The Pixel Project VAW e-News Digest: Edition Nine

Welcome to the ninth edition of The Pixel Project’s Violence Against Women e-News Digest. We compile the latest and most relevant news from around the world concerning violence against women and steps taken to eliminate it.

April is Sexual Violence Awareness Month! As projects such as Walk a Mile in Her Shoes and Take Back the Night get kicked off around the world, we remind ourselves of some chilling knowledge: although many of us recognize that sexual violence is an all-too-present danger for many women around the world, the vast majority of people are ignorant of the many forms it takes and how widespread a problem it is.

A survey conducted in Australia show that 1 out of 20 people believe that women who were raped had somehow ‘asked for it’. The figures could be much higher in less developed countries. People tend to forget that in a crime like rape, the victim is neither the criminal nor the cause of rape–the rapist is.

At the same time, we need to recognize those aspects of a culture that may be accepted as normal but are, in reality, rape. For example, in Yemen, a girl who had been married off when she was 12 years old died from marital rape just a few days after her ‘marriage’.

But it isn’t just in countries like Yemen that we see cultures that legitimize rape. Prostitution is prevalent in many parts of the world, and more often than not, it is an industry of rape. Marital rape is hardly recognized in many countries. Women still risk the possibility of being seen as liars when they report rape and even imprisoned for not adhering to social expectations of what a rape victim should look or act like. (See the UK story in the Rape/Sexual Assault section, below.)

That’s why those of us who understand the realities of sexual violence need to speak up. The actions you can take to effect change can be as small as donning high heels to “walk a mile in her shoes” or, in our case, letting others know about any news concerning violence against women that you feel deserves greater attention.

Think about the ways you can help to reduce and put an end to violence against women. You can send any news concerning violence against women that you wish to see in forthcoming editions of The Pixel Project VAW e-Newsletter to our archivist, Catalina Rembuyan, at catalina@thepixelproject.net.

In the meantime, do enjoy our most recent e-Newsletter and do feel free to share it! If you prefer to get breaking VAW news from us in real time, please follow us on Twitter (http://twitter.com/PixelProject).

With best regards,

The Pixel Project team

General Violence Against Women News

World: Analyzing the role of guns in violence against women worldwide.

Increasing violence against women depicted on television and film.

Domestic Violence

Afghanistan: Police in Afghanistan are learning how to deal with domestic violence.

Pakistan: Pakistan moves closer to criminalizing domestic violence.

Paraguay: New specially trained police units set up to handle domestic violence reports.

Uganda: President has agreed to sign the Domestic Violence Act, which aims at punishing perpetrators of domestic violence.

United Kingdom: Club faces boycott for name that normalizes domestic violence – domestic violence is NOT something so distant and beyond us that we can make jokes about it.

United States: Group sheds light on statistics of domestic violence in Ohio.