LL:URL: SA Action Alert: Please forward act - closes 12 June
I am seeking your support for a letter to the South Australian Government to encourage the inclusion of women's perspectives and opinions on the matter of constitutional and parliamentary reform. Your support involves a quick and simple process of going to the web site: http://www.PetitionOnline.com/womensa/petition.html and filling in your details. The petition will be open until the 12 June. It would be much appreciated it you could forward this email (by cut and paste) to anyone you know who may be interested in signing. Dr Tahnya Donaghy Hawke Research Institute, University of SA Forwarded by Denise Tzumli Dear Friends, Please take the time to do this. I have been slow to respond, and was shocked to see that I was only the 48th person to sign this more than a week after I initially received it. Women's views on the State Constitution are very important, since it can be changed in Parliament itself without having to go to a referendum. Some of you may have received my e-mail regarding the recent elections in Wales (reproduced below) where 50% of MPs are women. The Welsh women had to do a great deal of trading and negotiating to achieve this and it's secure only so long as the deals hold. If we want equal representation in Parliament, the rules and processes of elections and Parliament must require that at least 50% of MPs are women. We shouldn't need to rely on either exceptionally hard dedicated work by women or men's goodwill - surely by now equal representation is our right. Please sign the petition now while you are still online, or flag it to do as soon as you next go online. Denise ~~~ The original report below, does not celebrate this astounding event enough. In the new Welsh Assembly women are the majority on the government benches. It is even a LARGE majority!! The earth trembles as thousands of women leap up from their computers jumping and dancing for joy, running and leaping, shouting out loud it is possible! Denise Tzumli Original Message Subject: [femscot-pol] welsh election - comment on nos of women Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 17:40:05 EDT From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: list deleted At last! The new Welsh assembly is the first legislative body in the world made up of equal numbers of men and women. Sally Weale reports Friday May 9, 2003 The Guardian In a nondescript office block overlooking Cardiff Bay, an extraordinary moment of political history was played out this week. It passed without any great fuss or fanfare in the wider world, but, in the long history of women's struggle for proper political representation, it was ground-breaking, earth shattering, almost incredible. Following last week's elections, the Welsh assembly, created in 1999 following devolution, has become the first legislative body in the world to be made up of equal numbers of men and women. Did you catch that? In the 60 strong Welsh assembly, there are 30 men and 30 women. Parity! And in Wales of all places, home of patriarchal old Labour, born out of the coal and steel industries, and steeped in male dominated trade union politics. Better than Sweden, which has long been a beacon for female political representation, whose parliament is 45.3 per cent female. Better than Blair's Babes. Better than anywhere. On Wednesday, Crickhowell House, a bland, redbrick building once owned by the Welsh Development Agency and now the humble temporary home to the Welsh assembly, was the inauspicious setting for the inaugural meeting of this record breaking body. And yesterday, Rhodri Morgan, the Welsh first secretary, completed the extraordinary overhaul in Welsh politics by announcing his cabinet, which is also dominated by women, with five females and four males. Not only are there lots of women, in other words, but they are in senior positions, making decisions that will affect the lives of Wales's three million people. And unlike the last session, this time the Labour party is going it alone in government, rather than sharing power. Its majority, however, is slender: it cannot risk a by-election, so Morgan jokingly urged his members this week not to go skiing, not to become ill, and not to become pregnant - or, in the interests of equality, to take paternity leave. So how was this all achieved? How did this tiny country leap from a position of abysmal under representation of women in politics (up until 1997 Wales had only ever had four women MPs in its parliamentary political history) to parity? According to Julie Morgan, Labour MP for Cardiff North, wife of Rhodri and a key campaigner in the battle for equal representation for women, there is a long tradition of Welsh women who have been active behind the scenes in politics, but because of the male working class culture and trade union politics that dominated Wales, they found it hard to come through the party hierarchy. With devolution and the creation of the new assembly in 1999, women like Morgan realised
LL:DDS: Ecological Footprints Tues 1/4, spkr M. Wackernagel
Ecological Footprints - Do We Fit on the Planet? How much nature do we use? How much nature do we have? Date : 1 April 2003, Tuesday Time: 6 - 7,30 pm Venue: Auditorium, Adelaide Convention Centre A free public forum presented by internationally acknowledged sustainability advocate and co-creator of the Ecological Footprint concept, Dr Mathis Wackernagel. We're spending our natural capital as if there's no tomorrow. The average Adelaide resident requires approximately 8 hectares of productive land to meet their consumption demands. If all the productive land on the Earth were allocated equally, there would be approximately 2 hectares per person. The battle for sustainability will be won or lost in cities. As Adelaide strives to become a green city, innovative and creative approaches to reducing the city's Ecological Footprint need to be devised. Mathis Wackernagel will discuss how the Ecological Footprint can be used as a tool for creating new urban possibilities in the City of Adelaide. RSVP Not required. For further information, please contact Gary Brook on 8302 3142. -- To help Australians join the human shield in Iraq please send donations to: Aussieshield Account, C/o Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (SA), GPO Box 2094, Adelaide, 5001. .. -- -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Sub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
LL:DDS: Nuclear dump debate Sunday 6 April 2pm
Forwarded from another list The Nuclear Dump Debate !! Sunday April 6, 2-4pm Cynthia Poulton Hall (next to St. Peter's Cathedral), North Adelaide. Moderated by Monsignor David Cappo of the Archdiocese of Adelaide Chair of the Board of the State Government's Social Inclusion Unit, former head of Centacare Australia. Speakers: * Senator Nick Minchin (Liberal - federal government) * Barry Wakelin MP (Liberal - federal government - member for Grey, SA)) * John Hill MP (Environment Minister - SA Labor government) * Senator Kerry Nettle (Greens - federal) * Senator Lyn Allison (Democrats - federal) * Senator Penny Wong (Labor - federal) * David Noonan (Australian Conservation Foundation) * Janet Giles (SA United Trades Labor Council) * Dr. Jim Green (Campaign Against Nuclear Dumping) Followed by questions and comments from the floor. More information: * Jim Green ph: 8211 7604, [EMAIL PROTECTED]. * David Noonan ph: 8232 2566. Jim Green 6/21 Surflen St., Adelaide, SA, 5000 Ph. (08) 8211 7604 [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.geocities.com/jimgreen3 .. -- -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Sub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
LL:PR: Human Shield reminds PM on Geneva Conventions
Media Release: Human Shield reminds PM we are signatories to Geneva Conventions. Adelaide, Tuesday, 4 February 2003, 0123am The text of Ruth Russell's letter to the Australian Prime Minister was released this morning. Ruth Russell is one of the Australians who have joined the Human Shield in Baghdad. Of the five assessed sites Ruth has chosen to shield the water supply. Contact Details: Ruth is staying in apartment 101 at the al-kagiz apartment block in Baghdad. Donna, another Australian, is operating the group's press office. The press office will always know where Ruth is if she needs contacting. The press office number is: 0011 9641 7192303 If you plan to ring Ruth at her hotel, remember that they are 8 hours behind us. The line is really terrible, faint reception and is like speaking down an echoing pipe: 0011 9641 717 2639 ask for room 101. Contact details at the five assessed sites are: Taije Food Silo, Taije, BaghdadPh 885 2846/7 and 885 2842 Jaizert April 7th Water Treatment Plant, 7 Nissan Project, Baghdad. Ph 4433096 South Baghdad Power Station, Almasbah, Near Al Zquit and near Al Napaha Company Phone 718952012 Ext 322 Daura Oil Refinery PO Box 2075 Daura Area, Baghdad Manager is Al Khashab Ph 7750300 satellite phone 4337 Durah Electrical Power Plan, Durah, Baghdad Ph 775 0181 Manager Janan Matte Behum. Text of Letter to PM: John Howard Prime Minister of Australia Parliament House CANBERRA ACT. Dear Sir, I wish to inform you that I, Ruth Elizabeth Russell, am one of several Australian citizens who have come to Iraq in opposition to any proposed war. My concern is in relation to bombing of defenceless and innocent Iraqi people. I am part of the human shield movement who have been working with the United Nations Development Program who have now assessed five sites in Baghdad as of humanitarian value. Accordingly, today all the human shield people are deploying to these five sites in order to protect them from any proposed bombing as this would be an act contrary to the Geneva Conventions to which Australia is a signatory. The sites human shields will be protecting are: Taije Food Silo, Taije, Baghdad. Jaizert (7th April) Water Treatment Plant, 7 Nissan Project , Baghdad. Daura Oil Refinery, Daura, Baghdad Durah Electrical Power Plant, Durah, Baghdad. This is my formal notification to you of these sites and their locations. Any bombing that may occur on these sites I will now hold you responsible for if Australia joins with the United States of America in invading Iraq. I urge you to find a diplomatic, non-violent solution to issues relating to Iraq. Yours Sincerely Ruth Elizabeth Russell (signed by Denise Tzumli on my behalf as I cannot fax or sign this email). . -- -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Sub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
LL:ART: Terror information packs returned
Some of you may have missed hearing the following news item. It is quite heartening. ABC Online ABC Australia News - 13/02/03 : Terror information packs returned in their thousands http://www.abc.net.au/news/australia/2003/02/item20030212211232_1.htm] Thu, Feb 13 2003 1:15 AM AEDT Terror information packs returned in their thousands Thousands of people are returning the Federal Government's new information package on terrorism. The returned packages are flowing in even though the mailout is yet to be completed. Thousands of Australians have begun returning the Prime Minister's message and information package, part of a $20 million terrorism awareness campaign. By Friday all 7.5 million packages will have been received in households across the country. Australia Post offices in Western Australia have already received at least 2,000 packages marked return to sender. They are being stockpiled in post offices around the country. Brisbane Lord Mayor Jim Soorley advised people last week to send the packages back. He says many people think the campaign is scaremongering I would not be surprised if there was hundreds of thousands of these returned, he said. A post office here in Brisbane, one small post office, has had hundreds of them sent back. A federal senate estimates committee was told yesterday the stockpiled packages would be counted next week. © ABC 2003 | privacy .. -- -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Sub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
LL:ART: privatised water -
Privatisation of water and sewerage continues across the world. SA's privatised water sewerage handler United Water features in this article on a criticism of moves to privatise New Orleans water sewerage systems. Denise Tzumli http://commondreams.org/news2001/0907-06.htm Companies Vying for New Orleans' Water and Sewer Systems Linked to Criminal Behavior, Corruption, Poor Service Records Collectively Include Bribery, Environmental Violations, Substandard Maintenance, Broken Promises and Questionable Ties to Government Officials WASHINGTON - September 7 - The top three corporations competing to take over the city of New Orleans' water and sewer systems have tarnished records that, combined, include connections to criminal wrongdoing, suspect relationships with government officials, infliction of environmental damage, failures to maintain equipment, and the delivery of substandard customer service, a Public Citizen report reveals. The report, The Big Greedy, details the unseemly histories of three multinational corporations likely to submit bids to operate the water and sewage systems for nearly half a million people in New Orleans, in what would be the largest public works privatization in U.S. history. The winning company, expected to be chosen next spring, will run the system for up to 20 years and take in an estimated $1 billion in revenues. All three corporations are either subsidiaries of or maintain intimate business relationships with foreign-based conglomerates that are aggressively acquiring water and other utility services throughout the world. Giving a precious public resource to private interests is distasteful to begin with, but handing over New Orleans' entire water system to one of these companies would set a new standard for governmental negligence, said Wenonah Hauter, director of Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program. City officials need to seriously reevaluate their actions - particularly because multinational corporations hold the interests of their overseas shareholders above the interests of local communities. Public Citizen does not believe that New Orleans residents would benefit from privatization of their water and wastewater systems. Evidence indicates that private operation or ownership of such systems fosters corruption and often results in rate hikes, poor customer service and a loss of local control and accountability. Following an emerging trend among local governments, the New Orleans Sewerage Water Board (SWB) decided last year to hire a private company to operate the city's water and sewage systems. A team of financial analysts concluded that a corporation could do a better job than the city of minimizing rate increases that will result from $1.3 billion worth of necessary repairs to the systems. The SWB will continue to set water and sewer rates, but the system otherwise will be privatized. Though no formal bids have been submitted to run the systems - which include 1,610 miles of water pipes, 1,450 miles of sewer pipes, 105 pumping stations and two treatment plants - representatives from three corporations, including U.S. Filter, which already operates the city's sewer system, have toured the facilities. The track records of all three corporations have been sullied by various misdeeds: OMI Inc. of Greenwood, Colo. - Last year, the City Council of Biddeford, Maine, withheld payment from OMI until the company fixed a chronic odor problem at the city's sewage treatment plant. This year, the county executive of Bergen County, N.J., was accused of trying to privatize the county's wastewater system to pay back his campaign contributors, which included OMI, its parent company and its law firm. OMI is planning to submit its bid with Thames Water, a British water giant recently acquired by German energy giant RWE. United Water Resources of Harrington Park, N. J. - In 1996, a top executive of United Water's parent company, Suez Lyonnaise des Eaux of France, was sent to prison, along with government officials in Grenoble, for bribery in connection with a contract award. Last year, United Water executives from several states donated more than $10,000 to the brother of Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell, who was running for state auditor of North Carolina. It was just two years earlier that United Water won a $21 million contract in Atlanta, where local officials and residents have since complained about broken fire hydrants, slow service and brown water with flecks of debris. U.S. Filter of Warrendale, Penn. - In 1997, executives of U.S. Filter's parent company, Vivendi Environnement of France, were convicted of bribing the mayor of St-Denis to obtain a water concession. Last year, U.S. Filter shareholders took Vivendi to court over allegedly illegal payments made to U.S Filter executives to win support for Vivendi's takeover of the company. Last month, an electrical fire at one of the sewage
LL:DD: Candlelight walk for justice and peace 4th May
Forwarded FYI from: Ngarrindjeri Land and Progress Association [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Ngarrindjeri Land and Progress Association [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, April 27, 2001 4:18 PM Subject: candle light walk for Justice and Peace - May 4th (Info for other states at the end) Next candle light walk for Justice and Peace in Adelaide - May 4th! Candle light walks are held each month in Adelaide at Genocide Corner. (In front of Government House) These walks are an expression of concern for those who wish for justice for indigenous peoples. There is an opportunity to listen to Ngarrindjeri, Arrabunna and Kaurna elders speak on issues affecting their people. The microphone remains open for anyone to offer their thoughts on current issues to sing a song or to share stories of struggle. Another Candlelit Walk has begun in Perth every month, and soon other states may follow. Please feel free to attend. P.S.If anyone is interested in other states - please give us an email/phonecall. There is a hope that we will soon have walks all over Australia on EVERY first Friday... Don't worry if it will just be a small group of you to start with from little things big things come as they say! Ngarrindjeri Land and Progress Association Camp Coorong P.O. Box 126 Meningie, S.A Ph 08 8575 1557 Fax 08 8575 1448 -- Denise Tzumli Mile End South Australia -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
LL:URL: Peoplescape Nominations Close April 25
Nomination forms are available at www.peoplescape.com.au or by phoning 1300 555 190. Peoplescape will see 5000 cutout figures of "significant" Australians erected in the sloping lawn outside Parliament House, Canberra, next November. Could we all take responsibility to nominate at least 2 people so that the figures are not just a motley crew of "public" political, entertainment and sports figures but include the outstanding working class men and women who if they did nothing more made some significant impact on our own lives. -- Denise Tzumli Mile End South Australia -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
LL:QUERY: Seeking Information
Does anybody know of any Australian group(s) organising anything around the Global Women's Strike this year? -- Denise Tzumli Mile End South Australia -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
LL:DDS: International Whale Commission in Adelaide
The International Whale Commission is meeting in Adelaide from 3-6 July. On Tuesday the vote will be taken on the establishment of the South Pacific Whale Sancturary. Join activists outside Adelaide Convention Centre, North Tce from 7.30 am on Monday morning. We need to try to change some votes. Formerly pro whale voters such as: Denmark, Ireland, Switzerland, Oman, Spain, South Africa and Russia will be abstaining instead of voting for the sanctuary. We need placards and people, don't abstain vote yes. And there are a whole raft of Caribbean nations whose no vote, financed by Japan, who need to be moved from their no vote to abstention. From the Greenpeace site "The International Whaling Commission (IWC) is meeting on the 3-6 July in Australia. Both Australia and New Zealand, with the full support of all South Pacific countries, are proposing that the South Pacific Ocean be declared a whale sanctuary by the IWC and be permanently off limits to commercial whaling. Japan is working to resume large scale, commercial whaling worldwide and so is opposed to the South Pacific whale sanctuary. Japan is lobbying other countries, in particular Caribbean countries, to vote against this proposal. The vote takes place on 4 July and we are concerned that we may be two or three country votes short of creating the sanctuary. Greenpeace have identified three countries who might be persuaded to vote the right way and help save the whale sanctuary. If you want to help save the whales, please send letters to the Prime Ministers of St Kitts and Nevis, Dominica and Ireland. [This can be done from the Greenpeace site www.greenpeace.org] When you enter your mailing address and email address below, e-mail and fax messages to these Prime Ministers will automatically be created and sent with your name and address added to the message." See you Monday morning Denise Tzumli -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
LL:AA: Expressions of interest/ help sought
On Friday 29 October, as women all over Australia were taking part in Reclaim the Night Marches, a 25 year old woman collapsed in a city street 2 blocks away from the Adelaide RTN march. She later died of injuries sustained in a domestic violence incident. She had not sought medical attention for these. Monday 1/11/99, another young woman died of head injuries inflicted on her by her spouse in an Adelaide suburb. Enough is Enough. A group of South Australian women is organising a National Day of "watching the court" putting the lawyers and judges on notice that all domestic violence trials are now political cases. If you are able to help in any way, or are interested in taking part please contact me. Thank you Edith Pringle 08 8352 8586 -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
LL:DDS: correction WEL State conf
C Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] X-Loop: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Precedence: bulk my apologies, the telephone no. was incorrect. The Women's Electoral Lobby (SA) State conference will be held from 8-11 October 99. Rather than follow common conference formats of speakers handing down their version of reality to the listeners, and/or difficulty in choosing between simultaneous workshops this particular conference is a consultative conference. WEL wants to hear from as many South Australian women as possible what they want their future to be, what they value, what they want changed. Contact the WEL office on 08 822 7504 for more details. Conference costs are $50 and $20(conc). EVEN if you CAN'T come along you STILL CAN particate by filling in the conference consultative questionnaire. The Sunday morning session is devoted to the issue of women and leadership. Feedback we have been getting at WEL is that many women in leading positions face quite large amounts of harassment and bullying. WEL SA is particularly interested in left women attending this session of the conference, since by the very nature of our participation in this list we are all leaders. The leadership vacuum in South Australian left politics, especially with so many talented and experienced women currently sitting in parliament, is a matter that needs urgent analysis and strategy development. Denise Tzumli State Co-ordinator WEL SA LL.SJ Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
DDS: WEL State Conference
The Women's Electoral Lobby (SA) State conference will be held from 8-11 October 99. Rather than follow common conference formats of speakers handing down their version of reality to the listeners, and/or difficulty in choosing between simultaneous workshops this particular conference is a consultative conference. WEL wants to hear from as many South Australian women as possible what they want their future to be, what they value, what they want changed. Contact the WEL office on 08 822 7504 for more details. Conference costs are $50 and $20(conc). EVEN if you CAN'T come along you STILL CAN particate by filling in the conference consultative questionnaire. Denise Tzumli State Co-ordinator WEL SA Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
LL:URL:Videoconf re IWD
I have been monitoring the Unifem End Violence mailings for over 6 months but I ignored the video conference stuff because I thought it would be just another feel good exercise which would not change anything. The following article certainly challenges that view. Looks as if I could be wrong. Denise Tzumli Michele Landsberg on world context (UNIFEM Videoconference) By Michele Landsberg Toronto Star, March 20, 1999 We think we're wallowing in news, drowning in it, all news all the time --- yack radio, 24-hour TV, newspapers piling up, Internet information dividing and multiplying like cells. The verbiage is endless. But the share we get of the world's real news is equivalent to a single note of an entire Beethoven symphony, one tune-up squeak of the global orchestra. Every day, events take place that barely rate a paragraph in the paper, and yet will go on sounding and reverberating in millions of humans lives for decades to come. Just such a world-shaping event took place in the General Assembly of the United Nations on March 8, this century's last International Women's Day. UNIFEM and other U.N. agencies staged a dramatic and unprecedented live videoconference entitled "A World Free of Violence Against Women". It was a huge success, yet was barely acknowledged by North American media. For the first time in modern history, the attention of world leaders and international civil servants was seized and focused on what the conference speakers called "the pandemic" of sexual, physical and emotional violence against girls and women. That, my friends, is consciousness-raising on a global scale. Ambassadors from most of the United Nations member countries filled the vast and beautiful chamber of the General Assembly. Nelson Mandela and Jean Chretien both sent videotaped statements. The heads of all the major U.N. agencies jostled to get in line to send a message of support. Nearly 2000 audience members, including U.N. workers and New Yorkers, crowded the hall. The audience sat hushed and riveted as live video statements beamed in from every continent. A Rwandan woman spoke of the months of sexual torture she and her daughters endured; an Irish woman described her brave struggle to escape domestic violence; a shy young woman in New Delhi told how she fought back legally against the husband and in-laws who brutalized her (from the very moment she arrived in her wedding robes) because her dowry didn't include a car. As videotape rolled, and the spectators gazed into the sad eyes of little African girls who had been sexually mutilated, "traditional" practices like female genital mutilation (FGM) that might have seemed mere words on paper until that moment suddenly took on the air of intolerably cruel criminality. It's really impossible to over-estimate the significance of the videoconference. For the first time ever, women of the majority world (Asia, Africa, Latin America) spoke directly to the white minority of the industrialized north and described not just their own suffering but their own increasingly militant, organized and successful activism. It's only a blink of time --- scarcely more than a decade --- since the subject of wife-battering caused Tory MPs in our own House of Commons to erupt with crude jokes and sneering laughter. So it shouldn't be hard to understand that most of the world's cultures simply expect girls and women to endure, silently, a fate that may include being sold into sexual slavery, being beaten and burned, traded as beasts of burden or treated as household slaves or spoils of war. Now, their male compatriots are paying attention. I like to imagine just how startled some of them might have been as women like Dr. Nahid Toubia, the first woman surgeon in the Sudan and a tough- talking campaigner against female genital mutilation, strode to the podium and talked boldly of women's sexual rights. In cultural and social terms, this event was a stunning innovation. Imagine the audiences around the world for the satellite broadcast. At 40 sites across the former Soviet Union --- Yerevan, Baku, Tiblisi --- they gathered. At the Hong Kong Convention Centre, at Spain's University of Alicante, at the auditorium near the dental clinic in Zimbabwe's Parirenyatwa Hospital, at the Trinidad and Tobago Chamber of Commerce, on TV in Angola, Germany, France and Uganda, at hundreds of locations across North America --- they gathered and watched. For those women who feel battered and bruised by the right-wing media backlash against feminism, the videoconference offers a healing perspective. From the global vantage point, where figures like Secretary General Kofi Anan or World Bank chief James Wolfenson attended to the conference with great seriousness, the shrill and capering little backlash figures in Canada --- the criminal lawyers who defend rapists
LL:AA: Iraq Demo on Saturday morning
In Adelaide after a quick ring around we ended up with quite good numbers on the steps of Parliament House late this afternoon. This is just the beginning of the action. The Gulf Peace Action Committee is organising a rally for Saturday, 19 Dec, 11 am. Meet at Parliament House North Terrace. Bring your banners and placards. -- in sisterhood and solidarnosc Denise Tzumli Mile End , South Australia +++ + From the Preamble: + + "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (is) a common + + standard of achievement ... that every individual and + + organ of society ... shall strive to secure their + + universal effective recognition observance." + + I ask you: Are not corporations "organs of society" and+ + bound to uphold these rights? + + UN Declaration of Human Rights, article 23, pt 3: + + "Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable + + renumeration ensuring for themselves and their family an + + existence worthy of human dignity ... "+ +++ LL.SL end == Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List As vilified, slandered and attacked by One Nation mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
