EmilyKlausfelder

Vanquish
Gender-BasedViolence
IssuesBrief

The Issue
Approximately 1/3 women around the world will be beaten, forced to have sex, or
abused in another way at least once in their lives. Gender inequality is apart of the
culture in many impoverished
nations. The idea that women exist
to serve men and are lesser than
men, often leads to brutal abuse as
a form of punishment. Women are
being attacked with acid and
permanently disfigured, having their
reproductive organs mutilated as a
right of passage into womanhood,
and are being beaten and evicted
from their homes if their virginity is
not intact at marriage. Poverty has
also led to the sale of women for
sex, and has become a lucrative
business in many eastern nations.
Human trafficking is occurring
across the globe, and takes place in
First World countries, like the United
States.

Historical Background

Gender inequality has existed since the Medieval Ages, where women were seen
as inferior to men in every aspect of life, whether it be socially or domestically. Women
were expected to marry and then serve their husbands happily. As time went on,
women were seen as incapable of being virtuous citizens, and thus faced major social
restrictions. They could not make their own wages, hold office, vote, or do almost
anything without the permission of their husbands. It wasnt until the 1950s and and
1960s that American women, women who were supposedly citizens of a free nation,
challenged the status quo and demanded access to the public sphere. They had won
the right to vote a century earlier, but the previous expectations womens were still
heavily in tact.
Throughout this time, women who did not marry were doomed to be
impoverished spin stresses, and neglected by society. Women who defied their
husbands often faced physical abuse as a form of punishment. It wasnt until the 1970s
that spousal abuse become a public issue.
Internationally, many nations were, and still are, using violent tactics to punish
women for many reasons, such as not maintaining their virginity, even if it were lost
during a case or rape, not subjecting to arranged marriages, disobeying their husbands
or parents, and so forth.
Even during the 1980s, well after American women began establishing
sanctuaries for battered women, gender based violence was not being recognized as a
human rights issue. In 1992, the CEDAW Committee, the international committee
responsible for eliminating all forms of violence against women, adopted and
established General Recommendation No. 19 on Violence Against Women, or VAW,
that sets the notion that gender-based violence is an international issue. It took another
three years before the Beijing Platform for Action outlined the definition of violence
against women to include the following; violations of the rights of women in situations of
armed conflict, including systematic rape, sexual slavery, forced pregnancy, forced
sterilization, forced abortion, coerced or forced use of contraceptives; prenatal sex
selections, and female infanticide, an issue that has become a major concern in Asian

nations due to overpopulation and a preference for male heirs to the family. The
Platform also recognizes the
women as minorities,
refugees, and those as being
impoverished, are more likely
to be victims of such acts.

In December of 2012,
the United Nations finally
passed legislation that only
urged countries to ban the act
of female genital mutilation,
the act of altering the female
genitals in a violent and
non-medicinal way, in order to
prevent sexual pleasure.
Female genital mutilation has
strong roots in many cultures,
such as Australian tribes and
African nations. The process
includes removing almost all,
or all of the external genitalia,
and may even include the full
closing of the vaginal opening
via sutures. The practice is
extremely painful, unsanitary,
and has been traced back as
far as Ancient Rome.

Facts

What is Being Done Already

Many international womens rights organizations are banding together to work to

create federal and international legislation, and programs to protect victims, spread
awareness of the issues, and promote gender equality.

Legislation
At least 119 countries have passed laws on domestic violence, 125 have laws on
sexual assault, and 52 have laws on marital rape. However these laws are not always
up to par with international standards.

Care
Organizations like CARE, a
human rights activist group that
works to save lives, assist
those in need, attack the issue
of poverty, and achieve
international social justice, are
providing programs to end
poverty and promote equality
on 5 continents, and in
countries such as Mali, Jordan,
Bangladesh, and the
Democratic Republic of the
Congo. This group works with
international care, natural
disasters, and emergencies,
but places a special focus on
empowering and educating
women and girls around the
world.

The United Nations

UN Women, and World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts have
developed a global education program for youth to prevent and end violence against
girls and women called Voices against Violence. They have also established a
co-educational curriculum for groups 5-25 to learn about the problem, promote
awareness, and what to do if they get involved. UN Women also has created and
implemented a program called Partners for Prevention for men and boys to educate
and promote equality
Previously, in 1993 , the UN Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against
Women was implemented by the UN as a governing body.

USAID
USAID has partnered with non-governmental organizations, faith-based
organizations, and host government institutions to Increase awareness, improve
services for survivors, and to strengthen prevention of gender-based inequality and
violence

Solutions

The three best solutions to combat gender-based violence would be to create

and fund programs to protect/ counsel victims, create and fund programs to promote
gender equality in elementary and high schools, develop and institute laws to make
these crimes illegal and follow through with them, increase international awareness of
the issues, and finally, to encourage women to seek education, so they do not have to
default to unhealthy marriages in order for a means of living.

What Needs To Be Done

In order to end the violence, we need to attack the issues at hand now through
strong legislation that will be reinforced, increase awareness globally to gain support to
pass that legislation, and educate the younger generations about the issue in order to
change the culture of the future.

Create legislation

Pros
By making the brutal abuse of women illegal internationally, and follow through
with laws and enforce those laws. By doing so, a deterrent will be implemented in aims
to prevent assault cases, and punish those who do.

Cons
Although creating legislation will be useful and effective, it is a lengthy process,
especially when dealing with international nations. Many nations will not welcome
American or UN intervention, and will see it as an assault on their nation. It will also be
difficult to establish laws in nations that are primarily run by men, who are also often the
very ones who are committing these crimes.

Increase Awareness

Pros
In order to solve the issue, we need more people to rally behind the cause. This
will help pass legislation, and create necessary programs to protect women, and the
programs to establish education. Without support, very little will be achieved, much less
in a timely manner.

Cons
Increasing awareness will be immensely costly. Programs will have to be created
by organizations to educated people globally. They will need immense funding, which
will be hard to pass in todays Republican- run congress, as it would be funding towards
social programs.

Education

Pros
By educating the younger generations, we can change the culture of future
generations, and thus be able to lower funding for future programs, as a change in
culture will call for less outside intervention. Educating women will help provide them
with the means for creating their own futures, and thus being less reliant on their
arranged or abusive husbands.

Cons
Once again, to educate future generations, there needs to be funding. And to
educate women, communities will have to support the establishment of schools in their
communities, international teachers will need to be brought in, and communities, let
alone nations, will have to agree to support and fund these social programs.

Plan of Action

All programming that would be successful in combatting this issue, needs

substantial funding. Human Rights organization must focus their time and energy on
gaining outside support. They must make it their priority to bring programs to schools
and communities to share the issues at hand. From there. Those citizens needs to be
proactive. They must demand their governments to intervene on the national level.
Because that is such a daunting task, citizens can work on smaller levels and achieve

grants to further education in their community, and make donations towards already
existing programs.
We need to endorse this issue, and get people in the public sphere to openly
endorse already existing programs and donate to these causes. This will help promote
the issue publicly, and encourage middle-income families to take part in the cause.
On a much larger scale, we need to lobby in order to get our government to
intervene, and work to persuade the UN to take further action, provide more aid, such
as schools and institutions to house and protect victims, and create international laws
that are strongly enforced.

Anonymous. SURVIVORS SPEAK: ZERO TOLERANCE FOR FEMALE GENITAL

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