Womens Rights Are Human Rights

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Womens Rights Are Human Rights

• Bound Feet, Dowry Deaths and Female Genital
  Mutilation

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Introduction

• The aim of this presentation is to get you to
  think about why being female in some parts of the
  world means that your life experiences are worse
  than those of men
• It is not meant to be anti-men, a claim that life
  for all women is awful or something that suggests
  that the western world has all the answers

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China The Historical Picture

• A patriarchal society
• Women sold as possessions
• Marriage before the girl reached puberty
• The bride lived in her in-laws home
• Infanticide was common
• Foot binding a symbol of beauty and gentility
• Position improved between 1949 1976

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Foot Binding

• When a child was between 3 and 11 years old her
  feet would be washed and massaged. Then the
  childs toes were turned under and pressed
  against the bottom of her foot. The arches were
  broken as the foot was pulled straight with the
  leg, and a long narrow cotton bandage would be
  tightly wound around the foot from the toes to
  the ankle to hold the toes in place. After 2 or 3
  years the feet actually shrunk. The feet would be
  so deformed that they would be unbearable to walk
  on and often, because they were deprived of
  blood, toes would fall off.

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Bound Feet
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China Now

• Changes to economic policies since the death of
  Mao in 1976 have resulted in problems for women
  in China
• One-child policy
• Infanticide Anhui sex ratio 100113
• Women forced into having abortions
• Kidnapping in a 2 year period over 75 000
  women/girls were abducted

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India The Historical Picture

• A patriarchal society
• Women sold as possessions
• Marriage before the girl reached puberty
• The bride lived in her in-laws home
• Infanticide was common
• Sati was practised
• Dowry was traditionally paid

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India Now

• Position still poor
• Infanticide still common estimates show 1 in 10
  girls are killed
• Sex ratio 92100 in 1993 one village had a sex
  ratio of 14100
• Sex determination of 8000 abortions in one
  clinic 7,990 were of female foetuses
• Government statistics estimate 1 woman dies every
  102 minutes due to dowry deaths

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Dowry

• Dowry is a form of theft legitimised by
  marriage. It is economic bondage. When the woman
  stops being frightened by torture the only option
  left is to burn her.
• (Akbar newspaper editor)

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Female Genital Mutilation

• This is the removal of part, or all, of the
  female genitalia
• Infibulation is the most severe type. It involves
  removing the clitoris and the inner lips. The
  outer lips are then cut away. Finally they are
  stretched across and sewn together. A small hole
  is left to allow urine and menstrual blood to
  escape

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Female Genital Mutilation

• Depending on country, ethnicity and
  social-economic factors FGM can be carried out at
  different times, from just after birth to some
  time during the first pregnancy, but usually is
  carried out when the female is aged between 4
  8.
• Estimated that 135 million women worldwide have
  experienced it
• It reduces the womans desire for sex.

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Case Study
Hannah Koroma was 10 when she under went FGM.
This is what she says about it I was taken to a
very dark room and undressed. I was blindfolded
and stripped naked. I was forced to lie flat on
my back by 4 strong women, two holding each leg.
Another woman sat on my chest to stop me moving.
A piece of cloth was forced into my mouth to stop
me screaming. They used a rusty can lid. When it
began I put up a big fight. The pain was terrible
and unbearable. During this fight I was badly cut
and lost blood. All those who took part were half
drunk on alcohol.
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Female Genital Mutilation

• FGM shows an attempt to confer an inferior
  status on women by branding them with this mark
  which diminishes them and is a constant reminder
  to them that they are only women, inferior to
  men, that they do not even have any rights over
  their own bodies of fulfilment either bodily or
  personal As we can view male circumcision as
  being a measure of hygiene, in the same way we
  can only see excision as a measure of
  inferiorization. (Thomas Sankara, former
  President of Burkina Faso)