India: CRY's Charter to Protect Girls

Excerpts:
"Child Rights and You, a non-government organisation, has firmed up a charter of demands seeking better education, health care and protection from abuse for the girl child... wants the Women and Child Development Ministry to take immediate action to stop female foeticide through effective enforcement of law and take severe legal action against offenders, to set up autonomous law enforcement agencies to work against traffickers and exploiters with appropriate redress mechanisms, and assistance programmes for the affected child... (also) to provide easy access to schools and create a safe environment so that girls also readily attend school. The charter also includes a demand for separate legal act against child sexual abuse. Enforcement against child marriages, investigation against malnutrition deaths and policies and programmes to prevent malnutrition deaths among children, especially girls, have also been sought."
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Editorial on Polanski case: Who's Afraid of Harvey Weinstein?

Excerpts:

"How can Hollywood, a culture that decries rape in the Congo, protests crimes in Sudan, advocates for education of girls in Afghanistan and says we must never forget the Holocaust, say that we should forgive and forget the rape of child by a middle-aged man? Also, for the record, it was rape -- really "rape-rape." See the police report on The Smoking Gun.

"It would never be appropriate for a 43-year-old to have sex with a child of 13 even if that child was "willing." A 13-year-old does not have the mental and emotional development to make appropriate decision about sex - that is why 13-year-olds are not allowed to drive cars, buy cigarettes, alcohol or vote, and need parents signatures on their report cards. The victim was drugged, said "no" to Polanski's advances, repeatedly tried to leave, even told him she had asthma and had to go home and get her medicine (a lie in attempt to get away) -- a plea he ignored."

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Review: Half The Sky

Excerpts from editorial and review of Half the Sky, new book by Pulitzer Prize-winning writers Sheryl WuDunn and Nicholas Kristoff:

"Out in the open and in every crevice of the earth, human beings continue to exploit women and girls. We have an epidemic of abuse that continues to be ignored by governments that could help to punish the perpetrators.

"...the numbers aren't that high...they are higher. Current abuse statistics only include reported cases of abuse. One out of four women will be molested in the United States. Mackenzie's story would not be included in those statistics. Nor would mine, nor would many abuse survivors that I know.

"Acid burnings, dowry deaths, sexual trafficking, rape, molestation: the list is growing, and it is all part of the systematic oppression of women and girls worldwide. What WuDunn and Kristof do with their work is to continue to shed light on what happens to this gender when we provide them an opportunity to rise above this oppression, to thrive and grow and build successful lives even after trauma sometimes too hard to imagine."

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Rush to Defend Polanski Sparks Backlash

Excerpt:

"Polanski took a 13 year-old girl, gave her drugs, and then had anal sex with her," said Denis MacShane, Britain's ex-minister for Europe who also represents his country at the Council of Europe's parliament.
"Polanski committed an act of paedophile rape and should be held accountable for this violence in order to send a message that sodomising a little girl is not to be excused because of his genius as a film-maker."

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