Posted on 03/08/2011 9:56:17 AM PST by Sub-Driver
On International Women's Day NOW Calls for End to the "War on Women" Statement of NOW President Terry O'Neill
March 8, 2011
Today we celebrate International Women's Day, exactly 100 years after it was first established. Women have made incredible strides in that time -- both in the United States and around the globe. We cheer these advancements and thank the feminist activists whose dedication and fearlessness made them possible. At the same time, we are under no illusion about the road ahead, and we take this occasion to reaffirm our pledge that we will win full equality for all women.
The challenges before us are extraordinary. Many countries and cultures still view and treat women as second-class citizens. Human rights violations against women and girls take place in virtually every society. The global business of sex trafficking exploits millions of girls and women each year. In some parts of the world, rape is commonly used as a weapon of war. Even at one of the most triumphant moments in recent history -- the successful uprising in Egypt -- a woman reporter was targeted by a gang of men for a brutal sexual assault.
Here at home, we are no strangers to violence and injustice fueled by misogyny. Every two minutes in the U.S., someone, most likely a girl or woman, is sexually assaulted. Women continue to be paid less than men. They face discrimination at work and school. They are marginalized and objectified in the media. And now we face an all-out war on women's reproductive rights and their ability to access health care.
If conservatives are successful in their efforts, countless women will lose access to a wide range of services at family planning clinics, including mammograms, pap smears, screening for HIV and sexually transmitted infections, as well as contraception. Hospital emergency rooms will be allowed to let a pregnant woman die rather than perform a life-saving abortion. Public funding for abortion care will be permanently outlawed, and tax penalties will be imposed on companies and employees whose insurance covers abortion. The House of Representatives also voted to decimate funding for essential programs like prenatal care, women's and children's nutritional assistance, job training and college tuition assistance.
Sadly, the "war on women" isn't restricted to U.S. women. The House is poised to deliver a huge blow to the global women's health community by cutting international family planning assistance. This strike would include the elimination of all U.S. funds designated for UNFPA, the international development agency that works to reduce poverty and promote women's reproductive health in underserved areas around the world.
NOW calls on Congress and President Obama to vigorously defend the health and dignity of women everywhere. On International Women's Day, NOW also reiterates its call for the long-overdue U.S. ratification of CEDAW (the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women) -- the most complete international agreement on basic human rights for women. Our message is simple: The individual atrocities and indignities committed against women every day will not stop until the larger war against our sex is ended and women's full equality is guaranteed.
A simple solution is to change the “social sanction” around the world.
“Social sanctions” are the unwritten laws that almost every person, in every society, strongly enforces. Parents teach such laws to their children, and to a greater or lesser extent, most every person will help in some way to enforce these unwritten laws.
In America, for example, one social sanction might be if a person put on a t-shirt that said, “I have sex with young children”. They would have a hard time walking down a city sidewalk without being assailed by someone. This could run from looks of disdain, all the way to physical attack. Social sanctions can be very, very serious.
So this new unwritten law, this new social sanction, should be taught by women to other women, and to girls, everywhere around the world.
“Women and girls should *always* carry a bladed weapon with them, and if attacked by a man, they must cut him with it.”
Now, it does not matter if this is a 440 stainless fighting knife, or as little as a sharpened piece of scrap metal, or even broken glass, in very poor countries.
The social sanction is of women, demanding of other women and girls, that they must *always* have a bladed weapon on their person, and they *must* cut any boy or man that attacks them.
“Because this is what girls do.” That is the sole reason, with no other need for justification.
And then what happens? Undoubtedly some women will be beaten, or even killed, when attacked by men. But that happens right now.
But more importantly, men who *might* attack will have to think twice. And this makes all the difference in the world. “Does she have a knife? Will she cut me with it?”, are thoughts that persuade men to *not* attack in the first place.
There is a critical mass, of sorts, of women carrying bladed weapons. Many women and girls just won’t. But many will. And it is up to men to guess which ones are armed, and which ones are helpless. And they cannot tell. But the result is the same.
“I better not attack her, because she might have a knife, and she might cut me!”
And the world is changed.
“Because that is what girls do.”
“You don’t have your knife?? Here, I have an extra. You can have it. You don’t want to be out without one.”
Yes. In the middle east they subjugate women. Is that what she is talking about?
This is exactly what I thought it would be, decrying the loss of free services and restrictions on abortion, while ignoring the total subjugation of women under Islam.
To NOW, family planning clinics are places where familes are destroyed at the espense of the U.S. Taxpayers.
They have the hubris to assume they speak for all women. Any woman who doesn't march lockstep is derided. Stay at home Mom's are prisoners, etc. As I've said before, they are a miserable group of women clinging to each other and flotsam in the water as their ship goes down.
“March 8, 2011 - Today we celebrate International Women’s Day...”
Who knew? Fat Tuesday and IWD on the same day. As for me, I celebrate the women of Mardi Gras. Let the good times roll.
Any organization that promotes a day called “Love Your Body” Day that encourages celebrating by sitting around in sweats eating chocolates has no legitimacy in my book
Governor Palin called Griffin on it but NOW members are not known for their face to face courage. Making disgusting remarks from afar and then hiding behind their First Amendment Rights are more their style!
An armed society is a polite society.
She is about the unfunniest (is that a word?) person I've heard. I saw here on TV, and the extent of her humor was how she likes black men. Who cares?
It would be as if had a one-dimensional routine where I talked about nothing but taking out the garbage.
Speaking about taking out the garbage, NOW and Ms. Griffin are no match for Sarah Palin. Sarah is no wallflower.
An end to Islam would go far towards accomplising their goal.
An end to Islam would go far towards accomplishing their goal.
“Social sanctions” are the unwritten laws that almost every person, in every society, strongly enforces. “
I remember those...one of them was “you don’t hit girls”.
Unintended consequences: knives + PMS = danger!
“Someone needs to tell these whiners that males are much more likely to be victims of violence than females.”
Where’d you get that information? Everything I’ve read has it at around 75-85% (of non-lethal assaults) on women, not men.
I've seen them at the PETA building in Norfolk.
I once went to one of PETAs employee's homes to fix her refrigerator and
it was full of steaks, chicken and other meats. She said it was her husbands food,
yea right.
I call for an end to NOW and an end to NOWs war on babies.
Probably nobody but black men.
For that matter, all men would run for the bathroom to vomit at the thought of Kathy Griffin pursuing them for any reason.
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