Q: discuss the following concepts in view of women rights?
Work: Equal
pay for equal work[1] is the concept of labor
rights that
individuals doing the same work should receive the same remuneration.[2] It is most commonly used in the
context of sexual discrimination, in
relation to the gender pay gap. Equal
pay relates to the full range of payments and benefits, including basic pay,
non-salary payments, bonuses and allowances.
Employment: The
rights of women and men to have equal pay and equal benefits for equal work
were openly denied by the British Hong Kong Government up to the early
1970s. Leslie Wah-Leung Chung
1917–2009), President of the Hong Kong Chinese Civil Servants'
Association (1965–68), contributed to the establishment of equal pay for men
and women, including the right for married women to be permanent employees.
Before this, the job status of a woman changed from permanent employee to
temporary employee once she was married, thus losing the pension benefit. Some
of them even lost their jobs. Since nurses were mostly women, this improvement
of the rights of married women meant much to the Nursing profession
Women: UN support for the rights
of women began with the Organization's founding Charter. Among the
purposes of the UN declared inArticle 1 of
its Charter is “To achieve international co-operation … in promoting and
encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all
without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion.”
Within the UN’s first year, the
Economic and Social Council established its Commission on the Status of Women,
as the principal global policy-making body dedicated exclusively to gender
equality and advancement of women. Among its earliest accomplishments was
ensuring gender neutral language in the draft Universal Declaration of
Human Rights.
The landmark Declaration, adopted by the General Assembly on 10
December 1948, reaffirms that “All human beings are born free and equal in
dignity and rights” and that “everyone is entitled to all the rights and
freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such
as race, colour, sex, language, religion, … birth or other status.”
As the international feminist movement began to gain momentum
during the 1970s, the General Assembly declared 1975 as the International
Women’s Year and organized the first World Conference on Women, held in Mexico
City. At the urging of the Conference, it subsequently declared the years
1976-1985 as the UN Decade for Women, and established a Voluntary Fund for
Decade.
In 1979, the General Assembly adopted the Convention
on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), which is often described as
an International Bill of Rights for Women. In its 30 articles, the
Convention explicitly defines discrimination against women and sets up an
agenda for national action to end such discrimination. The Convention targets
culture and tradition as influential forces shaping gender roles and family
relations, and it is the first human rights treaty to affirm the reproductive
rights of women.
Five years after the Mexico City conference, a Second World
Conference on Women was held in Copenhagen in 1980. The resulting
Programme of Action called for stronger national measures to ensure women's
ownership and control of property, as well as improvements in women's rights
with respect to inheritance, child custody and loss of nationality.
Every Woman
Every Child
In the lead-up to the Millennium Development
Goals (MDGs) Summit in September 2010, the Secretary-General launched a global
effortconvening 40 key leaders to define a collective strategy for
accelerating progress on women's and children's health.
In 1985, the World Conference to Review and Appraise the
Achievements of the United Nations Decade for Women: Equality, Development and
Peace, was held convened in Nairobi. It was convened at a time when the
movement for gender equality had finally gained true global recognition, and
15,000 representatives of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) participated in
a parallel NGO Forum. The event, which many described as “the birth of
global feminism”. Realizing that the goals of the Mexico City Conference
had not been adequately met, the 157 participating governments adopted the Nairobi
Forward-looking Strategies to the Year 2000. It broke ground in declaring all issues to be women’s issues.
An early result of the Nairobi Conference was the transformation
of the Voluntary Fund for the UN Decade for Women into the UN Development Fund
for Women (UNIFEM, now part of UN Women).
The Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing in 1995,
went a step farther than the Nairobi Conference. The Beijing Platform for Action asserted women’s rights as human rights and committed to specific actions to
ensure respect for those rights. According to the UN Division for Women
in itsreview of the four World Conferences:
Gender Discrimination
in access to job, work load and salary/wages: UN Women merges four UN agencies and
offices into one
On 2 July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly unanimously
voted to create a single UN body tasked with accelerating progress in achieving
gender equality and women’s empowerment.
UN
System-wide Action Plan
(UN SWAP)
One key aspect of UN Women’s mandate is to guide
the system’s coordination on gender. On 13 April 2012 a UN System-wide Action Plan(UN SWAP) on gender
equality and women’s empowerment was adopted at a meeting of the United Nations Chief Executives Board for Coordination (CEB) to be applied throughout the UN
system.
Interview on UN SWAP with the Focal Point for Women at the
UN
Interview on UN SWAP with the Focal Point for Women at the
UN
The new UN Entity for Gender
Equality and the Empowerment of Women – or UN Women – merged four of the world
body’s agencies and offices: the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), the
Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW), the Office of the Special Adviser
on Gender Issues, and the UN International Research and Training Institute for
the Advancement of Women (UN-INSTRAW).
UN Women became operational on 1 January 2011.
UN Women became operational on 1 January 2011.
Eliminating Violence Against Women
The UN system continues to give particular attention to the issue
of violence against women. The 1993 General Assembly Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women contained “a clear and comprehensive
definition of violence against women [and] a clear statement of the rights to
be applied to ensure the elimination of violence against women in all its
forms”. It represented “a commitment by States in respect of their
responsibilities, and a commitment by the international community at large to
the elimination of violence against women”.
In 2007, the theme of the International Women’s Day was “Ending
Impunity for Violence against Women and Girls”. And on 25 February
2008, Mr. Ban Ki-moon launched “The Secretary-General’s Global Campaign UNiTE
to End Violence Against Women”. In opening the multi-year
global campaign, he called violence against women an issue that “cannot wait”.
(See also Resources for Speakers)
International Women’s Day is observed on 8 March. The
theme of the 2009 observance was “Women
and men united to end violence against women and girls”. The International
Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women is observed on 25 November.
Domestic and Field work
without wages: Women make up a vital part
of the economic and social fabric that hold their communities together, yet
that work is rarely valued at the same level as is men’s work. Much of this has
to do with what opportunities are available to them. Women are disproportionately
likely to be poor, under-educated, employed in low-wage or unpaid work, and
subject to dismissal for getting married or having children. In many
industries, female workers are systematically denied their rights to regular
pay and regular working hours; equal pay for equal work; permanent contracts;
safe and non-hazardous work environments; and freedom of association. Egregious
abuses, including sexual violence, harassment and forced pregnancy tests, are
all too common.
Moreover, the
social status of women has not opened up at the same pace at which women have
been brought into the workplace. They may have increasing opportunities at
work, but they are prone to domestic violence and unequal expectations at home.
It has become a mantra at development organizations, including the World Bank
and United Nations, that investing in women is the best way to improve a range
of societal concerns and that women’s full participation in society is a
critical factor in economic development. But more importantly, women’s
rights groups have long recognized that full equality is not possible unless
women can speak out for themselves.
ILRF is
committed to helping women do just that at work. We are continuing a long
tradition of women pushing forward labor rights. With the Rights for Working
Women Campaign (RFWW), ILRF has been at the forefront of securing fair
treatment and wages for women in the global workplace. We also work with
partners to help women around the world organize in industries with predominantly
female workers.
Q2: Define
violence and bring to light its different types. Discuss causes of violence
against male and female, its effects on individual and society. What actions we
should take to overcome gender violence.
Ans: "The intentional use
of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another
person, or against a group or community, that either results in or has a high
likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, maldevelopment,
or deprivation."
Violence
and other forms of abuse are most commonly understood as a pattern of behaviour
intended to establish and maintain control over family, household members,
intimate partners, colleagues, individuals or groups. While violent offenders
are most often known to their victims (intimate or estranged partners and
spouses, family members, relatives, peers, colleagues, etc.), acts of violence
and abuse may also be committed by strangers.
Violence
and abuse may occur only once, can involve various tactics of subtle manipulation
or may occur frequently while escalating over a period of months or years. In
any form, violence and abuse profoundly affect individual health and
well-being. The roots of all forms of violence are founded in the many types of
inequality which continue to exist and grow in society.
Violence
and abuse are used to establish and maintain power and control over another
person, and often reflect an imbalance of power between the victim and the
abuser.
Violence
is a choice, and it is preventable.
There
are nine distinct forms of violence and abuse:
1.
Physical violence;
2.
Sexual violence;
3.
Emotional violence;
4.
Psychological violence;
5.
Spiritual violence;
6.
Cultural violence;
7.
Verbal Abuse;
8.
Financial Abuse; and,
9.
Neglect
Effects of Gender Based Violence
The effects of Gender-based violence
can be devastating and long lasting. They pose danger to a woman’s reproductive
health and can scar a survivor psychologically, cognitively and
interpersonally. A woman
who experiences domestic violence and lives in an abusive relationship with her
partner may be forced to become pregnant or have an abortion against her will,
or her partner may knowingly expose her to a sexually transmitted infection.
Bitangaro (1999:9) reported what a
child psychologist says that “violence absolutely impacts on children…” A child
who has undergone or witnessed violence may become withdrawn, anxious or
depressed on one hand; on the other hand, the child may become aggressive and
exert control over younger siblings.
Boys usually carry out the aggressive
form of behaviour and as adults, may beat-their spouses. The effects of sexual abuse are the
exploitation of power. Young
people are especially at risk and this can have lasting consequences for their
sexual and productive health. The
costs can include unwanted pregnancies, sexually transmitted infections (STI),
physical injury and trauma. Bitangaro
(1999) reported that in Uganda as in many parts of the world, a lot
of stigma is attached to a woman who has been raped. The effects of female Genital cutting
(FGC) are many. According
to the report of women vision in Uganda (1998) the surgeons, who performed the
cutting are old women. These
women according to the report claim that they have ancestral powers. Female genital cutting can be seen as
an impediment to a girl’s sexual enjoyment. The girls according to the report of
women vision (1998) are known to experience intense pain, bleeding, painful
abdominal menstruation, infection or trauma.
The Population Reference Bureau (2000)
reported the World Bank as saying that gender-based violence is heavy a health
burden for women of ages 15-is as that posed by HIV, tuberculosis and infection
during child birth, cancer and heart diseases. The fourth world conference on women has
adopted a platform for action, which declares that “violence against women is
an obstacles to the achievement of the objective of equality, development and
peace” (Population Reference Bureau 2000:3).
Q No 3: discuss sense of
domestic violence and its types with understanding the causes of domestic
violence against male and female. How does domestic violence affect our
society? Suggest also remedies for domestic violence?
Ans: Domestic violence, or
intimate partner violence, is a violation of human rights. It involves violent,
abusive or intimidating behaviour carried out by an adult against a partner or
former partner to control and dominate that person. Domestic violence causes
fear, physical and/or psychological harm. It is most often violent, abusive or
intimidating behaviour by a man against a woman. Living with domestic violence
has a profound effect upon children and young people and may constitute a form
of child abuse. (The NSW Domestic and Family Violence Action Plan,
June 2010)
The above definition
includes violence in same sex relationships.
Many forms of domestic
violence are offences under the NSW
Crimes Act 1900 or the Crimes (Domestic and Personal
Violence) Act 2007.
domestic violence can include:
·
physical assault (including punching, hitting, kicking, pushing,
slapping, choking, or the use of weapons)
·
sexual assault (being forced to have sex or participate in sexual
activities, either by watching or participating)
·
emotional abuse (making you feel worthless, criticising your
personality, your looks, the way you dress, constantly putting you down,
threatening to hurt you, your children or your pets)
·
verbal abuse (including yelling, shouting, name-calling and
swearing at you)
·
social abuse (being stopped from seeing friends and family,
isolating you socially or geographically)
·
damaging property such as furniture, the house or pets in order to
threaten or intimidate you
·
financial abuse (taking control of the money, not giving you
enough money to survive on, forcing you to hand over your money, not letting
you have a say in how it is spent).
Physical and sexual
assault is a crime whether it happens in the home or on the street.
effects of
domestic violence
Violence and the threat of
violence at home creates fear and can destroy normal family functioning.
Violence in the home also affects children. Children and young people don't
have to see the violence to be affected by it.
Living with domestic
violence can cause physical and emotional harm to children and young people.
Children and young people who
live with domestic violence are more likely to display aggressive behaviour,
experience anxiety, have reduced social skills, suffer symptoms of depression
and show emotional distress.
domestic violence and children
For optimal development,
children and young people need to grow up in a secure and nurturing
environment. Where domestic or family violence exists, the home is not safe or
secure and chilldren are scared about what might happen to them and the people
they love.
Studies show that children
who have witnessed domestic violence are more likely to:
·
show aggressive behaviour
·
develop phobias and insomnia
·
experience anxiety
·
show symptoms of depression
·
have diminished self esteem
·
demonstrate poor academic performance and problem solving skills
·
have reduced social competence skills, including low levels of
empathy
·
show emotional distress
·
have physical complaints.
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #1: Know the signs.
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #2: Get your community educated
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #3: Get your community organised!
Domestic Violence
Intervention Tip #4: Boost your community
support network with technology! .
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #5: Stopping the violence is good for business.
For Individuals
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #6: Ring the bell
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #7: Bring a back-up
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #8: BE the back-up.
Domestic Violence
Intervention Tip #9: Make the call, NOW
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #10: Listen to empower.
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #11: Be on standby
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #12: Have an intervention plan.
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #13: Provide some relief
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #14: Check in regularly
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #15: Be a resource
Domestic Violence Intervention Tip #16: Document! Document! Document
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