Last Friday evening, while driving home from a community activism meeting, I was listening to Public Radio International's "The World." Okay, I know that first sentence makes me sound much more tuned into things than I actually am, but I really had been at a meeting and I--of course!--was listening to a subsidiary of NPR.
As I pulled into my driveway and parked the car, I found myself having what NPR calls a "driveway moment", where you're so engrossed in a story that you actually delay getting out of your car to finish listening. Unfortunately, the stories I was listening to weren't engaging; they were revolting, chilling and completely unnerving. We all hear about the horrible things that happen in our world today; I just wasn't prepared to hear three stories in a row that seemed to break off large chunks of the progress women have made in recent decades.
The first story was one about how the Afghani prime minister, Hamid Karzai, has approved the passage of a new law that places restrictions on the rights of Shiite women. Essentially, the law would restrict women from leaving their homes without the accompaniment of their husbands, and would also force women to submit sexually to their husbands, which is akin to marital rape. The expert talking on PRI about this law is Afghani, and said that Karzai hurried the bill through the Parliament, on which several women serve, not allowing any of the Parliamentarians to actually read the terms of the bill before signing it. This rush job was to insure that the bill would pass without objection, thereby appeasing the Shiites, the ultra-conservative minority sect. The expert made a good point--many Afghans, men and women alike, object to this law. Many of them have travelled overseas, whether through study or work, and have seen the rights of women in other countries, and don't agree with the oppression of women in Afghanistan. They are determined to bring progression and modernity back to their home country, and are bound to object to this law. The concern is how long it will take before their efforts--and those of the world--make a difference.
The second story was about how yet another ultra-conservative religious sect, this time in Israel, has tried to disenfranchise the accomplishments of Israeli female Cabinet members by photoshopping their images from a photograph of the Cabinet in various newspapers. The photo of the Israeli Cabinet, on which two women serve, was tampered with because showing the image of women is considered "immodest" by Orthodox tradition. A variety of newspapers targeted at the Orthodox community blacked out the women's images altogether, while other newspapers actually inserted the images of men over those of the women. According to the article, during the campaign leading up to the Cabinet elections, campaign posters were tampered with in ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods.
The last story is possibly the worst out of the three. This one details how video shows a Palestinian girl was beaten by Sharia radicals (note: the same religious sect that prompted Hamid Karzai's bill in Afghanistan) for reportedly having an affair with a married man. Notice that the man was not beaten for infidelity.
This morning on my way into work, the last story I heard on the BBC World News before leaving my car was about a Rwandan woman who had been raped by the Hutus during the mass genocide of Tutsis in the mid-90s. She bore a child as a result of the rape, and he is now plagued by the knowledge that his existence is based upon violence and hate. The woman has been shunned by her people for having kept the pregnancy, and is haunted by the questions her son has for her, to the point of beating him when he inquires. She has no governmental or family support for the decision she made. First she was violated; now she continues to pay the price. This violation of women continues throughout the world, but most notably on a large-scale in war-torn Congo and genocide-ridden Sudan.
In a world with so much wealth, knowledge and access, how is it that we have yet to solve the long-standing plague of abuse to women's rights? Come on, world. We're waiting.
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