This year on International Women’s Day, March 8, 2012, we find a growing World War against Women.
Some expected the next world war to be between nations, but it is clear that the current world war is by misogynists, extremists, groups, and men with a common cause: to oppress, degrade, dehumanize, and kill women. Such a coordinated attack by such an axis forces of misogyny is nothing less than a World War against Women.
In every part of the world, women are struggling for their universal human rights of dignity, equality, liberty, freedom of speech, and freedom of conscience. Women are struggling against human trafficking and slavery. Women are struggling against misogyny, violence, rape, and murder. We see women attacked by acid, women raped for seeking freedom, women sexually abused due to poverty, women raped and killed as a military tactic by sadists, women oppressed and abused, women denied education and opportunities, and women treated with disrespect and gutter language around the world – including by extremists in various areas within the United States of America.
Recognizing the World War Against Women
The World War continues on a daily basis against women. In too many parts of the world, women continue to resist those who claim they deserve death in so-called “honor killings” or by stoning. This is not merely a series of “isolated incidents” in different parts of the world, different nations, and different cultures. We must recognize this for the world war against women that it is.
— In Africa, we have seen women the target of genocide in Sudan, rape in the Congo, stonings in Somalia, religious-rationalized violence in Nigeria, and violence and oppression in many countries.
— In Egypt, even after the loss of the dictator Mubarak in Egypt, we have seen our sisters in humanity raped, beaten, attacked and denied rights.
— In Communist China and North Korea, the government forces there have long oppressed women’s rights to have children, their lives, and their freedom, with women of conscience forced to deny their faiths, and women imprisoned, beaten, and worse in concentration camps that harken to the Nazi era.
— In the Middle East, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, we have seen minority women the target of abuse, murder, rape, harassment, killings, prison, not just of those with minority religions, but also majority Muslim women targeted for oppression, beaten, and killed, simply because they ARE women.
— In Iran, we have seen women targeted by bully forces that seek to deny their freedom of speech, their right to protest against political regimes, and we have seen the sentencing of women to public stoning.
— In Israel, we see young girls and women harassed by religious extremists who seek to deny them the very right to walk in public, to deny them the right to sit where they want on the bus, and who spit on little girls.
— In the United States, we see so-called “honor killings,” and we see a culture where rape and murder – even of little girls – is too widespread and common. We see sexual harassment and abuse, efforts by extremists to seek to deny freedoms to women, and we see too many who tolerate words of hate and disrespect towards women in private and in public – with America’s so-called leaders in every corner choosing to selectively turn their head when it is not convenient. In America, the land of the free and the home of the brave, we see those who still seek to deny women Constitutional equality and we see bullies degrading women without readily felt consequences.
— These parts of the world are not the only ones with such problems; they are merely examples of the world war against women.
Our Response to a Coalition of Misogyny Against Women
The misogynists against women use different rationale for this world war. Some argue male supremacist views, some claim cultural reasons, some claim religious reasons, and some claim political reasons. But across their different rationales, their different identity groups, and their different nationalities, they have a consistency and an informal coalition – united under the disease of HATE.
Our response to this war against women must NOT be to match the violence and hate of those axis forces aligned against women. We must not offer an upraised fist, but an outstretched hand in our strength of LOVE for one another as sisters and brothers in humanity.
A response to the war against women begins with accepting RESPONSIBILITY. It requires a commitment to recognize that this is not just “someone else’s problem,” but it is our shared struggle. This war will not only attack someone else. Ultimately this global struggle will reach us personally – and it will reach our daughters, our sisters, our wives, our mothers, our friends, and our neighbors. This is no place to hide from or ignore this war against women. Unstopped, it will find its way to each of our front doors.
Our shared responsibility also must realize that we have different gifts, different skills, and different opportunities to end the war and free all of our sisters. We must take whatever personal action we can, appropriate to who we are and what we can do. Some will write. Some will petition. Some will speak. Some will march. Some will ensure existing laws are enforced. Some will create new laws. Some will simply provide comfort and courage to our sisters under attack. Whatever we can do, we must do. A war against women is a war against humanity itself, and we cannot afford to lose.
We must methods that reject hate and violence to seek change. We must demand that existing laws to protect women are enforced. Where laws don’t yet exist, we must build such new laws and new relationships to build love, dignity, respect, and equal rights for our sisters around the world.
We must convince the misogynists of this generation of the errors of their ways, and we must set an example for all of our children – boys and girls – to show them that misogynist views are consistently wrong and unacceptable – no matter who they are directed at. No exceptions.
Where misogynists are united in hate, so we must be united in love. Where they destroy, so we must build. We must build relationships based on mutual respect, dignity, and commitment to our shared universal human rights. But the burning flame of hate requires that act swiftly and with conviction. To reverse the destructive power of misogyny, for every relationship the powers of hate seek to destroy, we must build two new relationships. The relationships we build must be based on our shared universal human rights and our shared love for one another as sisters and brothers in humanity.
We Will Win Individually and Together as One Human Race
This brutal war against women is not simply a series of statistics and news stories. This is personal. The faces and the pain. The tears and the sorrow. In this world war against women, it is essential to remember in the vast statistics of global abuse that these women on the front line in the attack by misogynists are our fellow human beings. We know them. They are people we love and care about. They are family. They are neighbors. They may even be our children.
We will win this war by reaching to defend women around the world – INDIVIDUALLY one woman, one girl, at a time. We must try to change one life, then another, then another. Our efforts to support grand schemes and great ideas are meaningless – if we don’t put them in action for individuals.
But we will also win TOGETHER. While we make change one life at a time, we must not neglect the opportunity to also create new laws, change ways of thinking, and stand in solidarity together against outrageous attacks against our sisters in humanity.
Never in the history of humanity has there been a greater threat, and never in such history has there been a greater opportunity to organize, to work together, and the pool our resources to effect change.
While the misogynists have created their unwitting coalitions of hate against women around the world, we must create conscious, deliberate coalitions of love to defend women around the world. We can find solidarity, strength, shared ideas, and great courage in such coalitions. Our numbers exist, but most of us are fragmented, isolated, and frustrated. Imagine what we could do for women if we ORGANIZED. While any coalition is always difficult with diverse groups having different priorities and issues, if we can agree that we must end the war against women – end the misogyny, end the violence, end the killing, and end the hate – we will be on the right path.
Our group, Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.), will be working to help build a new coalition for human rights this summer, and we will be glad to work with any other coalition that is United for Women’s Rights and Dignity.
When we see the waves of hatred against women in America and around the world, it is often daunting; we can wonder if there ever a chance to really change things. But we must never forget that such change comes one person at a time, one imagination at a time, and one commitment to human rights and dignity at a time. We will turn the tide in the war against women. We must be responsible, consistent, and courageous.
A great American president once said: “In the long history of the world, a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility. I welcome it.”
Those of us united for women’s rights and dignity will accept such responsibility.
To those who have declared war on women – know this – every day that war will be coming to an end.
To the men of America – we need to demonstrate moral courage for our daughters, our sisters, our wives, and our mothers in America today.
We need to speak out and make it perfectly clear as men that we do not accept and we will not tolerate this type of despicable language and treatment of women in America, from any political corner or media figure – whether it is Rush Limbaugh or Bill Maher.
Women’s human rights and women’s inherent dignity as our sisters in humanity are not negotiable in political and public debates of any kind.
There is no political excuse, there is no rationale, there is no argument that justifies or rationalizes anyone in America or anywhere else treating our sisters in humanity without a shred of human decency and dignity.
This type of uncivil, gutter level discussion that we continue to hear about our sisters in humanity has no place in any type of dialogue on political, policy, religious, or public matters of any kind.
Yes, we know there will always those who express hatred and even misogyny.
But for every upraised fist of hatred, we must offer an outstretched hand of compassion and dignity to both our sisters and brothers in humanity — to show both our solidarity and our commitment to defending their universal human rights and their universal human dignity. We choose love, not hate.
When we reflect upon ourselves as human beings and as men, one of the essential elements that we must always be seeking is our conscience, and the courage to never let any circumstances and any conflict in our nation, our society, and our lives undermine the courage to keep that conscience a priority in our lives.
What are our lives worth without our conscience? What are all the things we do, all the things we build, all the things we obtain, if we lose the essence of what it means to be a human being, what it means to be a man, and what it means to be – an American.
Imagine how the rest of the world looks on American men today and wonders – will the men of America have the human decency to speak out in support of their daughters, their sisters, their mothers? Will the men of America have the courage of their conscience?
So I ask the men of America today – you have a voice, you have imagination, you have strength, and you have WILLPOWER. You can change the world. You can find time in your lives to stand up a moment to say to those who would attack, demean, and degrade the women of America.
You can find time to say to those who would dehumanize the women of America – and say ENOUGH.
We might differ on our political views. But we should never differ on the TRUTHS that we hold self-evident – that define us as Americans – that our sisters in America deserve the same equality, the same dignity, and same decency that any American deserves – without question, without reservation, and without exception.
Be responsible for equality and liberty – not just for us men, but also for our sisters in America and in humanity.
Show the world that we American men are NOT represented by the vulgar, disgraceful comments by media and political agitators attacking American women.
Put your name on the line – as one of the many millions of American men respecting women’s equality and dignity….
…simply because it is the right thing to do, it is the human thing to do, and it is the American thing to do.
To my fellow Americans – on behalf of the human rights coalition Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.), we stand in support of Constitutional rights for women and all Americans, and support the Equal Rights Amendment (E.R.A.), which Americans have been struggling to pass for over 40 years, and there continue to be efforts to extend the deadline to get the Equal Rights Amendment ratified.
Our Constitution guarantees rights and liberties consistently everywhere in America – without exception, without caveat, and without question. Our Constitution is intended to be an expansion on the DECLARATION of what it means to be an American – the truths that we hold self-evident. But we are not and we will not be complete as a nation, until our Constitution recognizes these truths not just for men, but also recognizes these truths for women and ALL AMERICANS – as ONE NATION, INDIVISIBLE, WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL.
Constitutional equal rights for women is not a left-wing or a right-wing, a liberal or a conservative issue. Constitutional equal rights for women is not a women’s or a men’s issue. Constitutional equal rights for women is an AMERICAN issue. It is our inherited obligation and responsibility to fulfill the truths we hold self-evident for ALL Americans. It is a historic opportunity to pursue the great dream and the great vision that America is and must be not only for us, but also for the world.
Yet I have sat and listened to the stories and tears of American women, whose rights have been abused in different parts of this great nation, and it makes my heart sick. I have heard and I have seen how they been treated as second class citizens, in business, in court, in government, and even by law enforcement. I have seen the uneven application of law and fairness that are basic fundamental principles of those truths that we hold self-evident. I have seen, especially in these days of great poverty among many of our citizens, how they can abused – even sexually abused because they are women, and people in business and people in law-enforcement have not made it a priority to defend their RIGHTS AS AMERICANS.
Perhaps you have not heard such stories; you have not seen such instances of abuse and disgrace across our great nation. But even those who have not heard or seen such shameful violations of American women’s rights have certainly heard and read the public dialogue over the past week. One only has to read the recent news stories and hear the interviews of those who think it is acceptable political dialogue to call American women “prostitutes” (and even more vulgar terms) to get the message of the level of intransigence against women’s rights and dignity. The timing of this latest attack on American women could not be a clearer indication of the threat to American women’s rights and dignity today. It should speak volumes to those who question the need for an Equal Rights Amendment to America’s Constitution.
We cannot and we will not complete the building of our great nation, by neglecting the Constitutional rights of half our country. We cannot and we will not become the nation that we were destined by failing to guarantee the Constitutional rights for our daughters, our sisters, our wives, and our mothers. We cannot and we will not become an American beacon of hope to oppressed women around the world – when we fail to give Constitutional rights to American women at home. We cannot and we will not ever truly become the UNITED States of America that we must be, when we allow and tolerate a division among our Constitutional rights for men and the Constitutional rights that all women should enjoy without question – simply because they are Americans – one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for ALL.
United We Must Stand – as Americans in support of Equal Rights for all women and men in America.
Jeffrey Imm
Founder
Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.)
https://www.realcourage.org
usa@realcourage.org
==========================
Equal Rights Amendment
Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.
==========================
R.E.A.L. Supports the Constitutional Freedoms of the United States of America - not just for men- but for women and ALL Americans
I have the following open letter to those attacking Muslims and Islam, regarding the recent deplorable event in a Cumberland County, Pennsylvania court. R.E.A.L. has provided the facts that were reported on this incident in a posting “Freedom of Speech: The Responsibility to be Consistent.”
The simple story is that a magisterial Judge Mark Martin apparently sought to intimidate an atheist who was allegedly confronted and allegedly harassed at a Halloween parade in Mechanicsburg, PA by a Muslim man who was offended by the atheist’s Halloween costume. The atheist sought to wear a zombie costume, which was disrespectful to the Islamic prophet Muhammad. If it hadn’t been for the words and actions of Judge Mark Martin, it is very unlikely that anyone would have ever heard about this minor news story and incident.
But Judge Martin made this into a national news story, by giving the appearance of defying our national and universal right to freedom of speech. Unfortunately, his actions have also given a platform for the anti-Islam movement to attack the religious freedom of people to practice Islam and given them a platform to spread hatred against Muslims.
In what clearly appears to be a recording of Judge Martin’s comments at the hearing dismissing charges against Muslim Mr. Talaag Elbayomy, you can hear Judge Martin stating to atheist Mr. Perce that “I don’t think you’re aware, sir, there’s a big difference between how Americans practice Christianity – I understand you’re an atheist – but see Islam is not just a religion.”
Note to Judge Martin – that is precisely the argument that those who seek to attack the religious freedom of Muslims in America use. In fact, Islam is just a religion like every other religion, especially in America. There are people of all religious faiths who make their religion the center of their lives and their culture, and also people of all religious faiths who do not. We have in America and around the world – religious freedom and freedom of conscience.
Not having done enough damage, Judge Martin also warns atheist Mr. Perce that criticizing or mocking the Islamic prophet Muhammed in “many Arabic-speaking countries, predominantly Muslim, something like this is definitely against the law there, in their society. In fact, it could be punished by death, and frequently is, in their society.”
I frankly would not have believed it, if I didn’t hear it myself. Certainly, when it gets to the point that Americans are warned by judicial authorities about the dangers of their freedom of speech (no matter how obnoxious and disagreeable), we have a big problem on our hands.
There was very much an implied threat in that comment by the judge in Pennsylvania. Furthermore, I am sorry, it was really very clear that the judge said “I am a Muslim.” (He later said he was Lutheran. No one should care what his private religion is, and it frankly is no one’s business. His job is to provide justice under the law – period.)
This incident and the judges comments have been used by many in the anti-Islam movement to attack all of Islam as a religion and all Muslims. That is wrong and simply spreads hate.
I have many good Muslim friends, including Muslims who have prayed in my home.
They are good citizens and decent people. I have Muslim friends defending Americans, including American Jews who have been under attack.
I have Muslim friends who defend and work for the human rights of women and people around the world.
I do not think the individual who harassed and allegedly assaulted the atheist at the Mechanicsburg parade is representative of Muslim Americans, and certainly not the Muslims I have met.
Every group, every religion, has diversity – it is not monolithic with one practice, or one set of practitioners. No group has just good people or just bad people. Just like humanity – every human identity group is diverse.
But I will tell you that the Muslims I know support our freedom of speech, including the freedom of speech that we don’t like.
The Muslims I know reject violence against their fellow human beings, just like all Americans must reject the violence that continues to be practiced against them and against their mosques throughout the Washington DC area – which is another disgrace in America. The Muslims I know urge love for their fellow Americans and for their fellow human beings.
To those who think this incident and Judge Mark Martin’s comments demonstrates why we should discriminate against Islam and Muslims, I tell you that is totally wrong and it is also anti-American.
Everyone in America has freedom of speech, and they also have freedom of conscience, freedom of religion, and freedom to worship — regardless of whether a judicial magistrate decides somewhere that your religion is not really a religion. He does not have the RIGHT to make such decisions in a nation that values and prizes freedom of religion for all its people.
This incident is not about Islam or atheism.
Nor is it about good taste or what is offensive speech.
It is about the freedoms we all share as Americans and as human beings. If a judge in Pennsylvania, in America, or anywhere in the world cannot understand and defend such Constitutional (in America) or universal (in the world) human rights, he has no reason being a judge – anywhere, anytime, and any place.
Judge Mark Martin needs to resign. Now.
I am sorry to say this Judge Martin, but the damage you have done is too great.
Perhaps there is another job he is better suited to perform. Being a judge, especially a judge in America, is not one of them. I hope that he, the people, and the authorities in Pennsylvania realize this and act on this. If he fails to resign, I hope that they speak out respectfully but firmly against his injustice to freedom of speech, and make certain he does not get re-elected as a judicial magistrate. I urge Judge Martin to do the right thing, swiftly.
Justice is not served by our government officials intimidating others to silence their freedom of speech. Justice is not served by warning our citizens of how criticism of religious figures and views results in the death penalty in other nations. Justice is not served by sending a signal that it is alright to harass others you disagree with, if you then suggest you didn’t understand it was wrong to do so.
Justice is also not served by our government officials in stating that Islam is not a religion – and that it deserves more or less freedoms than every other religion in America and its followers more or less freedoms than every other person in America. The truths that we hold self-evident state that we are all created EQUAL.
That commitment to equality and liberty must also include a commitment to reject those who ideas and organizations that would seek to demonize identity groups and religions that they do not like or agree with. If we hold these truths to be self-evident, then such equality requires the compassion and the patience to respect the diversity of people in different identity groups and religions, and to ensure that they have the same EQUAL rights as anyone else.
We end where we begin. We cannot promote human rights, civil rights, Constitutional rights, without HUMANITY. Our shared humanity requires us to have respect, compassion, and love for one another as brothers and sisters in humanity.
Choose Love, Not Hate. Love Wins.
R.E.A.L. Supports the Constitutional Freedoms of the United States of America - including Freedom of Speech AND Freedom of Conscience -- They Don't Have to be a CHOICE
The most controversial of our universal human rights has often been our freedom of speech.
Our most successful approach to defending our human rights and human dignity is to begin with the principle: — Choose Love, Not Hate.
Without such boundaries, our freedom of speech can be abused by those who seek to deny human rights and human dignity. Our freedom of speech can be abused to denigrate others of various identity groups. Our freedom of speech can be abused to mock, degrade, lie about, and slander others. Our freedom of speech can be abused to incite others to commit violence against other people. I am not just writing about such abuses from a theoretical perspective, but I have been a repeated victim of such abuse myself, as a result of my own stand for our universal human rights and human dignity.
But what is the answer? Can we deny freedom of speech?
The most balanced, consistent position is to use our own freedom of speech responsibly and fearlessly, and to obey the laws in our communities regarding slander and those who seek violence. Those criminal laws exist so that responsible men and women could have some defense from such attacks by those who abuse our freedom of speech. For this to be successful, we must be consistent in two areas.
1. We must NEVER respond to abuse of freedom of speech with our own abuse, intolerance, and violence. Our ethical mathematics must recognize that two wrongs only equal two wrongs; they do not make a right. We must have the right to disagree in our shared Earth, without the penalty being abuse, intolerance, and violence.
2. We must obey and expect our courts and law enforcement to obey criminal law, and not give even the appearance of favoritism. We must all understand the penalty for assaulting another human being, for slandering another human being, and for inciting mobs to commit violence, among other criminal activity.
However, we must challenge those who would abuse our freedom of speech, as well as those who disregard the need for consistency in law and order for a cohesive society.
In the United States of America, this issue was recently addressed in a case in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, where an alleged assault took place during an October 11 Halloween-type parade in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. During the season of Halloween in the United States, people regularly dress up in costumes, some of which are ridiculous, some of which invoke characters as monsters, and some of which are even offensive. The holiday is generally viewed as relatively harmless by most of the American public. During the Mechanicsburg Halloween parade, several individuals dressed up in costumes, one as a “zombie Pope,” and another as a “zombie Muhammad.” Such costumed representations were no doubt offensive to some Catholic Christians and to some Muslims. Ernest Perce, one of these paraders was with a group called the “Parading Atheists of Central PA,” was dressed in a costume as a “zombie Muhammad,” and stated that an individual, Talaag Elbayomy, had allegedly attacked him and was charged by the police with harrassment.
The Cumberland County magistrate, Judge Mark Martin, dismissed the case for lack of evidence, and claimed that there wasn’t sufficient evidence in the case. Mr. Ernest Perce claims to have a video that was taken place that captures some of the audio and environment of the alleged attack. He also claims to have audio of some of the magistrate’s comments. According to the audio of the magistrate’s comments, Judge Martin proceeded to instruct Mr. Ernest Perce V on why he should not insult followers in Islam, as an abuse of his freedom of speech. Judge Martin reportedly later stated that this had no bearing on his court decision.
CNN affiliate WHTM (ABC 27) reports that the arresting police officer, Sgt. Brian Curtis stated that Mr. Talaag Elbayomy grabbed the paraders beard and sign. According to the news report at WHTM, “Although Elbayomy denied touching Perce at trial, Curtis said he admitted grabbing Perce’s sign and beard the night of the incident. Talaag Elbayomy said he was at the parade with his wife and two kids and felt he just had to do something. In fact, he too called police because he thought it was a crime for someone to depict Muhammed in such a way. He has since learned otherwise.” WHTM interviewed Sgt. Brian Curtis after the incident at the parade and quoted the police officer as stating “Mr. Perce has the right to do what he did that evening, and the defendant in this case was wrong in confronting him.”
We may all object to those who are obnoxious and offensive. I certainly don’t agree with or accept these characterizations of religious figures that are offensive to others, and I think it is a mistake to do so. But that subjective perception does not allow the violation of another’s freedom of speech, and it does not allow someone else to physically grab signs and things on your body. Our freedom of speech is not just in Pennsylvania, and not just in America. This American Constitutional right is also a universal human right for all people – everywhere in the world – even when we don’t like it. Judge Martin decided to ignore Mr. Elbayomy’s reported statement that he touched Mr. Perce’s sign and beard. Having myself had my signs grabbed and been pushed many times in the past, I have seen the police refuse to get involved and simply let people sort it out. In my experience with numerous protests, law enforcement typically does not get involved until one party physically starts grabbing another individual.
This incident certainly may have gotten more press than a minor conflict deserves.
But the appearance that Judge Martin decided not to defend our citizen’s freedom of speech is deeply troubling. While Judge Martin states that this is not the case, there is certainly an appearance of this inclination from the audio report. Judicial officers are responsible for accepting such freedom of speech as part of their professional responsibilities.
Furthermore, the precedent that Judge Martin’s decision sets is unnerving, and it is against American principles. It is not keeping with America’s Constitutional rights of freedom of speech to allow someone to use admitted physical coercion to deny unpopular, even obnoxious and offensive speech. If we disagree with such obnoxious and offensive speech, the remedy is obvious, we have our own freedom of speech to express our views. But the idea that physical coercion can be tolerated to deny others’ freedom of speech is simply wrong, not only in America, but also anywhere in the world. Judge Martin claims to have had military experience. Based on his decision, one can only wonder what he thought he was fighting for.
This case is not about Islam or atheism – it is about the freedoms we have and the truths that we hold self-evident as Americans and as human beings. It is about freedoms that we all have the right to take for granted, without having to wonder if someone else will now believe they are entitled to physically accost us when we exercise those freedoms.
It sends the wrong signal at the wrong time that silencing others can be excused if there are “not enough witnesses,” and that physical violence can be an answer to opinions and speech that we don’t like. The incident itself may have been small, but the judicial misconduct is serious. Once again, Pennsylvania authorities have the opportunity to do the right thing, and they make a different choice.
It is troubling to see yet another figure of authority in Pennsylvania with such a cavalier attitude regarding their responsibilities to society. One can only hope that the state authorities in Pennsylvania will start to realize the need for them to act on such issues, and demonstrate their willingness to be consistent on human rights for all people.
Sunday February 5 Event United 4 Equality LLC also has a pro-E.R.A. rally scheduled for Sunday, February 5 at 1 PM on the walkway on the Key Bridge between Washington DC and Virginia. See their Facebook rally event!. For more information on the Sunday event, contact Holly Joseph 301-325-4740 OR Carolyn Cook 202-309-1963. According to the group “OPTIONAL: Bring a Red Heart balloon (for VA’s state motto – VA…Lovers, a Ratify ERA, VA’ sign and/or your organization’s sign. Parking is free on Sundays but it’s probably just as easy to hop on the Blue/Orange Line Metro to Rosslyn. On the street level, head towards 19th Street and turn right at US Rt. 29 and the first left on N. Lynn Street which takes you to the bridge. We will be gathered on the bridge awaiting your arrival.”
“ALERT! ACT NOW!!! First vote is Friday, Feb. 3.We have just learned that the first vote on our ERA bill is tomorrow morning!!! Please send your emails or make your calls NOW!!!Two important committee votes are scheduled for the Virginia ERA bill. Your help is needed to get the Virginia ERA bill through this first hurdle.”
“The bill will be voted on in the House Privileges and Elections Committee at 9:30 am on Friday, Feb 3 and in the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee on Tuesday, Feb 7 at 4:00 pm.”
“This is an important step in the “Three State Strategy” for the Equal Rights Amendment to be ratified in the US Constitution. Last year the Virginia State Senate approved the ERA bill with a bipartisan vote — the first legislative action on the ERA in over 30 years! Unfortunately six men in the House committee killed the progress of this legislation. This year, Virginia NOW is going at it again.”
“Please call or write the following Senators who are on the Senate Privileges and Elections to request that they vote for SJ 130.”
Mark Obenshain (chairman): 804-698-7526; district26@senate.virginia.gov
Janet Howell: 804-698-7532; district32@senate.virginia.gov
Stephen Martin: 804-698-7511; district11@senate.virginia.gov
Creigh Deeds: 804-698-7525; district25@senate.virginia.gov
Phil Puckett: 804-698-7538; district38@senate.virginia.gov
John Edwards: 804-698-7521; district21@senate.virginia.gov
Donald McEachin: 804-698-7509; district09@senate.virginia.gov
Chap Petersen: 804-698-7534; district34@senate.virginia.gov
Ralph Smith: 804-698-7519; district19@senate.virginia.gov
Ralph Northam: 804-698-7506; district06@senate.virginia.gov
Jill Vogel: 804-698-7527; district27@senate.virginia.gov
Jeffrey McWaters: 804-698-7508; district08@senate.virginia.gov
Bill Carrico: 804-698-7540; district40@senate.virginia.gov
Bryce Reeves: 804-698-7517; district17@senate.virginia.gov
Tom Garrett: 804-698-7522; district22@senate.virginia.gov
“Please write or call the following delegates who are on the Privileges and Elections Committee to request that they vote in favor of HJ 115.”
House Privileges and Elections Committee MembersCole (Chair); 804-698-1088, DelMCole@house.virginia.gov
Cosgrove: 804-698-1078; DelJCosgrove@house.virginia.gov
Hugo: 804-698-1040; DelTHugo@house.virginia.gov
Scott: 804-698-1053; DelJScott@house.virginia.gov
Dance: 804-698-1063; DelRDance@house.virginia.gov
Putney: 804-698-1019; DelLPutney@house.virginia.gov
O’Bannon: 804-698-1073; DelJOBannon@house.virginia.gov
Cox, J.A.: 804-698-1055; DelJCox@house.virginia.gov
Alexander: 804-698-1089; DelKAlexander@house.gov
Spruill: 804-698-1077; DelLSpruill@house.virginia.gov
Ingram: 804-698-1062; DelRIngram@house.virginia.gov
Bell, R.B.: 804-698-1058; DelRBell@house.virginia.gov
Ramadan: 804-698-1087; DelRRamadan@house.virginia.gov
Joannou: 804-698-1079; DelJJoannou@house.virginia.gov
Jones: 804-698-1076; DelCJones@house.virginia.gov
Miller (Vice Chair): 804-698-1050; jackson@jacksonmillerva.com
Ransone: 804-698-1099; DelMRansone@house.virginia.gov
Sickles: 804-698-1043; DelMSickles@house.virginia.gov
Albo: 804-698-1042; DelDAlbo@house.virginia.gov
Landes: 804-698-1025; DelSLandes@house.virginia.gov
O’Quinn, Israel: 804-698-1005; DelIOQuinn@house.virginia.gov
Howell: 804-698-1090; DelAHowell@house.virginia.gov
“The Equal Rights Amendment simply states, “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of sex.” The ERA was passed by the Congress in 1972 and sent to the states for ratification. Thirty-five states ratified it before it stalled in the 1980’s. The non-ratifying states are Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Missouri, Illinois, Oklahoma, Arizona, Nevada, and Utah.”
News media reports discussing the killing of over 200 individuals in Syria – and YouTube video are describing the attacks reportedly by the Syrian government.
The NYT reports: “Syrian opposition leaders raised the death toll to 260 in a military assault on Saturday on the ravaged central city of Homs, an attack that they described as the government’s deadliest in the nearly 11-month-old uprising.”
We offer compassion and prayers for the victims in Nigeria of terrorist atrocities, where over 178 have been reported killed, with the Bin Ladenist extremist group Boko Haram taking responsibility for the bloodshed and murder. Boko Haram has declared war on the Nigeria government and the Nigerian people. In the latest attacks which Boko Haram takes responsibility, it launched coordinated attacks on Nigerian government offices and police stations. During Christmas 2011, Boko Haram launched attacks on Christians and their churches, and in August 2011, Boko Haram launched an attack on a United Nations office in Abuja. Boko Haram has proven that they don’t stand for any religious or culture principals, other than their views of seeking death, destruction, and the end of human rights for Nigerians.
We need people of all faiths, all religions, all conscience, and all identity groups to stand against such violence, murder, and hatred.
We need our voice of hope, compassion, and dignity to be more than a whisper to the shouts of those who would seek to destroy and hate our brothers and sisters in humanity.
Choose Love, Not Hate – Love Wins.
Terrorist Attacks in Nigeria - with Boko Haram Taking "Credit" for Death and Destruction (Photo: Reuters)
Nigeria: Over 178 Dead After Bomb Blasts – Islamist Boko Harum Group Takes Responsibility
— Reuters…. “Islamist insurgents kill over 178 in Nigeria’s Kano”… “Gun and bomb attacks by Islamist insurgents in the northern Nigerian city of Kano last week killed at least 178 people, a hospital doctor said on Sunday, underscoring the challenge President Goodluck Jonathan faces to prevent his country sliding further into chaos. … “The scale of the carnage makes this by far the deadliest strike claimed by Boko Haram, a shadowy Islamist sect that started out as a clerical movement opposed to western education but has become the biggest security menace facing Africa’s top oil producer. ‘We have 178 people killed in the two main hospitals,’ the senior doctor in Kano’s Murtala Mohammed hospital said following Friday’s attacks, citing records from his own and the other main hospital of Nasarawa.”
Boko Haram spokesperson Abul Qaqa takes credit for weekend attacks killing 178 in Kano State in Nigeria
— Vanguard… “Nigeria: Why We Attacked Kano – Boko Haram.. Maiduguri — The Boko Haram sect has given reasons for its weekend attacks, which led to the killing of about 162 people in Kano State, saying it was to avenge the persecution of its members. Spokesman of the group, Abul Qaqa, made this known in a telephone interview with newsmen in Maiduguri, yesterday. Claiming responsibility for the attacks and multiple bombings on police stations, State Security Services, SSS, and passport office buildings in Kano metropolis, Qaga said: ‘Last night’s (Friday) attacks and bombings of Kano city followed our warnings in the second week of December, 2011.'”
Whispered prayer against Boko Haram needs to be spoken with louder conviction against violence
— “The emir of Kano has led a prayer service asking for God to help end attacks by a radical Islamist sect across Nigeria’s north. The ceremony by the senior Muslim religious official was held Monday in the city of Kano, where more than 150 were killed in a series of coordinated attacks Friday by Boko Haram. The emir spoke only for one minute in a voice so soft those gathered inside the half-emptied mosque could barely hear.”
Los Angeles Times
— “Reporting from Kano, Nigeria, and Johannesburg,— A militant Islamic group whose almost daily attacks have put Nigerians on edge left the country stunned Saturday after a well-coordinated strike with disturbing echoes of Al Qaeda’s brand of mayhem.” Daily Telegraph Report
— Many people are feared dead after a series of explosions outside of police stations in the largest city in Nigeria’s Muslim north.
Boko Haram’s Rise in Nigeria Sparks Civil War Fears — “Friday’s deadly bomb attacks in Nigeria’s second largest city, Kano, are the latest in a series of spectacular strikes by the radical Islamist sect Boko Haram. The coordinated series of assaults on police stations and other government offices killed at least 200 people. The rise of Boko Haram is sparking concerns that Africa’s most populous country may be edging closer to civil war… The radical Islamist Boko Haram has made headlines with increasing frequency lately for a series of audacious terrorist strikes. Among them, a Christmas Day bomb blast that killed worshippers at a Catholic Church and a deadly suicide bomb last August at a U.N. headquarters in Abuja.”
One of the greatest enemies to a coherent society and to shared human rights and dignity is the obsessive pursuit and defense of pride. Many try to instill a sense of self-confidence in our children. But self-confidence is not the same as self-obsession. You can readily tell the difference by the way that the self-obsessed are so intent on defending their pride that they believe they cannot be wrong, they cannot make mistakes, and their pride is more important than their society.
Excessive pride can be one of the more destructive forces among human beings, with the idea that some may believe that they or their group someone have superior rights, superior value, superior importance, and superior dignity than others. We cannot be individuals or a society which works towards equality and social justice when we are burdened with a preoccupation regarding pride.
In many cultures, pride is even viewed as a sin. In Judaism and Christianity, Proverbs 11:2 states that: “When pride cometh, then cometh shame: but with the lowly is wisdom.” Catholics view pride as one of the “Seven Deadly Sins.” In Hindu cultures believers are warned in The Gita, XVI. 4, that pride and arrogance belong “to him who is born to the heritage of the demons.” Pride is rejected in Buddhist cultures. In Islamic hadiths, Allah Ta’ala states “Verily, Allah does not love the proud ones.” Much of the world’s religions reject pride as something that undermines their values and peaceful society.
But to those cultures and philosophies where we believe that we are the most important part of the universe, pride is promoted. In the long run, such pride is self-destructive even in those cultures. Pride keeps some from recognizing and admitting when they are wrong or have made mistakes. Pride enables some to believe that they have a “right” to be superior over others. Pride gives false confidence to others that they deserve their personal pleasure and whims to be catered to, even if it means the suffering of others. Pride ultimately leads to societies based on endless wars among its members in the endless quest for MORE – even at the cost of undermining the very Earth itself. To some, there is nothing more than pride and seeking MORE.
Even in ancient Greek cultures, however, such obsession with pride was viewed as a societal sickness. One of the grave crimes in ancient Greece was the crime of hubris, and the view that one could believe that they were so superior to others that they had the right to abuse weaker individuals. One of the examples of the crime of hubris in Greek culture was the raping of young boys.
This brings us to the case of the Pennsylvania state University (PSU), my alma mater. My alma mater is where so many have been preoccupied with Penn State Pride, seemingly above all else.
The reports of raping of young boys at the PSU football facilities have sickened me as they have sickened sane individuals across the nation. The scandal is revolting and disturbing to all people with any decency. What is just as troubling are the cases of those within the PSU leadership who reportedly failed to do everything they could to stop such abuse of children. That institutional scandal has been unimaginable to me as an alumnus.
This too is part of the problem at the Pennsylvania State University. My horror and shock is partly due to my respect for my father, who struggled for 10 years to get his college degree there. My father was a symbol of a man who would sacrifice for his family and his community. His story of working his way from a janitor to becoming an engineer, by taking part-time classes at the Pennsylvania State University was one of the great success stories and profiles of courage in my life and in my family. My father – he was a living symbol of Real Courage. His courage and his tenacity to help his family and his society were guided by his years of accomplishments at the Pennsylvania State University. Financial difficulty and health problems never took his educational accomplishments away from him. When my father died in November 2010, it was like someone tore out half of my heart from my chest. I have continued to live and work, but it has been a deep struggle for me. One of the things that kept me strong was his lifelong example of courage and commitment to do the right thing, and remembering my father’s example of courage.
So it was a double blow a year later, when the PSU child rape scandal appeared in the national press in November 2011. Penn State was one of the accomplishments that my father and I held dear to our hearts. Penn State was a place where we had many special moments; it was in a part of my heart where hope, dignity, and happiness had their brightest days.
We had seen things changing over the years. In his final years, father and I had gone to football games at the Pennsylvania State University. He was beginning to lose mobility in his legs. We had to arrive at the campus very early in the morning to get a parking space in the handicapped parking lot. This was not because of the many handicapped attendees, which were less than 10 percent of those in the parking lot. It was because of the groups of youngsters with minivans, SUVs, and trucks who used other people’s vehicles with handicapped stickers to get choice parking spots in the handicapped lot near the stadium to host their tail-gate parties and drinking binges. Yet my father, step by halting step, walked with his hands on my shoulders and my arm around his waist as we took a few steps and then stopped, then took a few steps and then stopped, and took a few steps and then stopped. All the way. We had to be there at the crack of dawn for a parking space, so that my father could struggle like this. My father wanted to have a last few chances to cheer for the Penn State football team, as an excuse to visit the campus and for a few days remember the good old days where he struggled as a young man and student to get a college degree. What an accomplishment. A college degree.
As we sat at Penn State’s Beaver Stadium, surrounded by young people, the game began with the Blue Band playing the Alma Mater song… and the dirty secret that few of us spoke about, how many, many of the youngsters sang “we don’t know the God D*** words” (and laughed), as we tried to sing our alma mater asking “let no act of ours bring shame,” as my father and I shook our head, and just let ourselves believe that some of the kids there were drunk. No they weren’t, but it made us feel better to think that way. My father, who I nearly had to carry up the concrete steps of Beaver Stadium, step by step, just to be there with fellow Penn Staters, who couldn’t imagine the sacrifices and the struggle that he made for his college degree, including vulgar, spoiled youngsters who didn’t deserve to be in the same room let alone sit beside my father.
But that is the pain of my loss still speaking, and the struggle I too have made so much with the sin and social evil of pride. It is the same struggle I have had with pride that has made this scandal so difficult. It has been a sense of disgrace of my alma mater, when the facts are that my alma mater is no different than anyone else’s alma mater, and when the facts are that every college, educational institute, and organization will have bad apples, criminals, and those who will fail in their social responsibility. Still the weight of our alma mater song “May no act of ours bring shame, To one heart that loves thy name” still feels like a ton on my heart. Our pride led us to believe that Penn State was somehow different, somehow a last resort of dignity and honor. Our pride blinded us to the youngsters who would disgrace singing the alma mater song, and who would later be the type of students who would riot in the streets. Our pride refused to let us see what was clearly in plain view. We ignored a culture that continued to grow at Penn State, where football became too important in the Penn State community and culture. We could see it, but we didn’t do anything about it.
We were wrong. Our social responsibility, not our Penn State Pride, is and must always be our first and foremost priority. As a PSU alumnus myself, I want to publicly apologize to all those and to all those children who suffered as a result of the culture of blind pride that allowed some to believe that they could look the other way at the alleged crimes of former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky.
To the Penn State alumni, our alma mater has gone from its brightest days to its darkest nights. There will be those who debate actions or individuals. There will be those who will seek to point fingers and who will seek to deny accountability. But in the brightest day and the darkest night, we need to learn from our mistakes and grow as individuals and communities from our mistakes. We need to challenge ourselves as individuals and as a group. But we can’t begin to change, when we can’t begin to admit our mistakes and reject our pride that has caused so much damage. To those who seek to defend those that cannot admit mistakes, you too need to think about whether perpetuating the past will help us overcome our tragic mistakes to grow and change in the future.
My father, God love him, loved the Penn State community, no matter how decrepit and damaged it had become. He loved how it represented the opportunity for change and second chances for people to grow above their current station and be a positive contribution to society. I would like to say I have the decency and love of my father, but the truth is I do not. He had more decency in his finger than I have in all of me. To those of the Penn State community who would defend those that who looked the other way while little boys were raped, if it were just me, I would reject you and the Penn State community in disgust and shame.
But it is my blessing that I still have my father’s hands on my shoulders even today to guide me in the right direction, no matter how difficult the journey, and no matter how impatient and temperamental I may be. So I know that the right thing to do is to seek forgiveness for all. The right thing to do is to pray for the health and healing of all. I know that the right thing is to call for change in the Penn State community, not by turning my back on it, but by engaging with the Penn State community to seek positive change.
Change begins with apologies. If “We Are Penn State,” then we are also all those who looked the other way during all these years of this disgraceful scandal, because we enabled a culture that let it happen.
We Are Penn State, and We Are Responsible.
We need to end the dialogue of PRIDE and begin the dialogue of RESPONSIBILITY for our society and our community.
We need to stop talking about what we “deserve,” and about what we can do to help others.
We need to stop obsessing over those in Penn State that some alumni feel have been slighted, and being working to change a community where the football team became so important that so many were willing to make such morally compromised decisions. The past is the past. They were wrong, we were wrong. Our pride was our downfall. We must not let the past to define our future.
Instead of being Penn State Proud, we must choose to be Penn State Responsible.
Choose Love, Not Hate. Love Wins.
PSU Alumnus Robert C. Imm - Believer In Penn State Community, Honor, and Responsibility
A few weeks ago at the National Press Club, I spoke of the world crisis in respecting children’s dignity and human rights, and the need to challenge those who commit and those who tolerate abuse, hatred, rape, and violence against our children. I love my brothers and sisters in humanity of all identity groups, but we must stand united as a human race to challenge those who would attack our children.
I stated in my December 8 comments, they are “our children” because humanity’s children are humanity’s shared future. They are not just the responsibility of their parents, they are also our shared responsibility as a human society — not only for our human rights, but also for our very future existence. They are part of our shared responsibility not only for equality and liberty, but also for the future of humanity itself.
Even animals in the wild have the instinctual need to defend their children. Our human society must do better. We must work to end the very contempt so many have for our chidren, their innocence, their future, and their very lives.
So many would like to explain away not just the abuses of our children, but the societal willingness to accept this. We are too busy, the people committing such abuses are just crazy, they are the responsibility of the police and the children’s parents.
CONTEMPT.
You don’t spit on a child and call them filthy names by accident. There is no explaining this away. It is nothing less than open, unmitigated, CONTEMPT.
Yet this is precisely what has been reported in Israel over the past week. In the Jerusalem suburb of Beit Shemesh, an 8-year old Orthodox Jewish girl walking to Jewish religious school, wearing a long dress and long sleeve blouse was set upon by “ultra-Orthodox” extremists who spit on her.
Frightened Israeli Child Na'ama Margolis Fears Being Spit Upon and Threatened by Dozens of Men (Photo Clip: YouTube / Channel 2)
For months, this child, Na’ama Margolis, and her classmates have endured being spat upon and threatened with filthy insults by dozens of cowardly men, who see nothing wrong with attacking children. Such men apparently claim that these girls’ conservative dress is not conservative enough for them. This was reported and many in Israel have condemned such outrages against these children. Others have been challenging efforts at public gender segregation, excluding girls and women from public sphere in public events, in stores, on buses, and even on the sidewalk. Men supporting such abuse of women have clashed with the police. The attacks on such children and attempts at public gender segregation in the streets was broadcast by Israeli Channel 2 and is provided with English subtitles on YouTube at:
——————–
Some Israelis have also been challenging a growing repression against Israel women, including an Israel woman soldier called filthy names by a man for sitting in the front of a bus. I stand with the women and men protesting in Israel to reject such contempt against girls and women, and I am proud to support your campaign for freedom and respect. I reject the efforts of those who seek to use violence and contempt to intimidate girls and women in Israel (or anywhere). Outside of the U.S. Secretary of State, the situation in Israel has been received with a significant silence here in the United States, especially by activists. I am especially disappointed to see feminists who have been very active in challenging the disgraceful so-called “honor killings” around the world, apparently must be on vacation and too busy to be concerned about these issues involving Israeli women. I have also seen some writers who seem to want to explain the abuses against Israeli women away as political targeting or as some type of cultural misunderstanding.
Local Man in Beit Shemesh Justifies Spitting On Little Girls (Photo Clip: YouTube / Channel 2)
To those who believe it is a cultural misunderstanding to spit on little girls, let me tell you there are plenty of fathers who would have their own cultural response with a closed four fingers and a thumb if you spit on their daughter.
It is instinctual, it is normal, it is part of basic human survival coding to want to protect and defend our children. We shouldn’t need to explain it. We shouldn’t need to encourage it. It should be part of our human identity.
Nor is it political targeting to challenge abuses against children, among people in any nation or any identity group. I have stood in defense of Israelis many times to seek the respect, security, and human rights that all human beings deserve. But wrong is wrong – as other protesting Israelis point out, and we must have no acceptance of contempt against our children.
This incident summarizes the entire issue of open contempt against children, their rights, and their dignity: Spitting on Our Children. Such contempt does not get any clearer than that.
Certainly we cannot address child abuse in another nation, without addressing the disgrace and child abuse in the United States of America, who has yet to ratifythe United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), accepted by the General Assembly in 1989. While the United States signed this important convention as part of the United Nations, the United States is one of the few nations that has failed to ratify this convention. 23 years later, administration after after administration, Republican and Democratic, have come and gone, and still this basic convention on the rights of children has not yet been ratified by the United States. In 2008, Barack Obama promised to “review” this, but as we approach 2012, nearly four years later, the current United States administration has also failed to ratify this convention on child’s rights.
The only other nation that has not ratified the CRC is Somalia, where a 13-year old little girl (Aisha Ibrahim Duhulow) was publicly stoned to death in a pit as “adulteress” for the “crime” of being raped, watched by over 1,000 people who failed to act, as Aisha Ibrahim Duhulow’s extremist murderers justified killing her based on their interpretation of Islamic Sharia Law. The U.S. Senate passed a resolution condemning that killing, but where are they on ratifying the CRC?
We also cannot address the importance of the CRC, without challenging those who have ratified it with “exceptions,” that some children only have rights to life and human dignity based on limited religious interpretations. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights ensure human rights for all – without exception – but the United States of America’s government needs to ratify the CRC themselves so that when it offers advice to other world powers, it has done the least that it could do.
Image from State Dept Human Trafficking Report, section "Gender Imbalance in Human Trafficking"
We lead as human beings, as parents, as social leaders, as religious leaders, as identity group leaders, and political leaders – must lead by example. “Do what I say, not what I do” accomplishes nothing in social change and human rights. So the series of disgraces against children around the world require us to speak out consistently everywhere in the world, with every group in the world, and in every circumstance. We must show human rights, dignity, and compassion to some children, but we must do so for our all of our future children.
Our places of learning should be obvious places where children are safe. But we have learned in America how untrue that is today in our nation. Today, yet another alleged rape victim has reported the use of the Pennsylvania State University campus football facilities , as part of an apparently organized effort alleged to have been committed by former football coach Sandusky. It is sickening for Americans and people with respect for children’s rights around the world to hear the growing allegations, and this latest victim brings the number to 11 reported victims. All of us our responsible for our children, including those in positions of authority, not simply when it is convenient, but all of the time. Even if it is inconvenient to someone’s weekend (as former football coach Joe Paterno testified), we must alert the authorities to known or suspected abuse of children, and do the most we can to protect our children, not the least we can. As a Penn State alumnus, I understand when it comes to children’s safety – no one, no organization, no team, and no activity – is more important than our children.
Former Penn State University Coach Joe Paterno Testified that He Did Not Want to Disrupt the Weekend of University Official in Reporting Sandusky's Activities with Naked Boys (Photo: Ralph Wilson-AP Photo)
We see some who would rationalize and look the other way when children are killed as part of violence among adults. It is always and will always be unacceptable and wrong. There are no exceptions. We must stop killing our children, because we can not find ways to live with each other and to deal with our conflicts. Those who seek to fight, fight as adults, and leave our children out of these wars. I know the arguments, how people need to fight for security and defense. But our children don’t have to be a part of that. To those who say that is impossible, I say you need to find a way. If we are not preserving our children’s lives, what type of security, what type of defense, and what type of “victory,” do you think you are working towards?
In terms of the United States government, the Israeli government, and every government in the world who is at war or in conflict, there are no “acceptable” child casualties in war. It does not matter how we define these casualties, as “collateral damage,” or how sorry we are. This also includes the disgusting and disgraceful allegations that some Israeli soldiers have also used human shields. This also applies to any solider, American, or from any nation, who believes it is acceptable to allow the deaths of our children. Our apologies do not bring the lives of our children back anywhere in the world. No war justifies the death of children anywhere in the world, any place, any time.
A Child Injured in U.S. Drone Attack in Pakistan (Photo: AP/The Hindu)
Pakistani Child Ali Ahmad - Trained to be Suicide Bomber (Photo Clip: Voice of America)
This also includes disgraceful allegations of Palestinian militants using child human shields, or any other group with militants fighting anywhere in the world. Such groups claim they are working for ideological and nationalist causes. No cause justifies murdering children anywhere in the world, any place, any time.
In Pakistan and around the world, we have seen terrorist organizations seek to brainwash children with hatred and to train children to become terrorists. As the Pakistan Daily Times has reported, some Pakistani groups have used madrassas to teach children how to wear suicide bomber vests. Throughout Africa, and in other parts of the world, there are others who seek to recruit children for their wars. In Somalia this week, children are being recruited as “child soldiers” to wage war on the government by the Al-Shabaab group. No cause justifies this promotion of hatred in children’s minds, this warping of their innocents hearts to believe that people of all one kind, one group, or one religion deserve hatred, violence, and death. No group has the right abuse our children and try to turn them into killers.
Leave Our Children be Children
In every case and circumstance, those who would kill our children and make them into killers, anywhere and everywhere in the world, they too are spitting on our children.
Texas: Raid on Polygamist Group that Claimed Justification of Sexual Abuse (Photo Clip: NBC video)
We have also seen those who claim they have the “right” to murder young girls in America in so-called “honor killings,” rationalized by their extremist interpretations of Islamic religion and culture. Just slightly over a year ago, the trial of Faleh Almaleki began for the “honor killing” murder of his daughter Noor Almaleki. The Arizona Republic reported that “[f]amily members told police that the father was upset that his daughter failed to live by traditional Muslim values.” We need others to condemn those who rationalize murder and hate. (Almaleki’s families comments to the Arizona Republic is an extremist view that will no doubt disturb many traditional Muslims practicing love and respect to children and one another.) In April 2011, Faleh Almaleki was sentenced to only 34 years in prison for what was clearly a premeditated murder of his daughter.
Noor Almaleki - American Girl Murdered for an "Honor Killing"
Other American Girls Murdered in "Honor Killings": Amina and Sarah Said (Top Left), Methal Dayem (Top Right), and Tina Isa (Bottom)
All those who would use religious RATIONALIZATION to sexually abuse, beat, attack, and kill our children also have contempt for children’s rights. Their contempt and violence against our children speaks for itself, and they cannot hide behind their claims that contempt, abuse, and violence against children is justified by their extremist religious views or culture. They too are spitting on our children.
Those who seek to pray on our children’s minds and souls to corrupt towards violence and hatred know no boundaries. In our reporting at Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.), we have reported on those who seek to influence children via the Internet and from extremist group meetings to promote hatred of people different from themselves. We have seen with our own eyes the images of small children influenced by the Christian extremist Hutaree group and other groups that promote hatred and promote violence in the United States. When we challenge groups that promote such hatred and racial nationalism in America, as well as other groups that promote hate, we seek to protect our children – our shared responsibility.
Christian Extremist Terrorist Group Hutaree Give Rifle to Baby (Left); American Nazis Seek to Brainwash Young Girl (Right)
This problem is not limited to any one religious, ethnic, racial, national, or identity group. There is a decided effort by those promoting hatred to fight their war for hate with, against, and through our children. They too are spitting on our children.
But the contempt towards our children is hardly an isolated incident and, as I expressed in my December 8 remarks, this is a global phenomenon that we must challenge consistently and without exception. In every case, these too are spitting on our children.
Egypt: 15 year old Dina El-Gowhary - Target of Acid Attacks
In Sudan and Darfur, children are killed, young girls are raped, children are starved, authorities refuse to let children learn about their culture, and children are abducted to be forced into military service. In Balochistan, we have seen over 168 children who have “disappeared” and teenage boys killed as part of a brutal “kill and dump” campaign by authorities. In Bahrain, I have read reports of 5 children killed and hundreds of children subjected to excessive force by a brutal government that seeks deny democracy and human rights.
Sudan's Starving Children - Oppressed by Totalitarian Government (Photo: AP)
Only a Passing Trash Collector Tried to Save Chinese Baby Yue-Yue
(To those who state, you failed to address the contempt towards our children shown by this group or that group, you are correct. Given the near infinite variety of groups in the war against children, I guarantee I have missed some. Please write me at usa@realcourage.org and I will address such topics in the future.)
I know that this sometimes reads like just statistics, which is why in my December 8 remarks, I raised the issue of murdered American child Jorelys Rivera, a 7 year old girl who was raped and murdered, and dumped in a trash bin in Georgia, the week we were remembering Human Rights Day around the world. Our children are special, unique, and deserve the love, respect, and human rights. They deserve to be remembered not merely as statistics, but as human beings with names.
Jorelys Rivera - 7-Year Old America Girl - Murdered and Raped - Left in Trash Bin
The grim story of global contempt against our children is not just something I have heard about, but something I faced personally in the United States. I have spoke to young girls who have been the victims of sexual abuse predators in our nation, who have sought to steal their dignity because of the poverty and unemployment in America. To those who expect law enforcement will act on these matters, I can tell you from personal experience that this is not always the case.
The face of children’s human rights is the face of every child, those who have suffered and those remain unscathed. These children are humanity’s future. We cannot and must not expect the authorities or “someone else” to take the leadership in protecting our children around the world from contempt, hatred, brainwashing, abuse, rape, violence, and murder. Our conscience and our survival as a human race demands that we must not tolerate such abuse of our children – anywhere, any group, and any time.
We are the adults – when it comes to protecting our children – we are the authorities. It is our responsibility. It is our responsibility to stop those spitting on our children, literally and figuratively.
Our children deserve our universal human rights, including the right to life, dignity, and respect.
We extend respect to all identity groups, all religions, all races, all genders, and all nationalities as our brothers and sisters in humanity. While such individual identity groups are not to “blame” for extremists within them, they and we all have to responsibility to speak out on behalf of the need to protect and love our children – everywhere and anywhere.
Consistency on human rights is difficult, and perhaps painful and ugly at times. If we are consistent on human rights, we are going to offend someone. If we are consistent on human rights, our political allies, our national allies, our cultural allies, and our identity group allies are at some point going to be upset with us.
But the truth is that our future depends on consistency on human rights.
Our children depend on us to have the courage to be consistent on human rights, anywhere, everywhere, and all the time. We must set that example and provide that leadership for the next generation.
But first we must challenge the CONTEMPT against our children. It is unacceptable anywhere, everywhere, and all the time – with every child without exception. We must challenge the contempt against our children with our hearts, minds, and voices.
Our petition calls for all nations of the world, including the United States of America, to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). Our petition also calls for the world nations to make their ratification of the CRC without exception or qualification. We shouldn’t need to “qualify” the basic rights of our children to life, respect, dignity, and the universal human rights we all share.
Our petition rejects those who claim that any human culture or ideology permits contempt, abuse, rape, violence, and hatred towards children, and even murder of children.
Our petition calls for the end of child slavery and condemns the nations and individuals that participate and tolerate such disgraces.
Our petition calls for the protection, dignity, and safety of children anywhere and everywhere – free from attack by weapons of war, free from abuse by soldiers of any kind, free from terrorism and crime, and free from abuse and violence from any person.
Finally, our petition encourages the world to reject the idea that our children are someone else’s responsibility, but they are our responsibility and our future – not just when it is convenient, but all the time.
You may think you can’t do anything about the contempt towards our children, but you can. You can start with your public voice on the issues that all human beings should share regarding our children and our future.
