CSBR CSBR Activities, Featured, News from Member Organizations, ODOS

ATFD & Partners host Actions on Sexual Harassment in the Streets


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For One Day One Struggle 2015, l’Association Tunisienne des Femmes Démocrates (ATFD), in collaboration with ATL, Chouf, Groupe tawhida bechikh, Mawjoudin, Rojainu, Waii and Withour Restrictions are hosting two events looking at sexual harassment in public spaces.

Since 2004, Article 226 of the Tunisian penal code defines sexual harassment as ‘any persistence in the discomfort of others by the repetition of acts, words or gestures with the aim of bringing it to submit to his own sexual desires’, and carries a punishment including a one-year prison term and fine of up to 3000 dinars.

Yet according to civil society groups, the law that exists fails to provide effective and accessible redress and recourse to women bringing charges. Perhaps most problematically, the current law places the burden of proof on the person bringing the charge, and failure to prove that sexual harassment has occurred itself may result in fines or imprisonment for bringing a false accusation. Such a system actively discourages people from lodging a complaint for fear of reprisal, and heightens the disincentive to report for those who already feel stigma and shame from the experiences of being sexually harassed.

Another key challenge is that the law in Tunisia still narrowly focuses on sexual harassment as a phenomena limited to the workplace, completely overlooking the kinds of sexual harassment that are a daily challenge for women across Tunisia.

Sonya Ben Yahmed of ATFD shared with us the need to shift perceptions:

“Sexual harassment in public places, in the streets, is phenomenal in Tunisia. We don’t talk about it, or at least we don’t talk about it enough. It’s a huge problem here, and personally when I talk about it, people always say to me ‘Hey come on, at least we’re not in Egypt’.

Graffiti on Sexual Harassment in the streets of Cairo
Graffiti on Sexual Harassment in the streets of Cairo

Things in Egypt are have become so very challenging, of course, but being harassed in Tunisia is also totally normalized, and seen as completely banal, to the point that so many of us don’t even know how to articulate what it means to be harassed. And I’m talking about those of us who are being harassed, because the harassers know exactly what it is they are doing.

… In 2003, we’ve campaigned on the issue of sexual harassment before. We held seminars, made stickers and pamphlets, and wrote to parlement to denounce sexual harassment. And we did gather the testimonies of women’s experiences of sexual harassment, but usually this was women who have experienced sexual harassment at the workplace, and who have been fired as a result for wanting to talk about it. This was before the law was passed in 2004.

So looking at sexual harassment is not new for civil society groups in Tunisia, but [this focus on the workplace] is also why we don’t have much research or documentation to talk about sexual harassment in public spaces. We don’t have numbers, we don’t have a way to gage the issue with a lot of data, but in the last few years it is clear that it is more and more of a daily problem that women and people of different sexual orientations and gender identities are facing in the streets.

That’s why we decided to talk about this taboo topic. It is still something we cannot talk about openly, the victims still feel ashamed about it. It’s hard enough even to respond to a harasser in public space. So many times we opt to ignore it, or leave the bus or the public space, without being able to take that space to say “Stop!”, or “Hey, you just violated me” and put it in those terms.”

For ATFD, looking at all forms of violence against women, including sexual harassment in public spaces, also requires engaging men in challenging the hegemonic construction of ‘masculinity’ as inherently aggressive. “We need men to be present with us, at our events and engaging in these conversations also. We need them standing up and challenging the idea that masculinity is always aggressive, and working towards the solution. We need everyone to understand that harassment against women is a problem for all of society. And we want to raise the visibility that people of different sexual orientations and gender identities are also particularly targeted with this event.”

While a discussion and debate at a cafe in the city centre is planned for the evening, the day’s action also includes a component of going out into the streets to engage the wider community.

“For us this event is a chance have an action in a public space, either the streets or perhaps public transportation, or both. We’re not only hosting a seminar, or talking between walls, but we’re going outside to talk to people in the places where women and minorities are harassed, to take a public stand against this taboo. The idea is really to talk to people about sexual harassment, provide information on what sexual harassment is, and encourage women especially to talk about their experiences. We need new reactions to sexual harassment and new forms of engagement on the streets, and for us this event is a starting point for that.”

The #OneDayOneStruggle evening event is planned for 18h – 20h, at Cafe Mondial, Tunis. For more information about the event, see: https://www.facebook.com/Un-Jour-Un-Combat-996099703765811/

ATFD-ODOS-2015

CSBR CSBR Activities, Featured, News from Member Organizations, ODOS

VISION hosts Poster Exhibition to Deconstruct Stigma & Marginalization

For One Day One Struggle 2015, VISION is organizing a poster exhibit on sexuality rights in Pakistan,VISION-PK focusing on personal reflection and self-discovery as a starting point to deconstruct stigma and discrimination.

For VISION, this is a continuation of long-standing programming on sexual and gender diversity that began in the late ’90s, with outreach to hijra communities in Pakistan. Today their efforts are focusing on building solidarity and connections with a wider circle of women’s rights and development sector groups in Pakistan to take up the issue of sexuality and gender identity.

Tahir Khilji shared with us thebackground to the event:

“For One Day One Struggle, we are planning is a poster exhibit, and these posters are coming from photographs that we took at a workshop with partner organizations on a larger project on gender and sexual identity. That workshop brought together women’s organizations, development organizations, and more mainstream civil society groups in Pakistan. For many of them, this was the first time they were talking about the diversity that exists within sexuality and the sexual rights framework. It was very interesting to have them there for three days.

odos-csbr-2With everyone’s permission, we documented participants’ expressions as we worked through the activities over the three days. For example, photos from when we talked about labelling, when we talked about stigma and how it impacts people; when we started exploring sexuality and how on the basis of diversity within sexuality people are discriminated against; the feelings of isolation, of rejection that all of us at some point in our lives have felt. You know for one reason or another, we have all been isolated. And it may not because of our sexuality at all, but each person would reflect on those experiences of marginalization, and its those reflective moments that have been captured in these photos.”

For VISION, the journey of self-discovery is a means of self-empowerment and self-actualization. Its a journey critical to breaking down social barriers, especially when it comes to sexual and bodily rights. The method focuses on getting participants to a shared starting point, and from that common ground moving the conversations into exploring and articulating what underlies prejudices and openness.

“When we moved onto the reflective journey and talking about our own experiences and perspectives on sexualities, we began by looking at friendships. You know, exploring what we think of different forms of intimacy, what’s ‘too close’, what is not, and why. And its those questions that form the captions of the posters. … And for some participants they shared with us after the workshop that it was really eye opening. That this was the first time for some women to really unpack what it means to have control over one’s body.

So with this event we want to display the posters as a canvas, and say “Hey, Look at this canvas; what we think it says is that when you discover yourself, then you become very empowered and you discover others also. You begin to understand other people’s perspective as well. So may it be about sexual rights, or other rights, but the goal is that you stop saying ‘This is bad, because this person is of a different orientation, or has made a different choice’. That judgement point comes down. And that’s the goal.”

The #OneDayOneStruggle event will bring together stakeholders from the development sector, rights activists, media and academics to view the poster exhibit, and join a panel and discussion reflecting on the methodology as a tool for sensitisation and advocacy on sexuality and gender identity and expression. For more information about the event, get in touch with us at coordinator@csbronline.org.

CSBR CSBR Activities, Featured, News from Member Organizations, ODOS

GAYa NUSANTARA screening “Stories of Being Me”

StoriesofBeingMe-CSBRPhotoFor the 2015 ‘One Day, One Struggle’ campaign, GAYa NUSANTARA, in collaboration with C2O Library and discussants from Airlangga University, is hosting a film screening of episodes from “Stories of Being Me” and a discussion on the experiences of LGBTI Indonesians.

Stories of Being Me was originally launched in May 2014 as a web-series documenting the lived experiences and personal narratives of LGBTI individuals across cities in Asia. The first series ran for two months, with a new episode premiering each week. In 2015, a second series was launched, and to date 12 episodes have been produced, exploring stories from Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Phnom Penh, Kathmandu, Singapore, Beijing, Ho Chi Minh and Kendal.

Focusing the conversation locally, GAYa NUSANTARA will be screening three episodes that document stories of Muslim Indonesian queer individuals in Jakarta and Kendal:

  • Shuniyya: In a country where faith and sexuality often clash, Shuniyya Ruhama Habiiballah has been pushing boundaries for the acceptance and inclusion of the Indonesian transgender community. Shunniya is a successful transwoman businesswoman who teaches Quran to children, thus carving a space for her gender identity and her own religiosity.
  • Vilda: Vilda is a bisexual women living with HIV who had a history of using drugs. Overcoming her own biases, she learned to accept herself fully, and she is now helping others in her own community.
  • Imam Wahudiya: A candid autobiographical perspective from Imam Wahyudi who talks about the diversity of life in Jakarta, his views on faith and urges the LGBT people to celebrate what they have in common with the wider community.

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For GAYa NUSANTARA, this event is a continuation of past actions for #OneDayOneStruggle, and reflects GAYa NUSANTARA’s interest engaging younger audiences, the use of film for advocacy, and expanding the ways we record and share personal narratives and lived experiences.

Dede Oetomo shared, “Film making was alive for a while at GAYa NUSANTARA, at an amateur level, but the program ended. So this is part of an effort to revive that. To share how film-making can be used as a vehicle for documentation and advocacy, and also to introduce people to some of the newer programs about being LGBTI in the region.

…It’s also about access. In my experiences film today is often used by younger queer people to tell stories and share experiences. And the film makers in this series are examples of activists who work through non-conventional media; these videos are not shown in theatres, which is why we’re showing them at our community event. We’re lucky to have one of the filmmakers joining us to talk about the film and his work. Hopefully this will inspire some people to make similar films themselves.

…We’ve invited a wide group of stakeholders, and we’ll have discussants guiding the conversation after the film. We hope to get our allies more engaged on LGBTI rights, and as part of One Day One Struggle under the banner of CSBR, to explore experiences of being queer in a Muslim society, of being transgender in a Muslim society. All three of the people in the documentaries are living with Islam in different ways, and the films also touch on how Islam intersects with different aspects of their identities, their livelihoods, their expression, sense of community.”


For more information on the event, get in touch with us at coordinator@csbronline.org.

For more information about the Stories of Being Me series, see BE, an online peer support platform for young LGBTI persons, which also provides resources, maps of available services in 5 key cities in Asia.

CSBR CSBR Activities, Headline, News from Member Organizations, ODOS

One Day, One Struggle 2015: Over 20 groups across 8 countries collaborate on actions for sexual rights as human rights

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Each year on November 9th, the Coalition for Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Societies (CSBR), its members and allies celebrate sexual rights as human rights with the One Day, One Struggle international campaign.

The historic campaign began in 2009, making 2015 the 7th year running that we are coming together in solidarity with all those struggling for the rights to choose freely on matters of sexuality, fertility, bodily autonomy, gender identity and self expression.

This year the campaign has involved over 20 organizations across 8 countries hosting collaborative events, and the gamut of activities shines a spotlight on the diversity of key and emerging sexual rights issues across our contexts.

From street actions to talk about sexual harassment in public spaces in Tunisia, to film screenings and poster exhibits on LGBTI experiences in Indonesia and Pakistan, to a look at the right to assisted reproductive technology in Egypt, to a drama- and arts-based workshop exploring healing in the face of terror attacks in Turkey, to supporting trans communities’ access to justice in Malaysia, and more, CSBR members and allies continue to push the boundaries and break new ground in promoting a holistic approach to sexual rights as human rights in Muslim societies.

See a brief listing of the planned actions below, and keep up with us on Twitter (@SexBodyRights, #OneDayOneStruggle, #sexualrights) and Facebook (facebook.com/CSBRonline) on November 9th for more details and updates as the actions occur!

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Egypt:

  • Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) is hosting a talk on “Treating male infertility in Egypt: Psychological and Social Consequences for Women”. The issue of infertility in Egypt, particularly male infertility, remains a very sensitive topic. When do couples choose to disclose this diagnosis and when do they hide it? How do laws regulating infertility treatment in Egypt impact couples’ choices, especially given the fact of the illegality of egg and sperm donation? Who bears the greater psychological burden of In Vitro Fertilization (IVF)? How do these assisted reproductive technologies shore up a particular conception of women’s reproductive roles? Invited speaker Shams Labib will explore these key questions in relation to her research on the topic.


Indonesia:

  • GAYa NUSANTARA, in collaboration with C2O Library and discussants from Airlangga University are hosting a screening of “Stories of Being Me” and a discussion on experiences of LGBTI Indonesians.


Kyrgyzstan:

  • Bishkek Feminist Collective is producing and launching a video called “Bishkek Girls Unite for their Sexual and Bodily Rights”. For the video, 10 girls gathered together to share their concerns related to their body and sexual rights, and particularly to explore traditions and stereotypes, and the adverse impacts this has on women and girls’ rights to bodily autonomy and integrity. While mapping out challenges, the discussion also provided the space to talk about solutions, particularly from a lens of solidarity as women and girls facing the same challenges across the country.


Malaysia:

  • Women’s Aid Organization (WAO), drawing on resources from Justice for Sisters and the My Trans Ally campaign, is hosting a social media campaign across Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, and Pinterest from 9am – 4pm, which will look at transgender rights, including ways to support and inform local actions especially after the recent Federal Court ruling and subsequent rise in violence against mak nyah across Malaysia. Join the campaign and share your thoughts, comments, and experiences, using the hashtags: #BeFreetoBeYourself #TransAlly #OneDayOneStruggle #ODOS


Pakistan:

  • VISION and allies are organizing a poster exhibit and discussion on sexuality rights, focusing on the power of personal reflection and self-discovery as a starting point to understanding social systems and constructions of stigma, discrimination, and divisions in society.
  • Drag It to the Top and allies are hosting ““Responses to Homonationalism in South Asia: Conversations on strengthening queer feminist solidarity across South Asia and the Middle East”. Key questions in the conversation include: What is homonationalism and what are the responses to homonationalism in Pakistan?, What threats, if any, does it pose to cultural beliefs and indigenous social practices?, What roles can homonationalism play in decolonizing and democratizing feminist practices?, Can it be used as a tool to strengthen cross-cultural transnational solidarity?


Philippines:

  • PILIPINA Legal Resources Centre (PLRC) has organized a workshop with LGBT leaders, academia, media, civil society, and representatives from the local governmet to develop a proposal for the Implementing Rules & Regulations (IRR) on the Davao City Anti-Discrimination law as it pertains to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity and expression.

 

Tunisia:

  • Association Tunisienne des Femmes Démocrates (ATFD), in collaboration with ATL, Chouf, Groupe Tawhida Ben Cheikh, Mawjoudin, Rojalnu, Waai and Without Restrictions, is organizing a street action and a public discussion to raise awareness on sexual harassment in public spaces.


Turkey:

  • Women for Women’s Human Rights, in collaboration with LAMBDA Istanbul, are organizing a panel on the sexual and bodily rights of women and LGBTI refugees, asylum seekers and immigrants in Turkey. Panelists include experts working in the field, along with members of women’s rights and LGBTI organizaitons. A discussion with the audience will follow.
  • KAOS-GL is organizing a psychodrama workshop for witnesses of the Ankara massacre, which aims to use drama and art therapies to strengthen the participants’ bodily and spiritual rights, resiliency and health.

We also give a big shout out to those who planned activities in other countries and cities for this year’s campaign, but due to security concerns had to postpone their actions.

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Keep up with the actions on November 9th by following us on Twitter (@SexBodyRights, #OneDayOneStruggle, #sexualrights) and Facebook (facebook.com/CSBRonline).

CSBR Featured, News from Member Organizations

Congratulations to Pınar İlkkaracan, winner of the 2015 Joan B. Dunlop Award

CSBR sends our warmest congratulations to Pinar Ilkkaracan, who was recognized and honoured with the prestigious Joan B. Dunlop Award, from the International Women’s Health Coalition on 3rd November 2015.

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Pinar Ilkkaracan is a founding member of CSBR, and is currently on our Advisory Council. We are especially proud that this is the second Dunlop Award granted to a CSBR member, with the 2014 Award granted to Ninuk Widyantoro, of the Women’s Health Foundation in Indonesia.

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(4 November 2015) The Joan B. Dunlop Award was presented to Pınar İlkkaracan by International Women’s Health Coalition (IWHC) for her exceptional record of work in Turkey and the global level to promote women and girls’ human rights. The award ceremony was held on 3 November 2015 in New York.

Named after IWHC’s first president Joan B. Dunlop, the award is presented to an activist who is working under difficult circumstances to promote the health and rights of women and girls since 2013. The past recipients of the award are Nigerian activist Adenike Esiet and Indonesian activist Ninuk Widyantoro.

At the award ceremony IWHC President Françoise Girard presented the award to Pınar İlkkaracan and said “Pinar İlkkaracan is a true champion for the human rights of women and girls in Turkey and beyond. Her vision, strategic action and determination have transformed Turkish law, benefitting millions of women. For her courage, integrity, and passion, the International Women’s Health Coalition is pleased to call Pinar a partner in the global fight for women’s rights.”

In her acceptance speech İlkkaracan said “This award is very special to me, at a time when many of the reforms we’ve won for women’s human rights have come under attack. It is a reminder that, despite our current challenges in Turkey, women’s rights have advanced very far in the past 20 years. We will continue to fight for full gender equality and sexual and reproductive rights for all.”


About Pınar İlkkaracan: Pinar İlkkaracan (born in 1961) is a women’s rights activist and psychotherapist. Founder of the renowned Turkish NGO Women for Women’s Human Rights – New Ways (WWHR), she is the developer of the Human Rights Education Program for Women (HREP) run by WWHR. İlkkaracan also launched an international network of women’s NGOs from Muslim countries (Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Societies). She has won several awards, including the International Gruber Award for Women’s Rights. İlkkaracan has authored many articles and books on women’s human rights, legal reforms, violence against women, sexual violence, sexuality and sexual and reproductive rights. The books include:

  • Deconstructing Sexuality in the Middle East: Challenges and Discourses. (editor). London: Ashgate, 2008.
  • Women and Sexuality in Muslim Societies (editor). WWHR-NEW WAYS, 2000, translated into Arabic and Turkish.
  • Human Rights Education for Women: A Training Manual, in Turkish (co-author). Istanbul: WWHR-NEW WAYS, 1998.
  • The Myth of the Warm Home: Violence in the Family and Sexual Abuse, in Turkish (co-author). 1996.


About Women for Women’s Human Rights – New Ways (WWHR): WWHR is an independent women’s non-governmental organization (NGO) that aims to promote women’s human rights, equality and non-discrimination in Turkey and on the international level. Founded in 1993, WWHR was awarded the 1999 Leading Solutions Award by the Association for Women in Development (AWID), in recognition of its contributions to advancing gender equality and social justice. In 2007, it was the recipient of the Gruber Foundation International Women’s Rights Prize for coalition building to increase the knowledge, solidarity, and advocacy on bodily integrity, sexual, reproductive and bodily rights, and human rights among women and men in Muslim societies, and contributing to legal reforms to safeguard women’s human rights and the realization of gender equality in Turkey and around the world. WWHR-New Ways also holds NGO consultative status with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) of the UN since 2005.


About the Joan B. Dunlop Award: The International Women’s Health Coalition (IWHC) created the Joan B. Dunlop Award in honor of its first president. A charismatic and courageous leader, Joan Dunlop extended IWHC’s reach and shaped its crucial role in global policy development during her time as president from 1984 to 1998. In tribute to Joan’s extraordinary legacy, the award is presented annually to a deserving activist working to advance the sexual and reproductive health and rights of women and girls in developing countries. Along with a cash prize of $7,500, the award provides well-deserved support and recognition to activists who work under difficult circumstances to fight for the right of women and girls to control their fertility and bodies.


For more information please contact:

Women for Women’s Human Rights – New Ways
Damla Eroğlu, damla.eroglu@wwhr.org
0212 251 00 29, 0542 821 55 51
www.kadinininsanhaklari.org

CSBR Featured, News from Member Organizations, News on Sexual & Bodily Rights

Biggest International LGBTI Conference in Asia held in Taipei — Taiwan embraces 6th ILGA-Asia Conference for Regional Perspectives

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[Oct 26, 2015] More than 300 LGBTI activists from 40 countries and territories in the world at the sixth biennial regional conference of ILGA-Asia, the Asian chapter of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA), from this Wednesday to Friday in Taipei, Taiwan, turning a new page for Taiwan’s “NGO diplomacy” despite Taiwan’s international status in limbo.

Organizers of the conference, including the Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association (台灣同志諮詢熱線), ILGA-Asia and ILGA, a worldwide federation of 1,200 organizations dedicated to rights promotion for LGBTI people accredited by the United Nations and with NGO Consultative Status with ECOSOC consultative status, jointly expressed their hope on Monday that the event in Taipei would offer an opportunity for Taiwanese activists’ sharing of their best practices with other participants while benefiting from the international perspectives presented in the conference.

Taiwan’s international status has limited local activists’ participation at the international and regional arenas levels, explained Ashley Wu (巫緒樑), co-chair of the conference this year and a board member of the Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association, adding that the association would like to take the opportunity of the regional event to urge Taiwanese policy makes, especially all presidential candidates for Taiwan’s upcoming elections in January next year, to make public their stance on major issues of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex (LGBTI) discussed in the conference, such as marriage equality.

Bringing Asia’s activists together

As part of ILGA’s efforts to build a worldwide movement with regional representations from different continents, ILGA-Asia began to hold a regional conference for experience sharing among activists since 2002. “Creating a network of support and breaking isolation of activists from different countries is important,” said Ruth Baldacchino, ILGA’s co-secretary-general, who emphasized on the value of equal representation of all regions for a “proper global LGBTI movement”.

Describing Asia as the world’s largest continent with the biggest population featured with significant religious, ethnic, cultural, language, political diversities, where homosexuality is still punishable by death in some countries, such as Pakistan, Afghanistan and Qatar, while Communist-run Vietnam on the other hand repealed a law banning same-sex marriage last year and Thailand’s junta-appointed government enacted the nation’s first law specifically protecting LGBTI people earlier in March, ILGA-Asia’s co-chair Kaona Saowakun said the regional conference is a platform for activists in Asia to learn from each other, and for the world to learn about regional challenges in case timely support is needed.

The conference this year is expected to receive participants from 30 Asian countries, including Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Palestine and Cambodia, a remarkable breakthrough for Taiwan considering its diplomatic relations.

An opportunity for both Taiwan and the region

After taking place respectively in Mumbai, Cebu, Chiang Mai, Surabaya and Bangkok, the ILGA-Asia conference set its foot in Taipei this year, paving way for Taiwan’s sharing of its pioneer experiences in fighting for LGBTI movement. “Asia’s largest pride parade is held in Taipei. Having the conference in Taipei to learn more about Taiwan’s LGBTI movement and joining the pride parade afterwards on Oct 31 will certainly inspire many participants,” said Saowakun.

Although Taiwan’s international status has posed challenges to the conference preparation, such as on participants’ visa arrangements, the Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association regarded the efforts as worthwhile－because local activists could gain insights from regional and international perspectives with convenient and hassle-free access to the conference.

“Many activists here with rich experiences in advocacy and campaigns are not used to or lack access to international exposure, owing to Taiwan’s persistent diplomatic predicament under the “One-China” policy between the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China, or namely China and Taiwan. That’s why we were particularly keen to bring the conference to Taipei,” explained Jennifer Lu (呂欣潔), former Taiwan Tongzhi Hotline Association’s public affairs director, referring to the strong pressure from Beijing to bar Taiwan NGO’s international involvement. Lu lobbied in 2013 with Wu for Taiwan to organize the regional conference.

Specifically, Wu hoped that the conference held in Taipei could help open up local activists’ views. “For example, those working to promote persons living with HIVs can consider collaborating with regional activists on issues regarding the patent extension of drugs arising from trade pact negotiations, which could affect access to HIV/AIDS medication ,” he suggested.

LGBTI rights promotion a diplomatic asset

Extensive support at international and regional level, such as EU’s strong assistance in visa processing for participants from countries where Taiwan has no diplomatic presence was “indispensable and tremendously helpful” in bringing all participants to the conference, stressed Lu and Wu.

Speaking on why EU not only sponsored the event but provided further support to the local organizer, Madeleine Majorenko, Head of the European Economic and Trade Office (EETO), said that as EU brings together 28 member states to jointly solve common challenges and problems on the basis of respect for human rights, it believes that all are equal and should be entitled to enjoy their rights. “Taiwan has been a positive example of LGBTI rights protection and promotion. We hope Taiwan can always be the leader and stay at the forefront in the region in this regard”, Majorenko elaborated.

Lu, who is now one of Taiwan’s first Legislative Yuan candidate for the upcoming elections in January next year on the ticket of the Green Party and Social Democratic Party Alliance, cited EU’s support for Taiwan NGOs in organizing the conference as an example of how LGBTI issues could transcend political boundaries. “The government of Taiwan should approach LGBTI issues more progressively and leverage Taiwan’s achievements in LGBTI rights protection and promotion for its international space,” Lu suggested.

Broad range of issues for discussion

Two draft bills concerning same-sex marriage and partnership were put forward to the legislature of Taiwan for legislators’ deliberation respectively in 2006 and 2013, making marriage equality a “hot topic” in the regional conference held in Taipei. Immediately after the conference, Lu is also going to organize a same-sex wedding banquet with her partner on the street to raise awareness on the issue, which the EETO is expected to join with at least 50 delegates from UK, France and the Netherlands.

While recognizing the importance of marriage equality, Baldacchino reminded that LGBT rights should not “start from and end on marriage issues”.

“There are many other issues, such as LGBT youth, discrimination within the education system and at the workplace, that deserve attention,” said Baldacchino.

Several issues that were rarely often addressed before in regional conferences, including LGBT vulnerability and resilience in disaster risk reduction following the catastrophic 2004 tsunami in Aceh, the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster and Nepal’s earthquake six months ago, LGBTI rights and disability, presentations and discussions concerning middle-aged or older LGBTIs, could all be of interest to participants, Wu pointed out.

Previous achievements of the ILGA-Asia Conference included strengthened coordination and capacity of ILGA members in making use of the United Nations (UN) mechanisms, such as the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), a unique process involving a review of the human rights records of all UN Member States, for LGBTI rights protection and promotion. More specifically, the development of the ASEAN SOGIE Caucus (ASC), a strong and vibrant network of human rights activists from 10 ASEAN countries working for issues regarding sexual orientation, gender identity and expression (SOGIE), was partly inspired in the previous Conference, according to Saowakun.

The organizers expressed their hope that this year’s conference, with the theme of “Independent souls and bodies”, could mark a new milestone for activists’ solidarity and joint efforts in the region, with the supports of the Arcus Foundation, the American Jewish World Services, the Being LGBT in Asia (UNDP), the Common Language, EU, the Ford Foundation, the Ministry of Foreign affairs of Finland, the Open Society, and the Taipei City Hospital.

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Reposted from: Age of Queer

CSBR Featured, News from Member Organizations, Statements

ASEAN Disability Forum (ADF), Partners and Allies Respond to the UN Summit Outcome Document

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Response to the Outcome Document for the UN Summit to adopt the Post-2015 Development Agenda by the ASEAN Disability Forum (ADF), Partners and Allies

We welcome the outcome document of the United Nations Summit for the adoption of the post-2015 development agenda, which is a result of the hard work and perseverance of the co-facilitators, Member States, UN agencies, civil society, Major Groups and other stakeholders.

We, as representatives from the ASEAN Disability Forum, our partners and allies would like to stress for more effective inclusion of people with disabilities not only within the outcome document but also in terms of implementation programmes. People with disabilities remain a marginalized community. Needs of people with disabilities remain invisible and not included within policy documents at all levels – global, regional and local. Within this, women with disabilities are further marginalized because of the double discrimination on the basis of gender and on disability.

We welcome the inclusion of human rights, gender equality and empowerment of all women and girls in the preamble. The document reaffirms the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD POA) and the Beijing Platform for Action (BPFA), and the follow up of these conferences. We would also like to stress for the inclusion of strong international commitments in declarations and documents including the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), the Rio+20 document, CEDAW declaration, the MDGs and finally the Incheon strategy that are important documents our governments have ratified and signed on to.

Goal 3 talks about ensuring healthy lives and promoting wellbeing for all people at all ages. This is particularly of interest to People With Disabilities (PWDs) including women and girls with disabilities. Issues of maternal mortality and morbidity are further exacerbated for PWDs who are often denied access and information on maternal health services; women with disabilities are also more vulnerable to HIV and AIDS and other diseases. Further, forced sterilization, institutionalization and forced medical interventions are forms of violence that women with disabilities (WWDs) are subjected to. WWDs must be included in these discourses. Further, universal access to Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) services including family planning and other RH services, along with sexuality education will be incomplete if these do not include WWDs.

PWDs face a number of barriers including systemic barriers, attitudinal barriers (in families and in societies). Girls and women with disabilities also face additional barriers in schooling and education as they usually get left behind in comparison to men and boys. We therefore request for the need for better access to education for PWDs and especially for women and girls with disabilities in Goal 4 of the document. We call for better capacity development of teachers and instructors to be more sensitive to issues of disability. We call for our governments to look into specific challenges faced by PWDs in making education more inclusive for all.

There is greater need for inclusion of issues of PWDs within Goal 5 of the document, which addresses concerns on gender equality. 15% of the world’s populations are people with disabilities; within this more than half are women with disabilities (World Health Organisation). This population is therefore additionally vulnerable to risks of abuse, violence and also trafficking. These issues must therefore be more effectively included within the sustainable development agenda.

Goal 7 mentions important issues of energy. Accessibility can get severely affected by availability and access to energy. With inadequate access to energy, we won’t have good services at schools, offices, and markets etc. Lack of effective energy systems for cooking, can also affect PWD especially people with visual disability with smoke etc. Lack of accessible energy also leads to discrimination. For example, when lifts don’t work, PWD can’t come to work, can’t move around. Inadequate access to energy also affects transport systems and thus affects mobility especially for PWDs. Lack of mobility also affects sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) issues of WWD with less access to SRH services. We therefore recommend for assurance of existing energy for all services and buildings for transportation, better access to transportation and energy to operate devices, machines and to work with Disabled People’s Organisations (DPOs) to review the issues we have. Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) should include DPOs and key persons in disability movement.

Most often for PWDs, systemic and structural barriers lead people to feel ‘disabled’ instead of the disability itself. In Goal 9, which addresses the need for building resilient infrastructure, we call for better inclusion of concerns of people with disabilities. It is important to look at better physical environments in the construction of buildings and roads for better mobility. This would help in enhancing lives of PWDs and enable better and independent living facilities. Dealing with physical environment is a crucial cause of our disability. PWD may not feel they are disabled. Infrastructure doesn’t only include building and environment accessible. It also includes attitudes of society – this affects access of WWD. We call for developing inclusive societies and infrastructures so that data systems do not leave PWDs and WWDs out.

Goal 13 mentions combating climate change and its impact on people. PWDs as a community are worst affected in conditions of climate change and disaster situations. When PWD are impacted from disaster, they have less access to reach safe spaces for shelter. In a family with two or more children, families often protect non-disabled children first thus jeopardizing lives of children with disabilities further. In an example in Cambodia, during a disaster situation, PWDs had to face additional challenges with inaccessible toilets and safe shelter spaces. Shelters were often higher to reach thus making PWDs including people with visual impairments and people using wheelchairs extremely vulnerable. People also need to be transported from islands (in situations of disaster) to safe spaces and often these situations exacerbate concerns of PWDs. We therefore call for improving education and better preparation for disaster relief and in places of climate change. More effective planning must be made to include PWD and especially WWDs better. Capacities of government authorities must be developed so they have the additional knowledge and empathetic understanding towards concerns of PWDs in their programmes.

Goal 16 promoting peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development will not be possible without including it in national levels laws and policies. We recommend better systems of sign language and other inclusive modes of communication including audio-visual materials. We also need better access to information and communication on access to justice including education officers working on laws and policies. We also need more focus on criminal justice systems including police, lawyers and judiciary.

We recommend better and disaggregated methods of data collections to include issues of PWDs more effectively. We need better qualitative and quantitative methods of generating evidence-based research on PWDs.

Lastly, we reiterate and emphasize the inclusion and full participation of PWDs in all planning, organizing, and implementation of the sustainable development agenda to make this truly transformative and reaching out to marginalized communities including people with disabilities.

Signed:

ARROW: The Asian-Pacific Resource and Research Centre for Women (ARROW) is a regional non-profit women’s organization based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We work towards achieving sexual and reproductive health and rights for all through monitoring and evidence-based research for better advocacy, building strong and effective partnerships and networks, knowledge sharing through information and communication and building, and improving organizational systems for better outcomes.

ASEAN Disability Forum: The ASEAN Disability Forum (ADF) is a network composed by DPOs of the ASEAN region. It is a platform, where DPOs coordinate actions to advocate for disability inclusive policy formulation and implementation.

CREA, India: CREA is a feminist human rights organisation based in New Delhi, India. Together with partners from a diverse range of human rights movements and networks, CREA works to advance the rights of women and girls, and the sexual and reproductive freedoms of all people.

Endorsed by:

Carol Yong, Independent researcher, Malaysia
Coalition for Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Societies (CSBR), International
Indonesian Women’s Association for Justice (APIK), Indonesia
Kamayani Bali Mahabal, Feminist and Human rights activist, Mumbai, India
Muntada – the Arab Forum for Sexuality Education & Health, Palestine
Samarthyam, India
VISION, Pakistan
Women’s Aid Organisation (WAO), Malaysia
Women for Women’s Human Rights – New Ways, Turkey
Khedija Arfaoui, Freelance feminist researcher and activist, Tunisia

CSBR Featured, News from Member Organizations, News on Sexual & Bodily Rights

Let’s Talk About Abortion

25 September 2015

Image from: Asia Safe Abortion Partnership (ASAP)
Image from: Asia Safe Abortion Partnership (ASAP)

By Dr. Tabinda Sarosh | Program Manager, ARROW

We seldom hear the word abortion in conversations people have about their health issues or those of their family. In a global village connected by the Internet, people have access to a lot of health information and we see many people openly talk about their various health problems such as diabetes, hypertension and even invasive procedures such as surgery. In fact having undergone a surgery is often a major life event and is described with much detail and received with sympathetic acknowledgement.

Not so for abortion!

A huge stigma is associated with the word abortion even when it’s being used in a third person scenario. No one wants to say the word “abortion”, it is replaced with more acceptable terminologies like “misfortune”, “incident”, “procedure”, etc. Much like vagina, another word solely associated with a woman’s body is perceived to be a shameful word and heavily stigmatized. So we use other more “acceptable” words that do not offend the sensibilities of people. When I searched the Internet I found a large assortment of words from “twinkie” to “minnie” to “mi-mi”. But that is a discussion for another blog post.

Imagine, if only speaking out the word abortion carries such stigma what would be the stigma of actually having an abortion, particularly an induced abortion? Women have paid for abortion by suffering lifelong social boycotts, isolation, ostracization, humiliation, patronizing attitudes as well as forced marriages, physical violence and diminished socio economic options. This is in stark contrast to treatment meted out to those who have waged, financed and endorsed wars and conflicts that have resulted in tremendous pain, devastation, misery and loss of human lives at a global scale. No stigma seems to be attached to these actions that have caused so many “extra-uterine” deaths.

Sea Change, an organization working on transforming the culture of reproductive stigma, defines abortion stigma as, “as a shared understanding that abortion is morally wrong and/or socially unacceptable”. Naturally, the implications of this stigma are multiple in countries where abortion is prohibited by law. According to data compiled by the Asian-Pacific Resource and Research Centre for Women (ARROW), out of 22 countries examined only 4 have legal provisions for abortion on all grounds. However, this does not prevent women from seeking abortion services, both safe and unsafe. E.g. evidence indicates that often married women resort to abortion as a means of contraception. [1] In Pakistan alone, where the law around abortion is vague, approximately 800,000 women per year were reported to have availed post abortion care services. In reality however, this figure of 800,000 is only the tip of the iceberg as this data was collected from formal health institutions.[2]

Interestingly, in India where the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act makes it possible for a woman to access and avail abortion services, unsafe abortions still happen frequently. According to a study[3] 12% of women seeking abortion related services do it for complications caused by unsafe abortion. 63% of these women had an abortion performed by an uncertified provider; a significant 28% reported receiving services from certified providers at a lower-level facility.

abortion-stigma-patient-provider
Besides the law and/or availability of services, there are other factors that play a decisive role when it comes to women’s reproductive choices. Among various social determinants of health, in this case abortion, are the social constructions of gender, accepted gender roles and the “moral” burden pinned to abortion. The latter has led to the huge stigma related to decision and act of getting an abortion. When it’s socially mandated to be a “hush hush” affair, women would seek services that are “hush, hush”.

In a community setting women naturally gravitate towards services that do not obligate record keeping, and are situated in clandestine locations. These places may not offer a trained service provider or the optimum medical environment for an invasive procedure. An obvious reason behind this risky behavior is to avoid stigmatization by the community and society by keeping it all under the cover. Predictably enough the entire “moral” burden of abortion is on a woman’s shoulders, which implies that the decision then also should be solely hers.

However, choices are not made in a vacuum. Our choices are deeply connected to our lived realities, our social, economic and emotional experiences and challenges. In a Global South scenario this should be viewed in the backdrop of gender disparity, poor quality of health and reproductive health services available to women, stagnating contraceptive prevalence rates, dismal poverty indicators, the widening divide between the rich and the poor of this world, poor work conditions, conflicts and disasters, internal and external displacements, climate change and much more.

On top of the burden of abortion stigma, a woman also has to bear the burden of silence. The burden of not being able to speak about an experience that in all probability must have been a difficult and stressful one. While the introduction of Misoprostol (medical abortion) has given women a safer choice than procedures done in clandestine settings, talking about it or even seeking information still remains a stigma. As a physician I have had women tell me that obtaining Misoprostol from a pharmacy was no mean feat and it took a lot of courage to actually approach a pharmacist or to request a doctor to prescribe it.

September 28th marks the Global Day of Action for Access to Safe and Legal Abortion. In an ideal world we would not need a day dedicated to assuring people that women have reproductive rights and that it’s safe to talk about abortion. But sadly, we do not live in an ideal world. So, let’s start talking about it, about the difficult decisions women have had to make, decisions that cannot be judged by anyone else, decisions often made due to the stigma related to the morality of a woman pinned to issues such as having a baby without getting married. How ironic is that???

[1] http://arrow.org.my/publication/status-of-sexual-and-reproductive-health-and-rights-in-asia-pacific/

[2] Shirkat Gah Women’s Resource Centre, ICPD + 15 : Investigating Barriers to Achieving Safe Motherhood : A Study in Selected Sites in Rural Sindh and Punjab, 2009

[3] Bhattacharya S et al., Safe abortion-still a neglected scenario: a study of septic abortions in a tertiary hospital of rural India, Online Journal of Health and Allied Sciences, 2010, 9(2):1–4

—

Reposted from: ARROW

CSBR CSBR Activities, News from Member Organizations, News on Sexual & Bodily Rights

Teenage Pregnancy Has Turned Into A Serious Problem – Do We Even Care?

25 August 2015

TEENAGE pregnancy is a growing issue not just in Malaysia, but across the globe. Everyday, the number of teenage girls who become pregnant are steadily increasing, and usually these pregnancies are closely associated with a host of social and economic woes that may affect the teenagers.

According to the Ministry of Health, some 16,528 teenage pregnancies were recorded in 2014 based on the number of adolescents that registered at government clinics. Surprising or not, this is equivalent to 50 cases of teen pregnancies per day (with three-quarters involving married teenagers). Out of the thousands of teenagers in our country who are pregnant, 85 percent of them are planned, while the rest are unplanned, statistics reveal.

For unplanned teenage pregnancies, gathered research show that oftentimes, it occurs with lack of comprehensive sex education, which leads to unprotected and unwanted sex. Other common factors include poverty, family surrounding, chaotic lifestyle, weak parental monitoring and academic failure.

Most teenagers also fail to see the dangers and complications of having a baby at a young age, and are simply unaware of the responsibilities of becoming parents. Unfortunately for the teenagers who choose to raise their child, the scenario always seem to lead to sole motherhood, with the absentee of the father who chooses to flee away from responsibility, leaving them unmarried. As for the children of teenage parents, they often fall victim to abuse and neglect.

With that being said, what are the future prospects of these teenagers if they become pregnant and give birth while they are still in the stage of developing themselves? How are they able to cope with studies and complete high school? This is why prevention efforts must be constantly renewed and reinvented. We asked some advocates exactly what needs to be done.

Comprehensive Sex Education Is A Must

Over the years, studies have shown that abstinence-only sex education does not appear to be effective. In view of this, we need to dispel the misconception and the opposition towards the use of contraceptives. This can be achieved through comprehensive sex education, which not only stresses on abstinence but also provides information about contraceptives, and the outcomes have proven to be effective.

Lalitha Menon is the President of Women’s Centre for Change (WCC)
Lalitha Menon is the President of Women’s Centre for Change (WCC)

Women’s Centre for Change (WCC) President, Lalitha Menon (pic), in an interview with Malaysian Digest, said teenage pregnancy in Malaysia is indeed a growing issue and there are various interrelated factors that lead to this problem. She absolutely agrees that comprehensive sex education is the way forward.

“There is no denying that sexual activity among teenagers is prevalent in the country, and the Government is doing nothing concrete about teenage pregnancies in the country. There has been a long-standing debate over the implementation of sex education in Malaysia.

“Sex education should have been implemented a long time ago, given the fact that teenagers nowadays are bombarded with so many uncensored information and content online. This would indirectly lead to uncontrolled communication with the opposite sex.

“The more unprotected intercourse a teenager has, the more likely teenage pregnancy will prevail,” she observed.

Lalitha highlights that it is essential for girls and women especially to have good sex education, to understand their bodies better, for better family planning, and points that parents too, have a role to play in educating their children when it comes to having sex.

“With good sex education, adolescents will acknowledge the consequences of having free sex as well as learn to practice safe sex. Besides, [sex education] can also help give them proper knowledge, understand their responsibilities and be respectful towards peers of the opposite sex.

“On the other hand, parental role is of utmost importance. Whether or not Asian parents are open enough to share their sexual knowledge with their children is no longer the issue. It has come to the stage where parents should properly guide their children. They must communicate with them about sex even though it may be embarrassing or difficult for them to do so,” she said.

Without comprehensive sex education to guide the youths, she added: “Teenagers will not have proper knowledge about sex which leads to unwanted pregnancies and eventually cause a wide range of interrelated social problems.”

Echoing the opinions of WCC’s President, Communication Officer of Sisters in Islam (SIS) Aliah Ali told Malaysian Digest that aside from lack of proper sex education, the increase in teenage pregnancies are a result of various contributing factors, which include social surroundings and poor law enforcement.

“To deal with teenage pregnancies in the country, SIS is working indirectly with our partners Asian-Pacific Resource & Research Centre for Women (ARROW), Coalition for Sexual and Bodily Rights (CSBR) and Reproductive Rights Advocacy Alliance Malaysia (RRAM), discussing and promoting contraceptives from an Islamic perspective, improving access to healthcare and working towards ending child marriages,” Aliah shared.

She further added, “The lack of proper enforcement of the law – which allows for teenagers to marry, coupled with the lack of proper sex education and access to contraceptives result in the growing number of teenage pregnancies.”

“Why were these teens even given permission to marry by the courts when their main concern as teenagers should be to complete high school and ace exams?,” a worried Aliah posed the question.

When asked if implementing comprehensive sex education is a timely move in our national education system, Aliah said, “Comprehensive sex education is long overdue in Malaysia. One way to empower girls and women is to inform and educate them about their Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights (SRHR).

Yu Ren Chung is the Advocacy Manager of Women's Aid Organisation (WAO)
Yu Ren Chung is the Advocacy Manager of Women’s Aid Organisation (WAO)

“Through SRHR awareness, both girls and boys will be able to make informed decisions before engaging in sexual relations. How would we even begin to curb the growth of teenage pregnancy if we are not even allowed to discuss the issue in schools?” she further questioned.

Likewise, Advocacy Manager of Women’s Aid Organisation (WAO) Yu Ren Chung (pic) tells Malaysian Digest, unwanted pregnancies can be prevented through ensuring women and teenagers have access to comprehensive sex education and contraceptives.

“Age appropriate sex education is effective–it has been shown to delay sexual activity among teenagers and increase safe sex when they choose to have sex. There is no evidence that sex education increases sexual activity,” he observed.

To reduce teenage pregnancies in the country, Yu said: “Access to contraceptives must be enhanced in Malaysia. The contraceptive prevalence rate in Malaysia is low — around 50 percent — and it hasn’t increased much since 1984.”

Pregnant At 14: A Victim Shares Her Story

To further understand teenage pregnancy from a first-hand account, Malaysian Digest reached out to a victim who opened up about her experience. Elisa (not her real name) reflected on the circumstances that led to her pregnancy and shared how the experience has affected and changed her life.

“Growing without a mother during my teenage years was daunting in many ways. My parents ended their marriage when I was just nine years old. My mother had since left my father and I, and moved to Pontian, Johor with my two younger siblings. Since then, I stayed with my father here, in Ayer Tawar, Perak, until this very day.

“At 14, due to transportation issues, I moved to a new secondary school which was closer to my house. I made lots of new friends, and I was very happy there. That was when I knew this guy, Issac, and he was my first boyfriend,” recalled the now 26-year-old.

“He was a caring and kind-hearted guy. But blame it on my immaturity, I lost my virginity to him as we started having sex, or to be more precise – unprotected sex. We met each other almost every day and we were almost inseparable. After seven months of us being together, I began to feel really weird,” Elisa recollected.

Recounting her unpleasant experience, she said: “My attendance at school got worse and I was sent to school counsellors every Monday. In those times, I became really depressed. Yet, I felt that those counselling sessions didn’t help [my attendance] in any way.”

“Aware of my condition, both mentally and physically, my cousin came to visit me one day and took me to a government clinic nearby and persuaded me to go for a medical check-up. After the check-up, the doctor told me that I was pregnant,” she said, adding that her first reaction was, “Oh my God” and couldn’t help but cry.

“I excused myself from going to classes and eventually dropped out of school. To be frank, I wasn’t aware of the consequences of having sex at such a young age. I didn’t even know the symptoms of pregnancy. I had no idea I was pregnant for quite a while,” she confessed, teary-eyed.

Elisa further recalled her father’s reaction after hearing the news, saying he was quite hesitant at first but had later decided and persuaded her to get married. Now, Elisa lives happily with her husband with two young daughters, aged 12 and 7 respectively.

Asked how the experiences she encountered have changed her life? She parted with a word of advice to all youths: “Do whatever you should do at your age and don’t go overboard. Think of the consequences before doing anything. Always restrict your desire to do something bad, especially the young generation out there.”

It’s Time To Change Our Perceptions

Like with the case of Elisa, teenagers are always out to experiment with the opposite sex, unaware of the consequences involved. Yet, it is not for us to be the judge of their actions, neither should we turn a blind eye towards this harsh reality, but instead understand why it happens and spread the awareness. 

Aliah reminds the public: “We need to change the social mentality which currently blames teenage girls while ignoring the counterpart to the teenage pregnancy occurring.

“It is counter-productive for us to keep blaming teenage girls for teenage pregnancy without analysing the cause – that is the lack of access to healthcare, contraceptives and the absence of a comprehensive sex education.”

She then added that the Government and society should instead work to provide social and medical support to teenage girls rather than further victimising them.

“Calling teenage pregnancies a social ailment does not do teenage girls justice. Teenage girls who end up being pregnant are as much victims or better yet survivors of a system that failed to educate us on our sexual and reproductive health rights,” she concludes.

In view of this, unwanted teenage pregnancy ought to be viewed as a major issue that society should openly embrace and not be so quick to judge, for it is certainly a difficult challenge going through pregnancy as a teenager.

 

Reposted from: Malaysian Digest

CSBR CSBR Activities, Featured, News from Member Organizations, Statements

Statement delivered by Pinar Ilkkaracan on behalf of CSBR & the Women’s Major Group at Post-2015 Negotiations

Statement delivered by Pinar Ilkkaracan on behalf of CSBR & the Women’s Major Group at the Post-2015 negotiations in New York.

—–

July 28th, 2015

Thank you Ambassador Kamau and Ambassador Donoghue for this meeting.

We thank you very much for the recognition and inclusion of gender equality as a cross-cutting issue throughout the document and the reference to realization of gender equality in the preamble. We appreciate deeply that you have heard our voice.

We also thank you for the inclusion of references to the Beijing Platform for Action, the Program of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development and the outcome documents of their respective reviews in paragraph 12.

We would like to ask for your support to retain these references in their entirety. Beijing, ICPD and the outcome documents of their reviews constitute two decades of negotiations, accumulated knowledge and experience guiding necessary action on gender equality, health, population and development. They serve as the basis and framework of goals 3 and 5.

If our hard-fought stand-alone goal on gender equality, along with its targets, is not placed within the general framework of Beijing, ICPD and their reviews, it will attain a rather much limited and inadequate quality. In that case, it will not be a step forward, but rather a step backward in women’s and girls’ decades of struggle for the realization of gender equality.

We thank you again for the historical success you have accomplished and your support in the last three years.

—–

Reposted from Sustainabledevelopment.un.org

CSBR News from Member Organizations, Resources & Tools

The Road from Antipinkwashing Activism to the Decolonization of Palestine

The Road from Antipinkwashing Activism to the Decolonization of Palestine
by: Lynn Darwich, Haneen Maikey

In lieu of an abstract, here is an excerpt from the text: 

The Combahee River Collective Statement (1977) articulates a firm stand against sexism in movements for Black liberation and racism in white women’s movements in the United States. It is a compelling and inspiring call by Black feminists to dismantle interlocking sociopolitical and economic systems of oppression, namely capitalism, imperialism, racism, and patriarchy. The statement reflects a tense political moment in which a set of principles for consciousness-raising and political engagement are discerned for the sake of the liberation of all oppressed people. Oppressions experienced by Black women, and lesbians in particular, are centered in the statement, especially, says the Combahee River Collective, as “the most profound and potentially most radical politics come directly out of our own identity, as opposed to working to end somebody else’s oppression.” Now, more than four decades later, anchoring one’s political work in personal and collective experiences of oppression is as relevant and meaningful.

In our own organizing toward the decolonization of Palestine, and with the rise of antipinkwashing activism, both nationalist and identity-based forms of political organizing have continually been questioned and contested for their inherent limitations in forging strong coalitional politics. After all, antipinkwashing activism did not emerge within a vacuum but as a response to Israel’s use of gay culture and rights to distract from and normalize Israeli occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid. It is at the intersection of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, and queer movements and the Palestine solidarity movement. Before antipinkwashing, these two movements had rarely been perceived as ones that could potentially connect or interact. As a result of this binary understanding, antipinkwashing has been formulated as a new form of organizing, a new tactic, aimed to reform both movements: adding a bit of “solidarity” to LGBT movements and a little “gayness” to Palestine solidarity work. But is the task of antipink-washing activism to politicize LGBT movements, or is antipinkwashing an attempt to queer up Palestine solidarity movements? In other words, does antipinkwashing have the potential to expand beyond these limitations and become, not a reformist, but a radically transformative strategy?

Nearly four years have passed since the launch of antipinkwashing campaigns the world over. Since then, we’ve seen pro-Israel organizations counterattack with much anticipated allegations of anti-Semitism and racism, we’ve witnessed organized efforts against Israeli pinkwashing from an antiwar/antiracism lens, and we’ve also taken note that many LGBT activists and groups have integrated antipinkwashing within the framework of international gay solidarity activism. Aside from Palestinian Queers for BDS (pqbds.com) and alQaws (alqaws.org), both in Palestine, and a network of Arab activists, mainly through Pinkwatching Israel (pinkwatchingisrael.com), most initiatives have sprung within the global North. Antipinkwashing activism has rapidly become a striking and tense embodiment of all the questions that could emerge (or rather erupt) from the nexus of sexualized, gendered, and racialized politics within a modern gay transnational solidarity movement.

In light of emerging politics of solidarity and our inherently different positionalities, would it be useful to assume that everyone in this movement is here for the same reasons and is fighting for the same cause? Does “gayness” charge our activism, and if yes, toward what, and how? The Combahee River Collective Statement, for example, contextualizes and centers Black lesbian sexuality within wider movements in order to disrupt the heterosexism, racism, and economic oppressions circulating in those movements. Sexual orientations, however, in their contemporary depoliticized and neoliberal forms, cannot but narrow and limit antipinkwashing as a transnational solidarity movement. Framing antipinkwash activism through the familiar mainstream LGBT lens does not work: sexual orientations and gender identities cannot be the sole driving forces through which we relate to antipinkwashing efforts, especially as this takes away the focus from the central issue of Palestine. This is because pinkwashing in itself relies heavily on the logic of “gay rights” as it is commonly understood and practiced—a single-issue struggle based on one’s sexual identity to the exclusion of a range of interconnected categories of identification, such as race, ethnicity, class, gender, nation, and so on. It reinforces the isolation of gay identities and conceals the structural inequalities that make certain (Jewish, Israeli) bodies…

Full text available from: WSQ: Women’s Studies Quarterly, Volume 42, Numbers 3-2, Fall/Winter 2014, pp. 281-285 | 10.1353/wqs.2014.0057

From Antipinkwashing to Decolonization of Palestine

 

CSBR Headline, News from Member Organizations, News on Sexual & Bodily Rights, Statements

Statement on the Resolution on the Protection of the Family at the UN Human Rights Council, 29th Session, Geneva

In July 2015, Asian-Pacific Resource & Research Centre for Women (ARROW) delivered a Statement on the Resolution on the Protection of the Family at the UN Human Rights Council, 29th Session, Geneva.

ARROW’s statement, endorsed by 58 organizations worldwide, outlined key civil society concerns regarding the limitations and problematic framing of the text of the resolution. The statement calls on governments and the international community to recognize and respect the differences and diversity that exist among families all around the world so that laws and policies may adequately address their concerns, and services and interventions may be directed to prevent and eliminate discrimination and violence irrespective of their diversity.

Despite repeated calls for amendments and even the withdrawal of the Protection of the Family resolution by member states at the 29th session, the resolution was adopted on 3 July 2015.

ARROW’s statement with the list of signatories as a PDF here, and the text copied below.

See Sexual Rights Initiative’s response to the passing of the resolution and details of the voting processes here.

***

Statement on the Resolution on the Protection of the Family at the Human Rights Council 29th Session Geneva

At ARROW, an NGO based in Malaysia, we have been working to advance women’s health and rights, empowering women through information and knowledge, monitoring international commitments, advocacy and mobilisation along with our national partners across the Asia-Pacific region, regional partners from the global South and allies from the global North.

ARROW, together with hits partners and allies, present this statement on the Resolution on the Protection of the Family tabled on June 15, 2015, led by Egypt with the support of Bangladesh, Belarus, Cote d’Ivoire, People’s Republic of China, El Salvador, Mauritania, Morocco, Namibia, Saudi Arabia, Sierra Leone, Tunisia, Uganda, Qatar, and the Russian Federation.

Firstly, we commend the acknowledgement of human rights treaties and laws that oblige State Parties to ensure human rights of all. Further, the recognition of the Beijing Platform for Action and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women in the Resolution recognizes the essentiality of ensuring gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.

We reiterate that the family needs to be discussed beyond narrow ideas of ‘marriage’ or ‘marriage between a man and woman’ alone, so as not to exclude all other families that may not have their origins in marriage (including single-parent families, child-headed families, extended families, families of divorced individuals, same-sex families, intergenerational families, families headed by children orphaned by AIDS or grandparents, among others) thus implying that these families are not entitled to similar protection. Therefore, efforts towards ensuring necessary protection and assistance to families must ensure that all forms of families are recognised, protected and provided for without coercion and exclusion. We also believe that narrow formulations will marginalise people including sexual and gender minorities, single-headed households, child-headed families, families of HIV orphans amongst others.

We call for the recognition of the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) into the list of recognized and cited obligatory mechanisms in the Resolution. Additionally, Principle 9 in CPD 1994, which upheld the family as the basic unit of society that is entitled to receive comprehensive protection and support and must be strengthened, should be highlighted in this regard.

We remind State Parties of the calls for recognition of diversity amongst families in form and function in different countries and regions, the inclusion of individual preference and societal conditions during the International Year of the Family in 1994. We also state that any commemorations should promote basic human rights and fundamental freedoms as set out in international instruments in whatever status of individuals and in whatever form of the family. It recognises the caregivers’ role and fostering of equality between women and men within families, to bring about a fuller sharing of domestic responsibilities and employment opportunities.

While we commend the recognition of responsibilities of the family, in order for this to happen gender equality for women and girls has to be ensured throughout the life cycle, including the recognition and realisation of their sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR). Women and girls have to have choices and be able to realise their full human rights, within an atmosphere of safety and security in the family, where they are free from violence, abuse and coercion.

While we welcome the focus on gender equality and empowerment including maternal health, it is insufficient to ensure meaningful equality and empowerment for women. Some of the main causes of maternal mortality and morbidity include abortion-related injuries, restrictive and inadequate abortion policies, unavailability of safe, legal abortion services without conditions. These issues must be considered in order to break out of the cycle of poverty and have opportunities to improve overall wellbeing such as quality education, including comprehensive sexuality education. Gender equality thus cannot be achieved without ensuring SRHR of all women and girls and must be considered a fundamental right.

Discussions related to the Post-2015 development agenda should uphold and ensure the full realisation of human rights for women and girls, protection against violence, including that brought about by all forms of extremisms and practices brought on by extreme interpretations of religion as well as ensuring the realisation of SRHR for all. Additionally, they must address inequalities within the family and practices that are brought on by such inequalities.

In calling for the strengthening of national capacities to address national priorities relating to family issues, the resolution uses a narrow definition, thus ignoring sexually diverse groups and their rights related to cohabitation and having children. The fact that sexual diversity continues to be criminialised in many countries is further proof of the refusal to recognize that in different contexts, various forms of the family exist and should be protected and upheld.

At the same time, State parties should not interpret the preservation of cultural identity, traditions, morals, heritage and value system of the society in a manner that limits the potential of women and girls within the family and society, entrenching inequalities and gender biases within the family and society at large. Furthermore, a focus on preserving these helps to conceal human rights violations and abuses such as marital rape, child abuse, early marriages, incest and honour killings that occur within families. Individuals within the family have to be seen as right holders in their own right.

We call attention towards mention of reductions in social expenditure in the Resolution that often affects social sectors such as health, including reductions in expenditure on women’s health services. Overall health care and access to good health care including sexual and reproductive health care are essential for women and girls empowerment.

The Resolution calls for placing the choice of education in the hands of parents but this leaves room for decisions regarding the exclusion of Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) in formal or informal curricular development and delivery. This is noted particularly in relation to protecting the health and wellbeing of girls who are often seen as the guardians of family honour. In relation to such views, CSE would be considered inappropriate for boys and girls within notions of corrupting young minds and encouraging sexual activity rather than a means to empowering them with much needed information to make decisions about their own bodies and sexual choices.

We therefore call on governments and the international community to recognize and respect the differences and diversity that exist among families all around the world so that laws and policies may adequately address their concerns, and services and interventions may be directed to prevent and eliminate discrimination and violence irrespective of their diversity.

***

CSBR News from Member Organizations, News on Sexual & Bodily Rights

Milestones for the LGBTI Movement in Indonesia

The Jakarta Post recently featured a list of milestones of the LGBTI movement inGN Triangle Indonesia, which included the founding of CSBR member and current coordinating office Gaya Nusantara! Read the article below.


Milestones for the LGBT Movement in Indonesia

Indonesia’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) advocacy movement has come a long way since the 1960s, when then Jakarta governor Ali Sadikin first facilitated a transgender association in the city.

“The era after the 1998 reform was the dawn for more political LGBT organizations. […] Before 1998, the LGBT movement was accepted but controlled. After the reform era, LGBT organizations could get more political,” the director of LGBT rights group Suara Kita, Hartoyo, said on Monday.

Here we list the milestones of the Indonesian LGBT advocacy movement:

1960: Establishment of the Jakarta Transgender Association (Hiwad), with the support of then Jakarta governor Ali Sadikin. Other cities subsequently established similar organizations.

1982: Creation of the first public gay organization, Lambda Indonesia. Lambda members were mostly gay men, with little participation from lesbians or transgenders. The organization was disbanded in 1986.

1987: Creation of GAYa Nusantara, the oldest LGBT group still in existence.

1993: Indonesian Lesbian and Gay Congress (KLGI) held in Kaliurang, near Yogyakarta. Subsequent congresses were held in Lembang, West Java, in 1995, and in Denpasar, Bali, in 1997.

1998: Lesbian and bisexual women, as well as transgender men, participate in the Indonesian Women’s Congress in 1998.

2006: Signing of the Yogyakarta Principles, the first international principles on the application of international human rights law in relation to sexual orientation and gender identity.

2007: Establishment of the Gay, Transgender and Men Who Have Sex with Men Network (GWL INA), which aims to support the scale-up of HIV prevention and care programs for targeted communities.

2008: After the third International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA) Conference in Thailand, six LGBT organizations from Jakarta, Surabaya and Yogyakarta team up to strengthen the movement, the forerunner of today’s LGBTIQ Forum.

2013: National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) sets LGBT rights as a topic for a plenary discussion for the first time in 10 years.

Source: The Jakarta Post

CSBR News from Member Organizations, News on Sexual & Bodily Rights

Resistance in the face of police violence at Istanbul Pride 2015

Police attacked the LGBTI Pride Parade with water cannon and tear gas to disperse the participants at Istanbul Pride on Sunday 28 June 2015.

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The participants as well as journalists were exposed to violence, the disproportionate use of tear gas, and arbitrary detention by Turkey’s police forces. MPs from the CHP and HDP resisted together against the police attack. Despite of the police violence, rainbow flags were waived everywhere in Beyoğlu Street.

Turkish police fired water cannon and rubber pellets to disperse a crowd gathered around the LGBTI Pride Parade by using the month of Ramadan as an “excuse”.

A similar parade occurred peacefully in Istanbul without any incident last year during the month of Ramadan.

Pride Parade participants chanted slogans like “legs to shoulders against fascism”, “don’t keep silent, shout it out, gays exist”, “Police, prostitute yourself and live proudly” against police brutality.

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Just before the Parade, Kaos GL and Bianet editors were about to be taken into custody while recording police violence.


Cyber attacks to KaosGL.org

When police was attacking to pride participants, KaosGL.org faced cyber attacks. Could not access the site long time, technical difficulties continued until late at night.

U.S. Consul General in Istanbul Charles F. Hunter, MPs Filiz Kerestecioğlu, Beyza Üstün and Sezai Temelli from the HDP and MPs Sezgin Tanrıkulu and Mahmut Tanal from the CHP and Beşiktaş Mayor Murat Hazinedar were also in Taksim. MPs from the HDP and CHP formed a human chain to prevent riot police from attacking the participant of the Parade. They resisted against homophobia together.

The 23rd Istanbul LGBTI Pride Committee released an announcement and urged the participants to remain in place!

The announcement is as follows:

The 13th Istanbul LGBTI Pride Parade scheduled to take place at 17:00 in Taksim has suddenly been banned by the Governorate, using the month of Ramadan as an excuse, without any announcement.

The police is attacking tens of thousands of people with pepper spray, plastic bullets, and water cannon.

All entrances and exits to and from Taksim and Istiklal Street have been shut down.

We call on the Istanbul Governor Vasip Sahin to adhere to the Constitution of the Republic of Turkey, to immediately cease the attacks, and to make a public statement.

All Pride Parade participants are urged to remain in place and not leave Beyoglu until the walk can be started as planned.

People who believe in a free world but could not make it to Taksim: we invite you to make some noise with pots & pans or whatever you find, whereever you are, at 6pm.

WE ARE HERE, GET USED TO IT, WE ARE NOT LEAVING!

Love wins!

#GelYanima #JoinUs

The police did not allow the Pride Parade participants to make a press release at first, and then the participants walked through the Tunnel Square and were able to make a press release in such unfair conditions.

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Participants walked to the Tünel Square, Police didn’t allow for press statement

At 19:00, Pride Parade participants walked into a crowd of police barricades and police opened the Tünel Square. In a press statement; Committee highlighted police attack. Police didn’t allow the full press statement.

5 LGBT individuals were attacked by unidentified persons. Nose of one of LGBT activists and hip of one activist were broken.

Police also continued to attack the night after the party.

Despite the ongoing police attack rainbow flags waved in all the streets of Beyoğlu all day!


Photos: Barış Paksoy Docu News Agency

Reposted from: KAOS-GL

CSBR News from Member Organizations, Resources & Tools, Statements

Response to the Zero-Draft of the Outcome Document of the Post-2015 Summit

During the 20-24 June 2015 intergovernmental negotiations, ARROW submitted a detailed response to the zero-draft of the Outcome Document of the Post-2015 Summit. The response was supported by 116 women’s groups and allied civil society and social movements from 33 countries and 7 regions.

The response includes both general comments on the framing of the draft, and specific comments on the language. Overall the response calls for the inclusion of sexual and reproductive health and rights across the document from an intersectional gender-responsive approach that ensures accountability to human rights, environmental and labour standards, and non-discrimination on the basis of diverse identity markers.

Read the response here.

Response to Zero-Draft of Post-2015 Outcome Document

CSBR CSBR Activities, News from Member Organizations, News on Sexual & Bodily Rights, ODOS

A lesson in body positivity for Pakistan

6 December 2014

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Luavut Zahid is Pakistan Today’s Special Correspondent. Her work places an emphasis on conflict and disasters, human rights, religious and sexual minorities, climate change, development and governance. She also serves as the Pakistan Correspondent to the Crisis Response Journal.

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A much needed conversation just got started. 

To mark the One Day, One Struggle (ODOS) on 9th November, Drag It To The Top began a series of workshops which focused on human rights and bodily rights. The ODOS workshop, which falls under the umbrella of the Coalition of Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Societies (CSBR), took place at the Institute of Peace & Secular Studies (IPSS) in Lahore.

The workshops can potentially cause an extremely positive ripple effect because they don’t just aim to drum up dialogues and get people talking, it has the ability to break actual stereotypes. It is the result of collaboration between human rights activists Hadi Hussain, Aisha Haleem, Fakhra Hassan and Fatima A Athar.

In a country like Pakistan, focus on these issues is desperately needed and unfortunately rare. The two-hour multilingual workshop had a focus on Urdu as the main language. Through use of participatory theatre and interactive dialogue it tried to create a safe space where a diverse set of people could come together and discuss body acceptance, body positive and fat-positive attitudes. “Audience members were randomly asked to pick a word (a commonly used label or slur for body type/feature or outward appearance) which they then had to communicate to the audience by enacting it. After the audience guessed it, there would be discussion about the connotations, stereotypes and personal experiences of the audience members as a way to motivate us to think about these things as they manifest in our daily lives,” Fatima informed.

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“Our purpose behind the format was to facilitate the process of rethinking as well as relearning of the participants where they would be able to realise the whats, whys and hows of body politics,” Hadi informed while explaining the format. “Through this indirect learning methodology, we gave them space to be open enough to share their ideas regarding various body types and appearances and see what effects they have on others. It was an attempt to initiate self-actualisation process where one can recognise the social construction of all such labels,” he added.

The size of the workshop was also kept small on purpose; however, it doesn’t seem as though the group believes in strength in numbers. Fatima elaborated: “We knew from the get-go we didn’t want the ‘standard’ workshop model that divides attendees into teacher and taught, actor and spectator. There’s too much of that going on already!

“Our aim was to encourage critical thought, and for that we came up with a somewhat unusual model. So we kept the pilot workshop small, with attendees from all walks of life but not very many in total, and plenty of room for individual feedback. This was a workshop where the audience was also the teacher, and we wanted to make sure everyone received the time, attention, and safe space needed to draw out their thoughts. We’re thrilled by the response.”

Figuring out the best way to put the workshop together was also a journey for the group. “Initially, I was thinking of putting together a theatrical performance focused on the politics of oppression but then realised that this kind of activity was in danger of becoming one-sided and detached from experiences of daily life,” Fakhra said. “Drag It To The Top has a tradition of following a community-based approach to events that we have been organising since 2012. We believe in capitalising on human experiences and human bondage. Before the event, at the event and after the event, there is no hierarchy between an organiser and a participant,” she added.

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The manner in which the workshop functions is inspired by a need to change the way people perceive things, the way they consume information and the way they react to it. “One fine evening, we started talking about the “extreme news” in the media on violence, sexual harassment, murders, honour killings, rape, insanity and other horror stories of life we see in the papers and in our own lives occupied with nationalist and world politics. I thought “Oh my God, look at all the violence around us. We are so desensitised. We see violence and take it as a given, like passive recipients.

“This happens because we hardly find time and space to talk about our own selves. Look at our lives. Have we ever thought about how it affects our bodies and our psyche? Have we ever talked about how we really perceive ourselves and the others in light of all this violence and injustice in the world? Have we taken a stand to do something uplifting for those we care about? Are we really being true to ourselves?” questioned Fakhra.

The initiative is extremely important because people from Pakistan, and South Asia in a larger context, tend to undermine how essential it is to actually create a dialogue around their bodies. Fakhra feels that this has to change. “We usually undermine the importance of talking about our bodies, our perceptions and our feelings unless there is some kind of violation happening, which is quite frequent here anyway. Unfortunately most of us forget to acknowledge that our bodies are political, the very fabric of our being is political and therefore needs looking after and cared for. “I feel, therefore I am” is highly underrated,” she asserted.

And that is where the group also found their muse. “There it was. The talk had to be about body acceptance and body positivity and creating safe spaces for talking about these issues with comfort and ease. We later on settled for enacting body labels to begin with and decided to bring up the issues during the discussion. I think that worked out quite well,” Fakhra explained.

What seemed like just a discussion on labels at the start began to look more and more like an exercise in addressing and breaking stereotypes soon. The workshop was a multifaceted affair. “Although the labels we talked about involved body politics but it’s all about breaking stereotypes and that’s why we developed the idea of having this workshop in the first place. We wanted to question the hierarchical social construction of different body labels which gives a privileged status to a few while downplaying others. We wanted to challenge why the idea of beauty is always associated with being fair skinned, tall and having a toned/slim body. Why can’t a dark skinned, short, and fat person be beautiful?” Hadi asked.

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Pakistan can only progress with this kind of a conversation. The fact that it’s taking place under something like the CBSR also ensures that it will be done in a way that does not alienate anyone’s sentiments. Hadi feels that these kinds of initiatives serve the Pakistani society on multiple levels. “The idea of talking about bodies isn’t unique, as we are always commenting about how people look and appear, but yes talking about bodies in a non-stereotypical way, detached from normative depiction, is quite radical,” he excitedly explained.

“On one hand it will create a discourse of questioning and challenging the way people view various body labels while developing a non-judgmental approach of addressing such labels and on the other it will enable individuals to rise above the body shaming or body privilege they have been experiencing in their daily life. This will definitely have a positive impact on the physical and psychological well being of the individuals,” Hadi said.

The initiative has a lot of things on its list of things-to-do. This was just a small taste of what’s to come. “The workshop series’ overall aim is to promote body positivity and acceptance by exploring the intersection between racism, ableism (a pressing issue — consider the recent event where police beat up blind people protesting for their rights on World Disability Day), sexism, homophobia and transphobia,” Fatima explained.

“Since the first step to solving a problem is naming it, the pilot workshop focused on encouraging participants to reveal and discuss their own bias (conscious or unconscious) as well as personal experiences, as part of putting together a critical evaluation of the cultural vocabulary we use to describe, depict, and shape the ways we think about non-normative bodies and the labels those human beings are reduced to: the disabled, the unattractive, the unusual, the different,” she added.

The group plans to hold multiple workshops addressing the same issues in the future. Fortunately, this is just the beginning.

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Re-posted from: Pakistan Today

CSBR News from Member Organizations

Pertubuhan Pertolongan Wanita (WAO) Melancarkan Laporan Keganasan Rumah Tangga 2015 dan Kempen Kesedaran Awam, “Bolehkah Anda Simpan Rahsia?”

WAO Launch 'Can You Keep A Secret'

Kuala Lumpur, 23 Jun 2015 – Pertubuhan Pertolongan Wanita (WAO) melancarkan laporan tahunan bertajuk “Berganding Bahu: Kajian Kes dalam Respons Keganasan Rumah Tangga, Laporan 2015”, sekaligus melancarkan pameran seni seramik bertajuk “Bolehkah Anda Simpan Rahsia?” bersama Leo Burnett/ Arc Worldwide Malaysia hari ini di Publika. Majlis pelancaran tersebut dirasmikan oleh Menteri Pembangunan Wanita, Keluarga dan Masyarakat, YB Dato’ Sri Rohani Abdul Karim.

Laporan tersebut membutirkan pengalaman mangsa-mangsa keganasan rumah tangga dan cabaran yang dihadapi mereka dalam mencari perlindungan dan keadilan. Laporan ini juga menyenaraikan saranan komprehensif yang ditujukan kepada pihak berkuasa kerajaan yang berkenaan.

Pameran “Bolehkah Anda Simpan Rahsia?” merupakan inisiatif pendidikan awam bertujuan mempertingkatkan kesedaran orang ramai terhadap keganasan rumah tangga. Pameran ini akan mengetengahkan 12 kepala seramik saiz sebenar yang memaparkan wanita yang mungkin merupakan mangsa penderaan. Setiap kepala seramik ini mengisahkan cerita mangsa keganasan rumah tangga yang berbeza, dan menyeru orang ramai untuk tidak berdiam diri jika mereka mengesyaki berlakunya penderaan.

Barisan kepala ini dihasilkan secara sukarela oleh artis James Seet daripada Leo Burnett/ Arc Worldwide Malaysia. “Seni seramik digunakan untuk menceritakan kisah sebenar mangsa kerana menggambarkan betapa rapuhnya hidup mangsa penderaan jika tidak dibela. Mangsa biasanya hidup bertopeng sedangkan jiwa mereka sebenarnya terseksa,” kata Seet.

“Seiring dengan pegangan ‘Keinsanan’ Leo Burnett, kami ingin menyedarkan orang ramai akan WAO 2015 Report Working Togetherkeparahan isu keganasan rumah tangga. Isu ini tidak mungkin diatasi dalam sekelip mata, tetapi berkat pendedahan dan pendidikan dalam topik ini, kami berharap dapat menggalakkan rakyat Malaysia supaya bertindak apabila menyedari wujudnya keganasan rumah tangga,” jelas artis tersebut.

“Kementerian Pembangunan Wanita, Keluarga dan Masyarakat amat mengutamakan hak golongan wanita, dan sedang bekerja ke arah mencapai kesaksamaan jantina. Malaysia amat komited kepada Konvensyen berkaitan Penghapusan Segala Bentuk Diskriminasi terhadap Wanita (CEDAW). Kementerian sangat menyokong usaha-usaha untuk membantu mereka yang didera oleh ahli keluarga, tidak kira dari pihak kerajaan mahupun bukan kerajaan,” tekan YB Dato’ Sri Rohani Abdul Karim.

Beliau mengiktiraf kekuatan dan kelemahan dalam sistem respons bagi mangsa, sebagaimana digariskan oleh laporan WAO. Beliau berkata bahawa kementerian akan “mempertimbangkan cadangan-cadangan yang terdapat di dalam laporan” WAO agar keganasan rumah tangga dapat ditangani dengan lebih baik.

Sumitra Visvanathan, Pengarah Eksekutif WAO, menekankan peri pentingnya menangani keganasan rumah tangga dengan melibatkan kesemua pihak berkepentingan. Beliau berkata, “Semua agensi berkaitan termasuk pihak bukan kerajaan dan agensi kerajaan seperti pihak hospital dan pihak polis mesti berganding bahu demi mempercepat respons kita terhadap keganasan rumah tangga dan terus memastikan mangsa mendapat sokongan dan bantuan yang disediakan.”

WAO Launch 2Laporan ini mengutarakan peranan utama polis sebagai pihak bertindak pertama  dalam kebanyakan kes keganasan rumah tangga. Daripada 110 mangsa yang ditinjau, 68 (61.8%) daripada mereka mendapatkan bantuan polis terlebih dahulu sebelum pihak lain.

“Polis memainkan peranan penting dalam respons keganasan rumah tangga. Adalah amat penting untuk pegawai-pegawai polis menerima sokongan dan latihan sewajarnya untuk mengendalikan kes-kes sebegini,” jelas Visvanathan.

Satu lagi isu yang diketengahkan dalam laporan ini adalah beberapa kejayaan pihak mahkamah dalam membicarakan kes penderaan rumah tangga. Contohnya: kenyataan impak mangsa (victim impact statement, VIS) berjaya digunakan untuk mendakwa pelaku, manakala seorang pelaku lain berjaya dipenjarakan kerana melanggar arahan perlindungan, kali pertama untuk Malaysia.

Naib Presiden WAO Tashia Peterson berkata semasa majlis pelancaran, “Keganasan rumah tangga bukan perkara yang normal; wanita berhak hidup tanpa keganasan.  Orang ramai perlu mengenal pasti hakikat ini dan menyedari bahawa setiap daripada kita mempunyai peranan penting dalam membanteras keganasan rumah tangga.”

“Setinggi-tinggi terima kasih kepada Arc Worldwide/ Leo Burnett Malaysia atas bantuan mereka dalam menjayakan pameran seni ini, pejabat YB Senator Datuk Paul Low Seng Kuan, Menteri di Jabatan Perdana Menteri, dan Brickfields Asia College (BAC) atas sokongan murah hati mereka dalam penerbitan laporan ini. Terima kasih juga kepada Publika kerana menyediakan ruang untuk menjalankan inisiatif-inisiatif ini,” sambung beliau.

Pameran seni WAO akan berlangsung di Blue Bridge, Aras G3, Publika, sehingga 22 Julai dan seterusnya di lokasi-lokasi lain.

Laporan WAO boleh dimuat turun di bit.ly/WAOreport.


Pertubuhan Pertolongan Wanita (WAO) menyediakan tempat tinggal sementara, kerja sosial dan perkhidmatan nasihat untuk mangsa keganasan rumah tangga dan berjuang untuk hak wanita. Sila hubungi talian nasihat kami di 03 7956 3488 atau SMS TINA di 018 988 8058 sekiranya anda atau kenalan anda mengalami penderaan. Bersama-sama, kita merubah kehidupan.

Untuk maklumat lanjut: Kristine Yap, kristine.wao@gmail.com