Campaigns

Liberty: police should investigate military crimes

August 24, 2018
Cross-posted from: Women's Views on the News
Originally published: 21.08.18

Screen Shot 2018-08-23 at 08.47.44‘The people who were causing him terrible problems were the same people he would have had to ask for help’.

Civil liberties and human rights campaign group Liberty has called for civilian police to investigate all military crimes after the Coroner in Private Sean Benton’s inquest delivered a highly critical verdict.

The Coroner in the inquest into the 1995 death of Private Sean Benton at Deepcut Barracks recorded a verdict of suicide, and delivered a narrative verdict that severely criticised serious failures in duty of care at Deepcut barracks.

His Honour Judge Peter Rook QC delivered his conclusions at Woking Coroner’s Court following a wide-ranging inquest which began in January and heard evidence about Benton and life at the Surrey camp from 174 witnesses.

The Coroner said:

The Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) in charge of Sean’s troop, Sergeant Andrew Gavaghan, physically assaulted and humiliated him on numerous occasions; …

 

This article is available here at Women’s Views on the News.

Women’s Views on the News (WVoN) is a women’s news, opinions and current affairs site, and our management team, writers and editors all work on a voluntary basis. Our aim is to redress the gender imbalance in global newsreporting by telling the stories that the mainstream press ignores, while at the same time encouraging more feminist writers to become news reporters and editors. If you interested in volunteering for us as an editor or writer please contact us via our website. @newsaboutwome

Categories: Campaigns, Featured Blog
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Everyone Knew: Male Violence & Celebrity Culture, by @LK_Pennington

March 7, 2018
Cross-posted from: Everyone Knew
Originally published: 30.11.17

Screen Shot 2018-03-07 at 07.41.08

Everyone knew.

We hear this over and over and over again. Every single time a male actor, athlete, musician, artist, politician, chef (and the list goes on) are alleged to be perpetrators of domestic and sexual violence and abuse, the refrain is “oh, everyone knew”.

‘Everyone knew’ about the multiple allegations of sexual harassment, sexual assault and rape surrounding Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein; allegations that go back decades. Yet, no one (read men) in positions of power followed even the most basic protection regulations and laws around sexual harassment.

Everyone also ‘knew’ about Jimmy Savile’s predatory behaviour to children and women. Despite multiple allegations made to numerous people supposedly responsible for child protection and multiple reports to police, the media still didn’t want to publish the clear evidence of Savile’s sexually predatory behaviour even after he died. Everyone knew; no one talked.


Read more Everyone Knew: Male Violence & Celebrity Culture, by @LK_Pennington

Categories: Campaigns, Featured Blog, Violence Against Women
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A guide to completing additional questions for Personal Independence Payment by @JayneLinney

March 14, 2017
Cross-posted from: Jayne Linney
Originally published: 01.02.17

Follow this link for a very comprehensive PIP guide  which focuses on examples that you could for the additional information boxes.

Often people with disabilities or long term illness get so use to living with pain and discomfort that they do not realise how much their disability affects they everyday life.

Please share as widely as possible

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Jayne Linney: I’m a disabled woman, a life long feminist and Social Activist- I write from a personal perspective, usually about the current Political climate and its affects on disabled people. Director of DEAEP – Social Enterprise run by and for disabled people. @JayneLinney

Categories: Campaigns, Featured Blog, Women's Health
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The Women’s March Washington: The Speeches by Angela Davis and Gloria Steinem

January 23, 2017

Here’s the Full Transcript Of Angela Davis’s Women’s March Speech via @ElleMagazine

“At a challenging moment in our history, let us remind ourselves that we the hundreds of thousands, the millions of women, trans-people, men and youth who are here at the Women’s March, we represent the powerful forces of change that are determined to prevent the dying cultures of racism, hetero-patriarchy from rising again.

“We recognize that we are collective agents of history and that history cannot be deleted like web pages. We know that we gather this afternoon on indigenous land and we follow the lead of the first peoples who despite massive genocidal violence have never relinquished the struggle for land, water, culture, their people. We especially salute today the Standing Rock Sioux.

“The freedom struggles of black people that have shaped the very nature of this country’s history cannot be deleted with the sweep of a hand. We cannot be made to forget that black lives do matter. This is a country anchored in slavery and colonialism, which means for better or for worse the very history of the United States is a history of immigration and enslavement. Spreading xenophobia, hurling accusations of murder and rape and building walls will not erase history.” …

Here’s the Full Transcript Of Gloria Steinem’s Historic Women’s March Speech  via @MarieClaire

“Friends, sisters and brothers, all of you who are before me today and in 370 marches in every state in this country and on six continents and those who will be communing with us in one at 1 [p.m.] in a silent minute for equality in offices, in kitchens, in factories, in prisons, all over the world. I thank each of you, and I especially want to thank the hardworking visionary organizers of this women-led, inclusive march, one of whom managed to give birth while she was organizing this march. Who else can say that?

Thank you for understanding that sometimes we must put our bodies where our beliefs are. Sometimes pressing send is not enough. And this also unifies us with the many in this world who do not have computers or electricity or literacy, but do have the same hopes and the same dreams.

I think that because I and my beloved co-chairs, the Golden oldies right?–Harry Belafonte, Dolores Huerta, LaDonna Harris–all these great people, we may be the oldest marchers here today, so I’ve been thinking about the uses of a long life, and one of them is you remember when things were worse. …

Categories: Campaigns, Featured Blog
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Manifesto on VAWG for London mayor candidates by @newsaboutwomen

April 4, 2016
Cross-posted from: Women's Views on the News
Originally published: 30.03.16

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Commit to maintaining London’s pioneering Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy.

 

 

Women’s groups in London published a ‘manifesto for ending violence against women and girls in the capital,’ recently and sent open letters to Mayoral candidates highlighting the endemic levels of domestic and sexual violence in London, and asking them to make specific commitments on ending female genital mutilation (FGM), on prostitution, on ensuring support services are maintained, and the effective policing of these crimes.

A new ‘mayorwatch’ website, which will track all relevant mayoral and Assembly candidates’ pledges has also been launched.

The manifesto and open letters precede an ‘ending violence against women and girls hustings’ in central London on 12 April, with Sian Berry, Green Party;  Yvette Cooper MP for Labour; Stephen Greenhalgh for the Conservatives; Annabel Mullin for the Lib Dems; and Sophie Walker, standing for the Women’s Equality Party, on the panel.
Read more Manifesto on VAWG for London mayor candidates by @newsaboutwomen

Categories: Campaigns, Featured Blog, Violence Against Women
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16 Days of Activism to Eliminate VAWG: What you can do to support women’s services! by @EVB_Now

December 10, 2015
Cross-posted from: Everyday Victim Blaming
Originally published: 25.11.15

These are just a few of the ways that you can support women’s services during the 16 Days of Activism to Eliminate Male Violence against Women and Girls.

  1. Donate £1 to a specialist women’s service like the national organisations Rape Crisis, Women’s Aid, or Refuge.
  2. Donate £1 to your local service providers supporting women who are living with domestic and sexual violence and abuse. BME women’s services have been disproportionately impacted by so-called ‘austerity’ so please don’t forget them.
  3. Donate £1 every day to a different specialist women’s organisations.
  4. Share fundraisers for women’s services across social media. We understand that many women can not afford to donate £1. Sharing fundraisers is just as essential as being able to donate £1.
  5. Share articles on domestic and sexual violence and abuse on social media to raise awareness.
  6. Host a coffee morning for your friends to raise money.
  7. Bring some baked goods into work and ask for donations to a service of your choice from your co-workers.
  8. Collect clothing, bedding and any other unused household items to donate to your local refuge or those support services for women who are homeless, living in poverty etc.
  9. Donate toys to a local refuge for children who will be living in them at Christmas.
  10. Write to your local councillors, MP, or MSP about the consequences of austerity cuts to women’s services.
  11. Write to your MEP to demand that the tampon tax be over-turned.
  12. Write to your MP to point out how offensive it is for the government to fund refuges and rape crisis centres from the taxes collected from the sale of sanitary products.
  13. Write to your local councillors, MP, or MSP to demand ring-fenced funding for women’s specialist services, including those for BME women or those with disabilities.
  14. Write to local councillors, MP, MEP, or MSP and ask them to undergo specialist training on domestic and sexual violence and abuse from specialist organisations.
  15. File complaints with media about inappropriate, misleading and offensive coverage of domestic and sexual violence and abuse.
  16. And, if you’re a man, stand up for women’s rights. Challenge men who make rape jokes. Call out male friends who refuse to financially support their children. Insist your employer implement the equal pay legislation. Donate money to rape crisis centres and refuges. Wearing a white ribbon isn’t enough. Your need to do the work to end violence against women and girls.

You can find the address and contact details of your local councillor via  WriteToThem.

Categories: Campaigns, Featured Blog, Violence Against Women

We are the #DeadWomenWalking and these are our names

October 30, 2015
Cross-posted from: Certain Curtain Theatre

The #DeadWomenWalking march aims to raise awareness of the women behind the statistics of domestic violence murders. A peaceful, creative ‘Murder March’ to remember and represent the women murdered in the UK by partners, ex-partners and family members.


Read more We are the #DeadWomenWalking and these are our names

Categories: Campaigns, Featured Blog, Violence Against Women

REAL for Women: Reflecting Equality in Australian Legislation for women

June 8, 2015

REAL for women challenges the current paradigm of masculinity, male violence and male sexual violence against women, including prostitution and ‘sex object’ culture: the social, personal and political subordination of women via commercial sexual exploitation.

REAL for women is a grass-roots campaigning group that focuses on challenging Australian culture to evolve, so that it reflects the value of our female citizens as equal human beings.

[email protected]

“What prostitution does in a society of male dominance is that it establishes a social bottom beneath which there is no bottom. It is the bottom. Prostituted women are all on the bottom. And all men are above it. They may not be above it much but even men who are prostituted are above the bottom that is set by prostituted women and girls.

Every man in this society benefits from the fact that women are prostituted whether or not every man uses a woman in prostitution. This should not have to be said but it has to be said: prostitution comes from male dominance, not from female nature. It is a political reality that exists because one group of people has and maintains power over another group of people. I underline that because I want to say to you that male domination is cruel. I want to say to you that male domination must be destroyed. Male domination needs to be ended, not simply reformed, not made a little nicer, and not made a little nicer for some women.


Read more REAL for Women: Reflecting Equality in Australian Legislation for women

Categories: Campaigns