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grrrly news 10/26

October 26, 2003 05:45 AM posted by lisa : track it (0)

Forum Inspires Women's Rights and Disability Rights Supporters to Work Together
The common concerns of the women's rights and disability rights movements converged at the "Women with Disabilities and Allies Forum: Linking Arms for Equality and Justice for All" in Bethesda, Md., Oct.17-19. The forum, the first of its kind, was organized by the NOW Foundation and the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD).
The forum was an enlightening and inspiring experience for both the conference organizers and the participants, for those who have worked on the issues for a long time and those who were new to political activism. Women with and without disabilities found that their shared interests ran deep and that together they could lift each other higher.

Unsafe At Any Size

An advisory panel to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) voted on Oct. 16 to recommend that silicone breast implants be returned to the market after an 11-year ban. The verdict sent the share price of Inamed, the manufacturer, soaring to a record high and caused The New York Times to editorialize that "the verdict adds to a growing impression that the implants, once blamed for a range of serious illnesses in women, are relatively safe."
It's an impression that has everything to do with corporate spin and very little to do with science.

The Globalized Village
The road from Madras to my hometown Vellore in the southern part of India makes for a bumpy ride, regardless of one's choice of transportation – be it a sturdy socialist-era Ambassador car or a newer lightweight import, a crowded dirty bus or an air-conditioned taxi. There are no lanes and the traffic moves erratically and at will, as the black tar fades indistinguishably into the neighboring sand and thorn bushes

In Hard Times, Shelters Empty Beds, Raise Funds
As public funding for domestic-violence shelters has fallen during the economic downturn, many shelters are doing whatever it takes to keep their doors open

Women in Southeastern Turkey Now Have Own Oasis
A center in southeastern Turkey offers counseling, consciousness-raising and small business loans to women in the conservative region. Its founder was a victim of state torture.

U.S. Reps in Mexico Pressing Murder Investigation
U.S. lawmakers arrive in Mexico City, adding to the international pressure on local and state authorities in Mexico to solve the decade-long series of murders of young women

Bush Propaganda Seasons Ladies' Home Journal
A "first couple" interview by Peggy Noonan in the October issue of Ladies Home Journal leaves the commentator fuming at the way a women's magazine slipped political propaganda into its monthly fare of fashion tips and recipes

Legislator Fights Pakistan's 'Blood' Marriages
A Pakistan legislator is challenging the centuries-old tradition of "blood marriages," the use of forced unions to settle inter-clan disputes. Her campaign seeks to outlaw the practice that continues across the country

Study: Women Bear Brunt of Environmental Toxins
A California study calls for further investigation into how environmental toxins affect women's health. It estimates the health care cost of U.S. women's environmentally associated diseases is $12.2 billion annually

Senators Approve Abortion Ban
This week, senators voted in favor of the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003. President Bush is expected to sign the law that provides criminal penalties to persons performing abortions, advocates say, after the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, regardless of the woman's or fetus' health.

ESPN's story line irks women's association
ESPN's dramatic series "Playmakers" has been criticized by reviewers and the NFL for its unoriginal and stereotypical portrayals of professional football players as drug-abusers, womanizers and worse.
Now the Association for Women in Sports Media has protested a story line that revolves around a flirtatious female reporter who enters the locker room and touches a player suggestively.
The character is played by actress-real-life reporter Thea Andrews, who also appears on the ESPN2 program "Cold Pizza."

Breast cancer campaign 'too youthful' for older women, charities admit
Images of glamorous celebrities in campaigns for breast cancer are leading the women most at risk to believe the pink ribbon message is not aimed at them, reports Elizabeth Day

Why working women don't get what they want
Ask and you shall receive, goes the old saying.
But women don't ask -- whether for a higher starting salary, a raise, or a promotion -- and, as a result, they're not receiving.

Taliban threaten to kill Afghan women in foreign NGOs
Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime has threatened to kill Afghan women working for foreign nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) reported Friday.
The Pakistan-based news agency said the Taliban distributed a pamphlet in Laghman Province ordering Afghan women working for foreign NGOs to quit or face the death penalty

Greek Muslim women want education first, sharia abolition later
In one of the European Union's minority communities a man just needs to say three times he repudiates his wife in order to obtain a divorce, and automatically wins custody over the children when she remarries.
For Islamic sharia law is practised in a 100,000-strong Muslim minority in northeastern Greece, a member of the EU.
"Daughters inherit a third of the fortune, boys two thirds," said womens' rights activist Raif Shukran, a Greek citizen of Turkish stock living in Thrace, one of the EU's poorest regions

Women get place at table
Gov. Joe Kernan is a guy's guy.
He drinks beer -- Budweiser, not Bud Light. He loves baseball so much he wants to own a team. He went to Notre Dame at a time when it was an all-testosterone campus. And he served in the Navy in an era when the only women onboard ship were pinups. But go figure. Kernan is putting so many women in top positions that he's building a league of his own.

Exhibition shows women's role in war
Maj. Nadine Heron of the Royal Military Police had just fired a group of Iraqi men for stealing from her newly formed police service in Basra.
As the disgruntled men left the room, one commented: "We forgot. She's a major, but she's also a woman and they are emotional beings."
Heron, 33, laughed as she told the tale at the launching of a new exhibition on the role of women in war, but it shows how women's role in military conflicts has often been tied up with their image as the "fairer sex."

Women at work

Linda Cornish, president of Ro-Lyn Electrical Inc., has trouble getting some customers to talk with her.
They often ask to speak to her husband, Rowland, instead. Her husband has 30 years of experience doing electrical work, but it's Linda who manages the company. Ro-Lyn has worked on projects at Michigan State University, Lansing Community College and Union Missionary Baptist Church.
"Men just don't recognize women in this business," Cornish said. "They assume we don't know what we're talking about. In the beginning, all questions were directed to my husband."

Mammograms free to women who qualify
In the life-or-death fight against breast cancer, one of the most effective weapons may be education.
Informing the public about the importance for preventive medical exams could be the difference between someone having a curable form of the disease or a more advanced stage far less likely to respond as well to treatment.

Israeli army rejects women for combat
A military study (reported in the Washington Times) found that men could handle marches of 55 miles in length while women had difficulty with distances longer than 32 miles. The difference was attributed to a 10% higher hemoglobin level in men, which lets them feed more oxygen to their muscles.

The study also found that men could carry 55% of their body weight on average compared to just 40% for women. And, because military-age women weigh 33 pounds less on average than men, this adds up to a 44-pound load difference when carrying equipment and supplies

Extent of Violence Against Women in Congo Surfaces as Fighting Recedes
Gang rape has been so violent, so systematic, so common in eastern Congo during the country's five years of war that thousands of women are suffering from vaginal fistula, leaving them unable to control bodily functions and enduring ostracism and the threat of debilitating lifelong health problems.

Around the world, cases of ruptured vaginal tissue are usually caused by early childbirth and seen in such African countries as Ethiopia, Nigeria and Mali, where brides as young as 12 are too small to give birth. What makes the fistula cases in Congo so jarring to medical professionals here is the large number of them caused by rape.

Supporting women in theater
Shortly after the death of treasured company member Taft Miller in 1996, the staff of The Western Stage established a scholarship fund in memory of their colleague to support young up-and-coming directors.
This year's scholarship, however, marks a departure from the traditional guidelines and focuses on the development of women in the theater. As the recent TWS production of Jane Martin's "Anton in Show Business" pointed out, "Eighty percent of the roles in American theater are played by men, and 90 percent of the directors are men."

Baby girls still unwelcome in India
Prosperity and education, it appears, has only lead to an increase in female foeticide, according to an officially sponsored report.
More prosperous areas like Kurukshetra and South West District of Delhi are among the lowest scorers in terms of number of girls per 1000 boys, the report says, warning the resulting imbalance as a consequence to these "missing girls" can destroy the social and human fabric.

Gender imbalance prompts more care for girls in China
Two years ago, Zhang Chuanxin and his wife could hardly hold their heads high in their village as Zhang's mother kept complaining about their failure to "carry on their family line" by having a son.
Zhang, father of two daughters in Liugou village of Huaiyuan county in east China's Anhui province, however, found his life turned around in 2001 when China launched a national "care for girls" campaign to help control the gender imbalance in this world 's most populous nation.

Girls Gone Wild
Eight "Girls Gone Wild" camera and production crew members have surrendered in Panama City, Florida, to face charges stemming from allegations they had videotaped underage girls exposing themselves during spring break.

The suspects were released on bond after checking in this week at the Bay County Jail. They are set for arraignment next month on charges that include prostitution, selling obscene material, contributing to the delinquency of a minor and racketeering.

Notes from a proudly South African feminist
A visit to our offices by a group of Europeans a few weeks ago generated a great deal of animated discussion among us about the nature and significance of feminism in South Africa.

More specifically, it produced what could be described as defensiveness when the discussion turned to age-old arguments that feminism is an imported Western concept, which may not necessarily have a place in contemporary African society.

The defensiveness that rose up in my throat threatened to silence me (as it has so often in the past) as I once again prepared to defend the ideals in which I believe. I am, quite proudly, a feminist.

Rwanda Tops Sweden With Highest Proportion of Female Members of Parliament
After elections held earlier this month, Rwanda achieved the highest proportion of female parliamentarians in the world. According to the BBC, 48.8 percent of Rwanda¹s members of parliament are women. Women were voted into 39 seats in the lower chamber of deputies, 24 of which were reserved for women and 15 of which were open to men and women. An additional six were elected to the Senate.

Pakistan: Majority of Jailed Women are Rape Victims
The National Commission on the Status of Women in Pakistan recently issued a report on the Hudood Ordinances, stating that as many as 88 percent of female prisoners are serving time for violating the 1977 Zina Ordinance, which makes fornication a crime and adultery a state offence.

VMI: Women’s Soccer Team Endures
At the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) where women comprise just six percent of 1,324 cadets, the school's first women's soccer team (and first women's sports team) is standing strong. Facing obstacles like a 15 percent drop out rate among female first-year cadets, ten of the 11 players have pledged to continue riding out a rough year. "We all miss home," the players told Coach Julie Davis, according to The Washington Post. "We're all scared, but we're not running away

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