Stories about Women & Gender from October, 2006
India: Capital Punishment, Afzal and Santosh
National Highway reflects on capital punishment. “For the simple reason that the desire to see his life extinct reflects society’s desire to disown his act of crime as being ‘inhuman’. But what Santosh did was very human, born out of human impulses, and has to be resolved within the parameters...
Lebanon: Political Uncertainty and Men
Many Lebanese blogs are reflecting the internal political bickering that is creating an atmosphere of uncertainty about the future of the country. Most of the posts in this weeks review are bleak with little hope for the future. This is something that is very unusual for a people who take...
Arabisc: Sexual Harrassment and the Egyptian Blogosphere
After a month of abstinence (from sex naturally) during daylight hours in the Holy month of Ramadhan, a mob of sex starved Egyptians decided to celebrate Eid by attacking and sexually harassing women on the streets of Cairo. The first the incident was made public was during a television show,...
The Week That Was in Bahrain
Bahrain's bloggers celebrated Eid this week, with many posting greetings on their sites or simply musing about the tradition. While Mahmood Al Yousif thinks that “Eid this time seems to be spread through the whole week, rather than a single day where the whole nation celebrates!”, Silly Bahraini Girl took...
Argentina: Gender Equality Survey
The official Buenos Aires city government blog summarizes the results of a recent survey on inequality between men and women in Argentina's capital city [ES]: “8 out of 10 Buenos Aires residents call their society very or somewhat ‘machista.’ Furthermore, 70% think that women must do more to compete with...
Nicaragua: Total Abortion Ban
Jennifer Woodard Maderazo covers the controversial (and unanimous) decision by Nicaragua's parliament to implement a total ban on abortion. Costa Rican blogger Julia Ardón has reprinted a public letter signed by the Nicaraguan Association of Writers (ANIDE) [ES] demanding that exceptions be reinstated for women whose lives are threatened by...
India: Domestice Violence Act
To Each Its Own on the Domestic Violence Act in India. “The highlighting point of this Act is that it not only provides protection to women who are legally married but also those who are in live-in relationship, women who are sisters, widows or mother. The new law also addresses...
Russia: Thoughts on LiveJournal/ZheZhe
The Second Blog War continues in Russia. Brad Fitzpatrick, the LiveJournal's creator, has now joined the discussion over at sup_ru LJ community: in English, he offers some explanations and apologies here (and receives 248 comments so far) and lists the bloggers’ most common questions and concerns here (123 comments so...
Russia: Putin's Rape Remarks
White Sun of the Desert writes about rape and Vladimir Putin's sense of humor: “Russian humour, often thought not to exist, is very dry and often exceptionally dark. In many cases, it cares little for the sensibilities of those who are easily offended. This is, after all, a country which...
Japan: first lady
Kaishin in Japundit blogs about the public opinions towards the new Japan first lady, Akie Abe.
China: Botched jobs
‘Yes, journalists in China do have it rough,’ Bullog blogger Siyi says back to a recent BBC article, ‘but we're not all the innocent victims that you seem to think’ in: 中国是记者最大的监狱？ 监狱，还是桑拿中心？ ‘China is the largest prison for journalists?’ Prison? Or sauna center? BBC 最近一篇文章中说：”The media rights group Reporters...
South Afria: lesbian photo-activist
Sokari, who is visiting South Africa, writes about Zanele Muholi, a South African lesbian photo-activist: “Met Zanele Muholi, a lesbian photographer-activist. Progressive, radical, beautiful, challenging. Zanele took the photos behind “Tommy boys, lesbian men and ancestral wives” and is also the Community Relations Officer at FEW (Forum for the Empowerment...
Zimbabwe: woman-on-woman violence
Zimbabwean cartoonist joins the debate around the Domestic Violence Bill, “He raises an interesting issue, writing at some length about the ill-treatment of maids by their female employers, discussing this as woman-on-woman violence and asks whether this form of domestic violence will be included in the Domestic Violence Bill,” via...
India: Acid attacks on Women
An Anthropologist Wannabe on acid attacks on women in the subcontinent. “Being only 10 years of age, I didn't know the damage that acid could cause so imagine my shock when I saw Rivalli several months later to find half her face had been eaten away by the acid and...
Arabisc: Protests, Human Rights and Cultural Repression
With labour union elections coming up soon in Egypt, Manal and Ala are reporting about labour strike in Ain Shams University, where salaries were almost halved. على خلفية الصراع الطبقي اللي محتدم في البلد بقاله 5 سنين و اللي وصل ذروته السنة دي كع اقتراب موعد انتخابات المقابات العمالية بدأ...
China: decriminalization of sex worker
Li Yin-he argues for the decrminalization of sex worker, including prostitutes and “second wives” (zh).
India: Veils in the UK
WA comments on the issue of veils in the UK. – “If we decide integration is the way to go, how far does one integrate into the society? If I go to work in a saree, no one is going to question me, they might be surprised but it won't...
India: Women, veils and bedsheets
Annie writes on the covering of heads and bigotry. “I can understand the temptation to call for a ban, because, sometimes it seems as if that is the only way to protect women from a forced tent-ization, to divorce their clothes from their rights and duties. Yet, I would like...
Voices from Zimbabwe
Global Voices has posted a harrowing video documenting the brutal beatings suffered by worker's union demonstrators recently. Read the post and watch the video here. Debate surrounding a new law, the Domestic Violence Bill, became the context for a much criticized misogynistic outburst in Zimbabwe's parliament last week. Timothy Mubhawu,...
South Korea: sex trafficking
Micheal Hurt continues to blog about the sex trafficking issue in South Korea: Prostitution is on of South Korea's biggest service industries and its most embarrassing export, in terms of prostitution in its most pernicious and vile form – forced sex trafficking.
India: Microfinance and the Nobel prize
Dina on Dr Yunus winning the Nobel prize, why it fell in the Peace category and what it means for women in India. “His model is being followed in India as well … and the proliferation of Self-Help-Groups (SHG's), typically groups of women who are given access to microcredit to...
