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grrrly news 7/26

July 26, 2003 12:57 PM posted by lisa : track it (0)

Doctor must pay to raise boy
The High Court stunned doctors yesterday with a landmark finding that a surgeon who bungled a woman's sterilisation is liable for the cost of bringing up her child to the age of 18.
Medical groups and doctors warned that the ruling could lead to practitioners refusing to perform sterilisations and could have implications for other, reversible contraception procedures

Men take employers to court over dress code
THE government is facing an avalanche of sex discrimination claims from men who refuse to wear a shirt and tie at work because their female colleagues turn up in t-shirts and slacks.

Almost 1,000 civil servants in Scotland are taking legal action against the Department of Work and Pensions in protest at what they see as double standards and sexism in the workplace. The move, which has seen Glasgow’s Employment Tribunal office inundated with calls, is set to cost the taxpayer tens of thousands of pounds.

Forced Sterilization Once Seen as Path to a Better World
In a basement at Caltech, 59 gray boxes contain thousands of documents that reveal in detail how an influential group of California men once hoped to help direct the fate of the human race.

Within the brittle files is the story of the state's long and largely forgotten effort to sterilize mental patients. Memos show how California civic leaders helped popularize eugenics around the world, including Nazi Germany. Case histories offer a glimpse of the more than 20,000 people who were, by law, sterilized in state hospitals from 1909 through the 1960s in anticipation of curing an array of social ills — from poverty and promiscuity to overcrowded institutions.

'Hands off women', Italian men told
Italian men have long held a reputation for being more forward towards women than your average male around the world.
Italian guidebooks warn women about wandering hands on crowded buses. One even mentions a specific bus route notorious for men preying on female tourists.
But now there's a new rule: look but don't touch.

Marriage-promotion plan seen set to pass, despite criticisms
President Bush's proposal to nudge women on welfare toward the altar is headed for approval in Congress despite opposition from both the political left and right, as Democrats choose other battles to fight in the welfare debate.
From the start, the plan sparked outrage from libertarians who complain government has no place in people's intimate lives and from feminists who worry women will be coerced into bad matches. Both say scarce dollars should be spent elsewhere.
Despite the concerns, Republicans are largely in favor of the plan, Democrats largely resigned to it.

Making sex pay
The prostitutes on Brussels' Rue de Matheus operate day and night
They and other sex workers in the red light districts of Belgium's larger cities languish in legal uncertainty and amid varying degrees of toleration.
Belgian legislators are hoping to bring that to a close with a parliamentary bill that would draw prostitutes into the legal fold and bring the industry under state control, providing sex workers with labour rights and greater health protection.
But for a fee.

DOZENS OF CONS EYE SEX SWAP
About two dozen prison inmates are receiving the same controversial estrogen treatment a convicted killer is seeking in his sex-change suit against New York state, authorities said yesterday.
Mark Brooks, who now calls himself Jessica Lewis, wants taxpayers to pay for his sex change so he can serve out his remaining time — about 37 years — in a women's prison.
If he wins, he'd be the first inmate to get one in state history.

FDA reviews silicone implants despite continued health fears
After more than a decade of sharply restricted sales because of health concerns, silicone gel breast implants are poised for an unusual return to the market. The Food and Drug Administration is now reviewing an application to approve the controversial devices, and close observers believe it will rule on the subject later this year.

'Hunting for Bambi' a fraud?
A noted investigative website is claiming a Las Vegas company that says it hosts "hunts" where men stalk naked women and shoot them with paintballs is a certifiable hoax, perpetuated by local and national media exposure given to the firm's spokesman
Snopes.com now reports there is no evidence that any actual hunts have taken place and that the publicity blitz was used simply to sell the company's videotape showing the staged hunt.

Mail-order love
The NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund and other women's organizations are pushing for a federal law that would require criminal background checks of U.S. citizens applying for visas for an overseas fiancée. Advocates say more women who arrive in this country through international marriage brokers are showing up as crime victims, battered by spouses in textbook cases of domestic violence. But no statistics exist to document the problem or its extent.

Changing paradigm
Eliminate affirmative-action programs. Do the same with the sexual-harassment industry. Refuse to accept bias against boys in public schools. Those don't sound like the talking points of your typical feminist, but while Wendy McElroy isn't typical, she is a feminist. Mrs. McElroy advocated her feminist agenda in Washington last week, but it wasn't at the annual National Organization for Women (NOW) conference in town.
Instead, her remarks were made to a very different audience — one largely of men — at an event sponsored by the National Free Men Coalition, a group that could be described as masculinist, the opposite of feminist.

Bill Aims to Protect Overtime for Working Families
Nearly two weeks after the US House approved President Bush's proposed Department of Labor (DOL) rule change exempting nearly 8 million workers from overtime wages, Senators Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Edward Kennedy (D-MA) yesterday introduced legislation to block its implementation. "[Bush's proposal] is anti-work and antifamily," Harkin charged. "Workers could be forced to work longer hours-time that is taken away from their families-without pay," the Associated Press reported.

Senate Committee Approves Far-Right Judicial Nominee William Pryor
Far-right judicial nominee William Pryor, who has been described as "among the most extreme" of President Bush's nominees, was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee today in a 10-9 party-line vote. Pryor, who has been nominated to the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, has openly voiced his opposition to women's rights and gay rights and is a staunch advocate of states rights. "If he is confirmed, his rulings on civil rights, abortion, gay rights and the separation of church and state would probably do substantial harm to the rights of all Americans," the New York Times wrote in an editorial today. Democratic Senators also have raised questions about Pryor's truthfulness about involvement in fundraising activities for the Republican Attorney Generals Association.

Senate Committee Approves Funding Earmarks for Afghan Women
The Senate Appropriations Committee last week approved an $18.2 billion FY 2004 Foreign Operations package, which included $600 million for humanitarian and reconstruction assistance in Afghanistan. The bill includes earmarks of $4.5 million for the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, $10 million for the Ministry of Women's Affairs, and $2.5 million for the Judicial Reform Commission. The House Foreign Operations package also contains $600 million for Afghanistan, and in its report language supports earmarks for the Ministry of Women¹s Affairs and the Independent Human Rights Commission.

LA: Anti-Choice and Other Specialty Plates Blocked
After years of pendulum activity, a US District judge earlier this month halted further sales of all specialty license plates in Louisiana, ruling that the legislature's allowance of "choose life" but not "choose choice" specialty license plates violated the First Amendment. Judge Stanwood R. Duval, Jr. stated, "If the state built a convention hall for speech and then only allowed people to speak with whom they agreed with their message, the states' actions would be in contravention of the First Amendment... There is no significant difference in the case before the court," according to the Associated Press. Duval blocked the sale of "choose life" plates in 2000; however, sales resumed after the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned his decision.

Women Gain Inch in Push for Land Rights in Uganda
A new amendment to the 1998 Land Act in Uganda takes a small step toward women obtaining land rights. The issue is expected to remain on the national agenda, however, as candidates for president position themselves to gain the women's vote.

House Okays Global Aid Addressing Women's Needs
A global aid initiative that will require recipients to address women's rights was approved by Congress last week. The Millennium Challenge Account will require countries that receive aid to incorporate women into funding proposals.

Study Indicates Jobless Abusers Most Apt to Kill
A domestic-violence study concludes that a woman's risks of being killed are much worse when her abuser is unemployed. The study is also notable for bringing the term "femicide," usually reserved for usage about overseas crimes, into a U.S. context.

Birth-Rate Policies Whip-Saw Women in Peru
After forced sterilizations under Fujimori, Peruvian women now face coercive Toledo programs to increase the birth rate. Such extremes are dangerous for women, who deserve control over their health and reproductive destiny.

Massachusetts Bishops Escape All Criminal Charges
Massachusetts Attorney General Tom Reilly revealed that he would not be pressing charges against the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston or its senior managers for failing to protect children from sexually abusive priests and other church workers, reports the Boston Globe.

Malpractice-Cap Debate Spotlights Women
A cap on medical malpractice damages is a hot topic in Florida this summer. While Gov. Bush argues it will boost women's access to affordable care, detractors say a $250,000 cap isn't adequate for women who are homemakers or low-wage employees

Suit Presses for 'Gender Symmetry' in Shelters
A California man is suing shelters for battered women that denied him entry last year. The case against the already financially strapped shelters is supported by activists who favor more "gender symmetry" in attitudes toward domestic violence

Premier orders defense ministry to review status of women in army
Premier Yu Shyi-kun yesterday instructed the Ministry of National Defense to make an overall review within two weeks of the quota of female students enrolled in military academies and of women's duties in the military.
Yu said: "Modern warfare is different from the warfare of the past and the MND should study the role of women in war and make improvements."

Pornography not just for the fellas as women fess up
Defying the stereotype of the average pornography consumer as a desperate old man in a raincoat is a study that shows significant numbers of women are taking an interest, too.
Women make up about 20 per cent of respondents to an online survey, part of the Federal Government-funded study called Understanding Pornography In Australia.
Head researcher Alan McKee, a senior lecturer in media studies at the University of Queensland, said that although results from the three-year study were far from complete, they gave an indication of the changing image of pornography users.

Some women produce more eggs than expected
Women ovulate once a month. Couples' lives, their choice of contraception and even their efforts to combat infertility have been based upon this biological notion. But some researchers say it may not be as ironclad as we've thought.

Zimbabwean Women Think Beating Justified -Study
More than half of Zimbabwean women surveyed say a husband is justified in beating his wife sometimes, U.S. researchers said on Friday.
Men are within their rights to beat their wives if they argue, neglect the children, refuse to have sex, burn food or leave the home without permission, most of the women surveyed said.

Girls Think They're Fatter Than They Are
As if being a teenage girl isn't hard enough, it turns out that girls worry about their weight even when there's nothing to worry about.
A University of Delaware study has found that, when asked to pick a silhouette of a figure that most closely resembled their bodies, teenage girls chose figures that represented weights that were 11 pounds heavier, on average, than what they had described as their ideal weight. Yet in real life, the girls were only three pounds over that ideal weight, on average.

Fire camp pumps up girls' esteem
From scaling a 110-foot ladder and rappelling down a five-story building to cutting up cars using a 65-pound "Jaws of Life" and tackling fires, the girls of Camp Blaze aren't to be messed with.
If these teens can rescue a 185-pound simulated victim from a burning building -- after just one week of firefighting training -- there's little doubt they could hold their own in a male-dominated profession.

Colorado Elects First Lesbian State Senator
In a special election last week, Jennifer Viega became the virst openly lesbian Senator in the Colorado State Senate. Viega fills a vacant seat in the 31st District

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i gotta say i disagree

Posted by: Trannys on March 30, 2005 11:01 AM |

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Posted by: digital cameras on April 9, 2005 02:33 AM |

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