December 23, 2012

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Dehumanized: Will Arabs Forgive Them?

July 11, 2012 By 3 Comments

He lives in a tent. He rides a camel. He carries a sword on his back.
She’s a seductive belly dancer.
She lives in a harem. She only exists for male pleasure.

They are Arabs.

The negative images of Arabs had long been emblazoned into our minds. Where do these images come from?

“Oh I come from a land, from a faraway place
Where the caravan camels roam
Where they cut off your ear
If they don’t like your face
It’s barbaric, but hey, it’s home”

This was one of the verses of the opening song “Arabian Night” in the movie Aladdin, one of the most successful Disney movies ever made.
Following protests from the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination, the lyrics were changed from “Where they cut off your ear if they don’t like your face” to “Where it’s flat and immense and the heat is intense”. Children from all over the world viewed Aladdin and Arabs have been portrayed as backward, barbaric, sinister, violent and imminently dangerous to the Western world.

At a very young age, many children start to learn stereotypes from the environment in which they are raised. They begin to acquire prejudices from their parents, teacher, peers, the media and others around them. They investigate the world around them and start developing their own racial identity between the ages of two and five. They first become aware of how people look. For instance, they start to notice the difference in skin colors. They also become aware of their own physical characteristics. Then they start seeking explanations for differences. At a later stage, they begin to identify with the ethnic group that they perceive themselves to belong to.

In his paper titled “Development of social categories and stereotypes in early childhood: The case of ”the Arab” concept formation, stereotype and attitudes by Jewish children in Israel”, Prof. Daniel Bar-Tal (Tel Aviv University) demonstrated the strength of the Israeli cultural stereotype of Arabs and its influence on young children. Research of concept development shows that Israeli children begin to use the word “Arab” between 24 months and 30 months of age and they also become able to draw a picture of an Arab man which represents their image of him. The majority of young children with any knowledge about Arabs associated them with violent and aggressive behaviors, directed mostly against Jews.

Us and Them

“The way we see things is affected by what we know or what believe” – Berger

The Western Media has projected negative images of the Arabs in order to create “Otherness”. The concept of Otherness consists of dividing people into two social groups: Us (in-group) and Them (out-group). The in-group views the out-group as being different in a fundamental way. The out-group may be of a different race, nationality, religion, social class, political ideology, sexual orientation or origin.

Evaluating others as “Us” and “Them” is based on Social Identity Theory developed by Tajfel and Turner in 1979. The theory is based on three mental processes:

  • Social categorization
  • Social identification
  • Social comparison

The first process is categorization. It represents our tendency to categorize individuals, including ourselves into groups. In his book “The Nature of Prejudice”, Gordon Allport (1954) wrote that the human kind must think with the aid of categories… Once formed, categories are the basis for normal prejudgment. We cannot possibly avoid this process. Orderly living depends upon it.

The second process is social identification. In this stage we adopt some of the values and behaviors of the group we have categorized ourselves as belonging to. In other words, we adopt the identity of that group. Belonging to a social group gives us a social identity that boosts our self-esteem by enhancing our image.

The final process is social comparison. Once we see ourselves as members of a group, we start to define ourselves by comparison with other groups. People make social comparison with other individuals they perceive to be better or worse off than themselves.

Many of the studies have shown that our self-esteem is maintained by making social comparison with other groups: individuals with high self-esteem tend to make upward comparison choices, whereas low self-esteem individuals tend to make upward comparisons only when there is no threat to their self-esteem (Wood, 1989).

In conclusion, society is composed of social groups that tend to maintain their self-esteem. The power and status relations between groups are based on social identity (Hogg and Abrams, 1988). Members of high-status groups gain positive social identity and high self-esteem. They even tend to discriminate and be prejudiced against low-status groups in order to enhance their social power and status.

Nations and Identities

National identity is the sense of one’s belonging to one nation. Based on Social Identity Theory, a nation defines its own identity by comparing itself to other nations. As a result, having an out-group strengthens a sense of belonging to a nation that places an enmity between “Us and Them”. In brief, a nation needs enemies to maintain its identity.

As Sam Keen puts it in his book Faces of the Enemy: “In the beginning we create the enemy. Before the weapon comes the image. We think others to death and then invent the battle-axe or the ballistic missiles with which to actually kill them. Propaganda precedes technology.” (1986, p. 10).

Governments use the process of creating enemy images as a method of social control. They rely on negative stereotypes in an attempt to create a common enemy. They vilify and dehumanize the enemy as merely being thief, murderer, rapist, monster, criminal, kidnapper and terrorist. Once the enemy is depicted as evil, inferior and not human, it becomes psychologically acceptable by people to persecute him. The psychological process of dehumanization is very dangerous for it often paves the way for violence.

In Search of An Identity

There are many historical examples of dehumanization. Before and during the Second World War, Hitler and his Nazi regime created a negative image of the Jewish people using stereotypes and propaganda. The Nazis dehumanized the Jews by naming them “inferior race” in order to make their persecution more psychologically acceptable.

After the Second World War, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers and Cold War began. America used Hollywood and media in order to promote an anti-Communism propaganda. America created the negative images of the Soviet Union enemy and managed to manipulate public opinion to fear the new enemy.

When the Soviet Union ceased to exist, America needed a post-Soviet foreign devil (Said) to maintain its identity. And once again, the Western monopoly of power has dehumanized an entire group of people in order to create “a stereotypical image of the dangerous ‘Arab Other’.”

Dr. Jack Shaheen, Professor Emeritus of Mass Communication at Southern Illinois University, studied portrayals of Arabs in Western Media by examining 900 U.S. films. He writes “Arabs are the most maligned group in the history of Hollywood. They are portrayed, basically, as sub-human untermenschen, a term used by Nazis to vilify Gypsies and Jews. These images have been with us for more than a century.”

Hollywood has internalized the negative stereotypes of Arabs before 9/11 in order to serve the U.S imperial objectives. The Department of Defense and CIA have always been cooperating with Hollywood. Former Hollywood Reporter staffer Robb exposes In his book “Operation Hollywood: How the Pentagon Shapes and Censors the Movies” how Hollywood producers ask the Pentagon for help in making films. The department of Defense provides filmmakers with a crowd of Marines, or a Navy aircraft carrier and Blackhawk helicopters and the CIA provides filmmakers with a pile of script ideas. After all, the producers want to make money and the Defense Department wants to make propaganda (David L. Robb).

Hollywood’s representation of Arabs before 9/11 has been influenced by three major political events: the creation of the state of Israel, the 1973 oil crisis when the members of Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries proclaimed an oil embargo, and the Iranian Islamic revolution.

First, The Sheik (1921) and The Son of the Sheik (1926) were two films that depicted Arabs as savage beasts who auction off their own women. After World War II, Exodus (1960), a film based on the 1958 novel Exodus by Leon Uris, was the first movie to deal with the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. This movie highlighted the Israeli struggle against Nazi oppression and confirmed the U.S. support for Israel. After the Iranian revolution, the film Not Without Your Daughter (1990) depicted the escape of American citizen Betty Mahmoody and her daughter from her husband in Iran. The film was shot in the United States and Israel. The film highlights the return of Iran to the dark ages. After the first Gulf War and the end of the Cold War, the film True Lies (1994) directed by James Cameron, Arnold starring as Harry Tasker leads a double life, performing covert missions for the United States Government under a counter-terrorism task force called “The Omega Sector”. Harry’s latest mission in Switzerland reveals the existence of an Islamic terrorist organization group known as the Crimson Jihad, led by Salim Abu Aziz (Art Malik). And once again, Arabs were portrayed as terrorists, extremists and religious fanatics bent on destroying the world. The Rules of Engagement (2000) portrayed Arabs as extremists attacking the U.S. embassy. This movie dehumanized Arabs, which justified US Marines killing Arab women and children. These are some of the movies that depicted negative images of Arabs. After watching more than 900 movies, Jack Shaheen claims that only 50 or so had shown a neutral image of Arabs. He also says, “Each of Hollywood and Washington share the same genes”.

Conclusion

In the period before 9/11, the Western Media has developed a set of negative stereotypes depicting Arabs as enemies in order to serve the U.S. political agenda. On Sept. 20, 2001, President Georges W. Bush addressed a joint session of Congress and a national television audience to launch the “war on terror”:

“Every nation in every region now has a decision to make. Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists. From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.”

As Slavenka Drakulic expresses it, ‘once the concept of “otherness” takes root, the unimaginable becomes possible’. And once again, President Bush and his administration managed to convince the American public of the need to go to war with Afghanistan and Iraq.

If you’re still wondering:

  • Why most Westerners do not show empathy to Palestinian suffering
  • Why most Westerners did not stand up against the war in Iraq
  • Why most Westerners support Israel
  • Why most Westerners hate Muslims

That’s because Americans tell the best stories, they can invade a country and immediately construct a narrative justifying it (Jean-Luc Godard).

It’s time to occupy Hollywood.

 

Sources:

Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People, Jack G. Shaheen

The evolution of Hollywood’s representation of Arabs before 9/11: the relationship between political events and the notion of ‘Otherness’ - SULAIMAN ARTI, Loughborough University

The Construction of Arabs as Enemies: Post-September 11 Discourse of George W. Bush, Debra Merskin

https://www.self.ox.ac.uk/Current_Research_Students/documents/CHAPTER_2.pdf

https://www.sesamestreet.org/parents/topics/getalong/getalong05

https://www.mediaed.org/assets/products/412/studyguide_412.pdf

https://www.ibiblio.org/prism/jan98/anti_arab.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereotypes_of_Arabs_and_Muslims

https://arabstereotypes.org/why-stereotypes/what-orientalism/veils-harems-belly-dancers

https://beyondintractability.colorado.edu/essay/dehumanization/?nid=1082

https://www.redicecreations.com/article.php?id=16888

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_oil_crisis#Arab_oil_embargo

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_Without_My_Daughter

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/True_Lies

Filed Under: Equality, Featured, Media, Propaganda, Racism, Sexism, Women

Where Does Your State Rank In Equal Pay?

April 17, 2012 By Leave a Comment

by on April 17, 2012

Today marks Equal Pay Day and an opportunity to take a closer look as the wage disparities between the genders. The bottom line: the wage gap is real and it is persistent.

The American Association of University Women (AAUW) released a new state-by-state report on equal pay rankings, along with an interactive map that shows wage disparities in each state. How does your state rate? Some of the rankings may surprise you.

Overall the wage gap is the narrowest in Washington D.C., where women earn 91 cents on the dollar to men and worst in Wyoming where women make just 64 percent of men’s earnings. As expected, the numbers get worse when you account for race. African American and Hispanic women earn much less–just 70 percent and 61 percent of what white men on average earn. Nationally women earn just 77 percent of their male peers.

This discrepancy in pay costs working women and their families tens of thousands of dollars a year. It directly impacts women’s retirement security and ability to save for emergencies and college and it reinforces an outdated and offensive world view that women’s work is simply not of the same value as men’s.

Source: https://www.care2.com/causes/where-does-your-state-rank-in-equal-pay.html

Filed Under: Economy, Equality, Income Inequality, Money, Sexism, USA, Women

Afghan Woman Jailed After Being Raped Is Freed After Two Years In Kabul Prison

December 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment

By in Kabul

Woman sentenced to 12 years in prison for ‘adultery’ after reporting rape to police is finally released.

An Afghan woman who was jailed after being raped by a cousin has been released from the Kabul prison where she has spent more than two years, although her lawyer has warned her future remains far from certain.

Gulnaz, a 20-year-old who is known by one name, was set free on Tuesday night, nearly two weeks after Hamid Karzai, the Afghanistan president, ordered her release. Her case has highlighted the issue of “moral crimes“, which lawyers say have no basis in Afghan law.

Despite being the victim of a rape at the hands of a cousin, a day labourer called Asadullah Sher Mohammad, she was charged with “adultery” after reporting the attack to police and sentenced to 12 years in prison.

For two years and three months Gulnaz had been living in the Badam Bagh prison in Kabul with her daughter, who was conceived by the rape.

Karzai had come under growing pressure in the weeks leading up to the recent conference on Afghanistan held in Bonn to release Gulnaz, who has become a symbol of the highly conservative Islamic country’s failure to substantially improve the lot of women in the last 10 years.

Although the government said she would be released without any conditions, she has come under heavy pressure, including from a judge, to marry Sher Mohammad, who is in another prison in Kabul serving a rape sentence.

Kimberley Motley, an Kabul-based American lawyer who has worked on Gulnaz’s case, said she had “major concerns” about the extraordinary pressure her client has come under since Karzai announced her clemency – including from Sher Mohammad’s father.

“He was allowed to have continued access to her while she was in prison, and he has been in there in the last five days to try and make her sign a document,” she said. “We have no idea what this document is, and neither does she because she was unable to read it.”

No decision has been made whether Gulnaz, who has been moved to a safe place in Kabul that her supporters do not wish to be identified, will agree to marry her attacker, although she has previously said she might do so for the sake of her daughter.

She has also demanded a dowry before agreeing to marry her attacker, and suggested that one of Sher Mohammad’s sisters should marry her brother in order to protect her from reprisals.

Motley said she should not have to marry her rapist. “There are women in Afghanistan who are single mothers who are able to work and to survive,” she said. “She definitely has an uphill battle to fight, but it is ridiculous to say that if she does not marry this man her life is ruined.”

Efforts to bring her plight to public attention were first made by Clementine Malpas, a British film-maker who was commissioned by the European Union to produce a documentary about women’s rights in Afghanistan.

The EU, however, refused to allow the film, called Injustice, to be distributed or broadcast, saying it would jeopardise the lives of the women involved.

 

Source: https://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/14/afghan-woman-raped-freed-prison

Filed Under: Prison, Women Tagged With: , , ,

Saudi Woman Beheaded For ‘Witchcraft And Sorcery’

December 13, 2011 By Leave a Comment

By Mohammed Jamjoom and Saad Abedine

(CNN) - A woman was beheaded in Saudi Arabia for practicing witchcraft and sorcery, the Kingdom’s Interior Ministry said, prompting Amnesty International to call for a halt in executions there.

Amina bint Abdel Halim Nassar was executed Monday for having “committed the practice of witchcraft and sorcery,” according to an Interior Ministry statement. Nassar was investigated before her arrest and was “convicted of what she was accused of based on the law,” the statement said. Her beheading took place in the Qariyat province of the region of Al-Jawf, the ministry said.

In a statement issued late Monday, the human rights group called the execution “deeply shocking” and said it “highlights the urgent need for a halt in executions in Saudi Arabia.”

“While we don’t know the details of the acts which the authorities accused Amina of committing, the charge of sorcery has often been used in Saudi Arabia to punish people, generally after unfair trials, for exercising their right to freedom of speech or religion,” said Philip Luther, Amnesty International’s interim director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme.

Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy, practices a puritanical version of Islam and is governed by Shariah, or Islamic law. In the deeply conservative kingdom, sorcery, witchcraft and blasphemy are all offenses that can be punishable by death.

Amnesty says Nassar’s execution is “the second of its kind in recent months. In September, a Sudanese national was beheaded in the Saudi Arabian city of Medina after being convicted on ‘sorcery’ charges.”

The human rights group said the number of executions in Saudi Arabia has almost tripled in 2011.

“So far at least 79 people — including five women — have been executed there, compared to at least 27 in 2010,” the Amnesty statement said.

This is not the first sorcery case in Saudi Arabia to spark outrage from human rights groups. In 2008, Lebanese TV host Ali Hussain Sibat was arrested on charges of sorcery while in Saudi Arabia on a religious pilgrimage. In 2009, he was found guilty and sentenced to death. While Sibat has not been executed, he remains in prison.

Saudi Arabia’s judicial system also made headlines this month for the sentence imposed on Australian national Mansor Almaribe, who was convicted of blasphemy while performing the Hajj in the kingdom, and sentenced to 500 lashes and a year in prison. The Australian government is pleading Almaribe’s case.

 

Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2011/12/13/world/meast/saudi-arabia-beheading/index.html?eref=mrss_igoogle_cnn

Filed Under: Religion, Women Tagged With: ,

Giving Birth Is A Battle For Survival In Afghanistan

December 12, 2011 By Leave a Comment

HERAT, Afghanistan (Reuters) - She was 15 years old, heavily pregnant and had travelled eight days on the back of a donkey to reach hospital.

Suffering from seizures and high blood pressure, she died soon after at the Herat Maternity Hospital in western Afghanistan, one of the thousands of women who die in the country each year from causes linked to pregnancy and birth.

“She came at a late stage and we couldn’t help her,” said Somayeh, a midwife at the hospital and herself just 21. “She was already in a coma.”

Politicians, economists and activists from around the world met in Bonn this month to thrash out their vision for battered and impoverished Afghanistan. In addition to the insurgency and violence, it remains the most dangerous place in the world for a woman to have a baby, the latest World Health Organization data shows.

The figures are distressing, but still a marked improvement on the situation 10 years ago. The latest available WHO data, from 2008, shows the number of women who died giving birth had dipped to 1,400 per 100,000 live births from 1,800 in 2000.

The Ministry of Public Health says it has made maternal health a priority, supporting training schemes that have lifted the number of qualified midwives in the country to 3,000 from just 400, and expanding emergency delivery services.

“We have demonstrated that these strategies can work in Afghanistan. They can bring a change in the lives of women and families,” acting public health minister Suraya Dalil says. “The challenge is to sustain those achievements.”

Charities such as World Vision — which trained Somayeh — and Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) also have in-depth programs to help new mothers across Afghanistan.

But they worry that the planned drawdown of Western troops and funds — all foreign combat soldiers will be gone by the end of 2014, and a large chunk of aid budgets is expected to go with them — could jeopardise the modest gains of the last decade.

Without foreign cash to bolster scarce government funds, midwife training will almost certainly drop off, while aid groups may leave if they cannot operate in safety. MSF closed its Afghan operations in 2004 after five team members were killed, although the group has since returned.

“The greatest risk at present is through aid levels dropping off precipitously,” says Sarah Pickworth, a public health specialist who has worked extensively in Afghanistan.

“Without sufficient funding, there is likely to be a significantly slower pace of change. This risks losing the momentum of the tremendous gains made.”

SECURITY DEADLINE

Faced with an appalling death toll among pregnant women and new mothers, communities in rural areas — which have some of the highest mortality rates — have mobilised to help women.

Herat’s Institute of Health Sciences (IHS) has trained 256 midwives in the past seven years through schemes largely supported by charities such as World Vision. Many of its students have been deliberately selected from remote villages.

But if Herat is hit by violence, the families are likely to take their daughters out of school and take them home to safety.

A deterioration in the security situation would likely hit pregnant women as well as midwife training.

Transporting women in labour from rural areas to clinics is already a tough proposition in a country where few can afford cars and roads are scarce and badly maintained. It will become still harder if gunmen have freer rein to target travellers.

The re-emergence in political life of groups like the Taliban, which banned education and the free movement of women, could also have a devastating effect on death rates.

Under their influence, a generation of potential female midwives and doctors has already been lost, midwife trainers say. This is particularly devastating in a country where male doctors treating women is still largely taboo.

PLUGGING THE GAP

But as big a problem for Afghanistan is money. The Afghan government is facing a $7 billion hole in its budget after 2014, which it will need to pay for security and other services. It is relying on foreign help to plug that gap.

The grinding poverty in which many women live means hygiene and nutrition are often poor. A recent survey showed only around half of Afghans have access to clean drinking water, and only a fifth use approved toilet and sanitation facilities.

The IHS’ deputy director, Dr Ehrary, says money is a major stumbling block to completing the five further rounds of midwife training he calculates are needed to provide a base number of healthcare professionals in the region.

“Training is not difficult, but finding funds is difficult,” he says. The institute is struggling to train this year’s government-recommended quota of midwives to the right standard.

“We told the ministry we could not run the class this year because we have only three teachers and we cannot meet their standards,” he added. “They have now been funded. We found another donor, (German humanitarian group) Cap Anamur.”

If meetings like the Bonn conference fail to deliver a plan for action on poverty and some kind of roadmap to stability, the fragile gains in maternal healthcare could easily slip away.

In rural Herat, villagers say they are determined to stop that happening. After decades of upheaval and war, they are tired of death and violence and want a safer future.

“Everybody hopes there will be no more war in Afghanistan,” says one senior shura, or village council, member from rural Herat. “The first thing we want is safety, the second is to improve people’s health. We need doctors — we need midwives.”

 

Source: https://uk.news.yahoo.com/giving-birth-battle-survival-afghanistan-101333359.html

Filed Under: Afghanistan, Economy, Health, Poverty, Sexism, Women Tagged With: , , ,

Getting Burned in Pakistan: Report Finds Acid and Burn Attacks Against Women on the Rise

December 12, 2011 By 1 Comment

In Pakistan, like in many other South Asian countries, honor is a virtue that is not only valued but demanded from society, especially from women. Women who “dishonour” their families face severe consequences at the hands of a strongly patriarchal society who continues to see women secondary to men.

A new report from the AGHS Legal Cell has found that violence against women in the form of burning and acid attacks is on the rise in the country. Women who are seen as dishonoring their families are often the targets of these attacks.

Walking in public with a man who is unrelated to you could elicit an attack for it is often presumed that the woman is committing adultery. Fleeing an arranged marriage or a relationship where a woman is unhappy or being abused is another common reason for the attacks.

According to the report, from April to June of this year more than 220 women reported being burned, 40 of whom died as a result of their injuries which can be extensive. When acid is thrown in a person’s face, skin tissue melts on contact exposing the bone below the flesh that may also dissolve from the acid. If acid reaches the eyes, they are permanently damaged often leaving survivors with the use of only one or no eyes.

What’s worse? According to the report women are not being given appropriate medical care and few seek legal action after being attacked. Many cases are also not even reported to police so the actual numbers of victims are far worse than we think.

“Violence against women in Pakistan is endemic,” Nisha Varia, deputy director of women’s rights division at Human Rights Watch told The Media Line.” “We try to apply pressure so that the government recognizes these crimes, prosecutes the perpetrators and provides services to the victims.”

Acid and burn attacks are also not only isolated in Pakistan. It is also common practice in Bangladesh, India, and other South Asian countries. In Bangladesh, the Acid Survivors Foundation has been working for nearly ten years to eliminate acid violence in the country where there is currently an acid attack every two days. A similar organization also exists in Pakistan.

Violence against women exists everywhere. We know this. I also know that I can no longer sit idly as governments around the world fail to protect these victims.

Source: https://www.care2.com/causes/getting-burned-in-pakistan-report-finds-acid-and-burn-attacks-against-women-is-on-the-rise.html#ixzz1gJRZ9ghY

Filed Under: Campaigning, Corruption, Crime, Extremism, Law, Pakistan, Politics, Rights, Sexism, Torture, Tyranny, Violence, Women Tagged With: ,

Afghan Daughters and their Mother Disfigured in Acid Attack

December 12, 2011 By Leave a Comment

It really blows my mind when I think of the countless ways mankind has found to inflict violence against women around the world.

Acid attacks are one of such violent forms of assault that is most common in countries like Cambodia, Afghanistan, India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. A

The perpetrators were after the family’s oldest daughter because her father had denied one of the men’s requests for her hand in marriage. The girl’s father said he rejected the man’s offer of marriage at the time because his daughter was too young. Forced marriage of young Afghan girls is not uncommon today which makes the father’s protection notable.

Rejected, the man and his brothers, who are suspected of being members of a local militia, broke into the house to attack the girls and their mother in revenge. The men involved in the attack have since been brought to the capital by the Interior Ministry for investigation and potential prosecution.

“The attackers defamed Afghanistan in the eyes of the world,” said the ministry’s spokesman, Sediq Sediqui. “It was the harshest violence they could ever carry out.”

He said that the Afghan police were warning “those who commit such brutal acts that they will be brought to justice at any cost.”

The Elimination of Violence Against Women law, which was passed last year, specifically prohibits chemical attacks against women. Such offenses carry a punishment of at least 10 years of imprisonment and at most life in prison.

Given the law and the ministry’s quick arrest, one would hope that the men will be adequately punished, but history has proved differently. Since Afghanistan enacted the law banning violence against women there have been 2,299 complaints of gender-motivated abuse registered with the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission from March 2010 to March 2011 only 7% of those crimes have been prosecuted.

This is very unsettling. Acid attacks are a violent and inhumane form of violence against women that should be prohibited and punished under the law strictly. We have such laws for a reason; let’s make sure they are enforced so less women have to suffer.

Source: https://www.care2.com/causes/afghan-daughters-and-their-mother-disfigured-in-acid-attack.html#ixzz1gJQ6uN2l

 

Filed Under: Afghanistan, Law, Politics, Religion, Rights, Sexism, Torture, Tyranny, Violence, Women

Libertarian Feminism is Superior to Liberal Feminism

December 11, 2011 By Leave a Comment

One of the things we have to look forward to in the shift to a more free society, is the elevation of women. It’s no secret, that historically, men have dominated society, and it should be no surprise that a system based on forcing people to go along with the will of government results in patriarchy. This is generally due to our obvious physical advantage and psychological programming to dominate as the alpha male.

We evolved with different strengths in women and men to ensure overall survival and reproduction, not in our current, technologically advanced society, but in a state of nature. More than any real edge, this gave men the ability to dominate others by force. Fortunately, wisdom is catching up with technology, and people are realizing that dominating others by force, IS NOT to anyone’s REAL advantage.

In terms of traditional measures of economic productivity, men still enjoy an advantage from physical strength that is being rendered less relevant every day by automation. But men’s advantage that results from that physical strength being applied to other human beings, is a different issue. While there are plenty of female cops and soldiers these days, certain fields will always be male-dominated. When statism rules, when aggression against others is tolerated, men’s physical advantage will be a real economic advantage as well.

While women vote for statist politicians too, men dominate politics, law enforcement, and the military. These are not things for women to aspire to, but to lead men away from! Why should women want to engage in the same destructive behavior of dominance? It is as if some women are trying to assert their equality by trying to match the worst that men are capable of! Women have a much greater power and a much more important role to play. Women should not seek to compete with men in the fields of dominating others, in politics, in law enforcement, or in the military, but rather continue to set the example of NOT dominating others by force. But then, who the hell am I to think I should be telling women what to do.

Creating liberty requires empathy for the will of others. For all the essential virtues of men, it is time to take the lead of women, at least until we all learn that freedom is the way forward, and we can evolve past social systems based on force and coercion. Feminists tend to think that instituting a stronger government can lead to greater gender equality, but an institution premised on the initiation of force, inherently favors those best at using force. Fortunately, the historical trend is clear, and violence is less prevalent in our daily lives than ever before. As we become more free in general, the playing field shifts to the advantage of women, as it should.

Women have shown themselves to be as capable as men as administrators of government, but it is the willingness of men to be the enforcement of government that makes it possible. It is men’s willingness to subjugate and to follow orders that keeps government going. While women bear a certain share of the responsibility for the world’s problems, let’s be brutally honest: when it comes to the destruction of liberty, it’s the men who lead the way. To achieve the free society that we know is within our reach, let us put down the arms of government and acknowledge that we are all free, beautiful, independent, human beings, who aught to be the alphas of our own lives.

 

Filed Under: Politics, Women Tagged With:

The Evolution of Feminism

December 9, 2011 By Leave a Comment

In my life, feminism is everywhere and nowhere. I am mother to an 8-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter. The night my daughter was born (at home with a midwife, for those who care about that sort of thing), I spent the entire time obsessing over whether I was a good enough feminist to mother a daughter, instead of basking in the hormone high of new love.

“Our job today is less to kick open doors and more to walk into rooms.” So says Jennifer Baumgardner in her new book of feminist essays, “F ’em! Goo Goo, Gaga, and Some Thoughts on Balls.”

As a stay-at-home mother, work-from-home writer, part-time teacher/performer/curator, I understand Baumgardner’s words. I worried that choices I’d made would somehow set my daughter back—that she wouldn’t have a role model. I struggled with the demands of raising a family and needing health insurance while my husband made more money and I was exclusively breastfeeding. This was not the idea I had of myself as a feminist.

Baumgardner gives us her core ideas of feminism: “Egalitarianism, eradicating sexism and recognizing the historic oppression of women. Feminism is the belief in the full political, social and economic equality of all people. Feminism is also a movement to make sure that all people have access to enough information and resources (money, social support) to make authentic decisions about their lives. Thus it’s not the decision one makes so much as the ability to make a decision.” She explains that the feminism she practiced was an “expression of the trends that shaped [her] youth.”

Baumgardner’s first essay is “The Third Wave Is 40.” It opens with a neurotic moment about the author’s look

F ’em! Goo Goo, Gaga, and Some Thoughts on Balls

By Jennifer Baumgardner

Really? This is a book about feminism and you open with your looks?

I mean, I get it. I just turned 40 and I’m losing my looks too. I’m a feminist who is also mourning the loss of being an object, however retro and unenlightened that may sound. It’s part of what lies underneath the loss of Baumgardner’s identity as a “young feminist.”

She does admit to “a certain dissonance in my attempt to be a good actualized feminist and my desire to get the love and sexual attention I wanted.” And it is Baumgardner’s unflinching willingness to explore territory like this that makes “F ’em!” such an exciting read.

I love how Baumgardner connects her (my) generation with the feminists of the ’70s and also the women younger than we are. She puts ’90s feminism in as much of a historical perspective as possible, given that it was so recent.

An important theme of “F em!” is the existence of Third Wave feminism. The First Wave (1840-1920) focused on the rights of citizenship. The Second Wave (1960-1988) “fought for women to share in the opportunities and responsibilities men had, including creating a career, pushing off the drudgery of housework and refusing to be held hostage by their reproductive systems.” The Third Wave, which Baumgardner identifies with, was approximately 1988-2010: “Whether or not these individual men and women were raised by self-described feminists—or called themselves feminists—they were living feminist lives: Females were playing sports and running marathons, taking charge of their sex lives, being educated in greater numbers than men, running for office and working outside the home.” The most recent wave, the Fourth, approximately 2008 and onward, continues the legacy of the Third Wave and moves it into the tech-savvy, gender-sophisticated world of blogs, Twitter campaigns, transgenderism, male feminists, sex work and complex relationships within the media.

I understand why Second Wavers, who lobbied for Roe v. Wade, Title IX and the Equal Pay Act, see the Third Wavers as frivolous in our lipstick and lace T-shirts. We wore no bluestockings or even redstockings—just fishnets. And there were holes in our argument too—that taking control of our sexuality was powerful. Current TV shows like “Two Broke Girls” and “Up All Night” get a lot of credit for being female-driven, supposedly showing feminism in action, and while I personally find them enjoyable, it’s more for the liberal sprinkling of vagina jokes than anything else. I can see why some Second Wavers would be mad at us. Baumgardner writes of Second Wavers, “They were no longer the ones needing abortions or utilizing current technology.” Ouch. They fought so hard to get us out of the kitchen for this?

Competition between women, and the exclusion and rage that accompanies it, is a theme throughout “F ’em!.” Female competition is used to keep women down, and surely those who are oppressed oppress others, right? Baumgardner acknowledges this: “There is a sense that mentoring and torch passing steal from one’s own hard-won store of power.” I would have loved a more overt study of female competition.

“Every few years, feminism gets kicked up to marquee status under the rubric of having failed, like a stain remover that just didn’t do its job.” So starts an essay about the divides feminism has succumbed to—black/white, gay/straight, pro sex/anti porn—and, more specifically, about Ariel Levy’s 2005 work “Female Chauvinist Pigs,” which accused Third Wave feminists like Baumgardner of “making sex objects of other women and of themselves.” The writing is lively and fun and Baumgardner’s epilogue is what’s interesting here: She recounts meeting Levy for a drink “over the warm buzz of cocktails on a wintry Manhattan night” and liking her, noticing what they had in common. Baumgardner’s willingness to look back on her own work and show us how her positions have changed or matured is just one of the generous gifts she has to offer.

One of my favorite pieces in this collection is “Womyn’s Music 101,” which should be required reading for any cultural feminist. And certainly for any woman who makes music. This piece connects activism and art, giving us a history of women’s music in the ’60s and ’70s. It chronicles the beginnings of “lesbionic” Olivia Records (I was so happy Baumgardner used that word!) and Ladyslipper, which were around long before Lilith Fair. I had never heard of Cris Williamson before, nor did I know that the lesbian cruise line Olivia had begun as Olivia Records. She draws lines between Williamson in 1973 and Riot Grrrl in 1992.

The impact of “women’s music” is still reverberating today. But remember—for those of you who were around—when there were weird strong women in rock? When Courtney Love was cool in 1994? My friend Cat and I would make an open fist with an “O” and punch the air repeatedly whenever a Hole song came on in a bar.

Source: https://www.truthdig.com/arts_culture/page2/the_evolution_of_feminism_20111208/

Filed Under: Psychology, Women Tagged With:

Rise In Asian Women Trafficked Into China

December 4, 2011 By Leave a Comment

An increasing number of women from Southeast Asia are being smuggled into China and sold into marriage or forced to work as prostitutes, according to a state media report.

“The number of foreign women trafficked to China is definitely rising,” the report in the China Daily quoted Chen Shiqu, director of the office for combating human trafficking in the Ministry of Public Security, as saying.

Without giving figures, he said that many trafficked women come from poor rural areas of Vietnam, Myanmar or Laos and are lured by transnational criminal gangs with promises of good jobs or marriage with rich Chinese men.

On arriving in China, the victims are often sold to villagers as brides or forced to become sex workers in underground brothels in coastal or border areas such as Guangdong and Yunnan provinces, he said.

Women are sold for between 20,000 yuan ($3,100) and 50,000 yuan each, with prices varying with appearance and nationality, Jin Yulu, an official at the Ruili border crossing to Myanmar, told the China Daily.

Some Southeast Asian women are transported as far as Hebei province in the north, which surrounds Beijing, where police have rescued 206 women since April 2009, the report quoted the provincial public security department as saying.

Sex selection combined with China’s population control rules has led to a gender imbalance in the country, with 118.1 boys currently born for every 100 girls against a natural ratio of 105 boys for every 100 girls, according to UN figures.

Source:

https://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/12/03/rise-in-asian-women-trafficked-into-china

Filed Under: China, Women Tagged With:
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