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Feb
2014
Daft pseudo-scientific excuses have been used to exclude women from sports. It may have taken 90 years, but women were finally able to compete in the ski-jumping at this year’s winter Olympic Games at Sochi. Although women have been ski-jumping since Ingrid Vestby first soared through the Norwegian skies in 1862, at the Olympics the... Daft pseudo-scientific excuses have been used to exclude women from sports. It may have taken 90 years, but women were finally able to compete in the ski-jumping at this year’s winter Olympic Games at Sochi. Although women have been ski-jumping since Ingrid Vestby first soared through the Norwegian skies in 1862, at the Olympics the competition has been ‘men-only’ since20
Feb
2014
Women’s Aid calls for government to take action on online abuse. Three in ten women have been stalked or harassed online through email and social media platforms, including Facebook, according to a poll by Women’s Aid, the national domestic violence charity. And much of the abuse19
Feb
2014
I saw this poster again the other day. It encapsulates one of the strongest rows about inequality. The TUC recently reported that women over 50 earn a staggering fifth less than men of the same age, and on average women earn £5000 less than men a year. And the gap widens in some18
Feb
2014
Support the Fawcett Society’s campaign. The (male) Prime Minister and (male) Leader of the Opposition recently debated women in politics, in a House of Commons that is almost 80 per cent male. Despite the Prime Minister’s pre-election pledge to make a third of his Ministers17
Feb
2014
Here are some dates for your diary of woman-centric events going on around the UK this week. London: 17 February: She Grrrowls: Anti/Valentines at The Gallery Café, 21 Old Ford Road, London E2, from 7.30pm. She Grrrowls showcases a range of talented women and includes poetry, comedy14
Feb
2014
A story about making TV with real life poor people for your viewing delight. By Sue Marsh. As many of you may know by now, [last week] was the Big Benefits Row on Channel 5. “Roll up! Roll up for the spectacular sight! Real life poor people for your viewing delight!” I was13
Feb
2014
‘Demonstrating the risks filmmakers take to capture the stories behind the headlines.’ The 18th Human Rights Watch Film Festival in London will take place this year from 18 to 28 March, with a programme of 20 award-winning documentary and feature films. The festival will12
Feb
2014
A core purpose of honour killings is to remove all memory of the victims. Memini intends to do the opposite. TRIGGER WARNING: THIS IS VERY UPSETTING. The United Nations conservatively estimates that worldwide 5,000 women and girls are killed each year by members of their own family, often12
Feb
2014
Experts call for world-wide, wholesale change in preventing gender-based violence. Following several newly published reports and data sets, activists around the world are calling for a complete rethink of the way gender-based violence is dealt with. And recent events emphasise the urgent11
Feb
2014
How did The Sun respond? By the No More Page 3 campaign. On Sunday, a woman won the UK’s first EVER snow medal at the Winter Olympics. British snowboarder Jenny Jones took home the bronze medal on Sunday in the snowboarding “slopestyle” competition. Wow, WOW!!! It was10
Feb
2014
Here are some dates for your diary of woman-centric events going on around the UK this week. 14 February: One Billion Rising for Justice events are going on all around the UK; check here for details. One in three women on the planet will be raped or beaten in her lifetime. That is one
“The main female characters are all dying, dead, or not human”. Our regular cross-post from Bitchflicks. By Katherine Murray. Um… spoilers for Battlestar Galactica. What Battlestar Galactica is: To recap for anyone who isn’t familiar with the show but still20
Feb
2014
First results of survey show women are forced to chose between family and work. Project 28-40, a research project which aims to find out why women in their 30s fail to progress in their careers at the same rate as men, has released its first results. Since November, 25,000 women and19
Feb
2014
TV boss says lack of female representation is ‘unacceptable’. Finally, the BBC is doing something about the gross under-representation of talented women on their embarrassment of testosterone-fuelled panel shows. In an interview with the Observer last week, the BBC’s18
Feb
2014
Leading social scientists suggest practical local policies to reduce health inequalities. The British Academy has published a collection of nine proposals from leading social scientists setting out ways that local authorities in the UK could improve the health of their communities and reduce17
Feb
2014
All of a sudden men can be mocked and degraded too. I’m worried. I watch TV less and less, but I see more and more sexism, towards women of course, but also increasingly towards men. I see more and more semi-naked males, bronzed, buff, tanned, oily. They are running on my14
Feb
2014
Our regular cross-post from Bitchflicks. An insidious Hollywood product that seeks to convince viewers that street prostitutes are eternally radiant and movie-star beautiful. By Rachael Johnson. Garry Marshall’s romantic comedy,Pretty Woman, is one of the most popular American movies13
Feb
2014
‘We’re seeing women having an additional birth later.’ Latest figures from the Office for National Statistic (ONS) and Public Health England reveal interesting changes in UK demographics. The trend of an increasing birth rate continues, with ONS analysis revealing that the12
Feb
2014
Three joint winners united by one tragedy; the ‘honour killing’ of one of their family. The third IKWRO True Honour Awards 2014 saw three campaigners awarded joint winners following the tragic loss of their relative to ‘honour based violence‘. Jagdeesh Singh11
Feb
2014
You wouldn’t think school girls in the UK have to worry about female genital mutilation, but we do. Although it is illegal in the UK, it is still happening – 24,000 girls in the UK are currently at risk of female genital mutilation (FGM). People just don’t talk about it11
Feb
2014
Sexual violence is not about evil individuals, Asian grooming gangs, or 1970s BBC culture. By Sarah Graham. A number of years ago I heard British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) journalist Bidisha quote feminist academic Germaine Greer: “The corporation changes the woman before the10
Feb
2014
It is estimated that one in three women will be beaten or raped in her lifetime – that is 1 billion women. The refusal to hold perpetrators to account is a ‘global plague’ – and this year the one billion rising campaign will focus on justice and is calling07
Feb
2014
Airlines continue to perpetuate 1960s-style stereotypes around female flight attendants. In an episode of ‘How I Met Your Mother’, serial womaniser Barney Stinson goes on a monologue about “hot” professions. Air stewardesses, he insists, no longer hold this dubious20
Feb
2014
“These are entry-level jobs into a world of gross exploitation and violence.” The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has paid cash incentives of up to £2,275 to lap-dancing bars and similar establishments to hire young unemployed people aged 18-24 as part of its Youth19
Feb
2014
Report finds that 21 per cent of the UK’s workforce is paid less that a Living Wage. That is 5.24 million workers in Britain – and is an increase of 420,000, or 9 per cent over the last 12 months. The Living Wage Commission was set up to look at the case for a Living Wage and how17
Feb
2014
The USA must agree to change its law and halt all ‘data mining’ from ‘phone and internet use in the EU. Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) have backed Green demands for the immediate suspension of talks leading to a proposed new trade deal between the European Union14
Feb
2014
Demonstrations against ATOS will be taking place all across the UK on Wednesday 19 February 2014. On 19 February protesters will gather peacefully from 8am until 6pm at the locations used by ATOS to carry out the discredited Work Capability Assessments (WCA). These peaceful demonstrations14
Feb
2014
In 40 per cent of domestic violence cases that resulted in murder, the victim was stalked. Stalking affects approximately 5 million people a year, and a third of all women who were stalked reported that it was by a current or former partner. And most women who experience domestic violence13
Feb
2014
Join in! A digital archive is chronicling the lives of British women over the past 100 years. The Broken Leg Theatre, an award-winning, Brighton-based theatre company established in 2008, is currently carrying out research for its latest production, Three Generations. The idea is to draw on12
Feb
2014
Sylvia Pankhurst made a profound impact on the fight for women’s rights as both an artist and a campaigner. A display about Sylvia Pankhurst at London’s Tate Britian, devised by curator Emma Chambers with The Emily Davison Lodge as part of the Tate’s Spotlight series is up11
Feb
2014
Acas publishes guidelines for employers. The Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (Acas) published new guidelines for employers recently aimed at helping them create ‘an accommodating environment’ for women who are breast feeding. The booklet, called10
Feb
2014
It’s everywhere. By Dwysan Rowena. I re-read this fabulous article on casual sexism by Natascha McElhone recently. This was my response at the time: For someone like me who is a bit obsessed with equality and feminism it was even a bit of a surprise to me that her day consisted of07
Feb
2014
Not all children taught about consent at school, and we have no compulsory sex education. A survey of children and young people conducted by the Sex Education Forum, based at leading children’s charity the National Children’s Bureau, has found that almost one in three say they did06
Feb
2014
’We can’t ignore the homophobic laws which the Russian government has recently passed and the resulting vicious crackdown.’ Or can we? Speaking out about the recent persecution of LGBT people in Russia, ahead of the Sochi Winter Olympics, the Shadow leader of the