by Ms. V. (South Korea) | Jan 5, 2016 | 2016, International, UN, Uncategorized, Womanhood, Women's Rights, World Moms Blog, World Voice
The UN recently sent a delegation of human rights experts to the US to report on this country’s overall treatment of women. The result? This is how the preliminary report concluded:
“The United States, which is a leading state in formulating international human rights standards, is allowing its women to lag behind international human rights standards. Although there is a wide diversity in state law and practice, which makes it impossible to give a comprehensive report, we could discern an overall picture of women’s missing rights. While all women are the victims of these missing rights, women who are poor, belong to Native American, Afro-American and Hispanic ethnic minorities, migrant women, LBTQ women, women with disabilities and older women are disparately vulnerable.”
The report touches on these “missing rights” in the realms of reproductive health, wages, politics, and violence- particularly gun violence- against women.
One of the delegates, Frances Raday, told reporters “The lack of accommodation in the workplace to women’s pregnancy, birth and post-natal needs is shocking. Unthinkable in any society, and certainly one of the richest societies in the world.”
As I read their conclusions, which will be further developed in a more comprehensive report in 2016, I felt a familiar sick feeling overcome my being. It’s the same sick feeling I’ve gotten used to since moving back to the US, every time there is yet another mass or accidental shooting. The two questions that come with this feeling are when and why? When will enough be enough? Why not yet?
As a woman and a mother – both to a male child and a female child – the urgency of full and true equality for women and girls is plain as day, not just for me and my daughter, but for the well-being of my son and all boys and men. Everyone is harmed by inequality, and I agree with Ms. Raday, that it is unthinkable in the context of this nation.
After I sit with when and why, I have to move to what. What can be done? What can I do, each and every day in my life, to make a difference? I’ll admit to feeling totally overwhelmed by that question at times, but I’ve found that it can all be boiled down to two things: stand up and speak out. Stand up for what is just and speak out about what needs to change. Or, as Susan B. Anthony said: Organize, agitate, educate.
At times I’ve let my fear of being perceived by others as a downer keep me from standing up and speaking out, but at this point in my life, the stakes are too high to be afraid. The stakes are too high for me and my family and for the millions of families who are affected by the situation of women in this country. So instead I choose to organize (build community) agitate (speak out) and educate (stand up).
I imagine my grandmother at the time of my birth thinking about what a different world I was being born into than the one she had known, and yet she never lived to witness true equality. The dream of full equality has been shared by several generations of women now. Do I dare hope that it will be achieved by the time my daughter comes of age? Will I meet my granddaughter and welcome her into a world where she has no “missing rights”?
Were you surprised to hear the findings of this delegation?
This is an original post written for World Moms Blog by Ms. V.
Image Credit: “We Can Do It!” by J. Howard Miller, artist employed by Westinghouse, poster used by the War Production Co-ordinating Committee – From scan of copy belonging to the National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution, retrieved from the website of the Virginia Historical Society.. Licensed under Public Domain via Commons
Ms. V returned from a 3-year stint in Seoul, South Korea and is now living in the US in the beautiful Pacific Northwest with her partner, their two kids, three ferocious felines, and a dog named Avon Barksdale. She grew up all over the US, mostly along the east coast, but lived in New York City longer than anywhere else, so considers NYC “home.” Her love of travel has taken her all over the world and to all but four of the 50 states.
Ms. V is contemplative and sacred activist, exploring the intersection of yoga, new monasticism, feminism and social change. She is the co-director and co-founder of Samdhana-Karana Yoga: A Healing Arts Center, a non-profit yoga studio and the spiritual director for Hab Community. While not marveling at her beautiful children, she enjoys reading, cooking, and has dreams of one day sleeping again.
More Posts
Follow Me:
by World Moms Blog | Jan 4, 2016 | 2015, 2016, Africa, Asia, Clean Birth Kits, Europe, International, North America, Oceania, ONE, South America, UN, World Moms Blog
Happy New Year #WorldMoms! If 2016 is anything like 2015 for us it is going to be a fantastic year! Here are some highlights, impact, and accomplishments of World Moms in 2015.
Founder and CEO, Jennifer Burden, accepted the UN Correspondents Association award on behalf of World Mom, Purnima Ramakrishnan of India:
https://www.facebook.com/worldmomsblog/videos/1290132341031041/
Purnima was unable to attend the event in New York as she was busy reporting on the flooding in Chennai, India where she lives with her family.
Managing Editor Elizabeth Atalay joined Jen at Cipriani in New York City for the UNCA Award Gala where they also caught up with Dan Thomas, a Communications Director at the UN. Dan was formerly our World Moms contact at the GAVI Alliance when he was in Switzerland!
Jennifer and Steve Burden were in NYC to commemorate World AIDS Day and 10 years of ONE and (RED) with special guests Bono and The Edge, Hozier, Danai Gurira, Trevor Noah, Bill and Melinda Gates and more! #WAD2015 #WorldMoms
Kirsten Doyle of Canada, visited her home country of South Africa in 2015. No international journey is complete without meeting up with a local World Mom! Here she is with Mama Simona in Cape Town!
We celebrated #DayoftheGirl with our daughters from around the world. World Mom, Aisha Yesufu in Nigeria, wrote our post for #DayoftheGirl and her daughter is pictured below.
World Mom Nicole Melancon climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania with Solar Sisters to raise funds to launch new solar entrepreneurs.
Our editors stay connected with global Skype calls throughout the year.
World Mom, Kristyn Zalota, continued to help to provide nurse training and Clean Birth Kits to mothers in Laos through the non-profit she founded Cleanbirth.org.
World Mom, Susie in Israel, took her daughter in to the hospital where she works hard saving lives in Israel for “Take Your Daughter to Work Day!”
World Moms Blog attended the first ever Media Tour of Heifer Farms in Massachusetts.
There were lots of speaking engagements around the world including:
World Moms Blog’s panel at the World Bank in April 2015 in Washington, DC on the importance of universal education for girls!
World Mom, Cynthia Changyit Levin, also spoke at a RESULTS conference in Washington, DC on ending poverty.
World Mom, To-wen Tseng, spoke at a Breastfeeding Conference in LA.
And World Mom Sophia Neghesti Johnson spoke at a storytelling event for children, including a village story from Kenya, and one from Austria.
In September while in New York for UN General Assembly week World Moms met up at a ONE Campaign “Poverty is Sexist” party and hung out with activist and Reggae legend, Rocky Dawani. We were also in NYC at that time for the launch of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the Social Good Summit.:
We also started our collaboration with BabyCenter in October 2015, where our moms can also be found writing!
In Kenya World Mom Tara Wambugu toured an elephant orphanage in Nairobi.
Managing Editor, Elizabeth Atalay, and Social Media Editor, Nicole Morgan, advocated for vaccinations for children who need them most in Washington, DC with the UN Foundation’s Shot@Life Campaign and were both 2015 United Nations Foundation #SocialGood Fellows:
This summer World Mom, Jennifer Burden, visited the woman who wrote the very first post on World Moms Blog on November 1st, 2010! Astrid Warren, formerly known as pen name Asta Burrows, helped Jen raise the Lady WMB colors in Sogndal, Norway! The two took their families camping together among the fjords this past summer!
World Mom Alison Fraser, Founder of Mom2MomAfrica visited students benefitting from the program she started in Tanzania.
World Moms Blog Founder and CEO, Jennifer Burden, interviewed the CEO of Save the Children, Carolyn Miles, in April 2015 at the UN in New York City. They were there for the UNCA press conference for the State of the World Mothers Report.
Aisha proudly voted in the March Elections in Nigeria.
World Mom, Aisha Yesufu of Nigeria, proudly votes in her country’s elections this year.
World Moms Blog Founder and CEO, Jennifer Burden, met the Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban ki moon, at the UNCA gala in New York City in December.
We are excited to head into 2016 with new partners and exciting plans, and to see what this new year holds! Happy New Year!
World Moms Blog is an award winning website which writes from over 30 countries on the topics of motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. Over 70 international contributors share their stories from around the globe, bonded by the common thread of motherhood and wanting a better world for their children.
World Moms Blog was listed by Forbes Woman as one of the "Best 100 Websites for Women 2012 & 2013" and also called a "must read" by the NY Times Motherlode in 2013. Our Senior Editor in India, Purnima Ramakrishnan, was awarded the BlogHer International Activist Award in 2013.
More Posts
by Mannahattamamma (UAE) | Dec 30, 2015 | Cultural Differences, Feminism, Gun Violence, Holiday, Living Abroad, Middle East, Older Children, Peace, Religion, Terrorism, UAE, World Motherhood
“Will we be safe there?” My 11 year old son asked me that question as we were discussing our winter holiday travel plans, and I suppose, given that we live in the UAE, his question might make sense. In the last few years, we’ve traveled to Jordan, India, Kenya – all places that have been in the news lately as sites of violence.
Where are we going for the winter holidays, you might wonder, that would elicit such a question?
The United States.
I’ll let you think about that for a minute.
Okay, true, his question was a bit of a joke – the question of travel safety has become a running gag in our household, in part because that question is always the first thing my mother (in Illinois) always asks us.
But this time, when he asked the question, none of us laughed. He’d asked us just after the last mass shooting, the one in San Bernandino. And think about that for a minute: I have to specify for you which shooting I’m talking about. Was it the one in Colorado Springs outside Planned Parenthood, or the one in Oregon, or the one…
In other countries, when you say “mass shooting,” there simply aren’t that many to choose from because in the aftermath of the tragedy, governments have changed the laws to make such events less possible. But not in the good ol’ US of A.
When I tell people in the States where I live, there are two questions I am always asked: do I have to “cover” and “do I feel safe?” The answers are “no,” and “yes.” People who didn’t worry about me strolling home after midnight in New York’s East Village in the late 1980s now seem dreadfully concerned about my safety here, in this part of the world, as I drive off to the mall.
Part of why we chose to live abroad with our children had to do with wanting to give them a cosmopolitan perspective on the world: we wanted them to experience other cultures and learn to be open to, rather than threatened by, difference. I know that in the US it is possible to live in cosmopolitan cities—we used to live in Manhattan, where children from many nations crowded into my kids’ classrooms—but it is a different experience to live in a place where “your” culture is not the dominant.
A little while back, for instance, my older son had some friends over so that we could all go to a water park in the afternoon. When I told them it was time to get ready to go, my son said “well, we have to wait a little bit because T. is in the other room doing his prayers.” T. comes from a devout Muslim family and his mother would have been pleased to know that T. didn’t miss a prayer time just because the water park called. And for my son and his other friends, T. doing his prayers was as matter-of-fact as if he’d been changing into his swimsuit, or drinking a glass of water. Ordinary.
Like many of us, at home and abroad, I wrestle with how to explain to my children why the United States can’t simply change its gun laws and why so many people in the country seem afraid of anyone who worships at a mosque rather than a church or a temple. The explanation in both instances seems to boil down to fear: fear of change, fear of difference, fear of that-which-is-not-me.
It’s not much of an explanation, but it’s the only framework I have to explain why Donald Trump, for instance, can still be considered a candidate for the Presidency.
I know that the demagogues like Trump do not speak for all the people in the United States, and that many, many people are outraged by gun violence, but alas, the picture of the country that travels outward to the rest of the world is one of violent, gun-toting Islamophobia – and it’s scary. For me the fear rests not in the thought that Trump will ever be President because I refuse to believe that his bilious self is actually electable. I hang on to that fact as ardently as I once hung on to my belief in Santa Claus. No, my fear rests in the fact that, according to a recent poll, Trump leads the group of Republican Party presidential hopefuls, with 35.8% of the vote.
THIRTY-FIVE POINT EIGHT?
Maybe there really isn’t a Santa Claus.
How do you explain what’s happening in the United States to your children?
This is an original post by World Mom, Deborah Quinn in the United Arab Emirates.
Photo Credit to the author.
After twenty-plus years in Manhattan, Deborah Quinn and her family moved to Abu Dhabi (in the United Arab Emirates), where she spends a great deal of time driving her sons back and forth to soccer practice. She writes about travel, politics, feminism, education, and the absurdities of living in a place where temperatures regularly go above 110F.
Deborah can also be found on her blog, Mannahattamamma.
More Posts
Follow Me:
by ThinkSayBe | Dec 18, 2015 | 2015, Awareness, Being Considerate, Human Rights, Humanity, Independence, North America, Prejudice, Refugees, Relocating, Social Equality, ThinkSayBe, USA, World Motherhood
On November 26, 2015, here in the USA there was a celebration. It is called Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is celebrated by many Americans as a day when the ‘Injuns and pilgrims feasted together in harmony’. When possible, families gather to spend the day eating a plenteously-sized meal, and go over the things for which they are thankful.
When I came to the U.S. I heard of a couple of stories behind the meaning of Thanksgiving. I heard it marked a day in American history when pilgrims came from England and after having being helped to plant food by some Natives, they all gathered and had a big feast with the first harvest. I was also told that there was an exchange in which the Natives gave the English food like wild game, and the English gave the Natives blankets contaminated with smallpox which wiped out almost an entire First Nation. So it is that without researching further, I knew I didn’t want to celebrate this particular thanksgiving day without looking into its history first. I was okay with my family gathering, eating good food, and giving thanks for all that I had. I just wasn’t about giving thanks for the planned killing of anyone.
During the course of my life I have figured out that I am too idealistic. I am also fairly optimistic, so saying that I am ‘too’ idealistic feels wrong. However, as life has proven, I am too much of an idealist. That’s okay; I am still staying true to that for I am sure there is purpose in it, and I am rewiring some other thinking patterns. All this to say, that by the time I heard of the smallpox story, I knew there was a great chance that this had actually happened. The idealist in me immediately asked why any human would cause suffering and death to his fellow, but Sophia the realist started going down a list of atrocities that she knew about, that would make this new information less shocking.
The research I did before was in books I do not recollect the titles of. I presently did some more research, though, and I came across a story that an educator put together so the truth about the First Thanksgiving day may be shared with elementary school-aged children. With this story there were books cited and more information given in a more graphic manner than that written for young children.
I read the article and I leave it to you to read it as well. As I scrolled down and read more, I read the following paragraph and immediately I thought about the current situation in Syria, its people who are fleeing war seeking refuge amongst other human beings, and how many of said other humans are responding to this need. This paragraph reminds us of the history of U.S. Americans’ Anglo-Saxon ancestors, and so it is ironic that any of their descendants should feel okay saying Syrian refugees aren’t welcome to this land.
“….The Puritan “Pilgrims” who came to New England were not simply refugees who decided to “put their fate in God’s hands” in the “empty wilderness” of North America, as a generation of Hollywood movies taught us. In any culture at any time, settlers on a frontier are most often outcasts and fugitives who, in some way or other, do not fit into the mainstream of their society. This is not to imply that people who settle on frontiers have no redeeming qualities such as bravery, etc., but that the images of nobility that we associate with the Puritans are at least in part the good “P.R.” efforts of later writers who have romanticized them.(1) It is also very plausible that this unnaturally noble image of the Puritans is all wrapped up with the mythology of “Noble Civilization” vs. “Savagery….” Chuck Larsen quoting Berkhofer, Jr., R.F., “The White Man’s Indian”.
ΔΔΔ
We were driving by downtown the other day (what city is irrelevant) and saw people standing by the side of the road with signs reading ‘Refugees are not welcome here’. Immediately my mind rewound to when outcasts from England came here, and it is their descendants who are now standing on the side of the street saying they don’t want refugees here. These current refugees aren’t even outcasts, they are simply people who are no longer safe in the country they know as home. I say this very simply because I cannot pretend to understand what Syrians and all people in the middle of war zones are going through. Many Americans can afford to feel so detached because the war isn’t on American soil. However, we are at war, and the side of war we do not see here, is the side where there are humans who are suffering and dying. It’s easy to not put ourselves in other people’s shoes when we don’t see or know what they are going through. To feel anything but heartbreak or anger when seeing footage of women, children, and men being carried…body parts dangling, faces torn…. of children’s bodies washing up on shore or lined up with other dead children’s bodies… to know that there are humans who feel something other than heartbreak or anger, and who instead feel good as if these ‘strange people from a foreign country’ deserve it, is heartbreaking! It’s the kind of thing that makes me ashamed of being human. We have become so accustomed to these imaginary lines dividing our world, that we believe they are actually real. Otherwise, how could we feel anything but compassion for a father trying to find refuge for his remaining family?
I know I think too ideally. I know this. And I also know that because of this I tend to leave challenging questions and conversations alone. Truth is, though, that as a person I am hurt every time I see a sign/banner, a meme, or other social media image, saying something negative about a refugee. It’s like there is no compassion and history is forgotten. Actually… history isn’t forgotten. History is re-written; which is why the truth about Thanksgiving is not told in schools. It is changed a little, and changed a little more, until it is just the nice Pilgrims and the Indians who were sharing a nice harvest feast. This is why people forget where they came from, and this is part of the reason why when it comes to deciding whether or not we would welcome a refugee into our city or country, we feel comfortable and proud in saying “No, refugees are not welcome here!”
Ultimately my point is this: We are human. All of us. Chinese, Kenyan, Norwegian, Sioux, Japanese, Syrian, Mexican, Goan, etc… etc… etc…
We are all… human. How dare we not extend our hand in support of our fellow human in need?
Let’s not forget where we have come from, and let’s work together to build a better humanity. For those of us feeling a bit more self-assisting than altruistic (for whatever the reason), it may be good to remember that helping another person makes us feel good inside. If we were to die the moment after helping another living thing (human or otherwise), maybe our sincere moment of kindness would redeem us from other times when we weren’t so kind. Thus it is that extending our hand to someone in need is a win-win.
Hopefully, if there ever comes a time when we need help, someone will reach out and say “Come, you are welcome here.”
Are you and idealist or a realist? How do you feel it affects how you think about world issues?
Photo credit to
Rakel Sánchez. This photo has a creative commons attribute license.
I am a mom amongst some other titles life has fortunately given me. I love photography & the reward of someone being really happy about a photo I took of her/him. I work, I study, I try to pay attention to life. I like writing. I don't understand many things...especially why humans treat each other & other living & inanimate things so vilely sometimes. I like to be an idealist, but when most fails, I do my best to not be a pessimist: Life itself is entirely too beautiful, amazing & inspiring to forget that it is!
More Posts
Follow Me:
by Elizabeth Atalay | Dec 15, 2015 | 2015, Asia, India, North America, UN, United Nations, World Moms Blog
Purnima,
Congratulations on your achievement! It was our honor to attend the UNCA Gala and accept this award on your behalf. We wished that you were with us, but we thought of you at home in Chennai helping your family during this time of crisis with the flooding. All of us at World Moms Blog know that our families are our first priority. You are exactly where you need to be.
We will further recap the event soon!
Thank you for the opportunity!
Love,
Jen & Elizabeth
This is an original post to World Moms Blog by CEO and Founder, Jennifer Burden and Managing Editor, Elizabeth Atalay.
Photo credits to the authors.
Elizabeth Atalay is a Digital Media Producer, Managing Editor at World Moms Network, and a Social Media Manager. She was a 2015 United Nations Foundation Social Good Fellow, and traveled to Ethiopia as an International Reporting Project New Media Fellow to report on newborn health in 2014. On her personal blog, Documama.org, she uses digital media as a new medium for her background as a documentarian. After having worked on Feature Films and Television series for FOX, NBC, MGM, Columbia Pictures, Warner Brothers, 20th Century Fox, and Castle Rock Pictures, she studied documentary filmmaking and anthropology earning a Masters degree in Media Studies from The New School in New York. Since becoming a Digital Media Producer she has worked on social media campaigns for non-profits such as Save The Children, WaterAid, ONE.org, UNICEF, United Nations Foundation, Edesia, World Pulse, American Heart Association, and The Gates Foundation. Her writing has also been featured on ONE.org, Johnson & Johnson’s BabyCenter.com, EnoughProject.org, GaviAlliance.org, and Worldmomsnetwork.com. Elizabeth has traveled to 70 countries around the world, most recently to Haiti with Artisan Business Network to visit artisans in partnership with Macy’s Heart of Haiti line, which provides sustainable income to Haitian artisans. Elizabeth lives in New England with her husband and four children.
More Posts
by Melanie Oda (Japan) | Dec 10, 2015 | 2015, Asia, Equality, Japan
I read an article recently about “emotional labor.” You know what that is even if you don’t know what that is: the constant conversation going on in your head when someone asks, “What’s for dinner?”
You peek into your mental refrigerator, pit Johnny’s constipation against the fact that Sally will come home starved from basketball practice, your husband has high blood pressure and needs to reduce his salt intake, your mother-in-law has a birthday party at three and after all that cake no one will be hungry, and you only have $50 left in your checking account.
All that, not to mention keeping track of who needs picking up when and who needs what medicine and who has which project and oh- there’s a doll shoe, someone will be looking for that later, all of that thatness, is emotional labor.
I bet most women know exactly what I’m talking about, and are started to get exhausted from this post reminding you of the gazillion little things you need to be doing. (Our bath tile needs a good scrub.)
We are all doing way too much of it, with no remuneration (wouldn’t that be nice?) or so much as a thank you.
It may be more obvious, here, in Japan, where the gender divide is still a chasm and fathers spend all of their waking hours at work. The imbalance between the sexes is so off that you don’t need a scale (which I alone know the location of.)
For anyone who is reading this and thinking, what’s the big deal? I can say with some confidence that you are not pulling your weight in this area, or you would certainly know exactly what the deal is, and that is is enormous.
It’s easy enough to see how this happens: when you are a couple, keeping track of the minutiae of life for two is doable. If you’re like me and have a husband who doesn’t quite grasp which food items go in the fridge, and that the aloe gel is a) not a food item and b) not fridge space worthy, then you take these things on by default. (Yes, the aloe incident actually happened.)
But when you become a three person family, or more, with multiple schools and activities and interests and needs, then this becomes a massive task. And Mom is still doing it all.
What’s the solution? I wish I had a clue. Even when this kind of micromanagement is a career, it’s still female dominated and therefore underpaid if not outright disparaged. I’m thinking of all my secretaries, assistants, and teachers out there, but please feel free to add to this list.
I read this online, and I thought, “There is a term for this. There is a reason I am so constantly exhausted emotionally. I’m not alone. And other people realize that this work has value.” It’s too bad none of those people currently live in my house, but baby steps are better than nothing.
So, to all the other moms out there holding up the sky: what you are feeling is real. It isn’t fair, no, but you aren’t imagining it. I don’t have any answers, but sometimes acknowledging there is a problem is the biggest step.
How do you divide emotional or mental take in your family? And more importantly, how can I get the other three people I live with to start doing more of this for themselves?
This is an original post by World Mom, Melanie Oda in Japan.
Photo credit to cpo57 . This photo has a creative commons attribution license.
If you ask Melanie Oda where she is from, she will answer "Georgia." (Unless you ask her in Japanese. Then she will say "America.") It sounds nice, and it's a one-word answer, which is what most people expect. The truth is more complex. She moved around several small towns in the south growing up. Such is life when your father is a Southern Baptist preacher of the hellfire and brimstone variety.
She came to Japan in 2000 as an assistant language teacher, and has never managed to leave. She currently resides in Yokohama, on the outskirts of Tokyo (but please don't tell anyone she described it that way! Citizens of Yokohama have a lot of pride). No one is more surprised to find her here, married to a Japanese man and with two bilingual children (aged four and seven), than herself. And possibly her mother.
You can read more about her misadventures in Asia on her blog, HamakkoMommy.
More Posts
