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| Domestic
violence ------------------- Adolescent Sexuality |
Violence against Women One expert calls violence against women "the most pervasive yet least recognized human rights abuse in the world". Accordingly, the Vienna Human Rights Conference and the Fourth World Conference on Women gave priority to this terrible problem. Violence against women jeopardizes their lives, bodies, psychological integrity, and freedom. It generally serves by intention or effect to perpetuate male power and control. Domestic violence: Most domestic violence everywhere is male violence directed against their women partners. This gender difference appears primarily to be due to the way boys and men are socialized. The search for biological factors in boys and men that might contribute to violence has not identified anything strong enough to account for the dramatic differences in behaviour. Cross-cultural studies of wife abuse have found that nearly a fifth of peasant and small-scale societies are essentially free of family violence. The existence of such cultures proves that male violence against women is not the inevitable result of male biology or sexuality. Furthermore, studies of very young boys and girls show only that boys have a lower tolerance for frustration, greater irritability and impulsive ness, and a tendency towards rough-and-tumble play. These tendencies are dwarfed by the impor tance of male socialization and peer pressure into gender roles. The prevalence of domestic violence in a given society, therefore, is the result of tacit acceptance by that society. The way men view themselves as men, and the way they view women, will deter mine whether they use violence or coercion against women. The problem is worldwide: In the United States, between 21 and 30 per cent of women are beaten by a partner at least once in their lives; half of these women are beaten more than three times a year. In Colombia, about 20 per cent of women have been beaten by a partner. In Papua New Guinea, 67 per cent of rural women and 56 per cent of urban women have been physically abused. In Norway, 25 per cent of gynaecological patients were found to have been physically or sexually abused. In Kenya, 42 per cent of women said that they were regularly beaten by their hus bands. And many women who are thus tormented commit suicide. Rape: Eighty per cent of the women who are sexually assaulted already know their attackers- friends, acquaintances, intimates, or family members. Women who are assaulted and raped suffer myriad health consequences: severe injuries, unconsciousness, mental illness and trauma, STDs, and unwanted pregnancies. Their ability to love and accept love can be destroyed. Stigma leads some to commit suicide. In all cultures, incredibly, the rape survivor is suspected of or treated like she colluded with the rapist. Since women are traumatized and stigma tized by the experience, only a small proportion of rapes are reported. The majority of sexual assault victims are young. In Canada, a 1993 study found that more than half of the women surveyed had experienced some form of unwanted or intrusive sexual expe rience before reaching age 16; 51 per cent of these reported being the victims of rape or attempted rape. In Peru, a study found a staggering 90 per cent of young mothers aged 12 to 16 in a hospital to be victims of rape, often by a family member. Women in positions of abject dependence on male authorities are also particularly subject to unwanted sexual coercion. Violation of reproductive rights in emergency situations: Rape in time of war is still common. It has been extensively documented in the for mer Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Cambodia, Liberia, Peru, Somalia, and Uganda. It has been used sys tematically as an instrument of torture or ethnic domination. And women who have been raped must often endure a second torment-rejection by their friends and families for "consorting with the enemy". In June 1995, an interagency symposium drew up a field manual on meeting the needs of women caught up in conflicts, Reproductive Health in Refugee Situations. Participating in this were UNFPA, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), WHO, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, and non-governmental organizations. In November 1996, UNFPA, UNHCR, and the Federation agreed to use the manual's recommendations to help Rwandese, Burundese, and Zairean refugees in Central Africa. The pilot project provided many of the estimated 220,000 displaced women of childbearing age with a much-needed package of reproductive health care services. The new services also included care and post-coital contraception for sexually violated women. Trafficking in girls and women: Tens of mil lions of children are already in the global sex market, and each year two million girls age 5 to 15 are introduced to the trade. In developing countries, commercial demand for young women brings children from poor families in the country into the cities, where the sex indus try pimps them to the wealthy, including some tourists. Concerned political figures report the complicity of police and local authorities in some of this trafficking. Poverty fuels the sex trade in Latin America and Africa. Chinese women are kidnapped and sold into forced marriages in areas where few wives are available. The European Commission is con cerned about a "slave trade" in Eastern European women--an estimated 500,000 of them have been forced into commercial sex. Sex workers are much more in danger from STD/HIV infection than most women, and suffer more from reproductive tract infections. As many as 80 per cent are HIV-positive, and they and their clients are carriers and spreaders of the disease. |
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