Tags: Gender Equality
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What secularism means for African women’s rights and citizenship
Posted: Thu, 08 Mar 2018 by Dr Fatou Sow
In a long read for International Women's Day, Dr Fatou Sow says secularism is a feminist issue and reflects on its particular importance to women in Africa.
I join this conversation as an academic researcher in sociology and an activist, as the Director of... Read More »
Seven women who refused to be silenced by religious bullies
Posted: Thu, 08 Mar 2018 by Megan Manson
On International Women's Day, Megan Manson celebrates the stories of seven brave and determined women in the UK who religious hardliners have tried – and failed miserably – to bully over the past year.
Religion is one of the key obstructions to... Read More »
Yes, secularism is good for gender equality
Posted: Wed, 03 Jan 2018 by Megan Manson
Western academics who claim that secularism undermines women's rights are not merely wrong; their assertions are a slap in the face of women fighting for their rights under religious tyranny, says Megan Manson.
Of all the images that have emerged from mass... Read More »
The Christian ‘legal army’ in hundreds of court battles worldwide
Posted: Thu, 14 Dec 2017 by Claire Provost & Ella Milburn
Women's rights advocates say the US legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom is "exporting extreme ideologies worldwide" against sexual and reproductive rights. Claire Provost and Ella Milburn investigate.
The international wing of a controversial US... Read More »
A lesson in silencing dissent: the controversy of hijab in schools
Posted: Tue, 28 Nov 2017 by Yasmin Rehman
Yasmin Rehman was among campaigners who recently met Ofsted's chief inspector to discuss veiling in schools. Now, she writes, some powerful Muslims are making sinister efforts to silence her and her fellow activists.
As I prepared to mark the International... Read More »
Al-Hijrah School ruling: The fight to end segregation has only just begun
Posted: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 by Megan Manson
The ruling that an Islamic faith school's policy of gender segregation is unlawful should force us to have have a broader conversation about the religious segregation and inequality our children face in UK schools, argues Megan Manson
Make no mistake: the ruling... Read More »
UNESCO: Putting religious privilege above gender equality
Posted: Wed, 11 Oct 2017 by Megan Manson
UNESCO says gender equality is one of its top priorities. But Megan Manson says it is protecting misogynistic attitudes by awarding World Heritage Status to religious sites that practise sexual discrimination.
As the UK's United Nations Universal Periodic Review... Read More »
Separate is not equal – not in this ‘faith’ school
Posted: Tue, 11 Jul 2017 by Stephen Evans
Turning a blind eye to discriminatory gender discrimination in Islamic schools would be disaster for future generations of British girls growing up in Muslim communities, argues Stephen Evans.
I was in court this week for Ofsted's appeal of a ruling that gender... Read More »
Abortion ruling is a missed opportunity to recognise the disparity in women’s reproductive health rights across the UK
Posted: Thu, 15 Jun 2017 by Dr Antony Lempert
Ensuring that NHS abortion services are made available, free of charge, to UK citizens travelling from Northern Ireland would be a way of mitigating the harm caused by a disparity in women's reproductive health rights across the UK, argues Dr Antony Lempert.... Read More »
The human rights of women and secularism go hand in hand
Posted: Wed, 08 Mar 2017 by Alastair Lichten
On International Women's Day 2017 NSS campaigns officer Alastair Lichten reflects on the intersection of gender and religious privilege, and what the secularist movement can learn from IWD.
The theocratic mindset has always had a particular obsession with policing... Read More »
Saudi women’s rights activist arrested – days after Saudi Arabia returned to Human Rights Council
Posted: Thu, 03 Nov 2016 by David van Rooyen
A leading women's rights activist, Mariam Nassir Al Oteebi, has been arrested in Saudi Arabia and languishes in prison, just days after the country was re-elected to the UN Human Rights Council, writes David van Rooyen.
Mariam Nassir Al Oteebi had been playing... Read More »
Gender segregation: breaking the law to appease Islamism
Posted: Mon, 21 Mar 2016 by Chris Moos
The LSE and their Students' Union need to stop breaking equality legislation that is designed to protect students, and start listening to the Muslim women challenging gender segregation, argues Chris Moos.
Students and staff at the London School of Economics... Read More »
Britain’s first women’s mosque: rise of girl power or a Muslim women’s ghetto?
Posted: Tue, 08 Mar 2016 by Aisha Nabi
Muslim women are no different to their Western sisters who fought their battle for equality decades ago, writes Aisha Nabi. Muslim women are fighting the same evil as Western sisters are today – sexism, but what is the best way of achieving gender equality?... Read More »
‘Shariafication by stealth’ in the UK
Posted: Sat, 18 Oct 2014 by Pragna Patel
The state's adoption of 'faith based' approaches to address minority issues are increasingly marginalising women from minority backgrounds and denying them the right to participate in the wider political community as equal citizens, argues Pragna Patel.
In... Read More »
Secular conference created a sense of imminent and momentous change – and women will be the driving force
Posted: Wed, 15 Oct 2014 by Terry Sanderson
The passion of feminist secular activists from around the world at a recent conference has inspired Terry Sanderson, who chaired a panel on religion's role in the state, law and politics.
Last weekend's conference organised in London by Maryam Namazie and her... Read More »
Conquering fear with hope: Secularism 2014
Posted: Thu, 09 Oct 2014 by Gita Sahgal
Ahead of this weekend's conference on the Religious-Right, Secularism and Civil Rights, Gita Sahgal highlights the importance and bravery of secular activism in the Global South.
The issue of secularism is a controversial one in international human rights organisations.... Read More »
25 years: women working against fundamentalism in the UK
Posted: Wed, 10 Sep 2014 by Nira Yuval-Davis and Sukhwant DhaliwalI
An interview with Nira Yuval-Davis and Sukhwant Dhaliwal, co-editors of the new book telling the story of Women Against Fundamentalism, an organisation set up in 1989 by women of many faiths and none to work at the interface of feminism and anti-racism. The... Read More »
Talking to God: the corporate religious challenge to a pluralist, progressive Europe
Posted: Fri, 01 Aug 2014 by Kenneth Houston
EU and UN 'dialogue' with civil society gives disproportionate weight to conservative religious voices at the expense of moderate and secular opinion, argues Kenneth Houston.
Corporate religion needs to hear the word 'no' more often from our politicians.
An... Read More »
A woman is stoned. We politely look away
Posted: Fri, 30 May 2014 by Matthew Syed
Our reluctance to fight 'small' battles – over forced marriage and the burka – merely emboldens the fundamentalists, argues Matthew Syed
I guess I should start by saying that I am half Pakistani. My dad grew up there, has dual citizenship (British... Read More »
Religion as a human rights liability
Posted: Wed, 16 Apr 2014 by Nida Kirmani
While human rights movements must engage people of all religions and none, Nida Kirmani argues that explicitly linking religion to human rights can lead to the exclusion and persecution of minority groups and undermine human rights' claims to universality.... Read More »
Why “One of us”, the European anti-choice petition, should be monitored and tackled
Posted: Tue, 17 Sep 2013 by Julie Pernet
A statement on the "One of us" petition by Julie Pernet on behalf of the European Humanist Federation.
Launched in May 2012, the European citizens' initiative "One of us" has reached the required number of signatures — 1 million — to be presented... Read More »
Yes, we can talk about this
Posted: Tue, 03 Sep 2013 by Meg Wallace
London's National Theatre recently hosted a debate about freedom of speech, multiculturalism and Islam called Can we talk about this? The opening line was a question to the audience, "Are you morally superior to the Taliban?"
Anne Marie Waters, who was present,... Read More »
Convictions for female genital mutilation: France - 100; Britain 0
Posted: Thu, 25 Jul 2013 by Joan Smith
Back in 1999, a group of MPs criticised the author Germaine Greer. They were astonished by her claim in a book that criminalising female genital mutilation (FGM) amounted to "an attack on cultural identity". The MPs described Greer's view as "simplistic and... Read More »
The “cutting season” and FGM in the UK: A national disgrace, a national shame
Posted: Tue, 02 Jul 2013 by Elizabeth O’Casey
Last month, a coalition of Egyptian NGOs launched a campaign, 'Kamla' (meaning 'complete' in Arabic), against female genital mutilation (FGM), after a botched operation resulted in the death of Egyptian teenager, Soheir Mohamed Al- Batea.
FGM is an intensely... Read More »
Book Review: The Public Woman by Joan Smith
Posted: Thu, 30 May 2013 by Elizabeth O’Casey
In her book The Public Woman (The Westbourne Press, 2013), published this month, Joan Smith catalogues the various forms and dimensions of control, coercion and misogynist abuse of women in the UK and beyond. Her book seeks a reconfiguration of the public... Read More »
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