The U.N. Sent 3 Foreign Women To The U.S. To Assess Gender Equality. They Were Horrified.

[G_j]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/foreign-women-assess-us-gender-equality_566ef77de4b0e292150e92f0

The human rights experts concluded that the country falls far behind most others.
12/15/2015

?cache=1ugaowtmwl


A delegation of human rights experts from Poland, the United Kingdom and Costa Rica spent 10 days this month touring the United States so they can prepare a report on the nation's overall treatment of women. The three women, who lead a United Nations working group on discrimination against women, visited Alabama, Texas and Oregon to evaluate a wide range of U.S. policies and attitudes, as well as school, health and prison systems.

The delegates were appalled by the lack of gender equality in America. They found the U.S. to be lagging far behind international human rights standards in a number of areas, including its 23 percent gender pay gap, maternity leave, affordable child care and the treatment of female migrants in detention centers.

The most telling moment of the trip, the women told reporters on Friday, was when they visited an abortion clinic in Alabama and experienced the hostile political climate around women's reproductive rights.

"We were harassed. There were two vigilante men waiting to insult us," said Frances Raday, the delegate from the U.K. The men repeatedly shouted, "You're murdering children!" at them as soon as they neared the clinic, even though Raday said they are clearly past childbearing age.

"It's a kind of terrorism," added Eleonora Zielinska, the delegate from Poland. "To us, it was shocking."

..more..

[mwrguy]

1. Maybe they need to impose sanctions

[yeoman6987]

4. That would be funny

But they need us more then we need them especially Poland. Also funny that a member of Poland criticizing us when their country is vertically free of abortion access. But whatever. They made their point.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. I am not surprised at their findings.

We claim to be "the land of the free and the home of the brave" but somehow we fall short of those.

"Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" seems to have gotten lost as well.

We could be so much better than we are.

[davidn3600]

10. Considering 2/3rds of this country cheers on the death penalty...

...I wouldn't expect much change for awhile.

Many Americans are still a few centuries behind, socially.

[Thinkingabout]

3. This should be investigated. I hope some time was spent on violence against women.

[G_j]

6. They did,

Another main area of concern for the delegation is violence against women -- particularly gun violence. Women are 11 times more likely to be killed by a gun in the United States than in other high-income countries, and most of those murders are perpetrated by an intimate partner. While the Obama administration has talked a lot about combatting violence against women, its efforts have been frustrated by Congress' inability to pass new federal gun restrictions.

[oberliner]

5. An abortion clinic in Alabama is where they went to assess gender equality in the US?

And they were surprised by what they found?

[haikugal]

7. It's shocking to those of us who live with this every day as well.

Thanks! K&R!

[EX500rider]

8. One of them was from Costa Rica? Where abortions are illegal in almost all cases, including when...

......... the pregnancy is a result of rape or incest?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Costa_Rica

And one from Poland?

Abortion in Poland is banned except in the following three circumstances.
When the woman's life or health is endangered by the continuation of pregnancy,
When the pregnancy is a result of a criminal act, or
When the foetus is seriously malformed

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Poland

[cigsandcoffee]

9. Elective abortion is illegal in Poland. I wonder what she must think of that.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Poland

[Bluenorthwest]

11. And yet abortion is very much illegal in Costa Rica and allowed in Poland only for life of the

mother and cases of rape, which have to be approved and are not available by request at all. So this strikes me as a bit self indulgent. 'If we had reproductive freedoms we'd not allow protest of those freedoms' is not really a strong argument. 'If we were not oppressive our freedom would be better than yours'.

[Blue_Tires]

12. Yeah, I was about to mention that...