Reebok Drops Rapper; Sex Assaults Trigger Suicides

Credit: thecomeupshow on Flickr, under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).

(WOMENSENEWS)–

Cheers

Hip-hop artist Rick Ross was dumped by the sportswear company Reebok after the company decided he hadn’t shown an “appropriate level of remorse” for using lyrics in one of his songs that seemed to allude to raping a woman, CNN reported April 12.

More News to Cheer This Week:

The French Senate voted April 12 to legalize same-sex marriage in France, putting the landmark bill on track to become law by summer, The New York Times reported April 12.

Sixty-five percent of Americans believe the country would be better off if more women held political office, a NBC/WSJ poll published reported April 12 found.

Saudi Arabia has registered its first female trainee advocate, paving the way for women to practice as lawyers in the kingdom, Al Arabiya reported April 10. The Saudi Arabian cabinet also approved of Noor Saeed Baqadir‘s appointment as general director of media at the Ministry of Education, Bloomberg News reported April 8. In 2009, Nora bint Abdullah al-Fayez was appointed the kingdom’s first female deputy minister at the education ministry.

As of April 9, insurance companies in California can no longer discriminate against transgender patients, Feministing reported April 10.

On April 10 President Barack Obama lifted restrictions on Washington, D.C.‘s use of local funds to provide insurance coverage for abortion to low-income women and for easing restrictions on abortion coverage for some Peace Corps volunteers, the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health said in a statement.

The rabbi of Judaism’s holiest prayer site, Jerusalem’s Western Wall, endorsed a proposal to establish a section where men and women can worship together, a groundbreaking motion that could end a decades-old fight against an Orthodox monopoly of the area, The Huffington Post reported April 10. However, on April 11 five women were detained at the wall for breaching the ban on performing religious rituals Orthodox Jews say are reserved for men, BBC News reported.

Less than a month after Sheryl Sandberg published “Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead,” the editor in chief of BuzzFeed says in a piece published April 9 that at least two women came up to him for salary negotiations.

A workshop discussing a draft law to protect women from violence was held by the Egyptian presidency April 9, The Daily News Egypt reported. Meanwhile, women’s rights groups in Egypt are pushing back against some Islamists’ attempts to blame women for an upsurge in sexual harassment, Voice of America reported April 8.

Girlguiding UK has signed the “No More Page 3” pledge protesting the standard practice of the Sun newspaper in London of featuring a topless female model every day on its page three, The Telegraph reported April 9. Rupert Murdoch, owner of the Sun, hinted a few weeks ago that he is considering ending the publication’s reliance on bare breasts to maintain circulation.

Pakistani schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai has said 40 girls in Pakistan will be the first to benefit from a fund set up in her name. She was shot in the head by the Taliban for her efforts to promote girls’ education, CNN reported April 8.

Former first daughter Chelsea Clinton said April 8 she would consider running for office if she could make a “meaningful” impact on the country, Politico reported April 8. Read more in the Women’s eNews story “Speculation Builds on Hillary Clinton for President.”

Jeers

Two female teens’ suicides are being investigated after alleged rape and bullying. A Canadian minister of justice is investigating the rape by four teenagers of Nova Scotian teen Rehtaeh Parsons, who hanged herself last week after what her mother says was months of bullying, ABC News reported April 10. She was taken off life support April 7.

In another incident, on April 11 a Northern sheriff’s office arrested three 16-year-olds on charges of sexual battery on a passed out teen who was later humiliated by online photos of the assault, seven months after the tragedy, CBS News reported April 11. Fifteen-year-old Audrie Pott hanged herself eight days after the initial incident.

On April 2, a UCLA freshman water polo player was also accused of raping a female student at a campus residence hall, CBS reported April 8. He is due in court April 25.

More News to Jeer This Week:

A team reporting for BBC Newsnight has uncovered evidence that soldiers in the Democratic Republic of Congo were ordered to rape women by their superior officers, BBC News reported April 11.

Only a fraction of families with incomes at or below the official poverty level receive Temporary Assistance to Needy Families assistance despite their need, according to an April 10 report on the impact of the federal assistance program, Legal Momentum said in a statement.

The gender-based wage gap is hurting women and families in every single state of the U.S. and every one of the country’s major metropolitan areas, a study released April 9, on Equal Pay Day, revealed.

Doctors who provide abortions will face stricter standards in Alabama starting in July under a law signed April 9 that requires them to have admitting privileges at hospitals in the state, Reuters reported.

A former Hooters waitress has sued the restaurant chain in federal court, alleging she was pushed out of her job after brain surgery left her with a buzz cut hair and a healing scar that made it too painful to wear a wig, ABC News reported April 9.

Comments on a female candidate’s appearance can seriously affect how likely people are to vote for her, a study from the Women’s Media Center found, U.S. News reported April 8.

Noted:

French president Francois Hollande will seek a law that would extend restrictions on wearing “prominent religious symbols” to private schools after the French Court of Cassation annulled the 2008 dismissal of a Muslim nurse from a private daycare center because she refused to stop wearing the hijab, Al Arabiya reported April 10. Muslim women wearing the hijab have voiced concerns over their future in France.

In Memoriam:

Margaret Thatcher, the grocer’s daughter who punched through an old-boy political network to become Britain‘s first female prime minister, has died, The Los Angeles Times reported April 8. She was 87. Thatcher stamped her personality indelibly on the nation and pursued policies that reverberate decades later.

Mariam Chamberlain, who played a pivotal yet little-known role in establishing women’s studies in the American college curriculum, has died, The New York Times reported April 7. Chamberlain financed early research about the inequities women faced in the workplace and other realms of society. She was 94.