Military Bill Gains; NYT Favors Male Sources

Credit: Hajer Naili.

(WOMENSENEWS)–

Cheers

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., joined forces with GOP conservatives to introduce a bill that will limit chain-of-command oversight of military sexual assault cases, reported USA Today July 16. The Military Justice Improvement Act seeks to limit a commander’s ability to intervene in sexual assault cases involving members of their units. The intent of the bill is to end the protection of perpetrators by commanding officer. Republican backers include libertarian conservatives Rand Paul of Kentucky and Ted Cruz of Texas.

More News to Cheer This Week:

India‘s Supreme Court has given state authorities three months to implement new rules to control over-the-counter sales of acids, which have been used to maim, disfigure and even kill people, particularly women, The Washington Post reported July 19. The government earlier this week said it will categorize acid as poison.

Kathryn Bertine, an American cyclist, journalist and filmmaker, recently launched an online petition on Change.org to ask that women be permitted to race in the Tour de France in 2014, USA Today reported July 18. The Tour de France, which only allows men to participate, has been the most prestigious bicycle race in the world.

Canada announced funding to help more women get elected in Middle East and North African nations undertaking democratic reforms, Agence France Presse reported July 18. Two projects with combined funding of nearly $1 million include training in campaign management and coaching candidates on getting their messages out.

The United States launched a $200 million program to boost the role of women in Afghan society, Reuters reported July 18. The program, known as “Promote,” intends to help women between the ages of 18 and 30 build skills to find jobs, support female entrepreneurs with credit and microfinance and provide training to women who want a role in policymaking.

Indonesia will penalize political parties that fail to meet a requirement for women to make up at least 30 percent of candidates in the elections. The world’s most populous Muslim country seeks to halt a widening divide between the sexes, Bloomberg News reported July 17.

The Coalition of Egyptian Feminist Organizations called on the country’s interim president, Adly Mansour, to ensure that the committee that drafts the new constitution has a fair representation of women, the Daily News Egypt reported July 17.

The Advertising Standards Authority, an advertising watchdog, banned a Renault ad featuring scantily-clad dancers, ruling that it objectified women, The Guardian reported July 17. The YouTube ad for the Renault Clio featured a group of women in burlesque-style lingerie, gyrating and dancing around the car and drivers.

A North Dakota judge issued a ruling striking down as unconstitutional a 2011 state law banning medical abortion, Raw Story reported July 15. The law was due to take effect in August 2011, but the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Red River Women’s Clinic, based in Fargo, arguing that the law unconstitutionally restricts abortion access for women.

The recession has led to a financial awakening among U.S. women, new data obtained by USA Today show. While more women overall have indicated an interest in financial planning and become more involved in family finances since the recession, a subset has become especially informed and has taken charge of managing their money and making financial and investment decisions.

Minority female-owned firms grew 156 percent from 1997 to 2013 and now account for 1-in-3 female-owned firms in the United States, according to a 2013 report by American Express on the State of Women-Owned Businesses, Forbes reported July 15. In contrast, non-minority female-owned firms grew 32 percent during the same period.

Democrats in the Texas legislature vowed to fight both in the courts and at the ballot box an omnibus abortion bill passed by Republicans, USA Today reported July 13. The bill, passed by a Republican majority, will ban abortions after 20 weeks, require abortion doctors to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital and require all abortions to take place in surgical centers.

Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani teenager shot by the Taliban for promoting the education for girls, celebrated her 16th birthday July 12 by demanding in her first public speech since the attack that world leaders provide free compulsory schooling for every child, the Associated Press reported. From the podium at the United Nations, in an address to nearly 1,000 youth leaders from over 100 countries, she called for “a global struggle against illiteracy, poverty and terrorism.” She said the Taliban failed to silence her and her ambitions. Davis Guggenheim, the Oscar-winning director of Al Gore’s environmental documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,” is to bring the story of Yousafzai to the big screen, The Guardian reported July 16.

Jeers

Alexi Layton and Rochelle Richards, students of the University of Nevada, found that front-page New York Times stories cited far more male than female sources. After analyzing 352 stories published in January and February, Layton and Richards found that Times reporters quoted 3.4 times as many male sources as female sources. Among all the sources cited, 65 percent were male and only 19 percent were female, according to the study published by Poynter July 16. Seventeen percent of sources were unknown.

More News to Jeer This Week:

Libya‘s international women’s football team has been banned from a major tournament next week in Germany by the country’s sporting authorities, The Guardian reported July 19. Libya‘s football association cited Ramadan as the reason, but the ban follows a wave of criticism of the women’s football team by religious extremists in Libya.

In Turkey, Mücella Yapici, a member of Taksim Solidarity Platform and a leader in the Gezi Park protests who was charged for “leading a crime syndicate,” said she was harassed by police during her detention, Hurriyet Daily News reported July 12. “I was undressed by police, they bent me over and they made me cough,” she said, “I am 62 years old, I was searched naked. I was harassed, I saw young girls being abused. They did not let us go to the toilet,” Yapici said.

Alcohol-related deaths of women born in the 1970s have “disproportionately increased” in the last decade, according to a study of three cities in England and Scotland, Agence France Presse reported July 19. Researchers called for urgent action to tackle what they said was a “worrying trend” in rising deaths from alcohol misuse by women in their 30s and 40s, unseen among men of the same age group.

In Turkey, Justice and Development Party (AKP) deputy Zeyid Aslan was sent to his party’s disciplinary commission over his controversial remarks to a group of female journalists, Hurriyet Daily News reported July 12. Aslan, in responding to a series of photographs showing him sleeping at the parliament’s garden that surfaced the previous day, asked female journalists whether it would be moral if he took pictures “between their legs” and published them.

A women’s health care clinic in Fairfax City that performed more abortions than any other location in Virginia has closed, and it’s unclear whether it will reopen elsewhere, The Washington Post reported July 14. The clinic was sued twice in the past three years by its landlord. It may have faced a need to upgrade or move after Virginia changed its regulations to require abortion providers to have hospital-grade facilities.

Three ex-supporters repeated their demand for San Diego‘s Mayor Bob Filner to resign, saying he forcibly kissed two constituents and grabbed the buttocks and breast of a staff member, The Los Angeles Times reported July 15. A sexual harassment claim could be filed with city officials.

Women in Zimbabwe are being charged $5 every time they scream while giving birth, Standard Digital News reported July 16. A new report from Transparency International, which focuses on corruption around the world, found that a local hospital in one of Africa’s poorest countries was administering the hospital screaming fee to women who “raised a false alarm.”

Rural women, especially those without much education, are more likely to have their “tubes tied” in their 20s and early 30s than urban and suburban women, according to a U.S. study, Reuters reported July 15. Although it may be a good option for many women, researchers said, some others go on to regret it; especially when it’s performed at a young age.

Equality campaigners in the U.K. have accused the government of a systematic assault on measures designed to protect women and minorities, The Guardian reported July 13. In a report out this week, the Fawcett Society accuses the coalition government of “weakening the legal and institutional measures concerned with equality.”

Antalya police in Turkey finally caught a man accused of attacking a pregnant veiled woman at a bus stop, Today’s Zaman reported July 12. The incident happened July 4 when the victim says a man approached her and insulted her headscarf and clothing before hitting her hit over the head several times.

Noted:

Texas State Sen. Wendy Davis, in an op-ed published July 15 in the Washington Post, explains why she opposed the abortion bill that eventually passed on July 12. Davis “stood to oppose the bill because it rolled back constitutional rights and would reduce the number of women’s health clinics from 42 to 5, thereby threatening the health and safety of thousands of Texas women.”

In an article published July 16 by Feministing, Katty Otto denounced the silence of white feminists in the verdict of George Zimmerman‘s trial. “To know that the reason George Zimmerman walks free is directly related to the cowardice of white women leaves me no choice but to acknowledge the failure and violence of people just like me,” Otto writes. On July 13, an all female jury found Zimmerman not guilty in the February 2012 shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, reported The Chicago Tribune July 14.

A group of Afghan female lawmakers and activists are eyeing an unlikely alliance with the country’s religious leaders, hoping to promote and enhance women’s rights through Islam in a joint campaign, Reuters reported July 16.

North Carolina‘s Gov. Pat McCrory is facing discontent among some voters after the state’s House of Representatives passed a stringent abortion pill, a poll shows, Politico reported July 16. Only 34 percent of voters support the abortion measure while 47 percent oppose it, the Public Policy Polling found.