WMC FBomb
GQ’s Impressive Interview With Pussy Riot Is Still A GQ Interview
As Feministing.com reported last summer, three members of the Russian punk rock collective Pussy Riot were convicted in August 2012 and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for “hooliganism motivated ...
WMC Women Under Siege
Reports surface of rape and torture in Iraq
It has been 10 years since the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and stories of torture and sexualized violence are still coming to light. As Al-Jazeera reported Tuesday, Amnesty International’s recent publication, “Iraq: A decade of abuse,” is a horrifying, pain-filled heap of rape, sexualized torture, and other forms of sexualized violence. And the rights group is still gathering evidence.
WMC Women Under Siege
March 13, 2013 International,
Violence against women
International campaign asks 57th Commission on the Status of Women to uphold women's rights
The International Campaign to Stop Rape & Gender Violence in Conflict, on whose advisory committee WMC's Women Under Siege serves, sent the following letter to the delegates of the 57th United Nations Commission on the Status of Women today. The letter calls on member states to conclude negotiations with a strong statement that will prioritize action to end violence against women.
WMC News & Features
Futures Without Violence
A UN Commission on the Status of Women Event Highlights Groups Acting to End Violence Against Women Around the World.
WMC Women Under Siege
Why I work with rape survivors in Africa
“Has the world forgotten about us?” These words from Fatima, a Darfuri rape survivor, still haunt me. It was the summer of 2006 and I was collecting interviews as part of my research-based activism with 25 Darfuri genocide survivors at a refugee camp in Chad.
WMC News & Features
Showcasing Films by Cuban Women
For the first time, a group of women filmmakers from Cuba are showing their films in the United States, beginning in Los Angeles on March 8, International Women's Day.
WMC Women Under Siege
New Holocaust findings highlight larger gap in conflict and rape research
One of the most emailed New York Times stories over the weekend was a piece about the Holocaust. In it, Eric Lichtblau explains new findings from experts at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: that the number of Nazi ghettos, camps, and other sites of systematic human misery is six times what the study authors had predicted.
WMC News & Features
Witch Burnings in Papua New Guinea—in 2013!
First delivered on "Women's Media Center Live with Robin Morgan," this "Fighting Words" commentary demands action in response to a horrifying news story reported by journalist Jo Chandler.
WMC Women Under Siege
Salacious, voyeuristic, insensitive: How the media harms one survivor of rape
Context. It’s a simple word that requires its own set of words to make clear: Context, according to Merriam-Webster, contains “the parts of a discourse that surround a word or passage and can throw light on its meaning.” Everything has it. But that doesn’t mean it’s in great supply, whether in how we speak about the world or in how we are presented with the news.
WMC Women Under Siege
Kenyan rape survivors sue government for inaction
Imagine if rape survivors held politicians accountable every time their government failed to protect them. In Kenya, eight survivors of sexualized violence are suing their country for its “non-action” in response to attacks following Kenya’s 2007 general elections. As we’ve written about previously, the post-election violence took place during a dispute over who had won, which developed into tribal clashes.
WMC News & Features
Sarai Sierra Case Dominates Turkish Media—To What End?
Accounts of the Sierra murder investigation jumped forward from the proverbial 'third page' treatment of crimes against Turkish women, but the coverage is deeply flawed argues Alyson Neel, reporting from Istanbul.
WMC News & Features
Human Trafficking Bill Resurrected in Congress
This week the Senate took care of the unfinished business of reauthorizing legislation to combat the crime of trafficking, including services for domestic victims. Now it's up to the House.
WMC Women Under Siege
February 13, 2013 International,
Violence against women
Gender justice group urges South Africa's Zuma to create commission to stop sexualized violence
After the gruesome rape and murder of 17-year-old Anene Booysen, South Africans are wondering how to put an end to their country’s high levels of sexualized violence. In an open letter, the Sonke Gender Justice Network, a human rights group based in the country, calls on South Africa’s president to act.
WMC Women Under Siege
Placing blame: Report debunks misconceptions about wartime rape
The media loves to generalize about war, and with it, wartime sexualized violence. But ignoring nuance does nobody any favors—neither the survivors themselves, nor those who are trying to stop it.
WMC News & Features
The Pot Calling the Kettle…
The author goes beneath the Western stereotypes of African politics to explain what's at stake for women and all citizens in the upcoming elections in Kenya.
WMC Women Under Siege
The devil’s in the data: How rape culture shapes rape stats
If you follow debates about sexualized violence in the United States or elsewhere, in war or in peace, then you’ve probably heard at least some of the following statistical (or quasi-statistical) claims about patterns of rape: One in three U.S. women has been sexually assaulted. Seventy-five per cent of Liberian women were raped during the civil war there. Sexualized violence is declining (or increasing). Intra-military rape in the U.S. is down.
WMC News & Features
February 11, 2013 | Robin Morgan |
Economy,
Environment,
Feminism,
International,
Politics,
Violence against women
Dr. Vandana Shiva—The New Delhi Rape and Globalization
Dr. Vandana Shiva, economist, environmentalist, and feminist, spoke of the public outcry in India and how the devaluing of women in a global economy set the stage for the New Delhi rape. Adapted from a conversation broadcast last month on Women's Media Center Live with Robin Morgan.
WMC Women Under Siege
Why treating rape survivors is so complicated
As a clinician engaged in the evaluation of sexually and physically abused and tortured populations, I have often quietly pondered this question: Compared with victims of purely physical violence and torture, why do victims of sexualized violence frequently have such long-lasting effects?
WMC News & Features
Strike, Dance! Eve Ensler's One Billion Rising
On February 14, V-Day's Eve Ensler calls on "one billion women and those who love them" to rise up to confront violence against women.
WMC Women Under Siege
January 29, 2013 | Sanam Naraghi Anderlini, Sussan Tahmasebi |
International,
Violence against women
Voices from the ground: How to help Syria’s humanitarian crisis
In recent months, the International Civil Society Action Network’s (ICAN) staff have held regular in-person and online consultations with Syrian civil society activists based inside the country or those who have recently left. They are providing relief and development support to refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs). This brief summarizes key priorities and recommendations on immediate humanitarian issues that must be addressed by the international community.
WMC Women Under Siege
Why I’m breaking the cycle of violence in Afghanistan
I never realized how devastating our culture was for women until my brother-in-law tortured my sister. Growing up in Afghanistan, I had already watched my father beat my mother—but that was seen as just another part of daily life. Then the cycle of violence continued when I myself became an abuser.
WMC FBomb
Israel's "Photoshop Law"
As of January 1, what the media has dubbed the “Photoshop Law” has gone into effect in Israel. This law mandates that models working in Israel have to have a Body Mass Index (BMI) of at least 18.5, th...
WMC FBomb
January 22, 2013 | Sarah E |
Feminism,
Gender-based violence,
International,
Religion,
Violence against women
The Surprising Similarities Between Burqas and Short Skirts
The Burqa ban is the cause of much debate in France. The ban sparked a discussion about human rights: do the citizens of France have free will to wear whatever they want? Is the next step to silence p...
WMC Women Under Siege
When will I 'earn' my right to safety?
Delhi. Ohio. Nepal. Around the world, women are suffering sexual assaults so heinous that they are making the headlines on an almost daily basis. And yet, almost inconceivably, governments, members of the judiciary, and authority figures around the world continue to advocate that the solution lies with women—that their behavior is to blame and that their behavior has the power somehow, magically, to prevent rape.
WMC News & Features
Kosovo Human Rights Activists Resist Attacks on LGBT Community
The author, a mtvU/Fulbright fellow in Kosovo, confronts an outbreak of religious extremism of unexpected violence, directed against LGBT expression in Prishtina.