QD06 the issues you are discussing aren't really ones that can be solved by tactical measures like fundraising, protests, boycotts, conferences, etc etc. These are things every woman has to deal with day in and day out, and they are things we are trying to deal with, however it's not as "easy" to do as getting the vote or an abortion clinic.

Issues like that will take decades because it requires changing the hearts and minds of people. You don't stop men liking super thin models with a protest rally, nor to you stop the factors that allow girls (and many men) like that to be exploited over night. Rest assured however, that we do what we can on a daily basis, perhaps you don't see it, but maybe that's because you are not as affected by it.

Look at the Gay rights movement, they may have one things like the right to marriage through protests (I'm talking in the West), but homosexuality being recognized as a legitimate relationship and lifestyle took years of very suttle changing of attitudes.

Look at women, we won the right to vote, but in the West it's taken years so that it's become socially acceptable to work, to not be a virgin at marriage, to have a child out of wedlock, etc.

It's not that we women don't recognize and deal with the issues we face at home, we have no choice but to deal with them. The issues were dealing with now are fundamental cultural differences that will take a long time to overcome, sometimes it's just nice to stage a conference or a protest and win some women the right to drive a car, let's our frustrations out.

You state your case well and its hard to disagree with any of your points. I guess you are saying that to be effective we have to make sure that everything is right in our own backyards. Forgive me for paraphrasing you in such a simplistic way.

However, while I take your point that we have to ensure our interventions do not contribute to the problem, I cannot agree that we should not all vigorosly oppose the arcane and evil practices of some societies that are "justified" by culture or religion and deny their citizens the most basic of human rights under their legal systems.

Don't get me wrong, I am not advocating any more US invasions in the name of freedom, oil, national interest or anything else.

We had better live as we think, otherwise we shall end up by thinking as we lived. - Paul Bourget

Richard,

The point was not that we should stop but rather focus the way we fight. We have to look at the situation fully and then move forward. One of the ways of moving forward is to make sure that you are not a part of the problem. Albeit it is the hardest way to work on issues.

Human beings tend to focus on others rather than their on issues. You should never stop trying to help others however you should never stop correcting yourself either. I know many people in Women's, Gay, and Civil Right's movements who are the worst people and will do some very low down things to keep their topic in the public view. They usually jump from one hot topic or situation to the next. However the cause of the problems or issues still exist and no one tries to address it.

We have won when there is no need for women's shelters not when there is an abundance of them. The last time I checked more are opening every day. We have won when there is no need for an abortion clinic not when we have them advertising and competing for customers. We have won when there are no more liquor, car, burger advertisements with half naked women in them. Do you think these ads are a coincidence? We have won when all human beings are treated as equal not just a certain group.

Richard didn't England benefit from the slave trade also. The same as colonialism which also fueled the class structure back home. The abolishing of the slave trade was then helping to correct the structure at home. As I said though people like to trumpet such events but don't look at the full picture. The slave trade was abolished but it continued in the form of colonialism until recently and today under the disguise of world trade. Free or cheap labor. I would argue the effects of which can still be seen in many countries in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. The same way that slavery continued in the US under the disguise of Jim Crow and Sharecropping and today with migrant labor.

Act your age not your shoe size

Are you questioning the motivation of those who push for equality of women or are you arguing that things are so messed up in the west that us westerners should concentrate on our own problems before trying to solve the inequalities of others?

I don't really get your point. I agree that the media focuses on issues that are highlighted by political agendas and that there is plenty that needs fixing in our own societies but surely we should all push for, and support basic human rights.

Are you saying that the lives of women in the west are often plagued with low self esteem and that they should concentrate on their own issues and forget the plight of others?

Surely, women have the right to make their own mistakes, enjoy their own successes and develop their own insecurities and their own achievements. Basic human rights is everyone's business. We are all memebers of the human race.

England in the 1830s was a deeply divided and unjust nation, with a stiffling class sysytem and only limited suffrage based on class, sex and education. However, William Wilberforce concentrated his considerable skills not on the social injustices of his own country but on the horrendous slave trade. He was eventually successful and within a generation slavery was banned in America. According to your argument, he sdould not have bothered. The subjagation of women in many parts of the world is just as big a problem as slavery was then and in just as much need of correction.

First of all if you don't know what's happening in a country you can't do anything about it. So while it may seem like jumping on a bandwagon, it's also about learning about the situation.

Women's issues are always ignored and pushed under the rug,no war has ever been fought because women were being mistreated. The only people who care are other women. And there are lots and have been lots of women's organizations working in these countries and still working in these countries before they made the papers, but they just have not been recognized in the media. I can get you some lists if you like.

I'm not exactly sure what your point is. That because we haven't figured it all out in the west yet we should stop trying to help women worse off than us?

Or is it, that because we didn't win these rights that way we thought we did we should just give up.

You aren't making a point at all actually. All your saying is that things aren't perfect and I should just shut up and accept it. Sorry, but no.

Gypsy,

The point is that we often in the west assume that we are going to help. However we pick and chose our battles not based on wheter people actually ask for our help but based on media hot topics. Who cared about the Afghan women when the Russians were occupying the country and raping the women.How many women were in school then? Nobody cared because it was not reported in the news. Where were the women rushing to help there fellow sisters in the refugees camps in Pakistan? The Taliban were heralded as heroes because they were helping to rebuild the society in Afghanistan.

However when US policy shifted they became villified, the same as in Saudi. The Saudis were lauded during the first Gulf war now they are villified. We choose to dehumanize and villify groups of people based on policy not actual facts. I say this because African Americans were victims of these same policy shifts for centuries. The gains that women have gotten have been because of the gains African Americans died and struggled for.

The Suffrage rights act in the US was not to give women the right to vote. The people in power at the time could have cared less about women voting. However what they did care about was keeping Blacks from having a majority or voice in the country. If you don't believe me research the number of black in high political positions and the demographics of the US after the civil war up until the depression. So what do they have to do but increase the voting base by allowing white women to vote.

The same with the Civil Rights movement. How much womens rights legislation was passed during or after the Civil Rights movement? The point being that a lot of the gains you think that women had was not just because they marched and protested but economic and political reasons. The civil rights movement did not get laws passed because black people were being killed or did not have equal rights. The same as the Civil war was not to stop slavery.

You can jump on bandwagons but in the end you still have to go back home and deal with the your issues and the issues there. Where we have laws but nothing has really changed.

Feminism is not about making these women go to work, or wear scanty clothing. What it's about is making sure these women have access to basic things, like health care, education and justice. Things most men have access to. It's about making sure that that girl in Saudi gets the same justice as any man in Saudi.

Unfortunatly many many women don't have access to these simple things. Once we can provide them with that, than it is their choice what they do with their lives. But it women around the world don't fight for a woman in Afghanistans right to a gynecologist, who will? Given the political situation she can't, and men in Afghanistan certainly won't lift a finger.

I am not saying stop fighting but make sure the people you are fighting for actually want you or need you to fight for them.

I am not questioning your self respect but be honest humans due tend to this. If I can hide behind a cause I don't have to work on myself. I am too busy to evaluate myself.

Many women in the US have chosen to stop work and raise families. Have the abadoned the cause or just added another dimension? One that was being taken away by the pressure to be a part of the movement and its guidelines. Do they have right to work or not work? Do they have the right to raise their families or become a coporate leader? Yes they do. However if they chose to not work they are lambasted as subjating themselves to men.

I just don't have to fight the causes or campaigns that are the latest buzz in the media. I can actually respect a person enough to ask them first do you need my help. The people who get caught in campaigns fail to realize this. The best campaign is to change yourself at least that is one less messed up person in the world. Change yourself, your family, your fathers, uncles, brothers, teach your sons to respect women. Show your sons what a woman who respects herself looks like.

I will never stop fighting. I am having a hard time fighting with myself.

Act your age not your shoe size

Excuse me? We aren't hiding behind any shouts or campaigns, I'm not exactly sure what you are talking about?

Are you talking about my personal self respect?

If you are talking about men respecting women, than no man anywhere truly respects women, regardless of culture. That's why we have to start respecting ourselves, one of the ways we are going to do that is by fighting for our rights. I don't see what's wrong with that.

As for African Americans, the plight is very much the same, but what are you saying, stop fighting and just accept your place in life? That's ridiculous.

Gypsy,

I beg to difer your reply is still a cop out. My point was not that. I worked closely with employee relations at my last job. The majority of our cases were not men versus women issues but women versus women issues. It opened my eyes alot. Women have a lot of freedoms the same as African Americans also. They also have got caught up and still are looking at the temporary cures. However the lack of self respect is so evident.

It is one of the key ingredients to helping solve the problems but many of us have lost it in the campaigns. A woman can be naked or wearing a Burkha if she doesn't respect herself how can a man respect her. You can hide behind the shouts and campaigns but what happens when you go to China and fufill the mission.... You still have to come home and look at yourself in the mirror... So ask yourself who are you fighting for women rights or are you just keeping yourself busy so you don't have to look at your own issues.

Act your age not your shoe size

QD06, rights and freedoms are not temporary cures. No we can't change how men think about us, only men can do that, but at the very least we can fight so that our lives are not completely controlled by men.

I don't pretend to have solved the problem, but as long as there are places in the world where men can run to and find women who they can treat as slaves then we will never beable to cure the deeper issues.

As long as there is a woman somewhere who men can point to and say "Look she knows here place" or "She belongs to me", we'll never beable to cure anything at all.

Feminism. What did women gain? The majority of men still look at women the same. The majority of the issues still exist even in the West. Yes you can vote, get an abortion, go to work but what have you really gained. I say this because we like to try and correct societal ills with campaigns, laws and social programs. However we never really address the real cause of the societal problems-diseased hearts.

We pass a law and the disease just mutates to another form sometimes it is even more deadlier than the initial illness. We have been appeased because of a law and then we celebrate and move on. However the disease is still there and now is not being treated because people are focusing on the temporary cure(laws/campaigns) i.e. Roe vs Wade, Civil Rights Act and.....

I was listening to Civil Rights activist who put it so pointedly. She said we were fighting for equality, and equal justice not to be white or be like white people. So ladies please forget about the East and your sisters here. We in the west tend to think we have cured the disease and want to give the whole world the temporary cure...... Please work on the disease which still exists in the your own countries. Please have the courage to work on it seriously instead of shouting/focusing on the temporary cures and thinking that you have solved the problem.

Act your age not your shoe size

The women's right movement has come a long way in the West ducky but in the East it hasn't even started. The more time I spend in Asia the more I realize that the rights and freedoms I took for granted as a girl growing up in Canada have not even been introduced to this part of the world. The over emphasis on virginity and purity for example are still alive and well here, Hell, most women in this region aren't allowed to vote much less choose careers or husbands.

In the West we've begun to take the rights our mothers and grandmothers won for us for granted, but here in the East women are still struggling for this right. Should women just sit back and say "Hey, that woman is getting lashes for being with a man that isn't a relative is right because that is the law of the country" or should we women be saying "screw country laws and state laws, women should have the same rights as men world wide and if my sisters can't fight then I will fight for them."

Millions of women if not billions live daily without the rights to protection, job equality, and even the right to bear a child when they choose too, and it's time that stopped.

I think another reason that it seems like there is less of a feminist movement is that many of the issues fought for, particularly in the last half of the 20th century, can now be confronted through the courts or HR departments or the police and rarely requires taking to the streets.

Discrimination obviously still happens in promotions and salary and harassment and domestic violence and non-domestic violence, but the laws of many nations now explicitly make such discrimination illegal. So instead of organizing a movement to seek redress, women can now appeal to institutional resolution processes. Again, those processes don't always work, but I think that for better or worse they have replaced activism.

However I do NOT think the feminist movement is smaller than it once was. In fact, I think it is exponentially larger than it was even 20 years ago. It may not be in the streets but it is very often now built in to the belief system girls grow up with. It is at the core of the micro-credit movement. It is in universities where the head of Harvard gets excoriated for saying women can't do science as well as men -- and it's not just "radical" feminists who attack him, but editorials in mainstream newspapers and equal numbers of male and female academics.

I think young women who say they are not feminists are simply lacking a decent history lesson. Of course they are feminists. It take a lot of effort not to be, because they would have to make a concerted effort to reject the improvements in opportunities and responsibilities gained over the past 50 or 100 years.

Many women are no longer focused on the issues because the womens rights movement has come a long way. Things that women have fought for, and won, are now things we take for granted. We should remember that women have only had the right to vote since the 1920's. In addition, it took a world war to start integrating women into the work society.

If the freedoms that women now enjoy were to be taken away, then you'd see a huge uproar.

The abortion issue is not being pursued because I don't think many people believe Roe vs Wade will be overturned.

feel that the womens right movement isnt as huge as it once was. I mean once we have got the vote in the western coutries - and some of us have the right to choose about abortion it seems to have died down, women just arent as interested as they use to be in the subject - as the celebrations show more women are intereseted in fashion, yoga, cooking and so on and so forth. Gypsy is right - you know i didnt even know it was international womens day and i have never even heard of this before - how sad is that! Maybe once we can get the women of the world focusing on each other instead of what designer handbag, watch, car they drive-that would be a nice way to celebrate.

Here's the section on women's rights from the NHRC's 2005 Annual Report:

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Rights of Women:

The general situation of woman has improved. The most important factor is to make education available at all levels. There has been an increase in the percentage of women employed in senior positions. In addition to this, women themselves have widened their own prospects by being introduced to new fields and by their participation in political life. The women themselves have also opened up their thoughts by having debates and discussing certain issues. Despite the positive developments, the Committee advocates more to be done in order to abolish all sorts of discrimination against women and to place them on an equal footing with men. The State of Qatar is not a signatory to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and as such the Committee recommends that it join the Convention in order to combat discrimination against women.

Forms of Discrimination:

• Discrimination in the Freedom of Movement.

• Discrimination to the obtainment of Nationality.

• Discrimination in the place of Employment and particularly of the principle of equal payment for equal work not being implemented. The discrimination is usually in the form of allowances such as residence allowances, or senior official loans or allocation of lands.

• Women suffer in cases of custody of children whereby custody is usually granted to the man as he has the means to support the child.

Domestic Violence and other types of violence:

Women suffered in some instances from violence exercised by their family members which was increased by the pressures of society. No accurate statistics are available because of the social precautions surrounding the issue. The culture, traditions all add to the reluctance of victims to report such incidents. In situations where complaints are filed the courts may elect to protect the privacy of the family and may take into considerations which favour the society's view rather than the woman's.

House Maids:

Housemaids are more susceptible to suffering from many forms of abuse and violations to their human rights. The main reason for this is the economic and social factors that compel them to work for longer hours i.e. usually the whole week without a rest period and for financial considerations (as the wages may be minimal). Housemaids are at an increased risk to physical or sexual abuse, and they may even resort to prostitution as a last resort particularly if they fail to find alternative employment or transfer of sponsorship.

Trafficking Women:

Trafficking in Women is usually in the form of women who are vulnerable being exploited into forced prostitution because they have no other option. They may be employed in hotels, cafes etc however they are actually offering sexual services.

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The full report (as a PDF) is available here:

http://tinyurl.com/3ctzo2

For those of us not paying attention, the Taliban is no longer in control of 2/3 of Afghanistan and things have changed significantly for women since then.

That article was published in 1998.

The Day the Music Died:

Women and Girls in Afghanistan

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

by Karen Johnson,

Vice President Membership

The music died for millions of women and girls in Afghanistan in September of 1996. That was when the ultraconservative Taliban Islamic militia took control of the capital city of Kabul and more than two-thirds of Afghanistan. The Taliban considers itself a religious army and its leaders or "mullahs" have a unique interpretation of Islam as it applies to women. Thus on Sept. 27, 1996, the Taliban issued an edict that forbade women and girls from working or going to school. The edict took effect immediately, and women who tried to go to work the next day were beaten and forced to return home. Since that date many more edicts have been issued by the Taliban which restrict the human rights of all Afghans. Music, television, kites, mixed-sex photos, cameras, short hair, smoking and applause are forbidden. An 8:00 p.m. curfew is strictly enforced, and all men must grow beards of sufficient length.

On Sept. 26, 1996, women were 70% of the school teachers, 40% of the doctors, 50% of government workers and 50% of the university students — what a difference a day makes! Today, a woman must be accompanied by a male relative in order to leave the confines of her home. When a women is outside the home she is compelled to wear a head to toe covering called a "burqa," with only a small mesh opening over the eyes to facilitate a limited view of the outside world. It is important to note that the peripheral vision of Afghan women wearing burqas is so restrictive that many have been injured due to poor visibility.

Women have been beaten for showing a bit of ankle or having noisy shoes. Women are not allowed to speak in public and any female from puberty until death may only speak to men who are relatives. Homes in which women reside must have all the windows painted over to obscure view.

Health care is virtually nonexistent for women, and journalists report that the girls living in the Kabul orphanage have not been let outside since the edict was issued. Tens of thousands of families are starving. In the city of Kabul alone there are 40,000 widows who can no longer work to support themselves and their families. Some widows are fortunate enough to have male children who can beg for the family. Others sit in dark houses praying for humanitarian aid which can only be delivered to them by a male intermediary. Many are eating grass, suffering from skin diseases due to the lack of sunlight and dying due to starvation and untreated illness.

The Taliban asserts that the prohibitions for women and girls are religious and protective in nature. Yet it is known that many Taliban break their own rules and send their daughters to school in other countries. Since the Taliban took control of much of Afghanistan, the production and export of opium poppies (used to make heroin) has increased 25 percent, making Afghanistan, with 40 percent of the world's growth, the number one opium producer on the planet. The Taliban, which forbids drug use, does collect a 20 percent tax from the opium farmers.

The United States Government and the United Nations—along with all but three of the world's nations—refuses to recognize the Taliban as a legitimate government because of their human rights abuses. However, the U.S. oil company Unocal is the major player in an international consortium that plans to begin building a multi-billion dollar gas pipeline through Afghanistan by the end of this year. As long as the Taliban is in power, this pipeline would benefit their oppressive regime.

NOW Advisory Board Co-Chair and Feminist Majority leader Eleanor Smeal has spearheaded the feminist response to the atrocities occurring in Afghanistan. In late January 1998 NOW's Vice Presidents Elizabeth Toledo and Karen Johnson joined Smeal, NOW LDEF President Kathy Rodgers and other feminist leaders in a meeting with Assistant Secretary for South Asian Affairs Karl Inderfurth to discuss the plight of Afghan women and girls. The two Afghan women in the group, Sima Wali, president of Refugee Women in Development, and Zieba Shorish-Shamley, chair of Women's Alliance for Peace and Human Rights in Afghanistan, had recently returned from the Afghan refugee camps in Pakistan. They told of the heartbreaking misery and suffering caused by the Taliban's oppressive regime. According to Assistant Secretary Inderfurth, the U.S. influence on the Taliban is minimal and a quick resolution to the oppression is not likely for years. In Inderfurth's judgment the only thing the Taliban desires is recognition by the United Nations. Meanwhile, the conditions for Afghan women and girls is abysmal.

What can we do to help? Spread the word about the plight of Afghan women and girls. All NOW chapters were mailed fact sheets that can be copied and distributed. Urge United States and United Nations leaders to continue not recognizing the Taliban as a legitimate government and to do everything within their power to restore Afghan women's basic human rights to work, education, health care and safety. Encourage Unocal to immediately suspend any and all business ventures with Afghanistan until women's basic human rights are restored.