2023 Global Gender Gap Report of WEF: China Ranks 107th

Posted on 2023-12-30 by wrchina

WRIC compiled 12-30-2024

Progress against the large and persistent gaps documented in the 17th edition of the 2023 Global Gender Gap Report. The report provides a tool for continuously tracking gender gaps in economics, politics, health and education, and is designed to help leaders identify areas for individual and collective action. The ranking examines global gender gap scores across four main components: the gap between men and women in economic status, educational attainment, health survival and political empowerment.

According to the report, China ranked 107th among 146 countries and regions, down 5 places from 2022. In the area of political rights, which mainly refers to the gender gap in political leadership, China ranks only 114th out of 146 countries. When the report was first released in 2006, China ranked 69th among 115 countries and regions. Its highest ranking was in 2008, when it ranked 57th among 130 countries and regions in terms of political rights. Ranked 54th in the rankings, and has declined year by year since then. On the contrary, the proportion of female leaders in European and American countries has increased significantly.

The 2023 global gender gap score for all 146 countries covered in this issue is 68.4%. Taking into account the 2022 and 2023 editions covering a constant sample of 145 countries, the overall score increased from 68.1% to 68.4%, an improvement of 0.3 percentage points from last year’s edition. Taking into account the 102 countries covered continuously from 2006 to 2023, the gap narrows by 68.6%.

Progress in closing the gender gap is broader than last year: 42 of the 145 economies covered in the 2022 and 2023 editions improved their gender equality scores by at least 1 percentage point compared with the previous edition, and 40 others The country also made progress of less than 1 percentage point. The economies with the largest increases in scores (by 4 percentage points or more) are Liberia (score: 76%, an increase of 5.1 percentage points from the previous edition), Estonia (78.2%, an increase of 4.8 percentage points), and Bhutan (68.2%). , +4.5 percentage points), Malawi (67.6%, +4.4 percentage points), Colombia (75.1%, +4.1 percentage points) and Chile (77.7%, +4.1 percentage points).

While the number of countries with at least slight improvement increased, this progress was undermined by an increase in the number of countries whose scores fell by more than 1 percentage point (from 12 countries in 2022 to 35 countries in 2023).

The 2023 global gender gap rankings and scores for all 146 countries in this year’s report are shown in the table below.

Forum on the Rights of Chinese Women & Children Photos

Posted on 2016-03-16 by wrchina

Source from WRIC 03/16/2016

March 15, 2016, two NGO organizations Women’s Rights in China (WRIC) and Women’s Rights Without Frontiers (WRWF) collaborated to hold “Form on the Rights of Chinese Women and Children” in New York. Nearly a hundred attendants including US-based human rights activists, scholars and journalists were at the forum.

Caption: Pictures of the meeting Forum on the rights of Chinese Women and Children

Delving Deep Inside Amy Schumer

Posted on 2015-10-31 by Nian Hu

By Nian Hu

The significance of society’s inability to find women funny

It is a (supposedly) well-established fact that women just aren’t funny. As a result, it’s tough being a woman in comedy. Take Amy Schumer, comedian du jour. A talented and unabashed stand up comic and sketch writer, it’s easy to see why everyone is talking about her all of a sudden. In “Last F*ckable Day” she rips apart Hollywood’s sexist treatment of aging actresses. In “Milk Milk Lemonade” she parodies the booty craze. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Her show Inside Amy Schumer is ruthless. She leaves no avenue unspared. She turns left and right, bashing stereotypes and gender roles and sexism and societal hypocrisies. And all the

while, she is downright hilarious.

But look down at the comments section, and you might wonder if the commenters just watched the same video you did. Her sketch may be a satire of Bill Cosby fans, but all the commenters can see is her weight and the shapeliness of her legs. Compare this to the comments that male comedians typically receive on their YouTube videos. Commenters on a Louis CK video usually gush over how funny he is and marvel at his talent. But commenters on an Amy Schumer video systematically criticize her weight, call her ugly, compare her to various unflattering animals—and then go on to admire her rear end and discuss the likelihood that he would sleep with her (implicit in this discussion, of course, is the assumption that a talented woman such as herself would have sex with a 40-year old man living in his mother’s basement writing hateful YouTube comments).

No discussion about how funny she is. No mention of her talent. Just comment after comment about her body. And Schumer, perceptive as always, has already skewered this relentless objectification in her skit “Twelve Angry Men,” a parody of the classic movie—except this time the men are debating whether or not Schumer is “hot enough for TV.” And through this skit, a deeply depressing truth is revealed: No matter what she does, no matter how many jokes about her own vagina she makes, many people will never see Amy Schumer as funny.

And it’s not just Amy Schumer that they have trouble finding funny. It’s women in general. A 2012 study found that most people, men and women alike, tend to ascribe funnier cartoon captions to men rather than to women–even when they’ve already been told the writer was a woman. Simply put, it’s hard for people to see women as funny.

But what does it matter, right? As Christopher Hitchens once said, and as Amy Schumer video commenters often echo, maybe women aren’t funny because they’ve never needed to be funny. I mean, it’s just evolution. Throughout the years, as dinosaurs evolved into chickens and as carrier pigeons evolved into iPhones, human males evolved a sense of humor because it got them laid more often. One knock-knock joke, and before he knows it, the lucky man is a father to a litter of funny boys and unfunny girls. Or something like that. Science!

Sorry to burst your bubble, but while humor is a lot of things, it’s a lot more than just a flirting device used by men to woo women. Sidenote: if “Damn girl, that dress looks good on you but it’d look even better on my bedroom floor” is what you consider humor, consider me unimpressed.

No, humor is far more powerful than that. And that’s why it’s important that our society finds it so difficult to put “funny” and “woman” together. Humor—particularly satire—is a tool of social commentary and criticism. It’s a way for people to hold up a mirror in front of society’s face and point out all the pockmarks. Women, of all people, know that society is deeply flawed. When we routinely get paid less than our male colleagues, and , and when the length of our skirts determines whether or not we deserve to live—well, how could we not turn to humor to shine a light on society’s failings? It sucks to acknowledge these truths, but it sucks even more to pretend they don’t exist. And one way of making it suck less is by using comedy to reveal how shitty life is sometimes. And that’s a huge part of the reason why Amy Schumer has been so successful, with sketches like “Girl, You Don’t Need No Makeup” making fun of unrealistic “natural beauty” expectations and sketches like “Hello M’Lady” satirising those pushy guys convinced they’re in the “friendzone.” They get people to laugh, but they get them to start thinking, too.

So the question is not so much, “Can women be funny?” Humor, like most things in life, is subjective. Clearly I find Amy Schumer hilarious, but her style of humor is definitely not for everybody. The real question we should be asking is, “Why does that matter?” Why does it matter that most people find it so hard to believe that women can be funny?

It matters because humor is the voice, and oppression is the joke. And when you say “women aren’t funny,” you’re essentially silencing an entire population by telling them their voice isn’t important, and their oppression isn’t real. Society’s inability to find women funny isn’t just an antique strips them of a vital weapon.

Down with the Dad Bod

Posted on 2015-10-31 by Nian Hu

By Nian Hu

Loosening standards for men while tightening standards for women

What makes a man “hot”?”? If we take a look at the list of the sexiest men alive—a list that includes actors Channing Tatum, Ryan Reynolds, and Chris Hemsworth—we notice that they all have a similar body type, with glistening washboard abs and rippling biceps.

However, the conventional standard of beauty for men has been turned upside-down with the introduction of the “dad bod.” A term popularized by Mackenzie Pearson in a widely-read Odyssey article published earlier this year, Pearson explains the dad bod asthe dad bod is “a nice balance between a beer gut and working out.” Pearson lists several reasons why she (and all girls, apparently) is crazy about guys with a dad bod.

First, girls crave men with dad bods because fit men make them feel insecure about their own bodies, and “we are insecure enough as it is.” Second, girls want a boyfriend who is bigger so that in comparison they seem skinnier, because “we want to look skinny.” Third, guys with dad bods provide better cuddling, because they don’t feel like “a rock.” Fourth, guys with dad bods love eating, and they are “not scared of a cheat meal.” Fifth, a dad bod gives girls a preview of what the guy is going to look like twenty 20 years down the road—relevant because “girls tend to picture their future together with their guys early on.”

When this article was first released, reception was initially overwhelmingly positive. Men and women alike championed the arrival of the dad bod as a celebration of body acceptance, an appreciation of “curvy men,” and an acknowledgement of the unrealistic social pressure facing men to be buff and trim.

But if we take a closer look at the reasons that women provide for wanting a man with a dad bod, it has much less to do with the man and much more to do with the woman herself. If you look at Pearson’s reasons in support of the dad bod, you may notice that most of these reasons have to do with how the girl feels about her own body.

Reason number one: fit boyfriends make girls feel bad for not being more fit themselves. Reason number four: heavier boyfriends love eating, so they don’t make the girls feel bad for having a “cheat meal” herself. And most disturbing of all, reason number two: the chubbier the boyfriend, “the smaller we feel and the better we look next to you in a picture.”

These three reasons are an indication that the dad bod craze isn’t about male body acceptance. As a matter of fact, it isn’t about the guys at all. It’s all about promoting and reinforcing the notion that there is only one appropriate body type for women: skinny.

Don’t believe me? Then tell me why guys with dad bods—the ones who moan about the unrealistic body expectations set by Channing Tatum and Zac Efron—encourage their girlfriends to eat salads or work out. Tell me why Leonardo diCaprio, poster boy of the dad bod movement, almost exclusively dates supermodels. Tell me why men now have even more of an excuse to neglect their physical appearance, and why women are using this as an excuse to further scrutinize their own physical appearance.

The dad bod movement has nothing to do with making men feel more comfortable in their bodies. Such a goal is irrelevant in a world where men have never been subjected to the same physical beauty standards as women, a world where men are judged on their merit rather than their appearance. No, the dad bod movement has everything to do with making women, as Pearson said herself, feel smaller and look better in pictures. It has everything to do with making women less comfortable in their bodies.

The dad bod, therefore, is not a celebration of male bodies. It is a shrinking of female bodies, literally and metaphorically.

While men are encouraged to fill up the space around them with their loud voices and spread legs and now, thanks to the dad bod, expanding waistlines, women are encouraged to make themselves smaller, speaking less frequently and more quietly, and always, always watching their weight.

The easiest way to see this double standard is by asking where the mom bod is. If young college-age guys are allowed to look like fathers who spend their weekends drinking beer and eating pizza, then are young college-age girls allowed to look like mothers who have birthed three children?

The answer is an obvious no. Stretch marks and jiggly arms are sources of shame, plus-sized women are called things like “tractor-sized” and a “female hippo,” and according to one advertisement women don’t even belong at the beach if they don’t have a flat stomach and thigh gap.

And what’s more, even mothers aren’t allowed to look like mothers. Women inevitably gain weight during pregnancy, and if they aren’t Victoria’s Secret models with the time and money to exercise for 6 hours every day, most women find it very difficult to lose this weight after giving birth. Yet mothers are expected to look flawless immediately after giving birth. Tabloids regularly criticize female celebrities for failing to “get their body back” after giving birth, and idolize the celebrities who do manage to successfully “bounce back” and look as slim as they did before pregnancy. In other words, even actual mothers don’t have an excuse to look like mothers.

And yet, men, who undergo absolutely no physiological changes upon becoming a father, are congratulated for having a “dad bod.”

So let’s stop pretending the dad bod is some revolutionary and progressive movement, because it’s not. As long as women continue to be feel like there is only one body type they can aspire to, and as long as women of all ages continue to be shamed for putting on weight, there can be no gender equality.

In order for there to be true body acceptance, we need to end the double standards. Personally, I see no reason why we can’t celebrate both mom bods and dad bods. After all, I’m sure reason number three (“better cuddling”) is appealing to everyone.

Slut

Posted on 2015-10-31 by Nian Hu

By Nian Hu

The double standard of male and female sexuality

If you’re a woman, chances are you’ve been called a slut.

Women who have slept with 10 men have been called sluts. Women who have slept with one man have been called sluts. Women who have never had sex have been called sluts. Eleven-year-old girls have been called sluts. Laura Ingraham was called a slut by Ed Schultz, simply because she was politically conservative. Sandra Fluke was called a slut by Rush Limbaugh, simply because she supported access to birth control.

I’ve been called a slut, too.

In the first op-ed I wrote for The Crimson, I briefly mentioned that feminism is important to me because it gives me freedom, including the “freedom to have as many sexual partners as I want without being looked down on.” I thought it was clear from this statement, given the context, that I was pointing out the double standard when it comes to male and female sexuality, and the fact that men are not subject to the same judgment and disapproval that women receive for having multiple sexual partners.

Unfortunately, that meaning was lost on some readers—in particular, a journalist and conservative commentator named Robert Stacy McCain. He incorrectly interpreted my statement to mean that I wanted to engage in promiscuous activity, and that other people were not allowed to have their own opinions about my behavior.

McCain responded to my article by writing a blog post titled “Harvard Sluts and the Thought Police.” In his blog post, he accused me of being sexually promiscuous and he derided me and other Ivy League girls for being unclean and immoral.

He railed against “those tramps at Princeton” and the “floozies at Cornell” and the “vile hussies” at Harvard who “put out for every random guy in Cambridge” and are a “public health menace.” He ended his piece by saying that nothing is as “dangerous as having sex with a nasty Harvard slut,” and I can only assume he was referring to me.

However, in the comments section below, it appears that Robert Stacy McCain would actually risk that danger. In his comment, McCain said that he saw a picture of me online, and he conceded: “I’d hit it, after wrapping myself head-to-toe in latex and spraying her with Lysol.”

I cannot deny that I am disgusted by his spiteful comments. However, I am also grateful. It is people like McCain who give me the motivation, the drive, and the passion to continue writing about gender inequality. It is people like him who make me realize just how real the gender double standards are, even at this day and age, and just how important the feminist movement is.

It is ironic that McCain, in writing this blog post, presented such an excellent real-world example of exactly the type of double-standard phenomenon I wrote about in my op-ed.

In response to my innocuous statement about the societal double standard regarding male and female sexuality, McCain attacked me for being sexually promiscuous. It seems that accusing me of excessive sexual activity was the easiest way for McCain to smear my reputation and discredit my opinion.

This is, sadly, true for all women in our society. The fastest way to bring down a woman—any woman, of any age, for any reason—is by calling her a slut. Men of different political stripes such as Ed Schultz and Rush Limbaugh employed this method in dealing with women they disagreed with. Even women use this term against other women, as a way to tear down someone they envy or dislike.

The same, however, does not hold true for men. Herein lies the double standard. One commenter on McCain’s blog unwittingly provided an excellent example of the double standard, saying of me: “I also have to wonder what her parents make of her demands. She seems to put more emphasis on her sex life than on her education and career. Sounds a little skewed to me.”

You know what sounds a little skewed to me? I mean, besides the fact that you think I don’t put emphasis on my education and career when I am studying at Harvard and have seven internships under my belt. No, it’s the fact that you’re worried about what my parents think of their adult daughter for writing about sexual inequality, but you’re not worried about what McCain’s six children think of their 56-year old father for saying he’d like to have sex with an 18-year old college freshman.

Somehow, male sexuality seems less dangerous, less taboo, and less inappropriate than female sexuality. McCain’s desire to “hit it, after wrapping myself head-to-toe in latex and spraying her with Lysol” seems more acceptable than my desire to have the “freedom to have as many sexual partners as I want without being looked down on.”

While I am glad that McCain has embraced his sexuality, I wish that he and the rest of our society would extend the same courtesy to me. If he is allowed to be a sexual being, then why am I not allowed to be one? Why do women get shamed for their sexuality when men do not? Sex, after all, requires two people. And in heterosexual relationships, one person is a man and the other is a woman. Yet, women are derided for having sex while men are often lauded for it.

This double standard is exemplified in the words we use to describe people who have multiple sexual partners. For women, descriptors like “whore” and “tramp” have decidedly negative undertones, suggesting contamination and lowliness. For men, however, descriptors like “womanizer” or “player” are much more positive, evoking conquest and domination.

Slut-shaming, as a phenomenon, is uniquely directed towards women. It is defined as the idea of shaming women for being sexual, having multiple sexual partners, acknowledging sexual feelings, or acting upon those sexual feelings. In other words, we shame women for acting as sexual subjects, rather than the sexual objects they are expected to be.

Sexual objects are the sexy female models whose breasts, butts, and legs are used to sell things like milk, deodorant, and cars. They are meant to turn other people on; they are not meant to be turned on themselves. In our society, we expect women to be sexual objects. Women are meant to be sexy to other people, but they are not meant to enjoy sex themselves. I’m meant to be seen as sexy by Robert Stacy McCain, but I sure as hell am not meant to enjoy sex myself.

Sexual subjects, on the other hand, have sexual desires, pursue sex, and enjoy sex. Sound familiar? That’s right. Women who choose to act as sexual subjects are the very same ones we call sluts. And in desiring the “freedom to have as many sexual partners as I want without being looked down on,” I made myself a sexual subject. I became a slut.

If enjoying sex makes me a slut, then I’m glad to be one. But I want to live in a world where enjoying sex isn’t just a privilege reserved for men. I want to live in a world where female masturbation is just as accepted as male masturbation is, a world where women watching porn isn’t considered unusual, a world where depictions of female pleasure in movies get the same PG-13 rating that depictions of male pleasure do, a world where it’s acceptable for women to have casual sex the same way men can. I want to live in a world where women can simply admit that yes, they want sex just as much as anyone else.

Unfortunately, that just isn’t the world we live in right now. And historically, that hasn’t been what the world looked like. For centuries, female sexuality has been repressed and controlled. Under the patriarchy, where women were nothing more than property her father intended to pass down to a male heir, a woman’s virginity was paramount. What husband would want a wife who has already slept with another man? What husband would want “damaged goods?”

Therefore, the control of female sexuality was central in the patriarchy. Fathers were expected to safeguard their daughter’s virginity and ensure her sexual purity by secluding her from the rest of society, closing her off from educational and career opportunities. Should the daughter somehow find a way to have sex before marriage, the father, along with his sons, might even murder her in an “honor killing.”

In describing the patriarchy, I use the past tense because, though it still exists, it no longer manifests itself so overtly in places like the United States. However, for many girls and women in other parts of the world, this is still very much so their reality.

Though time has passed and things have largely improved for women in places like the United States, vestiges of the patriarchy still remain in our customs and habits—and while some are harmless, others are considerably less so. We continue to wear white at weddings, we continue to have fathers escort the brides down the aisle, we continue to hold purity balls—but most importantly, we continue to slut-shame.

We, as a society, can do better. And we, as people, can definitely do better. As long as people like Robert Stacy McCain continue to uphold outmoded sexist values and reinforce double standards, you can bet there will be people like me (and, hopefully, you) challenging those beliefs and working towards a world of greater gender equality—a world where sexuality is embraced as a natural and wonderful thing, not targeted as a source of shame, for men and women alike.

Are You On Your Period?

Posted on 2015-10-31 by Nian Hu

By Nian Hu, a student at Harvard

The stigmatization of menstruation

Call it the crimson wave, Aunt Flo, or cousin red—call it anything but what it actually is. Menstruation, the process by which the body sheds the lining of the uterus through the vagina, is all too familiar to any woman of childbearing age. That “time of the month” is an inconvenient and unpleasant, but also natural and universal, phenomenon.

Unfortunately, despite affecting roughly fifty percent of the world’s population, menstruation comes with a heavy stigma. In the past especially, there were many taboos surrounding a menstruating woman’s behavior. For example, people used to believe that drops of menstrual blood could kill plants and animals. In ancient Rome, Pliny the Elder wrote that bees left their hives, mares miscarried, and corn withered at the touch of a menstruating woman. People also used to think that beer, wine, vinegar, milk, and jam would become spoiled if touched by a menstruating woman.

Things haven’t gotten much better in recent times. As recently as the 1930s, scientists were trying to prove that menstruating women produced menotoxins, or poisons, in their menstrual blood, perspiration, saliva, urine, and tears. Professor B. Schick first came up with this concept in 1919, proposing that this was the reason why menstruating women supposedly caused wine to spoil and flowers to wilt at their touch.

Thanks to this stigma, women used to be—and in some places, continue to be—forced to leave their homes and spend time in isolation whenever they experienced their period. In many developing countries, girls as young as 10 must spend their menstrual cycles in an animal shed built outside their homes. This practice often causes girls to miss school, contributing to the phenomenon of uneducated women developing countries. In Africa alone, one in 10 girls misses school when she has her period because of lack of information and inadequate facilities.

While the physical ostracization of menstruating women is no longer a reality in countries like the United States, the stigma of uncleanliness and shame lingers. Recently Kiran Gandhi, drummer for M.I.A. and Harvard Business School graduate, decided to run a marathon on her period, without a pad or tampon. She had trained for months for this marathon, and had unexpectedly gotten her period the night before. She decided to run the marathon anyway, citing comfort as her primary reason for forgoing a pad or tampon. During the marathon, she freely bled into her athletic leggings.

When the story broke the news, the entire world recoiled in disgust. Even though the menstrual fluid was contained in the runner’s leggings, only leaving stains in her crotch area, people derided the runner as unsanitary, cited public health violations, and ridiculed her as disgusting and shameless.

Marathon runners often urinate as they run, unwilling to waste a precious second, and this is seen as understandable; yet, when this runner menstruated as she ran, unwilling to wear a pad or tampon that would cause painful chafing throughout the course of a long run, this was seen as disgusting and radical.

Why the enormous backlash? Kiran Gandhi said it herself best: “As I ran, I thought to myself about how women and men have both been effectively socialized to pretend periods don’t exist… Because it is all kept quiet, women are socialized not to complain or talk about their own bodily functions, since no one can see it happening.”

She has a point: in our society, periods are seen as something that should be hidden. Advertisements for pads and tampons are intentionally vague and misleading, showing montages of frolicking women and demonstrating pad absorbency using mysterious blue liquid. Seventeen publishes “period traumaramas” where girls share embarrassing stories about their periods—apparently, the worst thing that can happen to a teenage girl is getting your period around your boyfriend or dropping a tampon in front of your crush. Kotex sells pads with specially designed rustle-free wrappers, so even other women in a public bathroom don’t have to know you’re on your period. In our society, menstruation is so stigmatized that we essentially pretend it doesn’t even exist.

The stigma of menstruation is not only physical, but also psychological. Women on their periods are not only dirty and repulsive, but also moody and hysterical—according to experts on female physiology like Donald Trump, at least. Infamously, the controversial presidential hopeful insinuated that Megyn Kelly was menstruating during the GOP debate. On an interview with CNN’s Don Lemon, Trump said, “You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her…wherever.” Though he later insisted that he was referring to her nose, it is obvious that he was implying that she was on her period while questioning him in what he perceived as an overly aggressive manner.

This is not only an unfair assumption that invalidates women’s emotions and reactions as mere hormonal impulses, but also a line of thinking that prevents women from being taken seriously in their educational and professional pursuits. In 1981, a survey of Americans found that over half of the respondents thought that women were more emotional while menstruating, and about a quarter of the respondents believed that women cannot function normally or do their work as well while menstruating. However, studies found that there is no evidence of premenstrual or menstrual decline in women’s mental or physical performances.

Nevertheless, the stigma of menstruating women as being hysterical harpies persists. It is this stigma that caused Newt Gingrich in 1995 to declare that women are unfit for combat because “females have biological problems staying in a ditch for 30 days.” It is this stigma that caused cartoonist Pat Oliphant to portray Hillary Clinton as weepy and weak in the face of terrorists. It is this stigma that caused Marc Rudov to point to PMS and mood swings as the main downside of having a female president.

This stigma even puts the health and lives of women at risk. In the past, women who expressed any range of symptoms—including sexual desire, loss of appetite for sex, and a “tendency to cause trouble”—were often diagnosed with “hysteria,” a diagnosis no longer recognized by medical authorities today, and forced to enter an insane asylum or to undergo surgical hysterectomy.

Even now, doctors often do not take women’s complaints of pain as seriously as men’s complaints. Women under 55 are two times as likely as men in the same age group to die after being hospitalized for a heart attack, in part because doctors often ignore or minimize women’s complaints when they speak up. Women are often dismissed as “hysterical, dramatic, or crazy,” a dangerous stereotype that could even put their lives at risk.

The period stigma sucks. It’s annoying to constantly have your thoughts and emotions dismissed as hormonal impulses, it’s irritating to devise methods of bringing a tampon into the bathroom without anyone noticing, and it’s embarrassing to be shamed for having unexpected period leaks on your clothing or bedding.

But the period stigma has much more far-reaching consequences. It means that women are not taken seriously in the workplace. It means that women are not seen as competent leaders. It means that Megyn Kelly is seen as a hormonal bitch on her period rather than an intelligent reporter brave enough to ask the tough questions to Donald Trump. It means that Kiran Gandhi is seen as a disgusting unladylike rebel rather than a woman who wanted to run a marathon with her family and friends and just happened to have her period that day. The period stigma shames women for their natural bodily functions and for their thoughts alike, making women feel just as uncomfortable in the workplace as they do in their own bodies.

Sure, periods can be messy and annoying and always seem to come at the most unexpected times, but they are also a reminder of the incredible capabilities of the female body. Instead of pretending they don’t exist, we should be bonding over an experience that half of the human population undergoes every month. Period blood, after all, consists of eggs and uterine lining prepared for a potential developing baby—the apparatus used for making life. Personally, I don’t find that gross at all. I find it pretty miraculous.

Letter to UN Women from the Defense Attorneys for the Feminist Five

Posted on 2015-09-27 by wrchina

By Defense Attorneys for the Feminist Five in China Sept 23, 2015

The Honorable UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and the Executive Director of UN Women Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka,

We are a group of Chinese human rights lawyers, who are also the defense attorneys for the five young Chinese feminist activists detained by the police in March, 2015 (Wei Tingting, Zheng Churan, Wu Rongrong, Li Tingting and Wang Man). On the eve of the 2015 International Women’s Day, they were detained by the police authorities under the allegation of “Picking Quarrels and Making Trouble” as they were planning to organize activities to prevent sexual harassment on public transportations. Although they were released on bail in April thanks to the vigorous support of domestic and international communities, the police have not yet revoked this apparently wrong case.

As their defense attorneys, after we got involved in this case, we found that the three activities that the police was accusing them of, namely the “March 7th Stickers Against Sexual Harassment”, “Occupy Men’s Toilets” and “Blood-tainted Brides”, were neither illegal nor criminal. More importantly, we found that the police officers in charge of this case had conducted many behaviors that violate the laws in China as well as international human rights laws. Therefore over the past six months, the Feminist Five and us have reported and appealed to relevant government departments in China in written words for multiple times, demanding the police to revoke the criminal charges and demanding the Procuratorate to supervise this case.

However, these actions and written texts met with no responses from any relevant departments. On the contrary, ever since the Feminist Five were released on bail, they have been continuously investigated and surveilled as criminal suspects, their travelling and social activities have been restricted, and they cannot return to their work at NGO. At the same time, a number of NGOs in China were affected by this case: Their normal activities were restricted and harassed; their employees were threatened; some organizations were even forced to shut down; several supporters and volunteers were prohibited from international travelling and were newly listed as criminal suspects, two of whom have been arrested on unwarranted ground.

On July 7th, 2015, the “Five Feminist Sisters” wrote to both of you, hoping to get attention and help, but have not received any replies. On September 27th, UN Women will co-host the global women’s summit with the Chinese government. The president of People’s Republic of China, Xi Jinping, is going to deliver a speech at the opening ceremony. We want to remind UN Women that as the Procuratorate in China have refused to approve the arrest of the “Five Feminist Sisters,” it is not difficult for the police to revoke this case. However, on the occasion of the forthcoming opening of the global women’s summit, the Feminist Five are still being treated as “criminal suspects” . This is abusive police power, which could be easily interpreted by the general public as humiliation against any effort of the global women’s rights communities to advocate for the release of the Feminist Five in April. Co-hosting such event with the Chinese government will render UN Women questioned by the public that UN Women is not committed to promoting women’s rights and empowerment, but rather working as an accomplice to the abusive police. Remaining silent on the current situation will easily confirm such interpretation.

As the defense attorneys for the “Five Feminist Sisters,” we are now writing to you not only to explain the situation of this case and to express our opinions as lawyers, more importantly we want to ask for your attention to our clients’ request for help, to help our clients, and in particular taking the opportunity of this global women’s summit to raise concrete opinions and suggestions to the Chinese government. Here are our demands for the UN Women:

Please pay attention to the living conditions of the Feminist Five;
Based on the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, please voice your opinions on the Feminist Five case in fulfillment of your duty as an international organization;
The persecution of China’sFeminist Five by the police is one of the most significant events against the global women’s rights community this year. No matter how much UN Women could actually help the five sisters, at least it should respond to their request for help to avoid blemishing its honorable history.

Finally, we’d like to express our sincere gratitude to both of you, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Defense Attorneys for the Feminist Five in China:

Ge Wenxiu: +86-18028627307

Liu Shuqing: +86-13355415256

Yan Xin: +86-13601297308

Lv Zhoubin: +86-13968096061

Wu Kuiming: +86-13006881043

Chen Jinxue: +86-13826002506

“Aboveground- 40 Moments of Transformation” ; A Photography exhibtion of young feminist activism in China

Few of Feminist groups hold event at LES Gallery on September 27, 2015.

WRIC director Jing Zhang is being interviewed by a VOA reporter. Jing Zhang says the President Xi Jinpang persecuting feminism and NGO groups in China was worse than the previous CCP leaders.

105 Feminists Calling on the Release of Women’s Rights/ Human Rights Lawyers

Posted on 2015-09-01 by wrchina

By WRIC 26th August, 2015

Since the crackdowns began on 9th July, 2015, 17 human rights lawyers, lawyers’ assistants and law firm staff have remained in detention. Although “verdict” has been given by CCTV and the state media that these people are “guilty of defending human rights”, and yet for their family members and for the public, they are regarded as disappeared because no one knows where they are, let alone protecting their legal rights such as that of meeting their lawyers. We have learnt at the same time that by 18:00, 21 August 2015, another 241 people have been summoned by the police and warned not to take part in any solidarity action. Among them, 124 are lawyers.

Under the pressure to keep silent, any attempt to express solidarity with the detained lawyers could be risky and is difficult to make known. Nonetheless, activists in China have tried relay their messages by various means. Since 30th July, 2015, an appeal letter “Forward the Women’s Rights Drift Bottle: Calling On The Release Of Women’s Rights/ Human Rights Lawyers” has been put in circulation discreetly.

As of 12:00, 24th August, 2015, a total of 105 feminists have signed the petition. Among them, 55 are from 14 provinces across China, 24 from Japan, 8 from Europe, 7 from North America, 4 from Hong Kong, 3 from Taiwan and 4 from other countries.

Moreover, the parents of the victims of the Jiangxi Sexual Abuse of Young Girls’ Case, which was represented by Wang Yu, one of the detained lawyers, have also released a public statement.

Alliance of the Women’s Rights Advocacy: Human Rights Lawyers have strived For Women’s Rights Cases

According to the petition letter, human rights lawyers have been important allies to the feminist movement. “Wang Yu, who was arrested recently, had handled many cases on women’s rights, such as the Jiujiang case in Jiangxi in which young female students were sexually assaulted by her teacher, the Hainan case in which young girls were sexually abused by their headmaster, and the Yiyang case in Hunan in which girls were molested by their teacher.

“During the ‘16 days of Activism against Gender Violence’ campaign last year, Wang Yu arranged visited the Ministry of Education with a list of recommendations on the setting up of a response mechanism for cases of sexual abuses in schools.” The letter also noted other examples such as “lawyer Li Heping who had handled cases related to forced family planning in Linyin of Shandong, and lawyer Wang Quanzhang who had represented the case of Bian Xiaohui, a post-90s girl from the Hebei province who was not allowed to see her father in prison..”

This petition letter has been initiated by a group of anonymous feminists. They believe that “as feminists, we care about various issues related to women’s rights in this country. Human rights lawyers like Wang Yu have been defending rights in accordance with the law. They are in pursuit of justice, and have been striving, selflessly and fearlessly, to promote women’s equal rights. Now when they are secretly detained, in contravention of the statutory legal procedures, and when their family members are treated inhumanely, we do not want to just stand by and look on.

Undercurrent In The Storm: Forwarding The Women’s Rights Drift Bottle

In the petition letter, the feminists have demanded:

The immediate and unconditional release of all detained lawyers and other relevant parties;
That all detainees can enjoy their legal rights, including but not limited to immediate family notification regarding their detention and meeting their defense lawyers;
That no one should be put under secret detention and or tortured;
That all defamatory and smearing reports and coverages without support of any evidence should be stopped.
That the civil society as a whole should continue to follow the crackdowns and respective development.

Taking into consideration the concerns for security, the initiators of the campaign have designed two ways for the public to join. The first one is to encourage the public to repost this petition to Weibo, Weixin, and any other social media that they use, and then forward it to 3-5 friends and encourage them to help spread the message. The other one is to send relevant personal information to a gmail address or to fill in a Google doc form. People in China need to use VPN to access the form if they want to try the second method.

The initiators also emphasized in the petition that “To our knowledge, forwarding unoriginal information via social media has by far not led to any calls for interviews by the authorities. We can always find space to spread our message, to make ourselves heard and to counter the monopoly of the state media.

It is reported that the petition has been widely shared on social media and so far 105 people have co-signed.

Parents of victims of sexual abuse released a statement: “lawyers helped us according to the law”

The parents of victims of the Jiangxi Sexual Abuse of Young Girls’ Case released a statement concerning the detention of lawyer Wang Yu on 24th August, 2015.

In the statement, the parents described lawyer Wang Yu as follows. “She is a kind-hearted rights defense lawyer, with a strong sense of justice and integrity. Wang Yu lent a helping hand to us when we were most isolated, confused and desperate. She provided us with legal services and rendered us big help in resolving our difficulties in daily life. Lawyer Wang Yu has always followed the laws and regulations when she handled the cases. She never aided and abetted or incited her clients to go against the law, let alone any attempt to possibly endanger the state security. She has been making full use of the law and worked within the legal framework to bring maximum benefits for the victims.

The parents also wrote in the statement that as clients who have received her generous help, they could be the witnesses to lawyer Wang’s professionalism and were obliged to express their deep concern in this matter. “We hope the authorities will abide by the laws and related regulations in their investigations, and that they will fully respect and protect Wang Yu’s basic rights.”

The authors of the petition have at the same time expressed their worries about the safety of Wang Yu’s family members. They call on the authorities to ensure the implementation of “rule according to law”, to respect the facts and be serious in listening to people voice. They should work to uphold justice for the innocents.

The situation of human rights lawyers is worrying: residential surveillance can be reduced to black jails

It is reported that by 18:00 on 21 August 2015, at least 276 lawyers, law firm staff, human right activists, and family members have been detained, arrested, held incommunicado, summoned, restricted freedom temporarily or prevented from leaving the country

Lawyers alleged as “endangering national security” include Wang Yu, Wang Quanzhang, Liu Sixin, Sui Muqing, Xie Yang, Xie Yuandong, Zhao Wei and Gao Yue. Among them, only Liu Sixin and Zhao Wei’s locations of detention are known to the public. Wang Yu, Sui Muqing, Xie Yang, Xie Yuandong, Zhao Wei and Gao Yue were put under residential surveillance at designated location. Past reports indicated that “residential surveillance at designated location” might subject detainees to be held in “black jails” and face the risks of torture and ill-treatment.

None of the above detained lawyers has been allowed to meet with their lawyers by the time this press release is sent out.

Furthermore, the children of lawyer Wang Yu and Li Heping have been banned from leaving the country.

[For Enquires, please contact]

K Chan （China Human Rights Lawyers Concern Group）：+852-2388-1377

[Attachments]

Reports on women-rights cases taken up by women’s rights/human rights lawyers
Forwarding the Women’s Rights Drift Bottle, calling on the release of women’s rights/ human rights lawyers
A Statement Concerning the Detention of Lawyer Wang Yu by the Parents of the Jiangxi Sexual Abuse of Young Girls’ Case

【Attachment 1】: Reports on women-rights cases taken up by women’s rights/human rights lawyers

20140718 Oriental Morning News: Jiangxi Sexually-Abused Girls Sued The Bureau Of Education, and Lawyers’ Cellphones Confiscated Before The Trial

http://news.sina.com.cn/c/2014-07-18/114330541357.shtml

20131019 Xinhua Net:　Jiangxi Teacher Who Sexually Abused 7 Girls Sentenced To 14 Years Of Imprisonment, 6 Girls Suffered From Venereal Disease

http://news.sina.com.cn/c/2013-10-19/150928477731.shtml

20130822 Xinhua Net: Follow Up Of The Case Of The Principal Having Sex With Girls in Wanning Hainan: Hard For The Victims To Go Out Of The Psychological Shadow

http://www.hq.xinhuanet.com/news/2013-08/22/c_117056668.htm

20130717 Beijing Times: 5 lawyers who applied for information on the case of two girls starving to death in Nanjing got replies – unable to provide the information

http://news.xinhuanet.com/legal/2013-07/17/c_125021362.htm

【Attachment 2】:Forwarding the Women’s Rights Drift Bottle, calling on the release of women’s rights/ human rights lawyers

https://www.facebook.com/chinesefeminists/posts/495474730609279

【Attachment 3】:A Statement Concerning the Detention of Lawyer Wang Yu by the Parents of the Jiangxi Sexual Abuse of Young Girls’ Case

Lawyer Wang Yu served as defense counsel for the young girls who were sexual abused by one of the schoolteachers in Ruichang, Jiangxi.

Lawyer Wang fully complies with the relevant laws and regulations in the case all the time. Wang has never urged or incited the parties to engage in illegal activities, Wang is always making full use of the existing law and the legal framework to help the victims to fight for their legal rights and interests.

Lawyer Wang is a kind-hearted rights defense lawyer, with a strong sense of justice and integrity. Wang Yu lent a helping hand to us at the moment when we were most isolated, confused and desperate, and she even provided the victims with material support.Lawyer Wang Yu has helped us to fight for our rights and safeguard justice, she helped us without reservations. With her generous help, our cases have a better outcome and all the victims’ parents are very grateful.

Since Lawyer Wangyu is in danger and suffering now, as clients who has received her generous help and witness of her excellent professional skills, we must express our serious concern. We would like to remind the relevant departments to obey laws and related regulations, to fully protect the suspect’s basic rights and interests.

We are shocked to learn that Wang Yu is currently held under ‘residential surveillance at a designated place’ and has been denied of access to lawyers for having ‘endangered’ the state security, her husband Bao Longjun is detained and even their only son Bao Mengmeng who is just 16 years old and totally unrelated with this case is also under surveillance. As parents of teenagers ourselves, we feel a strong anger and pain about Bao Mengmeng’s great physical and mental suffering, so we urge the departments that are handling this case to stop getting the innocent boy involved in any form, including making threats, intimidating and limiting his personal freedom.

Moreover, concerning the smearing of Wang’s reputation by some of the official media, we urge the investigating authorities to work in accordance with the law, to investigate the facts thoroughly, to listen to people’s opinion, and to uphold justice firmly.

The family of victims in Jiangxi sexual abuse case

2015.08.24

Jiangling Li: Forced Abortion, a Permanent Scar on Women

Posted on 2015-03-22 by wrchina

Source: WRIC, Translator by Yang Yu 05-29-2012

Li Jiangli (left) talked about her experience of forced abortion with other women

Women’s Right in China held in Flushing, New York Office “China’s Family Planning Policy and Population Conference” on May 29, 2012. Participants of the conference had very heated discussion on China’s forced family planning policy and its impact on Chinese society.

The first speaker was the Tibetan history expert and writer, Li Jiangli. She made public the first time her horrible experience of forced abortion. She said, abortion brings more pain than any other physical pains to a woman because not only she has no dignity when the abortion is in process but also she feels like a conspirator killing her child. Women can gather together and talk about anything – but not about abortion because the process is too painful. Li Jiang stated, abortion is the commonly shared nightmare, scar, and secret of all the women in China. On the other hand, a woman will never share the experience with her husband or male partner, because he cannot truly understand the pain of his woman. Men are excluded from the issue of abortion and it is likely they don’t want to learn about the experience. Being unable to protect his woman makes the gap between two sexes.

Theorist Hu Ping also explained his point of view that China’s forced family planning policy is an unprecedented violence. What is more perplexing is that the policy is enforced without much resistance – even the privileged class is included. From official statistics, there are annually 10,000,000 abortion cases in China, which is like massacre of 10,000,000 people. One-Child Policy incurred millions of families without decedents, because they have only one child and later loose them when parents loose reproduction ability. One-Child Policy also results in the fact that the only child is harder to educate. In order to advertise the family planning policy, the China Communist Party fervently advocates for eugenics, which is closely interconnected with Fascism. Besides, the family planning policy consolidates discrimination against peasants in China. In fact, there has never been any societal discrimination against peasants before the China Communist Party established in recent 60 years.

Han Wu asserted that men are indirect victims of the family planning policy as well. After his wife was sterilized, he felt like their intimate life was unlocked by the sterilization ring. All the participants concluded that both men and women are victims of forced family planning policy.
When discussing why the forced family planning policy is so entrenched, initiator of Women’s Right in China, Zhang Jing used a couple of figures to demonstrate the issue. Zhang Jing said, according to official statistics from Chinese government in 2005, there were 58,700,000 family planning officials, 1,142,000 full-time family planning officials, and 57,270,000 part-time family planning officials. This means there are more than 100,000,000 people, which are one tenth of the whole population of China, involved in enforcing family planning policy. What is more, there are about 40,000 community family planning offices and about 5, 000 family planning service stations. The State Council has more than 20 departments dedicated for family planning policy – no such governmental policies would be this prevalent! Averagely, every Chinese citizen annually pays ten yuan for the family planning policy. Aside from the shocking benefit chain, the family planning policy even practices “political veto,” thus further consolidating the link between the family planning policy and the political life of governmental officials.

When discussing how to change the family planning policy, Li Jianglin asserted that women should no longer remain silent, and speak out their pain from abortion; otherwise, this pain will go on to their daughters, daughters-in-law, and granddaughters, etc.At the end of the conference, an interview from BBC with Ma Jian, a traveling author in Britain, was played. Ma Jian stated his new book Dark Road was a persecution of China’s family planning policy, and was also an attempt to regain women’s control over their uterus.