International Women's Day celebration

Each year, around the world, International Women’s Day (IWD) is celebrated on March 8.

Tassie McDonald, Silen David, Lucy Stephen, Flora Matthew and Lency Pedro celebrate International Women’s Day at the Tagai Secondary Campus morning tea.

Hundreds of events occur not just on this day but throughout March to mark the economic, political and social achievements of women.

And while the day is often seen as a day just for women, this was not the case at Tagai TAFE on Thursday Island.

The Mura Kosker Sorority joined with the TAFE to a different slant on their morning tea celebration by inviting men and boys from the TAFE to join in showing their support for women.

Speaking at the gathering, LJ Shibasaki said the day was about the boys appreciating women in their family and their lives, and acknowledging all the work they did for them.

“Hopefully when you go on to have your wives and daughters, you will be appreciative of what they do for you,” she said.

Lena Passi Women’s Shelter service manager Georgina Binjuda said it was important for teachers and students to show leadership in stamping out bullying in schools and among young males.

“Bullying can lead to domestic violence in later life,” Ms Binjuda said.

“At Lena Passi, we are running the Getting On program among 15- to 25-year-olds to help combat this.

“We are also working on a music DVD for the under 15s with an anti-bullying message.”

The Lena Passi Getting On program received a highly commended award in the Indigenous category of the Queensland Domestic and Family Violence Prevention Awards in 2009.

The first IWD events were run in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland in 1911 and attended by over one million people.

100 years on, IWD has become a global phenomena celebrated across many countries, and is an official holiday in approximately 25 countries including Afghanistan, Russia, Ukraine, Cambodia and Zambia.

Battered Women and European values

Vadim Kastelli shot a film about domestic violence ... in the land of Amazons and militant Cossack wives

By Anna SLIESARIEVA

Photo replica by Kostiantyn HRYSHYN, The Day   FIANCES (FROM THE CYCLE OF WORKS “MAZEPIANA”) BY RENOWNED UKRAINIAN GRAPHIC ARTIST SERHII YAKUTOVYCH

For anybody committed to European values, violence against women is a barbaric act. Incidentally, in Ukraine, a country known for its Amazons and militant Cossack wives, this “tradition” should be seen as alien, too. Obviously, it was brought here by some other culture, some other civilization...

Let’s recall that the first prize in this year’s World Press Photo Contest was awarded to the portrait of an Afghan girl, Bibi Aisha, who was mutilated by her own husband and father. This photo was taken by Jodi Bieber and it shocked the entire world, including Ukrainians, who are probably unaware that one in five Ukrainian women suffers from domestic violence, but is too ashamed to talk about it. To get this problem to surface in public debate, director Vadim Kastelli (known primarily as one of the authors of the film NATO: Friend or Foe) has addressed the issue in his documentary Battered Women. The film tells the stories of three Ukrainian women who have become victims of domestic violence. At the end of the road, one of them was barely saved by doctors, the other killed her tormenter, while the third found the inner strength to leave her abuser. Psychologists and lawyers, local and foreign experts analyze the situation, while celebrities unexpectedly tell their tales in this documentary.

Having learned the sad statistics, one understands why Kastelli chose this topic. One in five Ukrainian women experiences domestic violence, which makes for almost 4,600,000 casualties.

“Our statistics differ little from global ones,” Kastelli assures. “When we say that women are beaten everywhere, in housing projects as well as in palaces, it seems only a phrase, but we talked to pop stars and actresses, and they admitted to having suffered from violence, too.”

Of course, the issue exists not only in less than affluent countries like Ukraine. But some European nations formally recognize domestic violence as a crime, not a private matter, and perpetrators receive psychological treatment.

“European countries have long understood that open discussion is needed to overcome this phenomenon. When the social mechanisms in question function normally, where a woman knows that she can call the police and they will answer her call, where public bodies react to violence, where an abusive husband is publicly condemned and can be fired from his job – there a woman has it much easier. We have to go that way, outlined by the civilized nations of Europe,” Kastelli maintains.

Practice shows that Ukrainian women are embarrassed to publicly admit that they are victims of domestic violence.

“We have the infamous saying ‘an unbeaten woman is similar to an unriveted scythe.’ It is something that lies really deep in us,” Kastelli explains. “The situation was exacerbated during the Soviet years, when any private initiative was destroyed, while passivity was the norm.”

However, now Ukraine has special shelters for abused women and a helpline where one can ask for help. In addition to temporary housing, the victims get psychological, legal, informational assistance and other support. Nor should we forget about the number “102” [the Ukrainian police help line – Ed.].

“You cannot say that violence against women is a Slavic trait. Poles are Slavs all the same, but their situation is much better, especially after the country joined the EU. Any steps toward civilization are an improvement,” the director emphasizes.

Kastelli’s film will soon premiere on the First National TV channel.

COMMENTARIES

Nina POTARSKA, historian, political scientist and social activist:

“The problem of violence against women can not be separated from its cultural, political or economic context. The economic context is the most important. The economy is the core of the issue, other layers come later on; they include cultural policy and general gender ignorance of society, understatement of the importance of gender problems, stereotypical female images in the media space, reflecting sexism and depict the women’s role as secondary as compared to men.”

Nadia PARFAN, the Visual Culture Research Center at the National University Kyiv-Mohyla Academy:

“The defenselessness of women is, above all, a social problem, because violence against women is widespread, principally, within lower-status, poorer groups with unstable economic situations. Their cultural level is a result of their situation. The government has shown a lack of interest in protecting its citizens. Commercial media do not set educational objectives and only produce stereotypes ... To understand that the problem exists, one needs education, one must be interested, read, think about it...”

Olena Shevchenko, chairman of the NGO Insight:

“Of course, this complex problem is worth discussing; it is very poorly covered in the media, as it is not considered a pressing issue. So the public remains mostly uninformed about the shocking statistics of violence against women and the reasons for it. These reasons are rooted in gender inequality. Personally I have more confidence in the power of civil society, which is united, demands its rights be respected, and achieves its objectives. We so often hear talk about political will, as though the powers-that-be will decide to give us some rights, but this will is usually only political rhetoric.”

http://www.day.kiev.ua/206766

Ukraine's topless protesters attract fame and feminist fury

Femen's protests catch the eye

A group of women's rights activists in Ukraine regularly bare their breasts to protest a host of issues. Their topless demonstrations garner international attention, but provoke criticism within feminist circles.

 

The Ukrainian women's rights group Femen regularly resorts to staging topless demonstrations - no matter whether it is raining or freezing cold outdoors. 

"Using bare breasts is a public relations stunt, a shock tactic that unfailingly draws peoples' attention," Femen's leader Anna Huzol told Deutsche Welle.

But she stressed that the ultimate goal was to protect human rights in the entire country. "We are defending our rights and want women to take an active role in fighting for them," she said.

The movement, which was founded three years ago, has about 300 members in Kiev alone. One of the 30 women willing to bare their breasts during public appearances is economist Olexandra Shevchenko, who has denied that the women strip merely to show off their breasts.

"We want people to see our breasts and then read the slogans we've written on our posters and banners," she said.

Feminists remain critical

Femen's members have targeted sex tourism and domestic violence in Ukraine - but their eye-catching protests do not always meet with other feminists' approval or support.

Scantily-clad Femen activists take to the streets"Femen's activities give the impression at home and abroad that Ukrainian feminists are rabid women who show off their breasts," the head of the women's organisation 'Women's Network', Lajma Hejdar, said.

Sex tourism to Ukraine is in fact a problem, and it is on the increase as the 2012 European Soccer championship draws closer, according to Oksana Kis, a social scientist from Lviv. But, she says, the Femen activists discredit the most honorable ideas by the way they act.

"They take off their clothes for too many random issues, including the spread of swine flu," she told Deutsche Welle.

Other activists claim the movement portrays an undesirable image of Ukraine.

"Our country is like a giant distorting mirror, everything becomes unrecognizable," said Aljona Semenova, a gay rights campaigner. "These young women, who use their naked body to protest against all sorts of things, distort feminism in Ukraine."

Symbolic protest

But Huzol is convinced that the bare-breasted protesters have become a symbol for Ukraine, like the Klitschko brothers or soccer player Andrij Schewtschenko.

She adds that Femen also enjoys international backing and has received many letters of support from abroad.

"Contrary to those boring women who argue that we are harming Ukraine's standing, people abroad understand how cool it is to have such a movement in our country and that it is strong, courageous and effective," she said.

The number of women who join the Femen movement, meanwhile, has been on the rise. The women self-finance their protests - mainly by selling Femen souvenirs.

Author: Olga Wesnianka / db
Editor: Rob Turner

100th anniversary of International Women's Day

Kyivpost.com March 8, 2011

The head of the new U.N. women's agency said Tuesday there has been "remarkable progress" since International Women's Day was first celebrated a century ago but gender equality remains a distant goal because women still suffer widespread discrimination and lack political and economic clout.

Former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet said in a statement marking the 100th anniversary that the pioneering women who launched the commemoration to promote better working conditions, the right to vote and hold public office, and equality with men, would probably look at the world today "with a mixture of pride and disappointment."

It was discrimination against women that brought over one million women and men from the socialist movement onto the streets for rallies in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland on what was originally called International Working Women's Day on March 19, 1911.

The day became popular in Eastern Europe, Russia and the former Soviet bloc, and eventually spread around the globe. In some regions, it lost its political flavor and became an occasion for men to express their love for women with candy and flowers while in other regions, women's struggle for human rights and political and social equality remained the focus.

In 1975, during International Women's Year, the United Nations began celebrating March 8 as International Women's Day. Two years later the U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution proclaiming a day for women's rights and international peace. This year, events are being held in many countries to mark the 100th anniversary.

"The last century has seen an unprecedented expansion of women's legal rights and entitlements," Bachelet said, pointing to virtually universal voting rights for women, major inroads for women in professions from which they were banned, laws penalizing domestic violence in two-thirds of the world's nations, and U.N. Security Council recognition of sexual violence as a deliberate tactic of war.

But Bachelet, who became the first executive director of UN Women in January, said that despite this progress, "the hopes of equality expressed on that first International Women's Day are a long way from being realized."

Girls are still less likely to be in school than boys, almost two-thirds of illiterate adults are women, and every 90 seconds a woman dies in pregnancy or due to childbirth-related complications despite the knowledge and resources to make births safe, she said, and women continue to earn less than men for the same work and have unequal inheritance rights and access to land.

Despite some high-profile advances, Bachelet said, only 28 women are heads of state or government and just 8 percent are peace negotiators. Last week, the Inter-Parliamentary reported that while the number of women in legislatures reached an all-time high of 19.1 percent in 2010, "the target of gender balance in politics is still a distant one."

Cracking the glass ceiling also remains an uphill struggle for women in business, especially getting into boardrooms and heading major companies.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said in a report Monday that women farmers also face serious discrimination.

Giving women the same tools and resources as men, including better access to land, technology, financial services, education and access to markets could reduce the number of hungry people in the world by up to 150 million, the report said.

Babatunde Osotimehin, executive director of the U.N. Population Fund, said equal rights are advanced when girls can avoid child marriage and enjoy equal access to education, both men and women can plan their families, and pregnant women no longer fear losing their jobs.


Read more: http://www.kyivpost.com/news/world/detail/99179/#ixzz1G1nDqEkT

100th anniversary of International Women's Day

Kyivpost.com March 8, 2011

The head of the new U.N. women's agency said Tuesday there has been "remarkable progress" since International Women's Day was first celebrated a century ago but gender equality remains a distant goal because women still suffer widespread discrimination and lack political and economic clout.

Former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet said in a statement marking the 100th anniversary that the pioneering women who launched the commemoration to promote better working conditions, the right to vote and hold public office, and equality with men, would probably look at the world today "with a mixture of pride and disappointment."

It was discrimination against women that brought over one million women and men from the socialist movement onto the streets for rallies in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland on what was originally called International Working Women's Day on March 19, 1911.

The day became popular in Eastern Europe, Russia and the former Soviet bloc, and eventually spread around the globe. In some regions, it lost its political flavor and became an occasion for men to express their love for women with candy and flowers while in other regions, women's struggle for human rights and political and social equality remained the focus.

In 1975, during International Women's Year, the United Nations began celebrating March 8 as International Women's Day. Two years later the U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution proclaiming a day for women's rights and international peace. This year, events are being held in many countries to mark the 100th anniversary.

"The last century has seen an unprecedented expansion of women's legal rights and entitlements," Bachelet said, pointing to virtually universal voting rights for women, major inroads for women in professions from which they were banned, laws penalizing domestic violence in two-thirds of the world's nations, and U.N. Security Council recognition of sexual violence as a deliberate tactic of war.

But Bachelet, who became the first executive director of UN Women in January, said that despite this progress, "the hopes of equality expressed on that first International Women's Day are a long way from being realized."

Girls are still less likely to be in school than boys, almost two-thirds of illiterate adults are women, and every 90 seconds a woman dies in pregnancy or due to childbirth-related complications despite the knowledge and resources to make births safe, she said, and women continue to earn less than men for the same work and have unequal inheritance rights and access to land.

Despite some high-profile advances, Bachelet said, only 28 women are heads of state or government and just 8 percent are peace negotiators. Last week, the Inter-Parliamentary reported that while the number of women in legislatures reached an all-time high of 19.1 percent in 2010, "the target of gender balance in politics is still a distant one."

Cracking the glass ceiling also remains an uphill struggle for women in business, especially getting into boardrooms and heading major companies.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said in a report Monday that women farmers also face serious discrimination.

Giving women the same tools and resources as men, including better access to land, technology, financial services, education and access to markets could reduce the number of hungry people in the world by up to 150 million, the report said.

Babatunde Osotimehin, executive director of the U.N. Population Fund, said equal rights are advanced when girls can avoid child marriage and enjoy equal access to education, both men and women can plan their families, and pregnant women no longer fear losing their jobs.


Read more: http://www.kyivpost.com/news/world/detail/99179/#ixzz1G1nDqEkT

The Jewish Chronicle - FSU Jewish women take women s case to U N D C

The Jewish Chronicle - FSU Jewish women take women s case to U N D C

Project Kesher
Project Kesher activists Elena Kalnitskaya, Svetlana Yakimenko, Olga Krasko and Vlada Bystrova pose outside a U.N. workshop in New York on Feb. 25. " title="Project Kesher
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Project Kesher
Project Kesher activists Elena Kalnitskaya, Svetlana Yakimenko, Olga Krasko and Vlada Bystrova pose outside a U.N. workshop in New York on Feb. 25.

When Elena Kalnitskaya of Ukraine talked about her organization’s women’s empowerment projects at a United Nations conference last week, she was presenting the face of social progress in her country.

And she was doing it as a Jewish woman -- not unusual, perhaps, for an American participant in international gatherings, but worth a second look when the representatives in question are from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus.

Kalnitskaya and her three colleagues are from Project Kesher, a Jewish women’s organization that promotes human rights and women’s concerns in the former Soviet Union. They are the only representatives from the former Soviet Union at the weeklong conference. And, Kalnitskaya notes, Project Kesher is the only Jewish group standing up in an international forum for the rights of women of all ethnicities and faiths in a half-dozen Russian-speaking countries.

“That’s important because when people ask who we are, we say we’re Jews, and we’re here representing our countries,” said Kalnitskaya, 47, who lives in the eastern Ukraine city of Makeyevka.

Kalnitskaya spoke to JTA by Skype on Feb. 25 as she was wrapping up three intense days of meetings at the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women, which brought delegates from more than 4,000 nongovernmental organizations to U.N. headquarters in New York to discuss civil society, human rights and the advancement of women around the world.

She had spent the day in a workshop on women and technology, where she talked about Project Kesher’s computer training and job skills program. The program has helped more than 17,000 people, mostly women and girls, in the organization’s 17 computer centers throughout the former Soviet Union.

It’s been a long haul for Project Kesher, which started in 1989 as a partnership between Jewish women in North America and the Soviet Union focused on bringing American activist models to bear on issues including domestic violence, human trafficking, women’s health, anti-Semitism and intolerance in the soon-to-be-independent countries behind the Iron Curtain.

In its two decades, the group has gained the respect of political leaders in the region, a development that Illinois-based Executive Director Karyn Gershon attributes to the nonsectarian nature of its work.

Project Kesher activists in Belarus who work to gain access for more women to the country’s sole mammography machine are helping all women, not just Jews, Gershon points out. That’s also true of the tolerance-building projects the group runs in Ukraine, a country plagued by xenophobia and rising violence against non-Slavs.

The activists are motivated to do this work because of the Jewish values they learn through the organization’s Jewish education programs -- education dedicated to inspiring tikkun olam, or work to repair the world’s ills -- a relatively new concept in the former Soviet Union.

“We have a seat at the table now,” Gershon said, noting that Project Kesher works with the Russian Parliament, or Duma, as well as with top government officials in Ukraine, Belarus and Georgia on health and social issues. “They see that the Jewish community is not insular.”

At the United Nations, Kalnitskaya and her colleagues are trying to share their most successful models of empowerment with women from Third World countries facing the same struggles against illiteracy, sexual violence and job discrimination, which have been heightened by the global economic crisis.

Olga Krasko of Belarus outlined Project Kesher’s job training success at a workshop on women and financial literacy.

“Women from Haiti and Ghana came up to me and said how much they appreciated hearing about our methodology, learning how we started,” said Krasko, of Polotsk. “Today it’s useless to talk about ending domestic violence and sex trafficking if we don’t empower women with legal and financial knowledge.”

“Here are women from Africa, Asia, learning from Jewish women from the FSU, picking up their models,” Gershon added. “We get 5,000 hits a week on our website, people downloading our materials, using our models. Worldwide, people are picking up that there are Jewish women doing this humanitarian work -- and it’s not just American Jews but Jews from the FSU.”

Project Kesher is set to co-host a U.N.-sanctioned panel March 3 examining women’s strategic use of technology to build civil society and promote gender equality.

“We’ll share our experience beginning from 20 years ago, when people in Russia didn’t even have telephones,” said Svetlana Yakimenko, the group’s Moscow-based director. “Today our information is immediately available on our website, we have virtual offices and we Skype our meetings.

Also this week, Yakimenko and her colleagues are hitting the Hill, meeting with U.S. State Department and congressional figures to talk about American support for civil society initiatives in the former Soviet Union.

“The thousands of women in Project Kesher want our voices to be heard by American decision-makers,” said Yakimenko, noting that when the group’s American leadership visits the FSU, they meet with government officials in those countries together with their local colleagues.

“It’s important for political leaders in Belarus to meet our American women,” said Krasko. “And when we tell Russian government leaders that we are representing the women of Russia at the United Nations, they listen to us.”

Read more:The Jewish Chronicle - FSU Jewish women take women s case to U N D C