February 13, 2012
First, a disclaimer. I used to work as a sub-editor on the Australian edition of FHM, a men’s magazine that was not exactly known for being politically correct. But while I may have written off-colour captions, including an alarming reference to Chuck Berry’s penis and a spooky prediction of the death of Michael Jackson five ...
Tags: censorship,
consent,
Facebook censorship,
feminism,
FHM,
freedom of speech,
Hooters,
lads magazines,
Leveson Inquiry,
media,
News of the World,
objectificaiton of women,
rape,
rape apologist,
rape joke,
Rupert Murdoch,
sense of humour,
sexism,
Unilad,
women's rights
February 10, 2012
Today there was a win for people with disabilities when the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that a disabled victim of alleged sexual assault will get a second trial. The woman’s original testimony, about alleged assault when she was 19 from her step-father in 2004, was dismissed because she couldn’t describe what an oath was ...
February 8, 2012
When you need emergency contraception, you need it fast with no questions asked, as it’s most effective if it’s taken within 24 hours. At Shippensburg University, a vending machine dispensing Plan B and pregnancy tests has been installed so students can have easy access to the emergency contraception pill. The best part is that young ...
Tags: birth control,
condom failure,
emergency contraceptive,
health,
morning after pill,
Plan B,
pregnancy test,
privacy,
rape,
reproduction,
reproductive rights,
student association,
teen pregnancy,
vending machine
February 3, 2012
Meh, the night bus. It isn’t ideal, but with the price of trains nowadays and the hellish standing-up-from-Edinburgh-to-Manchester situation I encountered last time I donated the best part of one hundred pounds to Virgin Trains (that’s for another fume), I decided to give it a go. Not bad. There was a smell, but that also happens ...
February 2, 2012
If a woman is completely drunk then she is incapable of giving consent to sex, right? Well not according to Emily Yoffe aka Dear Prudence. In her web chats this week she completely dismissed a scenario where a woman stated she had been date raped on the basis that she had gotten very drunk in ...
Tags: "real rape",
blame the victim,
consent,
date rape,
Dear Prudence,
drunk sex,
law,
rape,
rape convictions,
rape-rape,
too drunk to consent,
women's rights
January 25, 2012
Rick Santorum, I feel sorry for any daughter of yours! Santorum, a candidate to become the Republican nominee for the presidential race late this year, says that if his daughter conceived a baby through rape he would counsel her against an abortion calling the baby a “gift from God.” If any woman became pregnant following rape ...
January 23, 2012
Last summer, the Vancouver Police Department started a campaign to try to cut the city’s growing rate of sexual assaults. Three posters with pictures of intoxicated young women were put up in bars and nightclubs around Vancouver with the slogan “Don’t Be That Guy.” The good news is that Deputy Chief Doug LePard announced that ...
January 12, 2012
With the Shafia honour killings case ongoing in Canadian courts, it’s important to look at why women take part in abusing, or even killing, other women. Tooba Yahya, accused with her son, Hamed Shafia, and husband, Mohammad Shafia, of the murder of her three teenage daughters and husband’s ex-wife, is becoming a familiar face. Yahya ...
Tags: crime,
gender-based violence,
Hamed Shafia,
honour killing,
Jassi Sidhu,
Karla Homolka,
Malkit Kaur Sidhu,
misogyny,
Mohammad Shafia,
murder,
Paul Bernardo,
rape,
serial killer,
Surjit Singh Badesha,
Tooba Yahya,
trial,
violence against women
January 5, 2012
A sexual assault survivor who fought for compensation after her convicted attacker won 7.2 million pounds of lottery money has waived her right to anonymity. Receiving an MBE (Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) for services to her community, Shirley Woodman spoke about her fight for compensation. After her attack in ...
December 31, 2011
There have been plenty of amazing women making the news this year in politics, arts, and many other fields and they all deserve a mention. It’s hard to narrow them down, but here is a list of my top ten women of 2011. Enjoy! 1. Samira Ibrahim — Egyptian activist. Ms. Ibrahim was subjected to ...
Tags: Adele,
blame the victim,
Bridesmaids,
Christine Lagarde,
Christine Schuler-DeSchryver,
City of Joy,
Democratic Republic of the Congo,
Egypt,
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf,
female comedians,
Gabrielle Giffords,
Healther Jarvis,
IMF,
International Monetary Fund,
Kristen Wiig,
lady drivers,
Leymah Gbowee,
Margaret Atwood,
movies,
Muslim women,
Nobel Peace Prize,
rape,
Samira Ibrahim,
Saturday Night Live,
Saudi Arabia,
sexual assault,
SlutWalk,
SNL,
Sonya Barnett,
Tawakkul Karman,
top ten women,
virginity test,
women's rights,
Women2Drive