Women's Views on News |
| Come clean on undercover policing Posted: 21 Jul 2015 01:30 AM PDT
A petition has been set up calling on Lord Justice Pitchford to ensure a transparent, robust and comprehensive public inquiry into undercover policing. It is demanding truth and justice for the women deceived into intimate relationships by undercover police officers and all those affected by police spying on social and environmental justice groups. Lord Justice Pitchford, who has sat in the Court of Appeal for five years, has been appointed to lead the public inquiry into the police's controversial use of undercover officers to infiltrate political campaigns for over more than 40 years. Why is a transparent, robust and comprehensive public inquiry important? Everyone has the right to participate in the struggle for social and environmental justice, without fear of persecution, objectification, or interference in their lives. However, many campaigns and individuals have been targeted by Britain's secret police for decades, undermining efforts for social justice that should be welcomed in a democratic society. Citizens have been spied on, psychologically and emotionally manipulated, and abused by officers for being part of, or simply knowing people who were part of, such campaigns. We all welcome the announcement of a full public inquiry into political undercover policing, but it must be truly transparent, robust and comprehensive. In particular the inquiry must: Be willing to hear evidence from those affected by undercover policing including: the women deceived into long-term intimate relationships by officers; the family justice campaigns for those bereaved at the hands of the police and those challenging the efficacy of police investigations in relation to the deaths or assaults of loved ones; the construction workers blacklisted with the help of undercover police;the families whose dead children's identities were stolen by officers; and all campaign groups spied on; Protect police whistleblowers from prosecution under the Official Secrets Act and encourage current and former officers to give evidence; Cover all undercover police units from 1968 to the present day; Ensure the police fully cooperate with the inquiry and do not obstruct its operation though the use of their 'Neither Confirm Nor Deny' stance; Hold senior police officers past and present, especially former Met Commissioners and Special Branch Commanders, to account for any wrong doing attributed to the units under their command; Investigate officers sharing or selling information and experience acquired through undercover policing to the private sector; and Make recommendations to change the law, especially the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (2000), to prevent these abuses from continuing. This petition runs just as a report to the Attorney General with the title Review Of Possible Miscarriages Of Justice Impact of Undisclosed Undercover Police Activity on the Safety of Convictions was published. The report, written by Mark Ellison QC and Alison Morgan, is being known as the Ellison Report. The review was set up after revelations that undercover officers had formed long-term relationships with female campaigners, stolen the identities of dead children, and hidden key evidence in court cases. More than 10 women have been taking legal action against the police after finding out that their boyfriends were undercover officers sent to spy on them or their friends. However, with many of the undercover officers still hidden, there is a possibility that other women have had relationships with police spies without knowing their true identities. And Doreen Lawrence, the mother of murdered teenager Stephen, has called for undercover officers who infiltrated political campaigns and spied on her family to be identified. A Scotland Yard undercover unit had spied on the Lawrence family and their supporters while they pressed police to carry out a proper investigation into Stephen's murder. Baroness Lawrence told the Guardian she believed that the reputation of the police had been damaged by their failure to investigate her son's murder properly and by the revelations about the undercover officers. "They need to rebuild their reputation. The only way is come out and say what you have done and speaking the truth," she said. "What I am hoping is that they will have learnt the lesson that the truth will come out eventually."  |
| Posted: 21 Jul 2015 01:00 AM PDT
The second Imagine a Feminist Internet meeting takes place in Malaysia this week – from 22-24 July 2015. It is being organised by the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) as a continuation of the space opened in 2014, where over 50 participants from women's rights, sexual rights and internet rights organisations discussed and explored intersections of gender, sexuality and technology. The Feminist Principles of the Internet gathered together agreements from the 2014 meeting and from a Twitter conversation held before the event, and offered a framework to articulate how we imagine the internet as a public space that is safe, engaging, open, free, and conducive to feminist movements. The principles bring attention to five key areas of engagement: Agency and autonomy; Digital access; Economy; Expression and Movements and public participation. This year, a group of 45 activists, researchers, academics and techies are meeting again in Malaysia to deepen depth of the discussion around feminism and technology. They will be tweeting on #imagineafeministinternet and you are invited to participate in the conversation by engaging with the hashtag and following @takebackthetech. Here are some of the key questions you are invited to explore too: Access How can we talk about internet access in a way that locates it within existing social, economic, political and cultural contexts? How can we guarantee more applicable digital security tools for women in rural areas who have limited internet access? What are the challenges that privatisation of internet access raises for connectivity for all? How do we address the exploitation of "saving girls and women from poverty" rhetoric that is upholding further privatisation of internet access and platforms? Beyond the conversation on access, what does feminist design and usage of technology look like? Agency and autonomy How does misogyny manifest on the internet beyond just Twitter trolls and how are women and queers responding to such forms of abuse? Is the discussion on online misogyny leaving out the experiences of women from the global South? What does it mean for us to be safe online, as individuals or groups? What are the threats? How is surveillance, a historic tool of patriarchy, affecting our bodies, lives and activism today? How do we frame children's rights to healthy sexual exploration and positive sex education on the internet we have today? How are feminists engaging with the question of consent on the internet? Economy How has the internet affected the gendered economy of migration and labour? What is digital capital and how is data ownership affecting our struggle for economic justice? How has the internet disrupted or reinforced capitalist frameworks? What does it take to make an internet where girls are creators of tech, not just consumers? How do feminists engage with the movement for free and open source software? Expression Is the internet enabling greater diversity of sexual expression or increasing opportunities for the policing of sexuality? Is the take-down of content that is violent against women a form of censorship? How has the internet facilitated or restricted the proliferation of feminist expression online? Who is drawing the line between legitimate and illegitimate sexual expression? How do we understand feminist pornography? What's the deal with real name policies and the anti-anonymity rhetoric? Has technology impacted the constructions of masculinity/femininity/transgenderism? Movements and public participation How has the internet facilitated feminist and queer movements of the global South? Are its public spaces dominated by particular forms of activism? What sort of trends do we see in anti-feminist movements using the internet today? Should feminists engage with influencing the policies of private companies? How has the internet shifted the way we understand power, politics and agency? What new nodes of power does it facilitate? How do we support the capacity of queer and women's movements to move beyond ICTs for social change and towards a more political engagement with internet governance? Do you have something to say on these issues? Share your analysis and thoughts on how you imagine a feminist internet and join the conversation on Twitter. Follow the Storify and watch how this conversation develops. You can also take a peek at last year's conversation. Know more about the Feminist Principles of the Internet (FPI) The FPIs are a tool for feminist, women's and queer movements to articulate and explore issues related to technology. Over the past year, the Feminist Principles have been used to build the case for a free, open and gender-just internet in both women's rights and internet rights spaces globally, including at the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), the Human Rights Council, the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), the Arab IGF, and the African School on Internet Governance. Groups have also taken this work local, organising around the principles in, among other countries, Bosnia and Herzegovina, India, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. The development of the Feminist Principles of the Internet also created a significant shift in the ability to articulate and advocate for gender and sexual justice online for those involved in its production. Join in!  |
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