At the global stage, one even to be highlighted was the launching of the Sex Work Law Map, produced by the Institute of Development Studies. It provides a perspective on female sex work by displaying a detailed summary of the laws, regulations and policies in over 75 countries.
The novel IDS research tool was made public few days after the US Homeland Security raid against the website Rentboy.com, designed for facilitating commercial sex encounters between men. The article by Melissa Grant published at Reality Check analyzes the episode underlining the complex dynamics at play in the realm of sex work rights politics.
When perusing the sexual politics global stage in September, we cannot avoid mentioning, once again, Pope Francis I endeavors. The pope’s nine days trip to Cuba and the US included a series of public speeches that have been appraised across the political spectrum, in particular his substantive intervention on sustainable development at the UN General Assembly. But as he had already done — when flying back home from the 2013 Youth Journey in Rio –, Bergoglio used the flight back to Rome to make ‘surprising ‘ declarations, which illustrates the convolution and complexity of the Vatican positions on sex. He told the in-flight embedded press that he had met Kim Davis, the Kentucky public clerk who, in early September declared that she could be arrested but would not issue the legal licenses requested by same sex couple who called upon her office to get married. Francis justified the encounter as a gesture of recognition in regard to conscious objection as a human right; by they’re making the significance of his act to reach beyond same sex marriages. Not surprisingly the disclosure of the meeting is now sparking a string of reactions worldwide, the first of which SPW has already compiled.
Coinciding in time and contrasting with the Pope’s ambivalent politics, during the last session of the Human Rights Council twelve UN entities have delivered a document calling for the end of violence and discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people. The statement can be download here.
Lastly, we also return to the Brazilian sexual politics landscape, because at Congress level mine fields keep multiplying and trenches are getting deeper. Senate debates triggered by an Internet mobilization proposing abortion legal reform have reached their end and it is not clear what will happen next. Meanwhile, a law provision criminalizing the dissemination of information on abortion barely failed to be approved by the Committee on Constitution and Justice and most importantly a new Statute on the Family that defines it as a union between man and woman and includes the right to life from the moment of conception was approved by a Special Committee and will be soon to final voting by the plenary. Sonia Corrêa and Fábio Grotz report on these latest developments.
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Dawn Training Institute 2016 – the program is aimed at young feminists from the South working for gender, economic, political and ecological justice.
Arab Foundation for Freedoms and Equality’s Social Change — The Program aims to develop the capacity of sexual and bodily rights and gender equality activists across the MENA region. The application deadline is 21 October 2015.