The World War on Women. By Christine Medina In today’s global society, the war on women still rages on, as it has throughout history. But women aren’t forced to fight for their rights just in the conservative pockets of the world like the Middle East and Africa””women’s issues have become global issues, as no country on earth seems exempt from violence against women. War on Women’s Bodies — USA The United States has been up in arms this year over women’s rights “” and politics are to blame.
From the proposed plan announced in February by The Susan G. But politics aside, the U.S. still has shockingly high numbers on malicious attacks against women. 48 Women Raped Per Hour — Democratic Republic of the Congo Leah Chishugi, a survivor of the Rwanda genocide, traveled to the remote jungles of the Eastern Congo, so isolated and dangerous that even the U.N. won’t risk sending aid there. “Rebels attacked our house. Her story, as gut wrenching and saddening as it is, is one of many in the Congo. Read More in Women.
Todd Akin’s ‘Legitimate Rape’ Timing Couldn’t Be Worse for Republicans. President Obama met the Tunisian prime minister on Friday and praised his country as one of the very few bright lights in the Arab world. Thank Olfa Riahi for that. The most famous investigative reporter in Tunisia is a 32-year-old blogger named Olfa Riahi. She broke the country’s biggest post-revolutionary news story—known as Sheratongate –and helped to save the country’s liberal revolution from the Islamists. When Tunisian Prime Minister Mehdi Jomaa met with President Barack Obama on Friday he was promised $500 million in loan guarantees and heard America’s enduring commitment to Tunisia’s democratic transition. Her story, named after the hotel where the financial and sexual scandal took place, appeared on December 26, 2012.
In exchange for her service to the country, Olfa Riahi was targeted for assassination by Tunisia’s Salafist extremists. “I always wear a smile in public,” she says. “This gave me the idea to start my boîte,” she says, using the French term for a start-up company. Will Indian Women Ever Have the Freedom Not to Marry? Behind the Bollywood dream of the Great Indian Wedding, complete with white horse and brass bands, the reality for many Indian women is stark: there isn’t much alternative to marriage. Does it have to be this way for the next generation? How long can tradition be used to justify marrying off women before they’re old enough to make good choices — or to pressure women into marriage, because being single is not a culturally acceptable choice? As I discuss in my latest column, except for a small sliver of the urban middle and upper classes, most young women will have only token control over what is considered the defining decision of their lives.
As I write, in modern India, “most girls and women are still defined by one major life event — marriage.” What marriage means, even today, for many women was articulated by a bright 19-year-old, Sunita Devi, who had been sent to a naturopathy center outside Delhi by her prospective in-laws. “Even my weight is under their control,” she said, laughing. Migration_women_southasia_gulf. Three Rulings Against Women’s Rights. Time is Running Out to Re-Authorize the Violence Against Women Act. Activists rally on Capitol Hill June 26, 2012 for the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act / Getty Images Every nine seconds in the United States, a woman is assaulted or beaten. In fact, domestic violence is the number one cause of injury to women in this country—more than car accidents, muggings, and rapes combined.
But despite these horrifying figures, Congress has failed to pass one of the single most important pieces of legislation aimed at protecting our nation’s women and girls. Time is running out for Congress to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), the cornerstone of our nation’s response to domestic violence, sexual violence, dating violence, and stalking.
Originally passed in 1994, VAWA has been consistently reauthorized and improved with broad bipartisan support. On Monday, Speaker Boehner announced a list of Republican negotiators in hopes of launching a conference committee to reconcile the two bills. Like this story? Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards. Companies with women on their boards performed better in challenging markets than those with all-male boards in a study suggesting that mixing genders may temper risky investment moves and increase return on equity. Shares of companies with a market capitalization of more than $10 billion and with women board members outperformed comparable businesses with all-male boards by 26 percent worldwide over a period of six years, according to a report by the Credit Suisse Research Institute, created in 2008 to analyze trends expected to affect global markets.
The number of women in boardrooms has increased since the end of 2005 as countries such as Norway instituted quotas and companies including Facebook Inc. (FB) added female directors after drawing criticism for a lack of gender diversity. The research, which includes data from 2,360 companies, shows a greater correlation between stock performance and the presence of women on the board after the financial crisis started four years ago. Contraception Without Co-Pays: Good for Women and the Planet. Happy Contraception Day! Today’s the day that most insurance plans in the United States have to start covering birth control with no co-pays under the Affordable Care Act. As a woman who’s spent a fair amount of effort and money avoiding motherhood, I couldn’t be more pleased. Birth control can be very expensive, and laws that help increase access are a great thing in my book.
But you don’t have to be a woman of a certain (reproductive) age to benefit from expanded access to contraception. Contraception is good for the women you care about, their families, their communities and the planet. And who could possibly be against that? First up: Women. The typical American woman only wants two children. So how does contraception help the planet? By Guttmacher’s projections, 222 million women in the developing world don’t have access to affordable and appropriate contraception. Sounds great, right? Sharp rise in number of women murdered in Honduras, dozens killed every month. BOGOTA (TrustLaw) - The number of women murdered in Honduras has more than quadrupled since 2002, the national human rights commission says, with more than 90 percent of the killings going unpunished in the country which has the world's highest murder rate.
Forty percent of the 3,018 women murdered over the past decade were killed in the last two years, the commision said in a report. In 2010, 36 women were killed on average each month in Honduras. In the first half of this year, that figure rose to 46 – about three women every two days. Experts blame several factors for the sharp rise in female murders, which has coincided with spiralling organised crime in the poor Central American nation and a rise in violent turf wars between Mexican cartels battling over cocaine smuggling routes to the United States. A report by Oxfam Honduras last year highlighted the danger to women of organised crime and gang violence, often carried out by local street gangs known as maras.
Jerrie Cobb | The Rise of the Spacewoman: 10 Women Who Conquered the Final Frontier. A licensed commercial pilot from the time she was 18, Jerrie Cobb held three world aviation records, piloted 64 different types of planes and, by the time she was 21, was at the stick delivering military aircraft to American Air Force bases around the world. In 1959, when NASA was selectingastronauts, she and a handful of other women were invited to submit their applications. But there was a catch: NASA required astronauts to have experience flying jet fighters and the military forbade women from applying for those positions. That was a neat little box that no woman—at least at that time—could escape. Cobb, one of America’s most gifted aviators, never flew in space. Next Valentina Tereshkova.
Knowing Your Value: Women, Money and Getting What You're Worth (9781602861343): Mika Brzezinski. Harmful Traditional Practices Against Women and Girls Law vs Practice: Rhetoric vs Reality. Harmful Traditional Practices Against Women and Girls Law vs Practice: Rhetoric vs Reality Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda General Secretary, World YWCA & President, NGO CSW-Geneva 20th Session of the Human Rights Council, Geneva 27 June, 2012 On behalf of the NGO Committee on the Status of Women in Geneva (NGO CSW – Geneva), and of my a own organization the World YWCA, I am honored to join this very important panel today during this 20th session of the Human Rights Council, as we continue to engage in advocacy actions and awareness. Last year the NGO Committee on the Status of Women in Geneva adopted five priority themes as strategic directions for the next three years.
We are meeting in this Human Rights Council at a time when there is a significant focus on gender equality and women's rights. Many women's organizations, including the World YWCA and the Inter Africa Committee have continued to work at the nexus of culture, faith and rights to advance the status and empowerment of women. Marianne Williamson – Peace Alliance – The Department of Peace. She talks about finding non-violent solutions to domestic and international violence. Marianne Williamson received an award from BraveHeart Women for her contributions to the cause of women’s rights and for being an exceptional women.
Lisa asked her about the Peace Alliance and what was going on with the Department of Peace and Marianne gives a memorable and passionate answer, less about whether or not the department is or is not, but more about how we need to change the paradigm of how we are handling violence. Marianne Williamson is an internationally acclaimed spiritual teacher. Six of her ten published books have been New York Times Best Sellers. Four of these have been #1 New York Times Best Sellers. Marianne’s other books include The Age of Miracles, Everyday Grace, A Woman’s Worth, Illuminata, Healing the Soul of America and The Gift of Change. She has been a popular guest on television programs such as Oprah, Larry King Live, Good Morning America and Charlie Rose. BraveHeart Awards. Sally Ride Dies at 61: Tributes to 1st American Woman in Space. This story was updated at 3:45 p.m. EDT.
Sally Ride, the first American woman to fly in space, died Monday (July 23) at the age of 61. Ride made history when she launched aboard the space shuttle Challenger on the STS-7 mission in 1983. She became only the third woman to ever travel in space, after Soviet cosmonauts Valentina Tereshkova in 1963 and Svetlana Savitskaya in 1982. Astronaut Sally Ride is seated in the cockpit of a T-38 aircraft in preparation to depart for the Kennedy Space Center ahead of the STS-41G mission.Credit: NASA Ride traveled into space once more in 1984, as a member of the STS-41G crew on the space shuttle Challenger. Sally Ride's death came after 17 months of battling pancreatic cancer. Barack Obama, President of the United States Michelle and I were deeply saddened to hear about the passing of Sally Ride.
Charles Bolden, NASA Administrator Sally Ride broke barriers with grace and professionalism — and literally changed the face of America's space program. Eileen M. GWLN : "Today at #WomenLeaders fo... Women Rights Defenders Targeted in Mexico. Lisa VeneKlasen (standing) speaks at the panel discussion on Growing Violence against Women Human Rights Defenders and Journalists in Mexico. | Photo: Kim-Jenna Jurriaans/IPS Source: IPS | Lawrence Del Gigante There has been an alarming increase over the past two years in violence against women human rights defenders and journalists in Mexico, according to a women’s human rights organisations. “It’s a crisis situation for journalists and defenders,” Lisa VeneKlasen, executive director and co-founder of JASS (Just Associates), told IPS. Reports of violence, threats, sexual abuse and, in some cases, rape and torture, have emerged, but have largely failed to gain the attention of international media, activists said.
“The problem is that the situation is so complex and volatile the journalists who report on that violent situation are targeted by both government and organised crime and there are not enough protections. The government has no interest in protecting them,” said VeneKlasen. Nuke power plant row: Women start guarding land. Report says women kidnapping cases on the rise. PESHAWAR: A non-government organisation on Thursday unveiled its annual report for 2011 about violence against women cases, showing an increase in the abduction and kidnapping cases across Pakistan. Briefing the journalists about the annual report at the Peshawar Press Club, Resident Director of the Aurat Foundation Shabina Ayaz said the organisation had been presenting annual reports since 2008, mostly covering media reports and first information reports registered at the police stations about violence against women.
“A total of 8,539 cases of violence against women were reported across Pakistan in 2011 including 2,089 that pertained to abduction and kidnapping,” she said. The women rights activist explained that about 1,846 cases of women abduction were reported in the Punjab, 152 in Sindh, 47 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 17 in Balochistan. Drawing a comparison, she said in year 2008, the total cases of violence against women were 7,571 in which 1,784 related to abduction and kidnapping. 28 Beautiful Examples Of Photo Manipulations With Women. Protect Women Human Rights Defenders in Pakistan especially in FATA. It’s Time Once Again For Women To Support Other Women. There was a time when women stood together in a bond of sisterhood, women supporting women. That time has come again. The time for sisterhood and support is now.
As we embrace the fullness of who we are as individuals, we may find ourselves supporting other women, helping others to reach the level of inner comfort and outer freedom that we ourselves have found.... Among those who are less sure of themselves and their place in the world, it may be more common to criticize other women than to seek their help.
We all recognize that we have much to learn from each other regardless of gender, but sometimes we could use a supportive role model that gives us a more precise example of what and who we can become. There was a time where women stood together in a bond of sisterhood, women supporting women. If we envision a world where women support each other and help each other find their place in an ever-changing world, then we can become the change we want to see. Impact Award 2012. Afghan women in shelters are prostitutes, says justice minister. My Journey as a Woman Entrepreneur in India – succeeding with some help along the way. By Shilpa Datar, Founder, Swayam India As a woman who was married at a young age into a conservative family by arranged marriage, starting my own business felt like a miraculous life-time achievement.
In my community, it is frowned upon in unwritten, bold lettering for a woman to do anything other than look after the home. After coming so far as to get my degree and start the process of setting up my business, I found myself faced with crisis after crisis, software glitches putting a hold on progress, and difficulties with suppliers dismissing me as “just a housewife” wanting to “play business.” I felt defeated, mentally and physically, and knew I needed support. I got the idea for my business while taking my Masters in Psychology through distance learning, as I knew I would not be able, nor allowed, to attend full-time college. I was working with special-needs kids and realized there was a huge gap in treating them. This was a perfect match. Angela Jia Kim - "Is tomorrow later than now?" Grassroot Diplomat. Indigeneity Program. The academic jungle: ecosystem modelling reveals why women are driven out of research - O’Brien - 2012 - Oikos. Meet The League Of Extraordinary Women: 60 Influencers Who Are Changing The World.