How many of you have ever witnessed an act of violence?Think-pair-Share

How did you feel

Witnessed an act of violence against a woman?

Think-pair-Share

How did you feel?

Gender Based Violence Violence and Women

What do we think of…

When I say Violence against women? Think-Pair-Share

I anticipated that you might say…

RapeMolestatio

n Verbal Emotional

Abuse

Sex trafficking prostitution Physical

abuseDomestic violence

Mostly domestic

issues

Our Objective

SWBAT define violence against women and give examples of acts of violence toward women around the world

So lets define Violence Against Women

UN defines this as- -any act of gender based violence that

results in or is likely to result in, physical, sexual, or mental harm or suffering to women, including threats, of such acts, coercion, or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or private.

?QUE QUE?

physical Emotional Deprivation of

liberty Threats Home public

Social & economic Costs

Women cant be productive

Cant generate income

Cant contribute to society

Need more health care

Wait a minute!

Why do we care about women? What kinds of things dodo they do for society?

Violence Against Women

Major public health and human rights issue around the world

Didn’t find any good info on the UN website

Went to the World Health Organization Lots of relevant info

Lack of access

…access to education opportunity low social status

All linked to high occurrences to VAW

Just the FACTS baby!

Lets talk about facts about Violence against women here in the United States.

Share your stats with someone around you

Are you surprised by the statistics?

Violence against women/girls globally

China

China & Gendercide

1979 Limited number of children Desire for boys Olden days: leave baby girls in the

gutter Now: abortion

What are the implications of this?

30 million more boys

By 2020 WTF? What are the implications of this? Rise in crime Expansion of sexual trafficking &

violence Rise in abductions Rise male/male sexual violence

OOOOOH SNAP!

Chinese Government recognizes that is problematic

Can they prevent it from happening? Using propaganda to deter female

infanticide.

Afghanistan/Pakistan

Some background info

Dominantly Muslim Traditionally women have been inferior Muslim Religion Civil law Taliban-very regressive Have declared that women be treated

equally

Are they? Oh Hell No!Check this out

An article by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon recently published in the Daily Beast highlights the issue of violence against women in Afghanistan.  The article tells the story of a young woman named Nadia (name changed), who had been married off at the age of thirteen in order to resolve a dispute between her uncle and another local family.  From the beginning, she was abused and beaten by her husband and his relatives.  When she tried to run away she was turned in to the police by her neighbors and returned to her in-laws.  As punishment for her attempted escape, her in-laws cut off both of her ears and most of her nose.  She was treated for her injuries at the U.S. military clinic at Camp Ripley and she is now living in a women’s shelter where she awaits a visa that will take her to the United States to undergo reconstructive surgery.

This is at present a growing trend!

UN Report Violence is escalating Rape/sexual violence Attacks on girls’ schools Female students

Gasoline and acid attacks!

This is Shahnaz Bibi who was attacked over ten years ago. The photo was taken in Lahore, Pakistan.

This is sixteen year old Najaf Sultana, also in Lahore, Pakistan. Her father felt there were too many women in the family, and attacked her while she was asleep. Her family abandoned her after the attack. She is blind . She has undergone

countless plastic surgeries to no avail.

Shamsia Husseini was 17, walking to school in Afghanistan when she was attacked because girls who go to school are whores. The literacy rates for Afghani women have hovered between ten and fifteen percent- yes, that’s ten percent who know HOW to read, not ten percent who don’t know-but now thousands and thousands of girls are attending school thanks to the American intervention and liberation. Many girls are attacked and their lives are threatened simply for attending class. Husseini has bravely stated that she will continue school even if the religious police keep trying to kill her.

In my research I found that…

Acid attacks are happening everywhere!

Ethiopia

In 2007, Ethiopia’s Kamilat Mehdi and both of her sisters were pushed into an alley and attacked with acid by a man who had been stalking Mehdi for four years. Reuters’ Andrew Heavens reported in EthioNews that all girls were injured, but Mehdi suffered the brunt of the damage. Her eyelids were burned off.  Sheikh Mohammed Al Amoudi, the world’s 64th richest man according to Forbes 2010, is an oil and real estate tycoon known for helping Ethiopian businesses, arts, and charitable causes. Heroically, he flew Mehdi to a hospital in France and paid for all of her medical expenses, so she survived. Her sisters were also treated with his generosity. Women’s human rights groups in Ethiopia say such attacks are thankfully rare in Ethiopia, but that most women suffer other forms of violence against them by intimate partners or hopefuls. Mehdi has been described as heroic, refusing to let this horror dampen her dreams for the future. But heartbreakingly, during treatment she described some of the pain. “It’s hard because every day they do something, and there’s no anaesthetic,” she said. Since she cannot close her eyes, she must sleep with a bandage on her face.

Iran

Iran

Iran’s Ameneh Bahrami was harassed repeatedly by Majid Movahedi, who pushed himself against her at every opportunity and constantly asked her to go out with him. She begged him to leave her alone, telling him that she was already married. He threatened to kill her. Finally, he attacked her with acid. “I decided to splash acid on her face so her husband would leave her and I could have her,” Movahedi told the courts. Article 209 of Iran’s constitution states that a woman’s life is valued only half as much as a man’s, in accordance with religious law. While similar crimes frequently go unpunished under court systems that recognize women as men’s property or consider women’s testimony only half the worth a man’s, sometimes sharia’s eye for an eye mandate is fulfilled. In this case, Movahedi was sentenced to have acid dripped in his eye. The victim declined total retribution of having acid splashed in her attacker’s face. “That is impossible and horrific. Just drip 20 drops of acid in his eyes so he can realise what pain I am undergoing.” Ironically, human rights groups have been up in arms about Iran’s cruel and inhumane punishments. In Iran, crimes against women are seldom recognized. In this instance, they got it right, and so instantly the international rights community forgets about the women and all the other women like her.

Cambodia

Cambodia

Sokreun Mean is a Cambodian woman who was attacked by her ex husband’s new wife. Cambodia’s population is primarily Buddhist, usually considered the least patriarchal religious group. Cambodia’s acid attack epidemic is interesting because the phenomenon usually takes place between jealous women fighting over a man. Cambodians are nearly all powerless in a lawless society where human life can be snuffed out for a twenty dollar bill. Women have the least power and their husband or boyfriend is often the only “stability” they have. In an absolutely reprehensible display of jealousy, the phenomenon of burning off another woman’s beauty is rampant. The philandering husband is seldom the victim of such attacks.

Other places…

Africa