TAG: violence

Sexual politics in August 2016

In August, the Rio Olympic Games provided a privileged stage for the critical observing of gender and sexuality performances. Several SPW partners positively and generously responded to our invitation to share their views on this peculiar scene. Fernando Seffner, for example, wrote the article Rio 2016: the “Sexual Games”? that glances over sexuality at large. […]

Olympics 2016: a preliminary overview over sex work

The Prostitution Policy Watch is preparing a report on the effects of the 2016 Rio Olympic Games on sex work in the city. The survey results, which follows a similar study carried out during the World Cup 2014, should only be released in early October, but SPW offers some early evidences and analysis obtained from […]

Capturing Semenya

As the women’s 800m approaches, headlines about Caster Semenya proliferate — once again, seven years after she won the World Championship in the 800m and became a news headline, we have been saturated with “debates” about her presence on the track. This year, these stories unfold in striking contrast with those celebrating other athletes who dominate their events.

Body shaming is an intersex issue

Please note that this post contains distressing images. It intersperses quotations about intersex infants and children with quotations about the bodies of public figures. Body shaming is an intersex issue, perhaps even more than any other issue. It stunts people’s lives and provides rationales for harmful medical interventions. If you want to know why openly […]

Why don’t humanitarian organizations provide safe abortion services?

Although sexual and reproductive health services have become more available in humanitarian settings over the last decade, safe abortion services are still rarely provided. The authors’ observations suggest that four reasons are typically given for this gap: ‘There’s no need’; ‘Abortion is too complicated to provide in crises’; ‘Donors don’t fund abortion services’; and ‘Abortion is illegal’.

Make International Safe Abortion Day an Official UN day

UN agencies supporting women’s rights have been asked today to send “a strong signal” to governments around the world by passing a resolution at this year’s UN General Assembly in September to make International Safe Abortion Day an official UN day. An Open Letter was sent to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the heads of UN Women, UN Development Programme, World Health Organization, UN Population Fund, UN Children’s Fund, UNAIDS, and UNESCO today.

Report: Indonesia’s LGBT Community Under Threat’

(Jakarta) – The Indonesian government stoked an unprecedented attack on the security and rights of sexual and gender minorities in early 2016, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The government campaign included hateful rhetoric, discriminatory edicts, and the use of force to repress peaceful assembly. The 56-page report, “‘These Political Games Ruin […]

Belize Supreme Court Overturns Anti-Gay Law

A law in Belize criminalizing same-sex intimacy was ruled unconstitutional by the country’s Supreme Court. The challenge to Section 53 of the Belize Criminal Code, which banned “carnal intercourse against the order of nature” and disproportionately affected gay men, was brought by Caleb Orozco

Sri Lanka: Discrimination on Grounds of Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation

(New York) – Transgender people and others who do not conform to social expectations about gender face discrimination and abuse in Sri Lanka, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The 63-page report, “‘All Five Fingers Are Not the Same’: Discrimination on Grounds of Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation in Sri Lanka,” finds that […]

IACHR’s Report “Violence Against LGBTI Persons in the Americas”

The IACHR just launched the English version of the report “Violence Against LGBTI Persons”. In this Report, the Commission focuses on violence against LGBT persons as contextualized social violence in which the perpetrators’ motivation needs to be understood as complex and multi-faceted, and not only as a individual-based act. In this regard, the IACHR understands […]

Gay and Transgender Egyptians go Underground

The last days of the government of Hosni Mubarak and the turbulent revolution that followed were tense, occasionally gut-wrenching times for many in Egypt. But for gay and transgender Egyptians, it was also a period of unaccustomed freedom. Read the full article at New York Times.

Why (chemical) castration will not end gender and sexuality based violence in Indonesia

While the international media were busy highlighting the Stanford rape and Brazil gang-rape cases, another gang-rape, followed by murder, of a 14 year-old girl named Yuyun happened in Indonesia. It was an atrocity as severe, despite the lack of international coverage.