Women's Views on News |
- Pentagon to allow women on front line
- New option for preventing breast cancer
- One Billion Rising: 14 February 2013
- Tsonga courts sexism controversy
| Pentagon to allow women on front line Posted: 29 Jan 2013 11:25 AM PST
In a groundbreaking announcement last week, the Pentagon confirmed that US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta will lift the ban on women serving in front line combat roles. This means that women will now be allowed to join military units which engage in combat at close quarters. It also opens up positions and career prospects in the armed forces that were previously not available to women. Congress has been given thirty days to consider the plans and raise any objections. The military services have been given until 15 May to consider how they will comply with the new regulations by 2016, or to otherwise request exemptions for certain roles where they believe that the presence of women would 'reduce combat effectiveness'. However, 'the onus is going to be on them to justify why a woman can't serve in a particular role,' a Pentagon spokesperson said. While women already make up 14 per cent of American military personnel, if Panetta's plans go ahead, hundreds of thousands of new positions are expected to become available to women in frontline and elite commando units in army and marine forces. This expands on the Pentagon's move almost a year ago which opened around 14,000 combat positions to women, predominantly in the army. However, women are still excluded from almost 25 per cent of roles in the Army, a figure which is expected to fall significantly when the new proposals are implemented. Democratic Senator Patty Murray, who is head of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, and a member of the defence appropriations subcommittee said: 'This is an historic step for equality and for recognising the role women have, and will continue to play, in the defence of our nation. 'From the streets of Iraqi cities to rural villages in Afghanistan, time and again women have proven capable of serving honorably and bravely. 'In fact, it’s important to remember that in recent wars that lacked any true frontlines, thousands of women already spent their days in combat situations serving side-by-side with their fellow male service members.' Despite what appears to be general support for the decision, there is, of course, dissent. Former Navy Seal Dick Couch said: 'I think it's a bad idea. Men and women are different. ‘The guys act differently around them. “This is not to lay blame at women – this is a gender specific indictment, I guess you might say, and I don't think it will contribute to combat effectiveness.’ He went on to say: 'It would be a very rare female who has the upper body strength to carry our some of these very arduous training programmes and special missions taskings that we ask some of our special operations troops to do. ‘So I don't see it really working. It just doesn't seem like a good idea to me.' Although these views are disappointingly antediluvian and based on vague notions rather than cold hard facts, they are, unfortunately, not isolated. Here in the UK, women are also banned from close combat roles. Women are not officially attached to front line operations, but are allowed to 'supply' them – in engineering or medical roles, for instance. Female military personnel currently make up around nine per cent of the British armed forces, and will be able to serve on submarines as of next year. But anything close to what has been announced in the US seems a long way off. Last November a Ministry of Defence spokesperson said there were no plans for a further immediate review. However, British Brigadier Nicky Moffat, who retired recently, said that judgements around who can and cannot serve should not be made on gender, but on capability. She said: “It is not just about physical strength. It’s about endurance, it’s about ability to operate within a team, it’s about a range of skills.' But Major Judith Webb, the first woman to command an all-male field squadron, thinks resources would be wasted trying to train women up to a standard they were unlikely to reach. 'By opening it up to women, are women shooting themselves in the foot? Because they are not going to meet those standards.' So, because not every woman would make the grade, all should be excluded? Is that what she's saying? The truth is that the new US policy will simply make the practice of women serving in front line combat roles 'official', as in reality, it has been happening for years. Eighty-four American servicewomen have been killed in the last 11 years during combat missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. British or American, if a women is capable of serving in a military position, whatever that may be, then she should be given an equal chance to do so…. and equal recognition if she is already doing it. Interestingly, as Cynthia Enloe of Clark University has pointed out in her blog, the news coverage given to Panetta's announcement is, in fact, misleading. 'The Defense Secretary and the Joint Chiefs of Staff have not suddenly awoken to the evils of sexism of their own accord. They have been pushed relentlessly. ‘The lifting of the ban is the result of 30 years of women activists' strategizing and campaigning.' She writes that activists such as Lory Manning and Carolyn Becraft of the Women's Research and Education Institute (WREI), and Nancy Duff Campbell and Holly Hemphill of the National Women's Law Center (NWLC), along with energetic members of the Servicewomen's Action Network (SWAN) deserve the credit for forcing the Pentagon's hand. And, she adds, one should never imagine that any major change in any powerful institution happens without the work of determined, smart, social movement activists. In this case, that would, I reckon, predominantly be women. |
| New option for preventing breast cancer Posted: 29 Jan 2013 07:00 AM PST
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) recently published a draft update to its guidance on familial breast cancer. The final guidance is likely to include the recommendation that all women over 30 with a moderate or high risk of breast cancer be offered preventative drugs. Breast cancer charities welcomed the announcement, with Chris Askew, the chief executive of Breakthrough Breast Cancer, calling it "a historic step”. "It is the first time drugs have ever been recommended for reducing breast cancer risk in the UK." One of the drugs that would form part of the preventative care, tamoxifen, is already in use in the UK as a breast cancer treatment. The other drug, raloxifene, is used currently to prevent osteoporosis, the condition of brittle bones. As far back as March 2011, cancer experts were calling for the preventative use of breast cancer drugs, saying that "the evidence for them is overwhelming." To balance the increased risk of womb cancer, blood clots and stroke associated with the use of tamoxifen, experts have agreed that certain conditions need to be met for the drug to be prescribed. The drug will be offered to women with a four per cent or higher chance of developing breast cancer in the next ten years. Tamoxifen is already used as a preventive measure in other countries, including the USA. If the NICE guidance is adopted, nearly 550,000 women in the UK would become eligible for the drugs. The update would produce two historic firsts by shifting the focus of care from treatment to prevention and by including men among those eligible for the care. It would also provide women at high risk of developing the disease an alternative to a double mastectomy, the procedure that involves removing both breasts in order to reduce risk. The proposed changes may become even more significant following publication of research suggesting that women should be taking tamoxifen for twice as long as is currently prescribed when used as a treatment for breast cancer. The NICE consultation on the draft update is open to contributions until 25 February 2013. |
| One Billion Rising: 14 February 2013 Posted: 29 Jan 2013 04:30 AM PST
Half of the 7 billion people on the planet are women. Of those 3.5 million women, one third will raped or beaten by men during their lifetimes. That's one billion women raped or beaten. Activist Eve Ensler, the American playwright responsible for the award winning Vagina Monologues, founded V-Day, a global movement to end violence against women 15 years ago. The 'V' stands for valentine, vagina and victory. And V-Day is a catalyst. V-Day is a global activist movement to end violence against women and girls that raises funds and awareness through benefit productions of ’The Vagina Monologues’ and other artistic works. To date, the V-Day movement has raised over US $90 million; educated millions about the issue of violence against women and the efforts to end it; crafted international educational, media and PSA campaigns; reopened shelters; and funded over 13,000 community-based anti-violence programs and safe houses in Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, Kenya, South Dakota, Egypt and Iraq. V-Day promotes creative events which aim is to increase awareness of and generate broader attention for the fight to stop violence against women and girls, and over 300 million people have seen a V-Day benefit event in their community. To mark its 15th anniversary, One Billion Rising this year is the most ambitious campaign to date: an event inviting women who have experienced violence, and those who love them, to take a stand, to rise up, to walk out, to dance and demand an end to violence against women. And 'Break the Chain'. Every day somewhere around the world, there is a story hitting the headlines involving a woman having been violated by a man. Sexual violence is now the central issue in India: we've heard shocking reports of two gang rapes in Delhi in recent weeks. In the UK, we've seen the revelation that Jimmy Savile was responsible for 60 years of abuse involving hundreds of girls. But we have also witnessed outrage at these atrocities. Now is the time to make a stand against violence, to show solidarity and raise awareness to show that violence against women will no longer be tolerated and is unacceptable. One Billion Rising UK coordinator Monique Wilson said, "We are thrilled to announce over 80 One Billion Rising UK events (and growing!). “OBR workshops have given voice to the needs of women and girls in communities around the UK; artistic events in the visual arts, film, poetry, theatre and dance are using the arts as a platform for change and transformation; big dance concerts are bringing together artists and musicians and dancers and annual performances of “The Vagina Monologues" and countless flash mobs are happening in universities, schools, theatres, high streets, town halls and squares all across the country. “The UK has always been known for the diversity of the cultures and it is this which makes the UK a fantastic representative for the global campaign. “The United Kingdom – from London, Brighton, Sheffield, Lancaster, Liverpool, Cardiff, The Scottish Borders, Bute, Norwich and many others – are coming together on February 14th and RISING to demand an end to violence against women and girls." In the UK alone, 1 in 4 women has experienced domestic abuse – you will know someone who has been violated by a man. You can show your support and join the one billion women rising on 14 February 2013 by locating an event in the UK near you and joining in. Join in. Join people in events in the 182 countries expected to be involved in One Billion Rising. Learn the dance and join in. And together we can break the chain. |
| Tsonga courts sexism controversy Posted: 29 Jan 2013 02:00 AM PST
Another Australian Open has drawn to a close, packed as always with thrills, spills and shock exits. It's been… emotional. Particularly, according to tennis ace Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, if you are a woman. After crashing out of the quarter finals at the hands of one Roger Federer, the French number one made some astonishing remarks that drew more attention than his tennis. Discussing the fact that the men's game had a consistent “big four” who seemed to dominate the game and, particularly, the grand slams (although Rafael Nadal is injured at the moment, so it’s more a “big three” ), Tsonga was asked at a press junket why he thought this pattern wasn't as visible in the women's game. And his response? “You know, the girls, they are more unstable emotionally than us. I’m sure everybody will say it’s true, even the girls.” Cue nervous laughter in the press room. Compounding his gaffe, Tsonga ploughed on, “No? No, you don’t think? But, I mean, it’s just about hormones and all this stuff. “We don’t have all these bad things, so we are physically in good shape every time, and you (women) are not. That’s it.” I dare him to go say that to Venus and Serena Williams's faces. No? Didn't think so. Scared they would cry, Tsonga? Or scared they would chase you round the tennis court like a pair of whippets with the scent of prey in their nostrils? I'm not really sure what point he is trying to make. Is he suggesting that hormones make women inconsistent in their game, or that they let their emotions get the better of them during a match? Tell that to John McEnroe. Is it just me, or is watching Andy Murray slog it out with Djokovic/Federer/Nadal for the hundredth time slightly less thrilling than watching Serena Williams, one of the greatest tennis players in the history of the game, fall at the hands of 19 year-old Sloane Stephens, who has never won a title in her life? If one takes Tsonga's asinine remarks with a pinch of salt and laughs at the sheer idiocy behind them, then none of this is earth shattering. But taken in the context of a continuing and uphill battle for women in sport to be accepted on an equal footing with their male counterparts, it's just another day, and another disparaging remark. The truth is that sexism in sport is rife, and not just in tennis. Recently, the England women's football team battled their way to a paltry £4000 a year pay rise, to £20,000 a year, after a two month (unpaid) pay dispute. In her retirement speech earlier this year, British cycling legend Nicole Cooke blasted the sexism that had dogged her years in the sport. The 2011 BBC Sports Personality of the Year shortlist was all male – selected, I might add, by a panel of male journalists. The Olympics were great, but you couldn't help but get the feeling that there were hordes of people gazing at their television screens in wonder, going “Oooooh, look… women can do sport too!” Women's sporting prowess has been so well hidden by mainstream media that this is depressingly unsurprising. But it needs to stop. Women's sporting achievements, which have never been so fruitful and so diverse, have to be recognised and rewarded in the same way that men's achievements are. And it will need high profile sports like football and tennis to lead the way. So it's very disheartening when someone as high-profile as Jo-Wilfried Tsonga says something so blatantly sexist, but which is so off the cuff and unconsidered that he clearly believes to be inherently true. At least the press had the good sense to take him to task. Interestingly, when journalists asked him to explain why he was unable to break into the men's “Big Four” himself, Tsonga seemed at a loss. PMT perhaps? |
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