Women's Views on News |
| Posted: 24 Oct 2014 04:27 AM PDT
The World Future Council, Inter-Parliamentary Union and UN Women awarded the Istanbul Convention their newly created Vision Award. Presented as part of the World Future Policy Award 2014, this award honours the ground-breaking nature of the Istanbul Convention and the vision it carries for women in Europe and beyond to lead a life free of violence. This is the second award presented to the Istanbul Convention, which demonstrates recognition of the fact that it is currently the most comprehensive international instrument on violence against women. The Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence – which is more widely known as the Istanbul Convention – is relatively new: adopted in 2011 and entered into force only recently, on 1 August 2014, and is open to any State in the world. It is currently the most comprehensive international legally binding instrument on violence against women and domestic violence. This is a key aspect of this convention's visionary nature. It is multi-disciplinary, with long-term preventive actions as well as measures to ensure the prosecution of perpetrators and protection of survivors. For to be effective both the prevention and response to violence against women must take a comprehensive approach. An approach which includes: collecting reliable data to inform laws, policies and programmes; implementing laws and policies that respond to and prevent violence; addressing impunity and ensuring women's access to justice; and developing quality essential services for the protection, ongoing safety and recovery of survivors. The Istanbul Convention addresses these essential aspects: it explicitly defines violence against women as a human rights violation; it recognises unequal power relations between men and women as the root cause of violence against women and it advocates a gender-sensitive perspective in tackling it. The Convention also places the survivors' rights and needs at the core of all State responses, while stressing the needs of particular groups of survivors. It emphasises prevention measures and it requires State parties to establish specialised institutions; to form partnerships with the non-governmental sector and the media; to ensure budget allocations; and to undertake regular data collection and research. Crucially, the Convention also provides for a monitoring mechanism through which State parties can and are to regularly assess implementation. It is essential that this mechanism is strong enough to monitor and to hold States accountable. We know from experience that "vision" is not enough on its own. This Convention must also have teeth and be prepared to bite. To date, 14 member states of the Council of Europe have ratified this new human rights treaty and another 22 states have signed it. The UK has signed but not yet ratified it. The problem? Physical, sexual and psychological violence against women is an extensive human rights abuse in all Council of Europe Member States. According to a new EU Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) report, one in three women (33 per cent or 62 million women) across the 28 EU Member States has suffered physical and/or sexual violence since the age of 15. These women are raped, mutilated, harassed, beaten or killed. Fifty-six per cent of Belgians, for example, know at least one person who has suffered serious sexual violence – a human rights violation that goes largely unreported due to prejudice and social stigma. An estimated 500,000 women and girls in the EU alone have suffered from female genital mutilation (FGM), another form of violence suffered by women and girls, while an additional 180,000 are at risk each year. The largest numbers of women and girls originating from countries where FGM is practiced live in the UK, Italy, France, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Sweden and Belgium. The illegal practice impacts on women's health, well-being and ability to achieve their full potential. "Protection requires governments to keep women and girls safe from violence. "When preventive measures have failed and violent incidents have happened or are about to happen, it is important to provide victims and witnesses with protection and support so they can rebuild their lives," said Michael Bochenek, Amnesty International's Director of Law and Policy. "Women and girls who have been targeted by violence beyond Europe also have the right to international protection, including in cases of people fleeing, for example, female genital mutilation or forced marriage." Governments bound by the Convention will have to take a number of measures, including to: Address gender stereotypes and promote changes in mentality and attitudes about the role of women and girls in society; Train professionals to work with survivors or women at risk of violence and work closely with specialised NGOs; Provide for both general and specialist support services which are appropriate and accessible for women and girls, including services for physical and psychological support, shelters, sexual violence referral centres and free 24/7 telephone helplines; and Develop a gender-sensitive asylum system – the obligation to protect includes the right to international protection. Women and girls who suffer from gender-based violence in third countries can seek protection in another state when their own fails to prevent persecution or to offer adequate protection and effective remedies. "Ratifying and implementing the Istanbul Convention is not a question of granting special rights to women, it is about remedying existing injustices and preventing further violations of women's human rights," Bochenek said. Amnesty International (AI) was instrumental in the process of drafting the Convention, by providing information based on the experience of NGOs in working with survivors of gender-based violence, as well as best practices, existing obligations under international human rights law and standards. This treaty is therefore a reflection of core international standards and the views of civil society.  |
| Body dissatisfaction: the growing epidemic Posted: 24 Oct 2014 01:09 AM PDT
As new evidence reveals the extent of body image issues in the UK advertisers backing ‘body confidence’ campaigns need to confront their own mixed messages. The findings of the 2014 British Social Attitudes survey have revealed that only 63 per cent of women are satisfied with their appearance compared with 74 per cent of men. In addition, 77 per cent of adults surveyed believed that society puts too much pressure on females to maintain a sexualised appearance. Perhaps most worryingly, however, was the finding that 47 per cent of respondents agreed with the statement 'how you look affects what you can achieve in life' and that nearly one third (32 per cent) of those surveyed agreed with the statement: 'your value as a person depends on how you look'. Other research coinciding with Body Confidence Week last week found that 10 million women in the UK feel depressed because of their appearance and 36 per cent avoid exercise because of insecurity about their looks. A roundtable discussion organised by Dove to launch Body Confidence Week and which included celebrities like Jameela Jamil and industry experts came to the conclusion that body image should be addressed by the national curriculum. "I don't think anyone can deny what impact school has on children's upbringing, it's massive," said Dove UK's brand director Lucy Attley. "Schools have a responsibility to open children's eyes up to what is real and what is not." "We are in the midst of a body confidence epidemic … It is a big issue that transcends generations and one we want to address," she added. However schools are not the only place where change needs to occur. Specifically, campaigns for body confidence run in conjunction with branding campaigns, such as Dove's, should be treated with some suspicion, as the marketing of women's products is one of the primary culprit areas for promoting negative body imagery. An inquiry by the government’s All-Party Parliamentary Group on Body Image in 2012 found that 75 per cent of respondents believed that media, advertising and celebrity culture were the main social influences on body image. It also found that media criticism of body weight, size or appearance, a lack of diversity in the bodies represented and an over-reliance on manipulation of imagery was seen as contributing to negative body image and was feeding into a situation where girls as young as five were worrying about their appearance. The inquiry noted a rise in cosmetic surgery of nearly 20 per cent since 2008, possibly linked to another finding that less than 5 per cent of the population could ever realistically attain the body ideals presented in visual media and advertising. As Laura Bates pointed out in the Guardian recently, there can be huge amounts of mixed messaging when companies which promote unrealistic female bodies in the media also launch 'body confidence' campaigns – for example the Sun's No More Skinny campaign which runs alongside endless articles on female weight loss and the continued inclusion of Page 3 models. However, many do agree with Dove's roundtable conclusion that schools are the appropriate place to confront these issues, and many MPs from the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Body Image back the suggestion that body image and self-esteem classes should be compulsory in schools. This is increasingly necessary because of the spread of imagery manipulation from magazine covers to every day communications in the form of people using camera-phones with filters and social media. MP Caroline Nokes, who launched the Be Real: Body Confidence for Everyone campaign, works in schools to help young people understand the manipulation that goes into creating unrealistic body imagery. She has however she has found that many young people manipulate their own photos. 'I ask them to shut their eyes and put their hand up if they have ever enhanced an image on Facebook', she said. They all usually put up their hands. '[T]hey are seeing the world through a filter, and that's not healthy,' she adds. 'It's really important we try to instill confidence that they can be who they are.' Dr Phillippa Diedrichs, senior research fellow at the University of West of England's Centre for Appearance Research, agreed. 'The more time spent on Facebook, the more likely people are to self-objectify,' she said. She explained that there is a tendency to seek out comments on appearance through mediums such as Facebook, leading to body image anxieties or the development of a public persona through photographs. However, to counter this, Dr Diedrichs pointed out that we need to hold the media accountable for not showcasing a more diverse range of bodies. School classes will only do so much when the media still focuses on body types which are unattainable to all but a handful of the population. Representatives from advertising and the media consulted as part of the All-Party Parliamentary Group of Body Image inquiry said that the industry had a genuine desire to use more 'diverse, relatable and authentic imagery', especially as research suggests that consumers prefer this. So while schools may have a vital part to play in confronting this issue, until the media, advertising gurus and celebrities can seriously reflect on their own role in combating unrealistic body imagery and do something, it seems unlikely that the body dissatisfaction epidemic will abate.  |
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