Women's Views on News |
| Posted: 31 Jul 2014 07:30 AM PDT
By Alice Welbourn. At the conclusion of the AIDS 2014 Conference on 25 July, Alice Welbourn is left wondering whether anything is going to change in the HIV world for young women – and their children. The 13,600 delegates at the 20th International AIDS Conference have all now packed up and gone home. The Melbourne Declaration states clearly in two – albeit much contested – paragraphs that gender equality is a critical part of an effective response. At least 50 per cent of the adults with HIV globally are now women, many of whom acquired HIV during their teens. Surely the tide is now turning? Well, only 1 out of the 8 new International AIDS Society board members are female. Only around 10 per cent of conference delegates had signed the Declaration by Friday afternoon. Only 2 out of 31 sessions on drug use in the conference addressed women's rights issues. HIV-prevention research funding has fallen by 4 per cent. And the UK's DFID did not even send a representative to Melbourne, since it decided to hold its own event for girls, focusing on the equally pressing and not un-related themes of female genital cutting and early child marriage, in London, right in the middle of the AIDS conference. So I am left wondering whether anything is going to change in the HIV world for young women, either vulnerable to or already living with HIV? At the conference I had the privilege of (re)meeting inspiring young women who are our movement's new leaders: young women have grown up with HIV such as L'Orangelis Thomas from Puerto Rico, Violet Banda from Malawi and Consolata Opiyo from Kenya; young women who have recently acquired HIV, such as Ayu Oktariani and Sindi Putri from Indonesia, and many other young women who are committed to working on HIV and their sexual and reproductive health and rights globally. Whilst they all spoke out forcefully and passionately about their need for safe spaces, for good education, information and choice, for access to non-judgmental health care and services without their parents' permission, for protection from gender-based violence and for their rights – in all their diversities – to be upheld, I have doubts about how much the academics, politicians and policy makers really listened to their messages. According to Dr Susan Kasedde of UNICEF, young people aged 10-19 are the only group in whom there is a 50 per cent increase in all AIDS-related deaths globally. As L'Orangelis Thomas Negron put it in her plenary speech: "According to the latest report of the World Health Organization, AIDS is the 2nd leading cause of death in young people and adolescents, the 1st is traffic accidents. "And I mention this because the first one isn’t another disease, it’s not some other health issue going above of HIV/AIDS. "Adolescents and young people are dying from AIDS. And it is not only about dying, is about what happens before death." Indeed, Kasedde explained that globally, of the 2.3 million new HIV people with HIV in 2012, 300,000 – or just over 800 new people each day – were adolescents. Two thirds of these were adolescent girls. Young women don't live in a vacuum. Young women, in many parts of the world, often date much older men. This is often in order to access goods and services and the related status which they do not have the economic, social or political status to acquire by themselves. Miranda van Reeuwijk in her PhD from Tanzania highlighted the breadth and depth of poverty which drives girls to have sex in secrecy, especially with out-of-school boys and men, in order to pay for basics such as school books and uniform, food and help with homework. Dr Salim Karim in his Monday plenary showed scientific proof of this so-called "inter-generational sex" through philogenetic analysis of school students in rural South Africa. This shows conclusively what we have long believed – that young women are acquiring HIV not from their peers but from older men. Thus whilst 1.5 per cent of young men aged 18-19 had HIV there, 13.6 per cent of young women aged 18-19 had HIV. A stark difference. Some organisations think you can give cash transfers to girls to make them less vulnerable to having sex with older men. But it is far more complex than this. Young people need – and deserve – more quality holistic support, from all of society around them than any amount of cash alone will provide. Before the first ever Stepping Stones programme in Uganda, back in 1994, young men told us "why bother about AIDS? We have to die some day anyway, we might as well enjoy ourselves while we can. These girls are our enemies, you cannot trust them, they are the ones who infect us…." This dominant narrative is widespread across many parts of the world. However after the Stepping Stones programme, these same boys said: "We have now realised that we have a life to live and things to do… the girls here have been on this journey with us, they are now our friends. These are the ones we would like to work with, date and marry…. we would like to work together with them to build a positive future." The young men and young women alike had dreams and desires for an income, for non-judgmental information, for options, choice, shared decision-making and safety – and sustained respect and support from their elders to move forward with their lives and realise their dreams. I have heard many similar shifts in discourse around the world once young people – and their elders – are offered the space and time to reflect on their own and others' lives in safety. They also have a positive knock-on effect on the next generation of children, who are then able to grow up in safety and peace rather than violence and vulnerability. But such powerful community-wide holistic empowerment programmes, which truly leave no-one behind, recognising the predominance of inter-generational sex and the need to build new bridges across genders and generations, are very rare. And they cost money also. Yet without such investment, numbers of HIV among young people will indubitably continue to rise. As Martha Tholanah said on these pages last week: "And what about our children? Unless we all take steps to change our own attitudes and those of our healthworkers and lawyers, our children will continue to acquire HIV at birth, and will continue to grow up uninformed, untested and untreated. They will also become criminalised as they begin to have their own sexual relations when older. And they will get sick and die. Unless we act now to perform a u-turn in attitudes and practices, this legacy of shame and blame will continue and will be the heritage that we, women and men alike, bequeath our children. And that will be a disaster for us all." Once again, such actions are not about medication, but about meaningful communication, listening, discourses and reflection – and a determined sustained commitment to act respectfully, humanely and peacefully towards one another. We have the science. We need investment in the programmes which will change minds and hearts amongst those with power to act – whether politicians, academics, policy makers or community elders. And we need concomitant investment in all women, together with girls and boys, to support themselves to broaden their own horizons – and become successful leaders in their own right. The next AIDS conference is in Durban in 2016 in the heart of the area where young women are most badly affected by HIV globally. Despite all the inspiring speeches from young women during the week, there was barely a mention of women and girls throughout the closing ceremony in Melbourne. L'Orangelis Thomas, at the end of her inspirational plenary speech, declared: “The failure to provide to adolescents the adequate information and the tools to make informed decisions about their health care is an assault on their existence. “By denying access to health, you violate our human rights and in consequence, the opportunity to have a dignified life … “In 15 years, in 2030 will we be still talking about the end of AIDS? Are we going to wait 15 more years? We will meet again and we will see.” Let us all hope and pray that Durban will show us the results that all the young women in Melbourne are striving for. Alice Welbourn is Founding Director of the Salamander Trust and a member of the UNESCO Global Advisory Group for sex, relationships and HIV education. A version of this article appeared in OpenDemocracy on 29 July.  |
| Posted: 31 Jul 2014 03:00 AM PDT
As the Edinburgh Festival kicks off Stand Up For Women, Object, Zero Tolerance and Rape Crisis Scotland are asking just how funny are ‘rape jokes’ – jokes that trivialise rape or are made at the expense of victims? Supported by Jenny Eclair, Peter Egan, Josie Long, Kate Smurthwaite, James Mullinger and dozens of other comedians and performers, we are simply asking comedians, promoters, Award givers and even audiences to think about this: #Censors!! We are not asking for a ban or an end to free speech. We are just asking people to think, to really think, ‘What Are We Laughing At’? #Everything is Funny Maybe, but how about laughing at rapists not victims? How about laughing at ‘rape culture’ – an entire culture that has trivialised rape so much that it has become little more than a strapline on a Tee shirt? #Nothing is Out of Bounds in Comedy Maybe, but how many racist jokes have you heard lately? #Kill Joys 25 per cent of the women in any audience are likely to be assaulted. It is almost certain that some have been already: 'I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach when the act just casually joked about how ‘rapable’ different female celebs were. It makes you feel like what happened to you was nothing. The comedy was over for me.'Rape Survivor. Is there is a comedian in the world who would want to make anyone in their audience feel like that? #It's Just Being Edgy! Really? Isn’t rape the least edgy thing to joke about, after all who's going to complain? A rape victim? They don't even complain about being raped! #What Are You Laughing At? Trivialising rape helps reduce the barriers to a man, or boy, from committing it. It becomes a 'non crime'. So a society that constantly jokes about rape, constantly refers to rape as if it was just 'sex' or 'sexy' plays a significant role in chipping away at those barriers. If you want to see an end to ‘rape jokes’ and see, one day, a culture that wholeheartedly condemns rape, you could sign this petition.  |
| Posted: 31 Jul 2014 01:09 AM PDT
The gender pay gap in the capital and around the country has widened, new figures reveal. The Evening Standard published figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) last week showing that for full-time workers in London, the gender pay gap widened from 6.8 per cent to 8.1 per cent between 2012 and 2013. For these workers, 2013 saw women paid 91.9p per pound paid to men, marking a fall from the 93.2p figure recorded for 2012. The head of policy at the Fawcett Society, Daisy Sands, said: "As prosperity returns to the City of London bubble, it is likely bonuses are going up — but at a lesser rate for women, if previous trends are anything to go by." "Research from last year revealed women face a 'gender bonus gap', with men in management roles earning average bonuses of £6,442, compared with £3,029 for women." The figures were obtained by Labour from the ONS to highlight the stubborn inequality in pay between women and men. "Whether you're a chief executive or hairdresser, women across the capital are being paid less than men for doing the same or equivalent work", said shadow women's minister, Labour MP Gloria De Piero. "There are some great examples of companies that are leading the way in efforts to close the gap but delivering equal pay should be a priority for all employers," she added. Worryingly, the pay gap in the capital still remains the smallest in the UK, with women being paid an average of 80p for every pound paid to men throughout the rest of the country. The Trades Union Congress (TUC) said its analysis of the ONS data showed that the gender pay gap was on average 15.7 per cent throughout the UK. The ONS figures also show that 2013 was the first year since 2008 in which the pay gap had actually widened. ”Years of a slow, steady progress on closing the gender pay gap has gone into reverse," TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said. "Ministers should be ashamed of presiding over this latest dismal record on pay." "It is not right that in Britain today women still earn 15 per cent less per hour than men, a pay gap that costs full-time [working] women over £5,000 a year." Charlie Woodworth of the Fawcett Society was quoted as saying: "News that the gap has begun to widen, after years of slow but steady progress, is a damming indictment of the Government’s record when it comes to women’s standing in the economy." "Women’s incomes are being squeezed on all sides – cuts to benefits are hitting them hardest, cuts to the public sector workforce are affecting them disproportionately, and we now know they face a widening gender pay gap." "These figures must act as a wake-up call for the Government. Women’s position in the labour market and their wider financial security are at grave risk." Different measures to combat the increasing gap have been proposed. “More must be done to tackle occupational segregation – women continue to be shockingly under-represented in better paid industries such as science and technology,” Woodworth said. In proposals for the Liberal Democrats' election manifesto, the Liberal Democrat’s leader, Nick Clegg, recently announced plans for legislation to force companies with more than 250 employees to publicly reveal their gender pay gap. This would replace the current system which merely ‘encourages’ companies to disclose the information. Only 140 out of 7,000 big firms have currently done that. "Real equality means fair pay. It's time to accept that the voluntary approach does not go far or fast enough," Clegg said. "We need to lift the lid on what big companies pay the men and women they employ, with that information there for every employee and customer to see." O’Grady agreed that the voluntary approach has not worked: "The light-touch, voluntary approach to tackling gender pay inequality is clearly failing.” However, she has called for a more comprehensive solution: “We need tougher action to force companies to look at their pay gaps, while government can lead the way by making all new jobs available on a part-time or flexible basis." Writing in the Guardian, Harriet Minter also believes that the problem is a lack of measurement and holding companies to account. She highlighted findings from a recent Harnessing the Power of Diversity conference, where attendees were polled about the importance of diversity to their business as well as whether they were measured on implementing it. While 71 per cent reported that diversity was very important to business, only 25 per cent said they were measured in any way. ‘For business, diversity is all about talking the talk but nobody wants to don a pair of walking boots,’ she said.  |
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