doctor and had her screening, but it was two years before they noticed that her results had been positive and therefore she had to go through a HIGHLY invasive surgery wherein she lost her uterus and suffered life-threatening complications afterward.

IMO, this is just another example of the way that women's health is scorned in Canada.

[seemslikeadream]

I wanna smash the faces of those beautiful boys

[Allegro]

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The following talk by Dr. Pamela Gay, an astronomer, could’ve been put into the current “shades of rape” thread, but Ms. Gay didn’t speak the word rape but once. Instead, she covers numerous topics, one of which is trolls: those who threaten women with violence, bully women with anger, online; obviously, and in no small measure, there’s been an increase of trolling women. She speaks of abusive behavior against women by men of power in astronomy circles.

Ms. Gay is a feminist, and, from reading comments at Bad Astronomy, a Christian.

Highlights mine. Many links in the original.

_________________
Make the World Better
Posted by pamela on Jul 15, 2012 in Personal | 70 comments

Yesterday at TAM2012 [The Amazing Meeting 2012] in Las Vegas I gave the hardest talk I’ve ever given. I present it annotated below. The out pouring of love I’ve received has been truly overwhelming, and I thank all of you for the strength you have given me.

update 08/17/2012
My talk was posted by the JREF on YouTube. It’s now embedded below.

^ Presented Saturday 14JUL12

This is the forth time I’ve been given the opportunity to speak at TAM. Each year I’ve written a new speech and work to write something that is relevant to the moment. This year I’ve struggled with my talk more than I’ve ever because I’m not entirely sure how to say what I want to say.

The past few weeks leading into TAM have been absolutely insane. Looking around the internet there have been terrible sadnesses and awe inspiring goodness. We live in a world that sometimes seems like nothing but extremes.

We saw a school bus driver bullied by out of control teens (link), and we saw the internet respond by starting out planning to raise money to send her on vacation and instead changing her life. (link)

We saw a New York 5th grader forbidden to give his winning speech on same-sex marriage, a speech that says “Who are we to judge… We must learn to accept all differences” … well he was judged by a close minded principal who tried to silence his ideals. But then, in response to a massive internet outcry, that principle felt compelled to allow that child to speak his heart in a special assembly. In his speech, he went on to say, “If we judge people like this, this is a form of prejudice. We must learn to accept all differences. … In conclusion, I hope that everyone understands how important it is to respect everyone for who they are.” (link)

We live in a society that in many ways is broken, but sometimes, remarkable humans decide they are just going to do what they can to make the world better, and they do this because they can, and ask if anyone minds only later.

Two weeks ago, Google high-lighted the Virtual Star Parties that my dear friend Fraser Cain hosts and that I and many others participate in. Here’s the video.

I work with some of the best people in the world.

In reaction Tim Farley wrote: “Fraser didn’t ask permission from anyone to do this. He didn’t conduct any focus groups or conduct a study. He just saw an opportunity and took it.”

This is powerful.

Fraser is one of those remarkable humans who has decided he is just going to do what he can to make the world better, and he does this because he can, and asks if anyone minds only later.

Doing what he does isn’t easy. It’s a lot easier to do nothing… easier to lose hope that anything can even be done. And there are people out there who would encourage despair.

If, like me, you’re a child of the 80s, you may remember a movie called “Neverending Story”. It came out when I was a dorky little kid. This movie contained a certain giant wolf who totally understands trolls and their effect of creating their own great nothing in the world. (link) When asked why he is helping the great nothing destroy their world, this wolf responds, “It’s like a despair, destroying this world. … people who have no hopes are easy to control.”

Looking around the internets, I see a lot of people sitting around trolling, and a lot people experiencing despair. There are YouTube videos of people complaining, and blog posts of people expressing their hurt, and in many cases there are legitimate reasons for people to be upset. There are people dying because we’ve lost herd immunity (link). There are lesbian teens in Texas being killed for falling in love (link). There are so many cases of abuse that it hurts to read the news. There are lots of real reasons to be frustrated about the world we live in and it is easy to complain… and it is easy to lose hope.

It is dreaming that is hard.

The Neverending story, in its childhood tale of morality, addresses this too. Through the voice of the Childlike Empress, the boy outside the story is asked, “Why don’t you do what you dream, Bastian?” Bastian replies the way I think so many of us reply when when asked why we don’t follow our wildest dreams, “But I can’t, I have to keep my feet on the ground!” (link)

Dreaming is hard. It requires risks. It requires you to own the fact that you are capable of something great.

A few years ago, I came across a powerful quote that was attributed to anonymous.

“Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?” (link to old blog post on this quote)

I’d challenge you to let your feet fly off the ground and I’d challenge you to dream big and let your light push away the darkness of despair in the world.

I challenge you to change the world.

Now I recognize that is a pretty big challenge. How many different inspirational posters have you seen encouraging you to just be the change you want to see in the world.

It’s kind of demotivating, and let’s face it, in reality, it often seems that no good deed goes unpunished. But don’t let that stop you. Do good, but know you may get punished – that’s reality.

I’m an astronomer. For the past 10 years I’ve been listening to folks bitch and moan about how people have stopped dreaming, about how NASA is failing, about “Oh whoa is space exploration, where’s my jetpack.” Tied in with these complaints was a blame game of the public saying NASA was boring, NASA saying “We’re not boring, but we can only do so much with our funding – Congress needs to give us funding,” and Congress… well congress says a lot of things. You can look around the internet – Heck you can look at past talks from this conference! – and you can see people complaining.

But complaining doesn’t build our jet plane future. We build our jet plane future.

Last winter I had the opportunity to attend The Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference. In attendance where NASA superstars and heroes of the past. Neil Armstrong – First Man in Space. THAT Neil Armstrong – gave the opening address! In attendance were the leaders of tomorrow – the entrepreneurs behind Virgin Galactic, Blue Orbit, Xcor, and a myriad of other commercial space corporations. These were men and women who dreamed of a rocket planes and having made their money online, they decided to make their dreams reality by hiring the engineers who could build the rocket planes, build the space suits, and build their future.

While not at that sub-orbital conference, the greatest role model of this future building ideal is Elon Musk. This South African born engineer made his start in Paypal. Energy and aerospace are two of his passions, and today he is channeling his talents into SpaceX and Tesla Motors. When I stood on this stage last year, I spoke about how we were just one week past the last flight of the Space Shuttle. Today, as I stand here, because one man decided to do something, I can tell you that we are well on our way to regaining US manned space exploration, and with tomorrow’s rockets we will go farther than we have ever gone before.

SpaceX is truly an awesome thing. Commercial space flight is opening up a new barnstorming style of innovations, but today’s test craft aren’t soaring grannies over cornfields, they are preparing to fly grannies and grandpas over the Earth’s atmosphere.

Society is in the process of undergoing radical change as we in many ways return to a less centralized way of doing things. Great minds of all ages are innovating a new reality.

Nicolas Negroponte saw a digital divide, so he worked on the One Laptop per Child program. He never got the systems he dreamed of, but his ideas lead to today’s netbooks, and to low cost computers that do start to narrow the chasm between the connected and the offline.

Mohammad Yunus recognized the ability of microfinancing to change the world and worked to define micro lending programs that make very small loans to individuals – often women – to seed new businesses. Today this same idea is behind Kickstarter and Indiegogo and many other websites where individuals can propose products and projects and seek community funding. Through these projects people are building their dreams, and the community is funding that construction. Through social media this is becoming a shared experience as we virally reshape our world one idea and one donation at a time.

I am one of those people who just wants to do something. And I like working with other people who just want to do something, and through this community I’ve gotten to know and respect, and often befriend other doers. The JREF is named after a man who fought to debunk charlatans and fakers. I don’t need to tell you Randi’s story, you can watch in the movie “red lights”. Following in his footsteps are successive generations of magicians. Fighting new fights are people like Eugenie Scott who is fighting to keep real science in schools and the false doctrine of young earth creationism out. Faced with a vaccination crisis Elyse Anders and others started raising money to get people vaccinated, and today we have the “Hug me, I’m vaccinated” campaign. These are doers.

And in astronomy, all through history, every day people have risen to the challenge and become the doers who innovate how we understand our universe. In 1781, composer and concert director William Herschel discovered Uranus. Through the 1870s, sanitation worker Andrew Ainslie Commons pioneered the field of astrophotography. The early twentieth century saw radio engineer Grote Reber take his commercial radio skills and turn them skyward as he built a backyard 9-m radio dish to map the radio sky. Over the past century, advances in optics and technology have allowed amateurs to add larger telescopes and ever more advanced equipment to their scientific arsenal. This has allowed amateur astronomers to see more and do more, and has also led to a flourishing of research opportunities both as observers and online research assistants.

For a while now, several of us – specifically myself, Phil Plait the Bad Astronomer and Fraser Cain, the publisher of Universe Today – have randomly talked about how to better make astronomy and science in general accessible to everyone, and how to engage anyone who wants to spend their spare time doing science… well, doing science. Our project, CosmoQuest, launched in January.

CosmoQuest seeks to build an online research center for the public that engages people in interesting science problems while providing them opportunities parallel to what they’d experience at a research institution. I’d like to introduce you to a project that we are demoing at our booth in the Lobby: MoonMappers.

The universe truly is your to be discovered.

Our goal with CosmoQuest is to create a community of people bent on together helping scientists do science; a community of people who can explain why what they do matters, and what questions they are helping to answer. We want to create a community, and here is where I invite all of you to be a part of what we’re doing.

Now, don’t get me wrong, as much as I try to be a doer, I’ve had plenty of my own “Rant on the internet” moments. But at the end of the day, I try really hard to remind myself not to feed the trolls.

But sometimes you can’t avoid the trolls, and they seem to be demanding food.

When I started this talk I highlighted places where something had gone wrong in the world, but the goodness of people like you working on the internet made it right. In my perfect world, that is the way things work. Things go well, and when they don’t, people step forward and fix.

Unfortunately, the internet is filled with trolls who sometimes work overtime to break what is right with the world.

Back in June Anita Sarkeesian tried to raise just $6000 to do a web series on how women are portrayed in video games. To look at things like, why is it always some guy rescuing the princess, instead of some female warrior rescuing the captured king. The internet responded by helping her raise more than 26x what she’d asked for. It was awesome. (link)

But then the trolls responded.

Here I’m going to read an excerpt from the NewsStatesman, which in turn quotes Anita.


Even if you don’t like the idea – or don’t believe that women are poorly represented in games … then isn’t it fine for other people to give money to something they believe in?

Except some kind of Bastard Klaxon went off somewhere in the dank, moist depths of the internet. An angry misogynist Bat Signal, if you will.

In Sarkeesian’s own words:
“The intimidation and harassment effort has included a torrent of misogyny and hate speech on my YouTube video, repeated vandalizing of the Wikipedia page about me, organized efforts to flag my YouTube videos as “terrorism”, as well as many threatening messages sent through Twitter, Facebook, Kickstarter, email and my own website. These messages and comments have included everything from the typical sandwich and kitchen “jokes” to threats of violence, death, sexual assault and rape.”

Anita tried to do good. Because of this, folks have labeled her a terrorist.

This is not okay. You can make a difference though. You can be the one to not feed the trolls by arguing with them, but instead, simply hit that report button, hit the block button – get them banned. Work to send them the message that what they are doing is wrong and will not be tolerated.

Imagine a world in which all the time, all the energy and all the bandwidth that goes into cyber bullying and trolling instead goes into building good things.

I have built the place to do astronomy. Others have built spaces to do art, to participate in wildlife studies, to work on story telling, to test and debunk false consumer products, and so many other awesome projects. Find what you are passionate about and build.

This talk is one I struggled to write. To finish this talk I have to step out of my comfort zone and give an honest acknowledgement that trolling isn’t something that just happens in nebulous random places on the internet and it isn’t just people being verbal in their close-mindedness. Sometimes things are more physical and more scary. As an astronomer, at professional conferences, I’ve randomly had my tits and ass grabbed and slapped by men in positions of power and by creeps who drank too much. This is part of what it means to be a woman in science. With the creeps I generally hold my own and get them to back off like I would with any asshole in a bar. With the people in power… I commiserate with the other women as we share stories of what has been grabbed by whom. I know as I say this that it sounds unbelievable – and how can we report the unbelievable and expect to be believed?

This isn’t to say women shouldn’t go into astronomy. It is just to say that in the after hours events, you sometimes need to keep your butt to the wall and your arms crossed over your chest.

Some of you have to have power to stop discrimination and harassment. It pisses me off to know that as strong as I am, I know I’m not powerful enough to name names and be confident that I’ll still have a career.

But some of you are people with power who can change things.

It’s often hard for women and minorities to rise to positions of power – to break through that glass ceiling. This is in some ways a self-efficacy issue, where the constant down pouring of belittling comments and jokes plays a destructive role in self confidence. At my university, I’ve heard tenured faculty laugh that there is a policy not to hire women into tenure track physics positions. They do this in front of the junior faculty – all men. I’ve heard people joke that the reason I’m in a research center rather than in Physics is because I have boobs. It’s all said with a laugh. So far, its been nothing actionable or against the law. But it hurts, because I know the women who work for me, strong awesome powerful women like the Noisy Astronomer Nicole Gugiliucci and like Georgia Bracey are going to be hearing this, and it is going to effect their self esteem as they look to build their own carreers. I know it hurts my self esteem. And I know there is nothing I can do to change the reality I am in. I could move to another university – I could change which reality I’m in – but that would leave behind a university devoid of women role models who are capable in physics and computer science, the two fields that my students come from. I stay, and I try to be the example of a woman doing things that matter. I try to say Brains, Body, Both – it is possible even in computational astrophysics.

Here in the skeptics community, we, like every other segment of society, have our share of individuals who, given the right combination of alcohol and proximity will grab tits and ass. I’ve had both body parts randomly and unexpectedly grabbed at in public places by people who attend this conference – not at this conference, but by people at this conference. Just like in astronomy, it’s a combination of the inebriated guys going too far – guys I can handle - and of men in power being asses.

I know that there has been a lot of internet buzz over the last two years about these issues. This community is filled with strong women. A Kovacs and MsInformation are two ballsy women I draw inspiration from. These are just two of the many SkepChicks, and many of the Skeptical and scientific podcasts have female hosts. When they see something wrong, they ask for ways to protect people from being hurt. And they do like Surly Amy did and raise money to get women here – women who together can support one another so that when we go home we have a network of women to turn to to support us even at a distance. These are women who react to problems with a sharp word and a needed call to action that is designed to fix the problems.

I know this is an uncomfortable topic. An I know that my talk is going to provoke some of you who don’t think I should air dirty laundry. But I see a problem and I can’t change it alone.

Changing our society takes all of us. Doing something is being that guy, and I’ve had two different guys be that guy for me, who jumps between the girl and the boob grabber and intervenes. Doing something is donating to get more women here, and to get more minorities here, and making a point to admit, we’ve got problems – we’re humans – and saying Stopping Harressment Starts with me. (see endnote 2, below)

We can make TAM a place that is focused on inspiring skeptical and scientific activism – that is focused on how each of us can in our own way make the world better. We can put this bullshit behind us, and we can try to rise above the problems that plague so many conferences in every field. We can be the better example.

The skeptics community is filled with strong people who are advocates of education, of building a more equitable society, and of protecting the uneducated from the charlatans and the quacks. There are times and places to fight. James Randi’s work has often exemplified the best ways to use evidence to fight the leaders of woo. The Dover case was an example of the right place to fight – taking on the leaders of the Intelligent Design movement in the courts. We do need to fight to build a better world.

Say that creating a more educated future is something you’ll fight for, and find something to help educate people about.

Use your social media to advocate for those who are doing good. When you see a problem that pisses you off, find out who is already fighting the fight, and support them. Highlight the issues, and then support the solution. And when something pisses you off, and you don’t see that fighter to support, do like Elyse did and start your own grass roots movement that fights to fix the problems and ignorances that plague our society.

That exhaustingly used statement, “Be the change you want to see in the world” … well, dammit be that change by doing something.

And if you don’t know what to do, support science! Together, we can understand our universe.

POST 2576 | keywords: abuse, troll, threat, dickery, bullying, hate, insult, mob-baiting, sexism, humiliation

[Allegro]

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Highlights mine. Many links in original.

_________________
The silencing of hate | Phil Plait
— Bad Astronomy | August 20th, 2012 11:16 AM

[I wrote this article for my friend Amy Roth, aka SurlyAmy, who has asked leaders in the field of skepticism to write about the recent surge of anti-women rhetoric. She posted my article on the Skepchicks site, and you can find links to the whole series of articles at the bottom of that post. I’m posting my piece here on my blog as well because this is a very important topic, and I want as many people to see it as possible.]

_________________

What the hell is going on in the online community?

If you’ve been reading or paying attention at all to any of the online cultures like skepticism or general geekery (scifi, gaming, convention-going, and so on), you’ll have seen astonishing and depressing displays of sexism. That’s been true for a long time. But recently some sort of sea change has occurred, and what we’re seeing now is a marked increase in outright misogyny and thuggery.

The examples are so distressingly ubiquitous I hardly need point them out. A woman gamer wants to make a documentary showing misogyny in video games, and she gets rape and death threats. Rebecca Watson calmly and rationally tells men not to hit on women in enclosed spaces and reaps a supernova of hate and irrational vitriol. And now we’re seeing death threats, rape threats, all kinds of violent threats, against women who are simply trying to improve the way they are treated at meetings as well as online.

This. Must. Stop.

I am a skeptic and a scientist. I know what’s it like to feel anger and frustration toward implacable forces I think are threatening my way of existence. You may feel this way about many things as well. And while you and I may disagree on some of these topics, the way to work out our disagreements is through the exchange of ideas via honorable words and actions.

Threats, dickery, bullying, hate, insults, mob-baiting, and humiliation are not honorable actions and must not be used. You want to change my mind? You want to win my heart to your cause? Then argue your case logically and based on evidence. If you have to resort to the kind of crap we’re seeing now, then maybe your convictions aren’t as rationally based as you think they are.

Look, I know people are angry. Some of them have the right to be. As I have said many times, anger is natural, anger can be warranted, and anger can be a great motivator. But it must not lead to hatred. Unfocused anger, uncontrolled anger, cannot lead anywhere but away from a goal. Once hatred leaks in through those cracks, rational discussion is dead.

I have seen precious few discussions on this where sooner or later (and usually sooner) the comments don’t devolve into spittle-flecked rhetoric. Even if the original article is well-reasoned, thoughtful, calm, and rational, the comments quickly fall apart. That is what hate does.

That’s unfortunate, but that’s the internet. There’s not a whole lot that can be done about that in general, because you cannot control how others act. But here’s what can be done in particular: you can control how you act. Don’t let the anger, don’t let the hate, get the better of you.

Internet discussion devolves quickly, but discussions in person tend not to. We know when we are facing another living, breathing, feeling person, but that knowledge is easily overwhelmed by emotion online. But the two are not separate: raging emotions online have real life consequences. Threats and bullying online don’t just go out into the ether. They affect real people, and can cause a lifetime of damage.

Don’t let the hate get the better of you.

I’ve been quiet about this up until now for many reasons. Whenever I dip my toes into this miasma the overwhelming response is been vicious and hateful. Even many people who claim to be critical thinkers dive into the ichor and become part of it.

But I decided I can’t stand by and watch this anymore, and that’s why I’m writing this now. My friend, Surly Amy, has been posting a series of articles by men speaking out against this incredibly disturbing trend toward violent rhetoric, and the post by Dale McGowan, Executive Director of Foundation Beyond Belief, really struck home:


Silently shaking my head does nothing. The women under this kind of attack can’t hear my head rattling, so they can only assume I don’t care, when I actually care deeply. I think it’s the difficulty of putting this massive, deranged genie back in the bottle that keeps so many of us quiet. But that’s a poor excuse that only keeps the victims feeling isolated and besieged.

This.

If you threaten violence against someone you disagree with, then you are not a critical thinker. You are not a skeptic. And you are most certainly not a decent human being.

If you disagree with someone, fine. You may be right, you may be wrong. But if, when expressing your disagreement, you bully, threaten, verbally or mentally abuse the person you’re arguing with, then you’re doing it wrong, and you need to stop.

Maybe you’ve heard me say this before, but it’s just as relevant now as it was in 2008, and it always will be: Don’t Be A Dick. If we can just start there, we’ll get a lot farther along the path of understanding and mutual benefit. And from there we can get on with the real work of making the world a better place. For everyone.

< end of Plait article >

^ Phil Plait | Don’t Be a Dick, Part 1: the video

[Project Willow]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/9487761/Anger-as-Iran-bans-women-from-universities.html

Anger as Iran bans women from universities
Female students in Iran have been barred from more than 70 university degree courses in an officially-approved act of sex-discrimination which critics say is aimed at defeating the fight for equal women's rights.

By Robert Tait3:17PM BST 20 Aug 2012
In a move that has prompted a demand for a UN investigation by Iran's most celebrated human rights campaigner, the Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi, 36 universities have announced that 77 BA and BSc courses in the coming academic year will be "single gender" and effectively exclusive to men.

It follows years in which Iranian women students have outperformed men, a trend at odds with the traditional male-dominated outlook of the country's religious leaders. Women outnumbered men by three to two in passing this year's university entrance exam. Senior clerics in Iran's theocratic regime have become concerned about the social side-effects of rising educational standards among women, including declining birth and marriage rates.

Under the new policy, women undergraduates will be excluded from a broad range of studies in some of the country's leading institutions, including English literature, English translation, hotel management, archaeology, nuclear physics, computer science, electrical engineering, industrial engineering and business management.
The Oil Industry University, which has several campuses across the country, says it will no longer accept female students at all, citing a lack of employer demand.

Isfahan University provided a similar rationale for excluding women from its mining engineering degree, claiming 98% of female graduates ended up jobless.
Writing to Ban Ki Moon, the UN secretary general, and Navi Pillay, the high commissioner for human rights, Mrs Ebadi, a human rights lawyer exiled in the UK, said the real agenda was to reduce the proportion of female students to below 50% – from around 65% at present – thereby weakening the Iranian feminist movement in its campaign against discriminatory Islamic laws.

"[It] is part of the recent policy of the Islamic Republic, which tries to return women to the private domain inside the home as it cannot tolerate their passionate presence in the public arena," says the letter, which was also sent to Ahmad Shaheed, the UN's special rapporteur for human rights in Iran. "The aim is that women will give up their opposition and demands for their own rights."

The new policy has also been criticised by Iranian parliamentarians, who summoned the deputy science and higher education minister to explain.
However, the science and higher education minister, Kamran Daneshjoo, dismissed the controversy, saying that 90% of degrees remain open to both sexes and that single-gender courses were needed to create "balance".

Iran has highest ratio of female to male undergraduates in the world, according to UNESCO. Female students have become prominent in traditionally male-dominated courses like applied physics and some engineering disciplines.

Sociologists have credited women's growing academic success to the increased willingness of religiously-conservative families to send their daughters to university after the 1979 Islamic revolution. The relative decline in the male student population has been attributed to the desire of young Iranian men to "get rich quick" without going to university.

[Canadian_watcher]

Allegro - thank you for those. really interesting to read.

I hesitate to say it (write it) clearly because then it'll be 'out there' for the universe to pick up on.. but:

I think perhaps women my age managed to live through the kind of 'golden age' of gender equality and now the slide is gathering speed. I am not saying that we came close to actually REACHING equality - far from it. But I do feel a marked difference in the amount and type of sexism in our culture from the time I was in my early twenties until today. (18 or so years).

It is very disheartening to have to deal with internet trolls, who very often do attack based on gender and really nothing more. In this age of information and global communication it is akin to a glass ceiling. Only a hostile one. A razor wire ceiling, i guess.

[Allegro]

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I’ve removed the format that Iamwhomiam
used for quoting Dalai Lama on this page.
Thank you, Iamwhomiam.

_________________

Developing concern for others, thinking of them as part of us, brings self-confidence, reduces our sense of suspicion and mistrust, and enables us to develop a calm mind.
~ Dalai Lama

Although we are all the same in not wanting problems and wanting a peaceful life, we tend to create a lot of problems for ourselves. Encountering those problems, anger develops and overwhelms our mind, which leads to violence. A good way to counter this and to work for a more peaceful world is to develop concern for others. Then our anger, jealousy and other destructive emotions will naturally weaken and diminish.
~ Dalai Lama

Not knowing the context(s) in which the Dalai Lama spoke what’s quoted above, the juxtaposition of image plus quotes produces a swarm of contradictions. As I recognize male privilege, my angst is highlighted when women’s psychophysiological presence and ongoing discrimination are not acknowledged.

POST 2648

[Allegro]

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The Dalai Lama on Women’s Role in Global Peace
Brain Pickings | by Maria Popova | January 13, 2011

We’re the first to dismiss gender generalizations as the product of psychosocial laziness to engage with individuals on a level beyond their chromosomal lineup. But every once in a while, an interesting perspective comes along that might be worth a listen.

In this panel from the 2009 Vancouver Peace Summit, moderated by Brain Pickings favorite Sir Ken Robinson, His Holiness the Dalai Lama shares, with great humility and none of the agitated self-righteousness typically associated with such discussions, his views on happiness, compassion and the role of women in world peace.


“Some people may call me a feminist… [Biologically], females have more sensitivity towards others’ pain or suffering. Scientists also [are] saying that. Now, in the 21st century, is the time we really need more effort for promotion of human compassion. In that respect, females have a more important role.”
~ His Holiness the Dalai Lama

[Allegro]

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^ Perspectives on the Power of Women

[Allegro]

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Highlights mine.

_________________
Kabul attack on female actors leaves survivors facing more ‘punishment’

Killing and death threats reveal depth of Afghan society’s prejudices against women

Emma Graham-Harrison in Kabul
guardian.co.uk | Thursday 6 Sep 2012, 05.36 EDT


^ Sahar Parniyan, pictured on the set of The Ministry,
is in hiding after receiving death threats.
Photograph: Ahmad Masood/Reuters

Even after the taunts and threats for appearing on TV, and whispered criticism of “immodest” outfits, the attack on actor sisters Areza and Tamana, and their friend Benafsha, came as a surprise.

The trio were minutes from moving out of a neighbourhood in which conservative locals had made them feel unwelcome, walking to meet a minivan full of their possessions, when six men surrounded them in a lane, lined with high-walled compounds. They left Benafsha bleeding to death outside a mosque with stab wounds, and the injured sisters desperately seeking help.

“I didn’t see the TV programme, I just heard the local boys saying that one of them played a role with boys,” said Yaqin Ali Khalili, owner of a shop that the women frequented. “The hatred of the people here is the reason she was killed, I am 100% sure,” he added.

Word travels fast in Kabul, and in a couple of days other actresses were being intimidated. One prominent young actress, Sahar Parniyan, received death threats and has gone into hiding. On the rare occasions she still ventures out she has to wear the burqas she used to despise. “The threats were in calls at midnight, or 2am when I was deep asleep, using very bad words and repeating ‘you will be next for assassination’,” Parniyan told the Guardian in an interview at a secret location. “I cannot continue my life as an actress in Afghanistan, although I love my job. The Taliban are against women, but so are other groups … Afghanistan is not made for women, whether actresses or not.”

The killing and death threats have fuelled fears that conservative pressures are shrinking opportunities for women in public roles.

Tamana had performed in the Emrooz television show, which sparked the most recent abuse, and her sister Areza had taken at least one small role, using the screen name Sadaf, in a popular satirical series, The Ministry, in which Parniyan also acts, according to its director. But although they survived the assault that killed their friend, they are now awaiting another kind of punishment.

After a few hours in hospital for treatment, they were taken to prison, where they face intrusive virginity tests and possible charges of prostitution or collusion in the attack. “We have already sent them to the forensic office to do an examination, to make clear whether these girls are having illegal relations with anyone,” said prosecutor Ghulam Dastegir Hedayat, responsible for western Kabul, where the killing took place.

Acting is controversial for women in Afghanistan, tied up in many minds – as it once was in the west – with prejudices. “She was quite silent, but a good girl,” Parniyan said of Areza, whom she met during filming for The Ministry. “In the eyes of society though, she was a bad girl, and I am a bad girl too.”

Perhaps because of this, the sisters hid their part-time careers. “They told us they did laundry in the city. We didn’t know they were actresses,” said Nasreen Amaninejad, mother of the family who rented them the room in Karte Seh. But the three women were vulnerable without any known male relatives. The sisters are orphans from the north. Benafsha was divorced and had apparently severed contact with her birth family, and the one she married into. No one has been in touch about her death, police and prosecutors say.

“Women living in a house together without male relatives is very unusual and the police and neighbours all seem to imagine that in a situation like that they are running a brothel,” said Heather Barr, Afghanistan researcher for Human Rights Watch. “We came across quite a few cases where behaviour that the police didn’t approve of seems to have turned into a crime and a long prison sentence. And certainly any woman who is not under the control of or vouched for by a husband or male family member is deemed immoral.”

The sisters, instead of seeing their attackers jailed, may face years in prison for “moral crimes”. While police and prosecutors claimed the women were not attacked for being actors, they suggested the assault was prompted by their work and living arrangements. “The result of our investigation is that she was not killed because they work in television, the six people who killed her were threatening the group one or two days before with the aim of getting them to agree to illegal relations,” said Hedayat, the prosecutor.

A senior police officer involved in the case also believed the women were probably attacked for refusing sex, and pointed to their lack of education as evidence they were prostitutes – even though he is a commander in a force where more than three-quarters of new recruits are illiterate. “To feed themselves they have to find money. Where do they get it from?” said the officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “This wasn’t a people’s attack on them, it was just something between some groups and the women … when there is a request to the females and they refuse, this kind of thing happens.”

POST 2672

[seemslikeadream]

“Some Girls Rape Easy"
Representative Roger Rivard of the Wisconsin legislature

[Allegro]

Highlights mine.

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Commission welcomes Action Plan to Address Violence against Women and Children
- 12 Oct 2012

View or download Victoria’s Action Plan to Address Violence Against Women and Children – Everyone has a Responsibility to Act

The Action Plan is about preventing family violence and improving community response when it occurs.

The right to safety and to live free from discrimination, harassment and violence in all its forms are fundamental.

Violence against women is one of the most pervasive human rights abuses in Australia.

It cuts across our society, affecting women from all cultural, socio-economic and religious backgrounds, and impedes the right of women to fully participate in society.

It undermines women’s access to employment, housing, health and education, and has a life-long impact on children and families.

In the most tragic circumstances, as have we have only just witnessed recently in Victoria, it can end lives.

In Victoria, Police Crime Statistics (2011/12) show that the incidence of family violence remains unacceptably high, with 50,383 family violence reports and 2,044 incidents of sexual assault.

Recent research shows that family violence is the number one preventable contributor to death and disability in women aged 15 to 44-years-old.

Research suggests that one woman is murdered every week in Australia by her partner or ex-partner.

The Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women is the first international human rights instrument to exclusively and explicitly address the issue of violence against women. It identifies that, violence against women ‘constitute[es] a violation of basic human rights and is an obstacle to the achievement of the objectives of equality, development and peace’. Violence is both a cause and a consequence of deeply entrenched inequality between men and women.

Every day we see how discrimination on the basis of sex manifests in behaviour across a continuum – jokes and sexist comments to overt discrimination in the workplace, through to physical and emotional abuse.

As a community, we need to explicitly make the link between sex discrimination and violence against women.

These behaviours that we tolerate in the workplace, at social events and in the media create an environment in which violence against women is normalised.

Sexism, misogynist attitudes and unequal power relations between men and women are the underlying determinants of violence. It is critical that we tackle these behaviours in all their manifestations.

In tolerating sexist and discriminatory behaviour in sport, in the workplace, in the media and in the world of the internet we support gender inequality in our community.

The State Government’s Action Plan to Address Violence against Women and Children focuses on prevention, early intervention and response.

Prevention is at the core of the Plan, which emphasises educating the community to change attitudes and behaviours that allow violence against women and children to occur.

The Plan acknowledges that government alone cannot end violence against women and that real and lasting change to stopping violence against women and children requires a community-wide response.

The response to the Prime Minister’s speech in Parliament this week clearly shows that we are ready for our leaders to stand up to sexist and discriminatory remarks against women.

Trivialising the issue trivialises the daily experience of women and children subjected to threats, intimidation, financial and emotional abuse, and violence.

This is not a women’s problem. It is essential the whole community take responsibility for this issue and reject violence in all its forms.

As the Victorian Government has made clear in its Action Plan, we all have a role in putting an end to this human rights violation and, if we are to succeed, we need to think about what to do next.

The Commission is currently running an Anti-Hate campaign that offers a place where people who have experienced or witnessed discrimination of any kind can report the behaviour and share practical tools and tips about how to take action.

To be an Anti-Hate hero please go to our website antihate.vic.gov.au.

Karen Toohey
Acting Commissioner

Media contact: Anna Craig
Phone: (03) 9032 3482
Mobile: 0459 114 657
Email: anna.craig@veohrc.vic.gov.au

[Allegro]

The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release | August 10, 2012

Executive Order -- Preventing and Responding to
Violence Against Women and Girls Globally

EXECUTIVE ORDER
- - - - - - -
PREVENTING AND RESPONDING TO VIOLENCE
AGAINST WOMEN AND GIRLS GLOBALLY

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. Policy. (a) Recognizing that gender-based violence undermines not only the safety, dignity, and human rights of the millions of individuals who experience it, but also the public health, economic stability, and security of nations, it is the policy and practice of the executive branch of the United States Government to have a multi-year strategy that will more effectively prevent and respond to gender-based violence globally.

(b) Under the leadership of my Administration, the United States has made gender equality and women's empowerment a core focus of our foreign policy. This focus is reflected in our National Security Strategy, the Presidential Policy Directive on Global Development, and the 2010 U.S. Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review. Evidence demonstrates that women's empowerment is critical to building stable, democratic societies; to supporting open and accountable governance; to furthering international peace and security; to growing vibrant market economies; and to addressing pressing health and education challenges.

(c) Preventing and responding to gender-based violence is a cornerstone of my Administration's commitment to advance gender equality and women's empowerment. Such violence significantly hinders the ability of individuals to fully participate in, and contribute to, their communities -- economically, politically, and socially. It is a human rights violation or abuse; a public health challenge; and a barrier to civic, social, political, and economic participation. It is associated with adverse health outcomes, limited access to education, increased costs relating to medical and legal services, lost household productivity, and reduced income, and there is evidence it is exacerbated in times of crisis, such as emergencies, natural disasters, and violent conflicts.

(d) The executive branch multi-year strategy for preventing and responding to gender-based violence is set forth in the United States Strategy to Prevent and Respond to Gender-based Violence Globally (Strategy). The Strategy both responds to and expands upon the request in section 7061 of House conference report 112-331 accompanying the Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2012

(Division I of Public Law 112-74), for the executive branch to develop a multi-year strategy to prevent and respond to violence against women and girls in countries where it is common.

Sec. 2. Creating an Interagency Working Group. There is established an Interagency Working Group (Working Group) to address gender-based violence, which shall coordinate implementation of the Strategy by the executive departments and agencies that are members of the Working Group (member agencies) in accordance with the priorities set forth in section 3 of this order.

(a) The Working Group shall be co-chaired by the Secretary of State and the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (Co-Chairs). In addition to the Co-Chairs, the Working Group shall consist of representatives from:

(i) the Department of the Treasury;

(ii) the Department of Defense;

(iii) the Department of Justice;

(iv) the Department of Labor;

(v) the Department of Health and Human Services;

(vi) the Department of Homeland Security;

(vii) the Office of Management and Budget;

(viii) the National Security Staff;

(ix) the Office of the Vice President;

(x) the Peace Corps;

(xi) the Millennium Challenge Corporation;

(xii) the White House Council on Women and Girls; and

(xiii) other executive departments, agencies, and offices, as designated by the Co-Chairs.

(b) Within 120 days of the date of this order, the Co-Chairs shall convene the first meeting of the Working Group to:

(i) establish benchmarks to implement the Strategy; and

(ii) determine a timetable for periodically reviewing those benchmarks.

(c) Within 18 months of the date of this order, the Working Group shall complete a progress report for submission to the Co-Chairs evaluating the U.S. Government's implementation of the Strategy.

(d) Within 3 years of the date of this order, the Working Group shall complete a final evaluation for submission to the Co-Chairs of the U.S. Government's implementation of the Strategy.

(e) Within 180 days of completing its final evaluation of the Strategy in accordance with subsection (d) of this section, the Working Group shall update or revise the Strategy to take into account the information learned and the progress made during and through the implementation of the Strategy.

(f) The activities of the Working Group shall, consistent with law, take due account of existing interagency bodies and coordination mechanisms and will coordinate with such bodies and mechanisms where appropriate in order to avoid duplication of efforts.

Sec. 3. Strategy to Prevent and Respond to Gender-based Violence Globally. Member agencies shall implement the Strategy to prevent and respond to gender-based violence globally based on the following priorities reflected in the Strategy:

(a) Increasing Coordination of Gender-based Violence Prevention and Response Efforts Among U.S. Government Agencies and with Other Stakeholders.

(i) Member agencies shall draw upon each other's expertise, responsibility, and capacity to provide a comprehensive and multi-faceted approach to issues relating to gender-based violence.

(ii) Member agencies shall deepen engagement and coordination with other governments; international organizations, including multilateral and bilateral actors; the private sector; and civil society organizations, such as representatives of indigenous and marginalized groups, foundations, community-based, faith-based, and regional organizations (including those that serve survivors), labor unions, universities, and research organizations. The Working Group shall consider a range of mechanisms by which these stakeholders may provide input to the U.S. Government on its role in preventing and responding to gender-based violence globally.

(b) Enhancing Integration of Gender-based Violence Prevention and Response Efforts into Existing U.S. Government Work. Member agencies shall more comprehensively integrate gender-based violence prevention and response programming into their foreign policy and foreign assistance efforts. This integration shall also build on current efforts that address gender-based violence, such as the U.S. National Action Plan on Women, Peace, and Security; the Global Health Initiative; the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief; the U.S. Government's work to counter trafficking in persons; and the U.S. Government's humanitarian response efforts. The Working Group shall coordinate these different efforts as they relate to gender-based violence to leverage the most effective programs and to avoid duplication.

(c) Improving Collection, Analysis, and Use of Data and Research to Enhance Gender-based Violence Prevention and Response Efforts. Member agencies shall work to promote ethical and safe research, data collection, and evidence-based analyses relating to different forms of gender-based violence and prevention and response efforts at the country and local level. This work will include the development of a research agenda that assesses agencies' research and data collection capabilities, needs, and gaps; builds upon existing data and research; and is coordinated with the work of other organizations that are prioritizing global gender-based violence research. Member agencies shall prioritize the monitoring and evaluation of gender-based violence prevention and response interventions to determine their effectiveness. Member agencies shall systematically identify and share best practices, lessons learned, and research within and across agencies. Member agencies, as appropriate, shall seek to develop public-private partnerships to support U.S. Government research initiatives and strategic planning efforts.

(d) Enhancing or Expanding U.S. Government Programming that Addresses Gender-based Violence. Consistent with the availability of appropriations, the U.S. Government shall support programming that provides a comprehensive and multi-sector approach to preventing and responding to gender-based violence; shall consider replicating or expanding successful programs; and shall assess the feasibility of a focused, coordinated, comprehensive, and multi-sector approach to gender-based violence in one or more countries.

Sec. 4. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:

(i) the authority granted by law to an executive department, agency, or the head thereof; or

(ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.

(b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.

(c) Independent agencies are strongly encouraged to comply with this order.

(d) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

BARACK OBAMA