December, 2021 – This has been an extraordinarily productive period, as MCLD provided input the Democracy and Nutrition Summits and USAID’s new Local Capacity Development Policy, strengthened our stand for Climate Action and began developing ambitious national chapter strategies for 2022.
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The Pill vs Gender-based Violence
Tenth in a series for 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence. Photo: iStock.com/araoraor December 4 – On this day in 1961, Britain’s National Health Service first made oral contraception available. Despite opposition from the Catholic Church and some other religious groups, a 2012 study by the Guttmacher Institute found that 99% of all women…
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Halting Sexual Abuse of People with Disabilities
Ninth in a series for 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence. Photo: The Hunger Project-Bangladesh December 3 is the International Day for People with Disabilities. According to the Minnesota website DisabilityJustice.org, “People with disabilities are sexually assaulted at nearly three times the rate of people without disabilities.” The site reports that 83% of women…
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Community Action to End Modern Slavery
Part 8 for 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence. Photo: iStock.com/Favor of God December 2, 2018 is the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery. Modern-day slavery is appallingly widespread. According to the UN more than 40 million people are in forced labor, including 4.8 million in forced sexual exploitation. Women and girls are…
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Women on the Front Lines of Peace and Security
Sixth in a series for 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence. Photo: UN Peace Keeping. Seh-Dong-Hong-Beh, leader of the Dahomey women’s regiment, drawn by Frederick Forbes, 1851 – Public Domain. Today, November 30, is Benin National Day. What does that have to do with Women, Peace and Security? Well – Benin’s history features the…
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Women Human Rights Defenders
Fifth in a series for 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence I am always deeply inspired by each of the heroic women and men who have served as United Nations High Commissioners for Human Rights. The High Commissioner’s “To Do” list is horrific, dealing personally and skillfully with one brutal situation after another. (Many…
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When Women Lead
Fourth in a series for 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence On this day in 1919, American-born Nancy Witcher Langhorne Astor (Lady Astor) became the first woman elected to the British Parliament. Women gained the vote in the UK in 1918, and not until 1920 in the US. During this same period, India was…
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Denying Health Care is Violence
Third in a series for 16 Days of Activism against Gender-based Violence. Photo: The Hunger Project – women’s march at the Bissiga epicenter. There is a heartbreaking scene in Christy Turlington’s documentary No Woman, No Cry (2010) as a rural woman walks 12 miles to a birthing center, and is then turned away because she…
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Community Leadership to Halt Gender-based Violence
November 26 – Second in a series for 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence. How do women living in impoverished, deeply conservative rural communities fight gender-based violence, including child marriage? You can ask them! My organization, The Hunger Project, like many others, builds the capacity of women to be the key change agents for…
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Halting Gender-based Violence is Job #1
First in a series for 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence. November 25 is the International Day for the elimination of Violence Against Women. Photo: The Hunger Project-Bangladesh. Acid attack survivors speak out. Will we males ever stop abusing women? This issue is so fundamental to all other human progress that each of us needs…