Category Archives: Feminism

Seasonal Agricultural Workers Left Out of Chilean Boom – Inter Press Service | Inter Press Service

Tens of thousands of women employed as seasonal workers in rural areas of Chile suffer high levels of poverty and poor working conditions, even though their labour generates huge profits for agricultural exporters.

In 2013, Chile’s agro-exports amounted to nearly 11.6 billion dollars. But most seasonal workers earned less than the minimum monthly wage of 380 dollars a month.

Chile is ranked by international consultants as one of the world’s 25 fastest-growing countries and the second-fastest in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which it joined in 2010 to become the only Latin American member along with Mexico.

And according to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), it is the country with the lowest proportion of informal labour in the Latin American and Caribbean region.

Nevertheless, there are still casual and seasonal workers employed in precarious conditions, without basic labour rights.

“In Chile there is a large number of workers, and women in particular, suffering precarious working conditions characterised by low wages, a lack of job stability and a lack of legal protections because they are subcontracted or outsourced, etc,” the minister of the National Women’s Service (SERNAM) Claudia Pascual acknowledged.

And the situation is especially bad for women from poor urban neighbourhoods or rural areas, the minister told IPS.

“It’s not the same thing to be a poor woman, a Mapuche, Aymara or Quechua [indigenous] woman, a rural woman, as it is to be a professional,” Pascual added.

The amount of work done by seasonal workers skyrocketed in the 1980s when fruit plantations and exports grew exponentially in Chile.

via Seasonal Agricultural Workers Left Out of Chilean Boom – Inter Press Service | Inter Press Service.

Mahienour El-Massry, often dubbed as a voice of the revolution and a champion of women’s rights, has spent her first few nights behind grey walls at Damanhour prison after being sentenced to two years in jail for protesting.

The 28-year-old and eight others were sentenced by one of Alexandria’s crumbling courthouses for organizing an ‘unauthorized protest’ and violating the protest law.

The young activist, who also happens to be a lawyer, had participated in a protest on December 3rd 2013 to call for justice and retribution for Khaled Saeed, the man who was tortured to death in late 2010.

Instead of retribution, her solidarity protest was broken up with tear gas and force. Mahienour and eight others were branded criminals and detractors by security officials.

via .

Megachurch pastor compares abortion clinics to Nazi concentration camps

Megachurch pastor compares abortion clinics to Nazi concentration camps.

(60+ percent of Americans support women’s right to decide whether to have an abortion or not. So according to this wannabe-superstar-who-knows-more-than-God 60+ percent of Americans are Nazis?)

Of course, everyone loves hijacking and trivializing the Holocaust for their own political agenda. But if Garlow is really interested in history, abortion and Nazism, he should listen to someone who actually knows about it, likeGisella Perl, a physician and prisoner of Auschwitz, who saved women’s lives by providing them with abortions. Garlow may condemn her, but I’m pretty sure history won’t.

The Courageous Career of Slain French Photojournalist Camille Lepage · Global Voices

Conflicts on the African continent claimed another journalist last week. Camille Lepage, a 26-year-old French photojournalist, is the latest reporter to pay the ultimate price for trying to inform the world of the violence against unarmed civilians in the Central African Republic (CAR).

Lepage’s body was found on May 15 by French peacekeepers in a village near the town of Bouar, CAR, in a car driven by Christian militia fighters known as Anti-Balaka.

The Central African Republic has been marred by conflict since 2012 when the Muslim faction Seleka and the Anti-Balaka began warring over control of the territory. Lepage is the first western journalist to be killed in the fighting.

She specialized in photojournalism in Africa, notably in Egypt, South Sudan and the Central African Republic. She explained that her motivation was to cover news stories that mainstream media tend to ignore. “I can’t accept that people’s tragedies are silenced simply because no one can make money out of them,” she said.

Emotions ran high after the news of her death broke, especially among her colleagues in the news industry and in communities with an interest in human rights and African affairs.

via The Courageous Career of Slain French Photojournalist Camille Lepage · Global Voices.

The Monuments Men Recognition Act: H.R. 3658: Monuments Men Recognition Act of 2013 – POPVOX.com

One of the honorees is a woman – so she is going to be given medal recognizing Monuments “Men”?

H.R. 3658: Monuments Men Recognition Act of 2013

Summary: To grant the Congressional Gold Medal, collectively, to the Monuments Men, in recognition of their heroic role in the preservation, protection, and restitution of monuments, works of art, and artifacts of cultural importance during and following World War II.

via The Monuments Men Recognition Act: H.R. 3658: Monuments Men Recognition Act of 2013 – POPVOX.com.

[UPDATED] NY Times Abruptly Replaces Jill Abramson As Top Editor: Gothamist

Paying a woman less – plain and simple sexism by management – ironic and sleazy! 
Update 5:58 p.m.: In a post on the New Yorker’s blog, columnist Ken Auletta says sources tell him that in addition to other tensions with management, Abramson “discovered that her pay and her pension benefits as both executive editor and, before that, as managing editor were considerably less than the pay and pension benefits of Bill Keller, the male editor whom she replaced in both jobs.” She reportedly confronted the paper’s management—”and this may have fed into the management’s narrative that she was ‘pushy,’ a characterization that, for many, has an inescapably gendered aspect.” Auletta reports that Abramson was told she would be terminated last Friday.Update 5:58 p.m.: In a post on the New Yorker’s blog, columnist Ken Auletta says sources tell him that in addition to other tensions with management, Abramson “discovered that her pay and her pension benefits as both executive editor and, before that, as managing editor were considerably less than the pay and pension benefits of Bill Keller, the male editor whom she replaced in both jobs.” She reportedly confronted the paper’s management—”and this may have fed into the management’s narrative that she was ‘pushy,’ a characterization that, for many, has an inescapably gendered aspect.” Auletta reports that Abramson was told she would be terminated last Friday.

via [UPDATED] NY Times Abruptly Replaces Jill Abramson As Top Editor: Gothamist.