feminine-genius

What do we expect?

This story is almost too dark for words, though we need to unpack it a little.

Earlier this week, The Washington Post had one of those slice-of-life news features that took an everyday topic from real life and framed it in a way that put it on page one.

The hot question of the day: Why are all of those girls wearing such slutty T-shirts to school? What’s that all about, other than some kind of post-feminist libertarian mall-values revenge plot?

I mean, the shirts are getting so bad that the liberal establishment is nervous.

That would be the liberal establishment that guarantees that pop culture is as grungy and lewd as possible (free speech) and that kids imbibe their message (that sex is fun and there are no limits) at as early an age as they can. Is it any wonder that the kids spew this back? "Garbage in; Garbage out"

Kids have always pushed the envelope of rules, social norms, and appropriateness. So what do they do when they're raised with no rules, no social norms, and no understanding of appropriateness. To push against nothing means you fall headlong into a pit -- and so they do. They look for shock value, they know the body is simply an instrument of sexual pleasure (a message religious cranks have been trying to supress for centuries) and they respond like this. This generation was raised on "clever" innuendo and double entendre from their first Disney flick, so where's the surprise?

It would seem that, despite the buttoned-up pretense of the successful adults in society, "Peyton Place" was always going on somewhere. Whispers to that effect indicated that the straight-laced generations of old weren't what they pretended to be, and the hippies called them on their hypocricy. No more duplicity. Now the hippies have raised their kids without pretence or "empty" constructs and have found that it didn't work either. With nothing to hand on in terms of basic ground rules for the good of family and children, we're in a adolescent cesspool of hormones and games -- which bring death. (But my how we'll giggle as we go down.)

Well, whaddya know?

Deep in this list of reasons for increased stats of breast cancer is the connexion everyone pussy-foots around:

The number of women diagnosed with breast cancer is at an all time high and the trend shows no sign of decreasing, according to official figures.

Data from the Office of National Statistics shows an 81 per cent increase in new cases in England since 1971, with breast cancer accounting for one in three cancers in women.

Experts said yesterday that age probably contributes most to the figures since women are living longer and breast cancer is largely a disease of older women. But modern lifestyle also plays a significant part.

Obesity, having no children or fewer children and later in life, drinking alcohol and hormone treatments like the Pill, and hormone replacement therapy, all raise the risk of breast cancer to some extent.

Interestingly, just the increased age of the population doesn't explain it, because it's often the behaviours of the reproductive years that cause the event later in life. So hiding behind "gee, we're all just living longer" doesn't cut it.

Read this carefully, to consider what it really means:

"The steady increase in the number of women diagnosed with breast cancer in the UK over the past 30 years is most likely linked to the growing trend of women having fewer children, breast feeding for only short periods and starting families later."

Hmmm, "starting families later." If that increases the risk, then maybe celibate women like nuns should be at highest risk, right? Especially if "fewer children" adds to the mix -- they usually have, er, none. Unless it means that there some sort of sexual activity with some sort of measure taken to sort of, well, avoid/postpone things. Like maybe a birth control pill? Euphemistically, one must carefully parse these things, because folks just refuse to be clear about women's reproductive "health."

As always, the real story here, here and here.

Women in Iran

A report on the status of women in Iran reiterates basically what has been known for decades -- that inequalities and injustices are rampant.

In an article published June 24, 2006 in the reformist online daily Sharq, journalist Elaheh Farahani harshly condemned the discrimination against women in Iran. She protested against the physical and emotional violence experienced by many Iranian women and girls, and said that victims of domestic abuse must either return to their homes or become prostitutes, since no shelters exist for abuse victims. Following are excerpts from her article: [12]

"The attitude that women as the inferior gender, the curtailing of their freedom within the family, the marginalization of women, the denial of their right to control their own fate and lives, the imposing of specific occupations not to their liking upon them - all these are [manifestations of] the emotional violence to which women and girls are subjected, causing them distress and anxiety. But most telling are the effects of violence against women. According to the available data, domestic conflict is the chief cause of suicide among women, followed by despair and crises caused by this emotional violence. The data further show that most women who commit suicide are married women between the ages of 18 and 24... Mental and physical illnesses are another consequence of this phenomenon of violence... Therefore, as long as violence against women continues, Iran's 32 million women will gradually become a disappointed, ill, and tormented population...

"According to Iranian law, non-physical violence by the husband, such as sexual and emotional violence, is not a crime. This means that [the law] provides no protection to women attacked by their husbands... The [existing] law refers only to physical violence by the husband, and also fails to consider the fact that women [who flee their homes due to domestic violence] must return to the same homes, and that the likelihood that their husbands will take revenge on them is very high. Non-governmental organizations have opened shelters for these women, but the number of available spaces is very small and limited. In these circumstances, houses of prostitution offer shelter to girls and women who run away from their homes - and unfortunately girls and women have no choice but to fall into this trap... in search of a safe place to stay. For years now, activists and groups who defend women's rights have been alerting the authorities to the need for [women's] shelters, but the efforts of the women Majlis members have so far yielded no results."

What is new is an effort to collect a million signatures to decry the injustice, although every attempt to bring the effort to light is met with a violent response by the government.

Iranian human rights activists recently initiated a "One Million Signatures Demanding Changes to Discriminatory Laws" campaign, aimed at fighting legal discrimination against women in Iran. According to one of the initiators, journalist Maryam Hosseinkhah, the campaign aims to collect one million signatures by June 2007. Its planned activities include door-to-door petitioning as well as conferences and rallies. The campaign also operates a website (http://we-change.org ) on which Iranian men and women over 18, inside and outside Iran, are invited to sign the campaign petition.

Unfortunately, even putting your name to that petition is probably a very dangerous thing.

A small act of chivalry

As we come to grips with the two most recent school-related tragedies, I want to point out one small detail in the initial report of the Colorado shooting earlier this week:

Tom Grigg said his 16-year-old son, Cassidy, was in a classroom when the man walked in, fired a gun and began telling some students to leave and others — all girls — to stay.

"He stood them up at the blackboard," Grigg said. "He hand-picked the ones he wanted to get out."

The gunman told Cassidy to leave, but he said he wanted to stay with the girls, Grigg said. "The guy flipped him around and put the gun in his face and said, 'It would be in your best interest to leave,"' Grigg said.

Mr. Grigg should be proud of his son's effort to stay. That he ultimately left is completely understandable, but his first inclination was heroic. God bless him.

Reminder for confession

This story about Babs isn't shocking (because nothing she does can shock any more):

The YENTL star recently visited a medium after her brother told her the psychic was terrific and, although she went in to the meeting very skeptical, she came away convinced she had contacted her dead dad thanks to the medium and a ouija board.

There are dark spirits and to deliberately commune with them is sinful. As nominal protestants, we had a Ouija Board and played with it for fun. If any of you did in your equally silly days out of ignorance, please confess it forthwith. There is a dark force that accompanies such things and with all the toxicity that our families are slogging through, we don't need the ball-and-chain of occult activities dragging us down.

The priest will understand. Go, and sin no more. (And then spread the word.)

African round-up

Did you know that the first black female president is finishing up her first year in office? Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was elected president of Liberia on November 23rd, 2005. After years of corruption, violence, and destabilisation, she hopes to guide her country back to an even keel.

"My election was a clear message to the world that the good people of our country despite the civil unrest in our country which threatened our existence as a nation there exists a high mentality by the people, especially women that it was time for change," President Sirleaf noted.

President Sirleaf then, challenged Liberian women to tackle and go above the sadistic theory, which remains prominent in certain quarters of the society. She added that women have remained barricaded away from the mainstream of decision-making while at the same time, their tireless efforts to gain access to resources and opportunity continue to be undermine by the reluctant of society to show a demonstrated commitment toward the goal of equality.

"We remain optimistic that these winds of change will blow and that the marginalization of women will be history."

As for what she brings to office as a woman:

Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf said she wants to become president in order "to bring motherly sensitivity and emotion to the presidency" as a way of healing the wounds of war.

She has pledged to work towards reconciliation by bringing her former opponents into a government of national unity - if they want to join her.

Namibia (in South West Africa) is still trying to implement the mandates of the Fourth UN Conference on Women which took place in Beijing. Feminists all over the world united to demand quotas in government and the workplace, and yet most countries resist.

Women's Manifesto, a women's advocacy group, called for legislation mandating "50/50 representation", also known as "zebra listing", several years ago. The "zebra" system means that male and female election candidates are listed alternately.

"We're not asking for a quota system," women's campaigner Liz Frank said. "We're asking for a piece of legislation that would make a permanent amendment to the electoral law."

They realise that they are fighting tokenism in this battle, because filling slots isn't conforming to the authentic advancement for women:

According to the latest annual report of the Employment Equity Commission, only 48 women held executive positions at the 345 companies and state-owned enterprises surveyed.

Rosa Namises, who runs Women Solidarity, a nongovernmental organisation, is concerned that conforming to the SADC requirement might result in tokenism. "Appointing women in positions just to fulfil the quota is wrong. Grooming women for leadership positions should take place with the same intensity as for men," she told IRIN.

Here we get into the same problem faced with the west. Grooming women for a political end is duplicitous and breeds ill will. I know the women there are fighting entrenched discrimination, but quotas aren't the answer. Visible parity doesn't bring about fundamental equality -- only transformed hearts do. Christianity and its reverence to femininity couldn't hurt.

Ghana is making arguments that sound darkly familiar to those made in the US in the early 1970's:

THE DIRECTOR-General of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Professor Agyemang Badu Akosa has lamented the rate of maternal mortality resulting from unsafe abortion, particularly in Ghana and on the African continent as a whole.

According to Prof. Akosa, who participated in the just-ended special session of Africa Union ministers of states and experts on the provision of sexual reproductive health (SRH) services in Africa, a research conducted by him showed that death resulting from unsafe abortion constituted about thirty percent (30%) of maternal mortality.

Now who will dispute those numbers in an undeveloped country? He could have pulled the number out of a hat for all we know (just as NARAL did here in order to bolster their argument in favour of legalising abortion). He can't prove it, but no one can disprove it either. What he's angling for is the implementation of the "Millennium Goals" which require abortion on demand. That country has restricted access now, and Ghana's ministers wisely counter that they cannot lose autonomy over this on the state level for the sake of conforming to the laws of the continent of Africa as a whole (sound familiar?) What they find hard to fight is the money offered by the Development Folks at the UN, which will only come when they conform to the Abortion on Demand mindset. Dastardly.

A large meeting in Mozambique on the question brought to light the reason for women's health-related problems:

While there has been significant improvement in women's health globally, none of this progress has benefited mothers in sub-Saharan Africa. Notwithstanding the international and African commitments, inadequate access to quality health services, unsafe abortions and lack of reproductive health care cause the deaths of at least 250,000 women each year in Africa, one of the highest rates in the world. Women in the United Kingdom have a 1 in 5,800 lifetime risk of maternal death, in Ethiopia the equivalent risk is 1:14.

High maternal death rates have multiple causes, but one major underlying problem is the deep-rooted inequalities between men and women. Women have fewer opportunities for education, they do a disproportionate high share of manual work, have less influence on policy making and are disadvantaged in terms of nutrition and access to health care. Lack of access to health care is a major cause of maternal mortality.

Even where there are positive legislative and policy frameworks, women often battle to exercise these rights within the family and the community. Traditional gender norms and practices, along with the unequal status of women, relegate women to being primarily responsible for contraception and childcare, with little power to negotiate when, with whom and why to have sex.

Nutty idea: why not abandon the effort to abort the babies, and focus time and treasure on educating women, making stable marriage a foundation of village life, and bringing in some development ideas that lighten the load of manual labour that falls to women. I'll bet the pastors and local women have lots of ideas, short of birth control devices and abortion. Even aspirin, antibiotics, and iron supplements go a long way in such conditions.

Speaking truth to power

Now in this instance, it is a phrase properly applied and for once honourably recognised:

Mumbai (AsiaNews) – Ruth Manorama is known as the Voice of India’s Dalit Women. For her commitment to their cause, she received the 2006 Right Livelihood Award, also know as the ‘Alternative’ Nobel Prize.

The 42-year-old Christian woman from Chennai, Tamil Nadu, heads the National Federation of Dalit Women. She has taken part in numerous international meetings to promote the rights of Indian outcaste women. In 1995 she played an important role in the 4th United Nations World Conference on Women held in Beijing (China).

Interestingly, this alternative to the Nobel Prize was initiated by another Swede:

The Right Livelihood Award was established in 1980 in Sweden by Jakob von Uexkull, a writer and former Member of the European Parliament. It honours groups and individuals who, through personal sacrifice, uphold the principles of ‘Right Livelihood’ despite opposition by those in power, who might see them as an obstacle to their rule.

One cannot fathom the contempt that Indians have for Dalits -- and it's interesting that there is even a hierarchy at the bottom of society between Christian Dalits and Hindu Dalits. Both are "untouchable" but Christians are somehow "more untouchable." She comments on the details of the indignities they live with:

Is there any difference between cities and the countryside?

Life for rural Dalit women is really hard. Health facilities are inadequate, dignified jobs are in short supply and economic conditions are really bad. The situation in the cities is not much better. It is mostly Dalit women who manually scavenge latrines in terribly unhygienic conditions. In India the practice was banned in 1993 but the law has not really made any major dent in the situation.

In addition to being humiliating, the practice raises serious social and health-related questions. Not only are Dalit physically ostracised but so are their children. It is one more reason for being treated as an outcaste. For them getting a basic education is very difficult. It is an unfair social system, one that considers a cow’s life more precious than that of a human being from a lower caste.

Congratulations, dear sister in Christ, both for your good work, and this worthy recognition.

"Thrives" may be stretching it

Blazing trails and forging new paths is exciting.

A woman in London, Ont., wants the Ontario Court of Appeal to recognize her as the third parent of a boy she's raising with her lesbian partner.

The application, if allowed, would be believed to mark the first time in Canada a child would legally have more than two parents, and would fundamentally change the definition of the word "family."

The biological father and mother and her female partner must remain anonymous because of a court ruling protecting their identities.

"The family has evolved over the years in a way that the law should recognize the reality of this little boy," said the father's lawyer, Alfred Mamo, "his reality being that he's got two mothers and a father with whom he thrives. They all want this for their son."

Perhaps we could look in on this "family" in about ten years to see how he's thriving. Some children suffer unforseen tragedies. Others have it deliberately foisted on them because the adults in their lives cannot see anyone other than themselves. "His reality" is that he's surrounded by selfish people, and he's a way cool pawn through which they can all affirm their lifestyle choices. Yippee.