Two items crossed my desk today, as they do...
The first was that yesterday was UN International Elimination of Violence against Women Day. Which includes mothers.
The Guardian ran an article on the World Health Organisations data on this.
The first was that yesterday was UN International Elimination of Violence against Women Day. Which includes mothers.
The Guardian ran an article on the World Health Organisations data on this.
"A new report from the World Health Organisation has drawn together data from dozens of studies and found that worldwide, 35% of women have experienced violence - and that the consequences for their health can be devastating"
The health consequences of violence are always devastating. One follows the other, like night and day.
We do live in a hierarchically violent culture - the strong beat on the weak, in politics, in economics,religion and in many other ways, some so subtle that they are accepted as 'normal', and even justified by so called 'innocent' bystanders, who lose their innocence with that acceptance.
Ignorance is bliss. Ihe innocence of the conditioned mind.
There is no such thing. That often unwitting unknowingness is far from innocent, it is the bedrock upon which violent hierarchies thrive. And getting angry with that sector, the innocent 'ignorant' does not help them escape.... only empathy can do that.
Just as only empathy can drive through the changes required to fulfil the United Nations aim, which all decent people share, of course. How could we not?
Yes some men will scream out about 'violence against men' ... missing the point altogether, though there is violence against men - war, for want of a better word, yet they keep going to those war movies, and they keep on enlisting and they keep on learning how to kill. And wanting to do the job they were trained for? Ouch! C'mon!
OK. I AM being facetious here, and the issue of violence against women is clouded for some men who feel that 'feminism' (a term so general that it can only be defined as it is used,it must be qualified to have any real sense,meaning or context) is anti-men.
It's not. Some feminists are anti-men, and probably so 'cos they are angry, they are hurting somewhere deeply, and they feel things so intensely because some things are if we face them honestly extremely painful, and actually that's ok, it's nothing to be frightened by, it's healthy to feel that pain to some degree, it's an expression of a valid feeling - just don't give them guns! The boys or the girls..
Jokes aside, the thrust of a given concept is not defined by an individuals actions, other than in relation to that specific individual.
Women are exposed to a lot of hostility just because they are women, and that's plain nuts. It really is. And it's dangerous... and so something needs to change, and it's different things in different places, because the hostility towards women takes many forms, some of them cultural.
The next thing that came across my desk is part of the resolution of violence against women, and will lead to a a massive reduction in hostility towards women, and in the long term hostility in general, benefiting society massively.
It's the petition by the Global Women's Strike to the UK Government for a living wage for mothers and carers. The background document to this petition is well prepared, detailed and easy to digest. And it's accurate.
The petition was published on the 1st of May 2013. it has only clocked up 557 names since then! What? Only 557 names? In 6 months?
"Houston, we have a problem here..!"
You see what I mean about the hostility towards women? towards Mothers! Think the Unions have a hard time bargaining for better wages? Nothing on what the Mothers are faced with!
I recommend reading the background paper and then consider signing the petition, or not, as the case may be. The read is a good read. If if one does not at first support the proposition. You WILL learn something.
Kindest regards
We do live in a hierarchically violent culture - the strong beat on the weak, in politics, in economics,religion and in many other ways, some so subtle that they are accepted as 'normal', and even justified by so called 'innocent' bystanders, who lose their innocence with that acceptance.
Ignorance is bliss. Ihe innocence of the conditioned mind.
There is no such thing. That often unwitting unknowingness is far from innocent, it is the bedrock upon which violent hierarchies thrive. And getting angry with that sector, the innocent 'ignorant' does not help them escape.... only empathy can do that.
Just as only empathy can drive through the changes required to fulfil the United Nations aim, which all decent people share, of course. How could we not?
Yes some men will scream out about 'violence against men' ... missing the point altogether, though there is violence against men - war, for want of a better word, yet they keep going to those war movies, and they keep on enlisting and they keep on learning how to kill. And wanting to do the job they were trained for? Ouch! C'mon!
OK. I AM being facetious here, and the issue of violence against women is clouded for some men who feel that 'feminism' (a term so general that it can only be defined as it is used,it must be qualified to have any real sense,meaning or context) is anti-men.
It's not. Some feminists are anti-men, and probably so 'cos they are angry, they are hurting somewhere deeply, and they feel things so intensely because some things are if we face them honestly extremely painful, and actually that's ok, it's nothing to be frightened by, it's healthy to feel that pain to some degree, it's an expression of a valid feeling - just don't give them guns! The boys or the girls..
Jokes aside, the thrust of a given concept is not defined by an individuals actions, other than in relation to that specific individual.
Women are exposed to a lot of hostility just because they are women, and that's plain nuts. It really is. And it's dangerous... and so something needs to change, and it's different things in different places, because the hostility towards women takes many forms, some of them cultural.
The next thing that came across my desk is part of the resolution of violence against women, and will lead to a a massive reduction in hostility towards women, and in the long term hostility in general, benefiting society massively.
It's the petition by the Global Women's Strike to the UK Government for a living wage for mothers and carers. The background document to this petition is well prepared, detailed and easy to digest. And it's accurate.
The petition was published on the 1st of May 2013. it has only clocked up 557 names since then! What? Only 557 names? In 6 months?
"Houston, we have a problem here..!"
You see what I mean about the hostility towards women? towards Mothers! Think the Unions have a hard time bargaining for better wages? Nothing on what the Mothers are faced with!
I recommend reading the background paper and then consider signing the petition, or not, as the case may be. The read is a good read. If if one does not at first support the proposition. You WILL learn something.
Kindest regards
Corneilius
Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe