By Samara Ginsberg
I must say straight away that I am happy with the way I look. There are things that I would change if it were easy to do so. I would like to have longer limbs, and yes, smaller breasts.
But I quite like my body. It’s mine and it’s familiar. It’s good at martial arts and playing the cello and giving hugs. This happiness and acceptance however has been hard-won.
I liked my breasts when they first appeared. I was a 28A for a long time and, while I felt a little self-conscious about these new additions to my physique simply by virtue of the fact that most other 12-year-olds didn’t yet have any at all, I liked them. They were small and perky, in proportion with the rest of me and didn’t get me any unwanted attention.
All of this changed virtually overnight when I was 14. In the space of about three months, I went from an A to an E cup. The way I was treated by people I knew and by strangers completely changed.
My peers began to see me as "slutty," despite the fact that I had never even kissed a boy. The bitchy, popular clique of girls at school tried to recruit me, not seeming to understand why I had little interest in wearing a truly hideous amount of makeup to school and making other girls’ lives hell.
Teachers began to see me as troublesome, giving me detention for minor things. And overnight, I went from being able to walk down the street without even being looked at, to having strangers lean out of car windows to inform me that they would like to fuck my brains out.
Groping my breasts became almost a sport among the boys at school. It would happen in class, during break times, while I passed them in the corridor -- any time that I was within groping distance. Typically, a boy would grab my breasts while his friends whooped and hollered. Occasionally, the friends would be holding me down. I would scream and hit them, but this seemed only to increase their enjoyment. Nobody ever came to my rescue: not the girls, not the other boys whose opinions these male chauvinist piglets probably would have respected the most, and not the teachers whose job it was to intervene. It simply was not regarded as important.
It was seen as an inevitability of my figure, and if I had the temerity to walk down the corridors looking like I did, what did I expect? A boy once told me about a specific sexual fantasy he had, involving tying me up, beating me and raping me. He apparently used to crack one out while imagining this every night. Another boy once asked me, "Hasn’t anybody ever told you a handful is enough?" as if I had deliberately inflated them myself.
It wasn’t just the boys. A campaign of complete lechery from one of my teachers distressed me sufficiently for me to bunk off lessons. He stared at my tits in class, made lewd comments about me in front of everybody and, when I lost weight as a result of being so anxious and upset, chided me because he "liked his women with curves."
When I finally plucked up the courage to complain to my (female) head of year I was simply told: "Don’t worry dear, I’m sure he didn’t mean it."
As I spent many break times hiding in the toilets, the girls would try to say helpful, supportive things. The general consensus was that I should be glad of having big breasts, that I should be happy with them because boys liked them, that perhaps I ought to chill out and enjoy the attention, and that putting up with groping was just the price I had to pay for being hot.
I don’t lack respect for these girls (they were after all only between 14 and 16 years old at the time), but it’s hugely worrying that their kind words didn’t consist instead of: "You shouldn’t have to put up with this," "It’s not your fault," or "Let’s talk to the headmaster and make sure the governors hear about this, because that teacher ought to be fired immediately."
My male friends trivialized the situation, possibly simply fearing the scorn of their classmates, but, for whatever reason, they were disinterested in sticking up for me and generally adopted the same "chill out and enjoy the attention" attitude as the girls. As for the teachers, they turned a blind eye whenever possible, pretended they hadn’t noticed when I was assaulted in their classes and did as little as possible when I specifically asked for their support.
Read more
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Sexual harassment in public spaces at a critical level
By Selina Jervis
"I worry about my sister, who told me: ‘If I don’t get commented or honked at on the way to school, I’ll feel really ugly that day.’"
As I sat down write this, my sister arrived home and said a man tried to pull her into a car. She was walking home from the bus stop in broad daylight and a man cruised the curb for a while, trying to talk to her before getting out and grabbing her arm, pulling her towards the car. She pulled away, firmly said no and walked on. She is 17. This might sound unnerving, but as she breezed in, she told the story like a bit of gossip and went straight onto MSN.
I can trace it back to around the age of 14, when men start to catcall and comment in the street. Suddenly as you cross the road their eyes will follow you as they drive round the corner. When you walk past a pub the smokers will croon “hello gorgeous”. There are random encounters with men who may follow you off the bus to “ask you the time”, then ask your name and where you’re going. Women are exposed to harassment all the time, but, as a young woman, it’s worrying to think of the lengths it can reach.
In the past it may have been polite to say a good morning to a woman, so why is it OK now to beep a horn, call a rude name and ask questions. I am 19. In the last few months, men, none younger than 30, have followed me down the road I live on, approached me at bus stops and generally leered from cars as I wait to cross the street. That’s only in the past few months. Since living in a student-dominated part of Manchester for the past year, this summer I noticed the difference at home in inner-city Birmingham and don’t want to take it anymore.
My mum was shocked, and warned my sister again of the dangers of getting into cars and talking to strangers, but she shrugged and said she knew that and brushed it aside. I don’t think parents know that their daughters could receive ‘the look’ as my friends and I call it, on practically a daily basis. It is the stare where a man’s eyes will bore into you and look you up and down before leering or moaning.
This afternoon, for example, I walked through town, down an empty side street, and a man behind me, around 40-years-old, said: “Excuse me love, can I ask you something and you promise you won’t slap me in my face?” As the years have gone by, I realise I’ve developed a variety of reactions, as the number of encounters like this has increased. Sometimes it’s easier to walk on ignoring the person when there are not many people around, so you can survey the area and hurry to a busier place, or say a polite but firm, “No thank you” or “I’m sorry, I’m in a rush.” Today I said: “If you have to ask that, then you shouldn’t say anything.” He said: “I just wanted to ask if your man treats you right?” His suggestive face may have had other connotations, but taking his statement at face value, I said “yes he does”, and walked on. I argue with myself over whether it is extremely inappropriate for a much older man to approach young girls like this – believe me, I look around 16 – or whether this is day-to-day banter in society?
There are different kinds of behaviour that could be deemed acceptable. If a man walked past me and said, “I just had to say, you look lovely today”, I would be flattered. I can say that this never happens. If a group of men honked at me from a van I would laugh it off. Maybe I’ve got used to it, or maybe it’s more acceptable as I’m not a child anymore. I am insulted and creeped out when a man will lick his lips or actually make a move when they could be older than my dad, though. I used to have a range of false names which I would give out and for a time would loudly shout, “I’m 15! Walk on!” I am thankful to all the women and men who have approached me and sincerely asked if I was OK, if a strange man sat next to me on a train and tried to strike up an inquisitive conversation or someone shouted something lewd from a car.
I can understand that a man has a natural reaction when they see a woman or girl they are attracted to, but he doesn’t have to act on it by staring or shouting something. Maybe due to shyness or politeness, a man younger than about 25 has never behaved like this in front of me. But it’s scary that men react this way when they are old enough to have, and possibly already do have, children of their own. How would they like it if someone shouted “oy sexy” at their 14-year-old daughter?
A lot of these men seem strange and sinister. Since winning an award for my blog and appearing in a few local newspapers over a year ago, there have been many times when random men have approached me asking about it. I mentioned to my mum that I was worried about a man who lives on our road who would constantly stare, goggle-eyed at me, and a few weeks ago he approached me in a shop and said: “How’s the website?” This brings up other issues about putting your life on the internet and who has access to it.
Media influences and popular culture may contribute to the uninhibited attitude towards calling out to women. There is constant discussion of kids growing up too fast, with teenage girls applying make-up, straightening hair and using sun beds. There is no reason why this would necessarily be encouragement for attraction; if a woman takes time over her appearance it does not mean she wants to attract men, much like the ‘encouraged rape’ argument. But to men it may be seen as a signal that a 13-year-old can be treated as a woman if she dresses like one, and so it’s OK to perv on children.
Maybe the media representing teenagers as all sexually active, with teenage pregnancy and STIs constant headlines, makes the men believe that girls can be treated as women, therefore it’s acceptable for him to show his attraction and make a move despite being much older.
Is it the rich men with trophy wives or being able to pay to get close to a lap dancer that gives some men the impression that they might actually have a chance with a teenager that they are approaching? A man followed my sister home a few months ago and said age is only a number. Fifty and 17 are very different numbers.
I would not consider myself a provocative dresser or particularly attractive. I do not wear low-cut tops or high heels in the daytime. I don’t dress typically, but tend to favour vintage dresses. I have curly red hair too, which I am told most do not favour, so judging by the amount of men that leer at me, a lot of girls must be in my situation or worse. When talking to friends about this, we all discussed our worst encounters and the commonalities were that we were walking alone and approached in cars or on quiet streets. A man followed my friend around a mile home and when she told him he looked around 50, he said: “Age is only a number, I want to take you out, yes?” I once rang a friend when she was on the way to my house and could hear a man riding along the pavement offering her a lift in the background.
Do these men honestly think a young woman would be interested in them? Can they not help themselves? Whatever happened to politeness and the decency not to startle a girl or woman alone minding her own business? Do these men really believe they are flattering women or complimenting them?
This all connects up with other issues, such as men in unmarked cars sitting outside clubs with the taxis and offering ‘free lifts’ or a boss who makes suggestive remarks about your body.
I worry about my sister, who told me: “If I don’t get commented or honked at on the way to school, I’ll feel really ugly that day.” Thinking back to encounters where men have reached out and fondled my hair or sat next to me on a bus full of available double seats, you can’t always be on guard and prevent these things. I have the right to be able to wear whatever I want and look however I please and not be shouted at or leered at by a man who happens to walk past. It’s abusive and scary. It should not be common behaviour.
"I worry about my sister, who told me: ‘If I don’t get commented or honked at on the way to school, I’ll feel really ugly that day.’"
As I sat down write this, my sister arrived home and said a man tried to pull her into a car. She was walking home from the bus stop in broad daylight and a man cruised the curb for a while, trying to talk to her before getting out and grabbing her arm, pulling her towards the car. She pulled away, firmly said no and walked on. She is 17. This might sound unnerving, but as she breezed in, she told the story like a bit of gossip and went straight onto MSN.
I can trace it back to around the age of 14, when men start to catcall and comment in the street. Suddenly as you cross the road their eyes will follow you as they drive round the corner. When you walk past a pub the smokers will croon “hello gorgeous”. There are random encounters with men who may follow you off the bus to “ask you the time”, then ask your name and where you’re going. Women are exposed to harassment all the time, but, as a young woman, it’s worrying to think of the lengths it can reach.
In the past it may have been polite to say a good morning to a woman, so why is it OK now to beep a horn, call a rude name and ask questions. I am 19. In the last few months, men, none younger than 30, have followed me down the road I live on, approached me at bus stops and generally leered from cars as I wait to cross the street. That’s only in the past few months. Since living in a student-dominated part of Manchester for the past year, this summer I noticed the difference at home in inner-city Birmingham and don’t want to take it anymore.
My mum was shocked, and warned my sister again of the dangers of getting into cars and talking to strangers, but she shrugged and said she knew that and brushed it aside. I don’t think parents know that their daughters could receive ‘the look’ as my friends and I call it, on practically a daily basis. It is the stare where a man’s eyes will bore into you and look you up and down before leering or moaning.
This afternoon, for example, I walked through town, down an empty side street, and a man behind me, around 40-years-old, said: “Excuse me love, can I ask you something and you promise you won’t slap me in my face?” As the years have gone by, I realise I’ve developed a variety of reactions, as the number of encounters like this has increased. Sometimes it’s easier to walk on ignoring the person when there are not many people around, so you can survey the area and hurry to a busier place, or say a polite but firm, “No thank you” or “I’m sorry, I’m in a rush.” Today I said: “If you have to ask that, then you shouldn’t say anything.” He said: “I just wanted to ask if your man treats you right?” His suggestive face may have had other connotations, but taking his statement at face value, I said “yes he does”, and walked on. I argue with myself over whether it is extremely inappropriate for a much older man to approach young girls like this – believe me, I look around 16 – or whether this is day-to-day banter in society?
There are different kinds of behaviour that could be deemed acceptable. If a man walked past me and said, “I just had to say, you look lovely today”, I would be flattered. I can say that this never happens. If a group of men honked at me from a van I would laugh it off. Maybe I’ve got used to it, or maybe it’s more acceptable as I’m not a child anymore. I am insulted and creeped out when a man will lick his lips or actually make a move when they could be older than my dad, though. I used to have a range of false names which I would give out and for a time would loudly shout, “I’m 15! Walk on!” I am thankful to all the women and men who have approached me and sincerely asked if I was OK, if a strange man sat next to me on a train and tried to strike up an inquisitive conversation or someone shouted something lewd from a car.
I can understand that a man has a natural reaction when they see a woman or girl they are attracted to, but he doesn’t have to act on it by staring or shouting something. Maybe due to shyness or politeness, a man younger than about 25 has never behaved like this in front of me. But it’s scary that men react this way when they are old enough to have, and possibly already do have, children of their own. How would they like it if someone shouted “oy sexy” at their 14-year-old daughter?
A lot of these men seem strange and sinister. Since winning an award for my blog and appearing in a few local newspapers over a year ago, there have been many times when random men have approached me asking about it. I mentioned to my mum that I was worried about a man who lives on our road who would constantly stare, goggle-eyed at me, and a few weeks ago he approached me in a shop and said: “How’s the website?” This brings up other issues about putting your life on the internet and who has access to it.
Media influences and popular culture may contribute to the uninhibited attitude towards calling out to women. There is constant discussion of kids growing up too fast, with teenage girls applying make-up, straightening hair and using sun beds. There is no reason why this would necessarily be encouragement for attraction; if a woman takes time over her appearance it does not mean she wants to attract men, much like the ‘encouraged rape’ argument. But to men it may be seen as a signal that a 13-year-old can be treated as a woman if she dresses like one, and so it’s OK to perv on children.
Maybe the media representing teenagers as all sexually active, with teenage pregnancy and STIs constant headlines, makes the men believe that girls can be treated as women, therefore it’s acceptable for him to show his attraction and make a move despite being much older.
Is it the rich men with trophy wives or being able to pay to get close to a lap dancer that gives some men the impression that they might actually have a chance with a teenager that they are approaching? A man followed my sister home a few months ago and said age is only a number. Fifty and 17 are very different numbers.
I would not consider myself a provocative dresser or particularly attractive. I do not wear low-cut tops or high heels in the daytime. I don’t dress typically, but tend to favour vintage dresses. I have curly red hair too, which I am told most do not favour, so judging by the amount of men that leer at me, a lot of girls must be in my situation or worse. When talking to friends about this, we all discussed our worst encounters and the commonalities were that we were walking alone and approached in cars or on quiet streets. A man followed my friend around a mile home and when she told him he looked around 50, he said: “Age is only a number, I want to take you out, yes?” I once rang a friend when she was on the way to my house and could hear a man riding along the pavement offering her a lift in the background.
Do these men honestly think a young woman would be interested in them? Can they not help themselves? Whatever happened to politeness and the decency not to startle a girl or woman alone minding her own business? Do these men really believe they are flattering women or complimenting them?
This all connects up with other issues, such as men in unmarked cars sitting outside clubs with the taxis and offering ‘free lifts’ or a boss who makes suggestive remarks about your body.
I worry about my sister, who told me: “If I don’t get commented or honked at on the way to school, I’ll feel really ugly that day.” Thinking back to encounters where men have reached out and fondled my hair or sat next to me on a bus full of available double seats, you can’t always be on guard and prevent these things. I have the right to be able to wear whatever I want and look however I please and not be shouted at or leered at by a man who happens to walk past. It’s abusive and scary. It should not be common behaviour.
Why Love Is Our Most Powerful, Lasting Form of Activism
By Courtney E. Martin
Who you love and how you love them is as much a statement about your social conscience as the letters you write to Congress or the votes you cast. It's harder to be good to someone else.
People who want to see the world bettered -- made more just and honest and kind -- often set their gaze on the farthest horizon. Our instinct, as progressives with global perspectives, is to obsess over situations far afield of our own backyards -- Indonesia, Sudan, the Middle East. These situations stir a sort of Peace Corp romance within us, a love affair with that which might make us feel gallant and extraordinary for caring.
I am as guilty as the next bleeding heart of focusing the majority of my energies on problems I see as compelling in large part because of their strangeness to me. But when I sit with myself, quiet my righteous indignation, my whiny white guilt, my attachment to the idea that I am a humble truth teller among powerful fibbers, I realize that it is not the world outside of me that is in most desperate need of my world-changing instincts. It is the world inside of me, the world between me and my beloved.
We are so often wide awake about the decisions our elected officials make in the political, public realm and so asleep about our private choices. Our relationships can be sites of radical transformation but are so often soporifics. They have the capacity to tilt the whole world in the direction of ingenuity and kindness, and yet we are so often looking outside of ourselves for the tipping point.
Who you love and how you love them is as much a statement about your social conscience -- perhaps even a far more accurate and moving statement -- as the letters you write to Congress or the votes you cast. It is harder to be good to someone else. It has the potential to make them be good to others. And others are the fulcrum of social change.
Some of the ways in which love can be radical are quite obvious and tied to institutions. The choice of whether or not to get married in a nation where the status (and its tax benefits) is still doled out discriminatorily is a powerful one.
Reflections on ritual, commitment and partnership are quite radical in a world that is pushing you to link your love to a market, spend conspicuously, be a celebrity-for-a-day no matter what the cost, call it quits half the time. Muting the cacophony of outside propaganda about love and weddings -- and listening to your own inner answer -- is incredibly difficult and also morally necessary. What promises do you want to make in what ways before whom?
And, of course, beyond the obvious is the most critical -- what kind of relationship do you want to be in? What sort of partnership will push you to be your best, freest, happiest self? It is not just a matter of reversing roles or reacting to those models you have seen before, but wiping the slate clean and then imagining the most humane and transcendent of possible unions. How good could your love be? How fortifying? How honest? How can you create a love that reflects your values instead of parroting the culture's bottom line-driven definitions?
If you think that love is finite, think again. Just as your dollar has ramifications well beyond the taste of the organic, locally-grown apple you buy, your devotion can influence whole generations. Look at Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving -- the interracial couple that pushed Loving vs. Virginia all the way to the Supreme Court -- striking down the last anti-miscegenation law on the books and ushering in a new era of legally-sanctioned love across racial boundaries. June will mark the 40th anniversary of their courage as the Loving Day campaign reminds us.
Think about Barack Obama, the product of a short-lived, early 60s college romance between a black African exchange student and a white Kansan. His interracial identity, as he so beautifully explains in his first book, is the roots from which his political ideals have grown. Fifty years after his parents fell in love, they are both gone but their creation is changing the way America understands itself.
Anyone who doubts that our most intimate relationship can also be the site of our most impactful activism need look no further than the second wave of feminism. A generation of women insisted that the personal was the political, that they would only be in relationship with those who respected their full humanity, and we -- their daughters and sons -- are engaged in far more fair partnerships as a result. (Though we have much more work to do if we are to fully realize their dream of equal parenting.)
And, of course, decades of queer men and women have bravely come out to their families and friends, colleagues and clergy, and in the process, redefined family. Their challenge of notions of normality have freed us all -- gay, straight, bisexual, weary of labels -- to be more honest about our own complex sexualities. Lives have been lost in this quest -- Brandon Teena, Harvey Milk, Matthew Shepard etc. -- but countless lives have also been saved.
bell hooks, the guru of love as revolution, wrote: "The moment we chose to love we begin to move towards freedom." I think she's wrong, but not by much.
It is not the moment we chose to love that we begin to move towards freedom, because love is so rarely a choice. Love is an instinct, an accident, an epiphany, a stomach ache. It can feel like incarceration and pardon, alienation and intimacy, tragedy and comedy. It so often grabs us by the collar and drags us in whatever direction it feels magnetized. We don't choose it. It harangues us.
It is the moment we critically and consciously choose how to shape our love that we move towards freedom. It is a critical response to our commercialized culture of romance, a rejection of that which feels outdated, a vision of a more inclusive, more authentic, more liberating relationship. In fact, the moment we choose to shape our love is the first, most critical step in shaping the whole God damn world.
Who you love and how you love them is as much a statement about your social conscience as the letters you write to Congress or the votes you cast. It's harder to be good to someone else.
People who want to see the world bettered -- made more just and honest and kind -- often set their gaze on the farthest horizon. Our instinct, as progressives with global perspectives, is to obsess over situations far afield of our own backyards -- Indonesia, Sudan, the Middle East. These situations stir a sort of Peace Corp romance within us, a love affair with that which might make us feel gallant and extraordinary for caring.
I am as guilty as the next bleeding heart of focusing the majority of my energies on problems I see as compelling in large part because of their strangeness to me. But when I sit with myself, quiet my righteous indignation, my whiny white guilt, my attachment to the idea that I am a humble truth teller among powerful fibbers, I realize that it is not the world outside of me that is in most desperate need of my world-changing instincts. It is the world inside of me, the world between me and my beloved.
We are so often wide awake about the decisions our elected officials make in the political, public realm and so asleep about our private choices. Our relationships can be sites of radical transformation but are so often soporifics. They have the capacity to tilt the whole world in the direction of ingenuity and kindness, and yet we are so often looking outside of ourselves for the tipping point.
Who you love and how you love them is as much a statement about your social conscience -- perhaps even a far more accurate and moving statement -- as the letters you write to Congress or the votes you cast. It is harder to be good to someone else. It has the potential to make them be good to others. And others are the fulcrum of social change.
Some of the ways in which love can be radical are quite obvious and tied to institutions. The choice of whether or not to get married in a nation where the status (and its tax benefits) is still doled out discriminatorily is a powerful one.
Reflections on ritual, commitment and partnership are quite radical in a world that is pushing you to link your love to a market, spend conspicuously, be a celebrity-for-a-day no matter what the cost, call it quits half the time. Muting the cacophony of outside propaganda about love and weddings -- and listening to your own inner answer -- is incredibly difficult and also morally necessary. What promises do you want to make in what ways before whom?
And, of course, beyond the obvious is the most critical -- what kind of relationship do you want to be in? What sort of partnership will push you to be your best, freest, happiest self? It is not just a matter of reversing roles or reacting to those models you have seen before, but wiping the slate clean and then imagining the most humane and transcendent of possible unions. How good could your love be? How fortifying? How honest? How can you create a love that reflects your values instead of parroting the culture's bottom line-driven definitions?
If you think that love is finite, think again. Just as your dollar has ramifications well beyond the taste of the organic, locally-grown apple you buy, your devotion can influence whole generations. Look at Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving -- the interracial couple that pushed Loving vs. Virginia all the way to the Supreme Court -- striking down the last anti-miscegenation law on the books and ushering in a new era of legally-sanctioned love across racial boundaries. June will mark the 40th anniversary of their courage as the Loving Day campaign reminds us.
Think about Barack Obama, the product of a short-lived, early 60s college romance between a black African exchange student and a white Kansan. His interracial identity, as he so beautifully explains in his first book, is the roots from which his political ideals have grown. Fifty years after his parents fell in love, they are both gone but their creation is changing the way America understands itself.
Anyone who doubts that our most intimate relationship can also be the site of our most impactful activism need look no further than the second wave of feminism. A generation of women insisted that the personal was the political, that they would only be in relationship with those who respected their full humanity, and we -- their daughters and sons -- are engaged in far more fair partnerships as a result. (Though we have much more work to do if we are to fully realize their dream of equal parenting.)
And, of course, decades of queer men and women have bravely come out to their families and friends, colleagues and clergy, and in the process, redefined family. Their challenge of notions of normality have freed us all -- gay, straight, bisexual, weary of labels -- to be more honest about our own complex sexualities. Lives have been lost in this quest -- Brandon Teena, Harvey Milk, Matthew Shepard etc. -- but countless lives have also been saved.
bell hooks, the guru of love as revolution, wrote: "The moment we chose to love we begin to move towards freedom." I think she's wrong, but not by much.
It is not the moment we chose to love that we begin to move towards freedom, because love is so rarely a choice. Love is an instinct, an accident, an epiphany, a stomach ache. It can feel like incarceration and pardon, alienation and intimacy, tragedy and comedy. It so often grabs us by the collar and drags us in whatever direction it feels magnetized. We don't choose it. It harangues us.
It is the moment we critically and consciously choose how to shape our love that we move towards freedom. It is a critical response to our commercialized culture of romance, a rejection of that which feels outdated, a vision of a more inclusive, more authentic, more liberating relationship. In fact, the moment we choose to shape our love is the first, most critical step in shaping the whole God damn world.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Does Pakistan Have No Shame?
By Fatima Bhutto
Photo Anjum Naveed for AP
Is Pakistan trying to force rape victim Mukhtaran Mai to drop her case? Fatima Bhutto reports on a campaign of intimidation.
In 2002, an illiterate woman named Mukhtaran Mai was punished for something her brother did. He committed the unforgivable crime of falling in love with a young woman outside his tribe. So, in accordance with tribal tradition, a local council of elders decided that instead of punishing him directly, his sister Mai would be gang raped and paraded across her small village of Meerwala half naked.
Five days after this rape occurred, Mai did the unthinkable: She pressed charges.
Her defiance of custom—reporting the rape instead of silently accepting it—made headlines worldwide. Nicholas Kristof and Time magazine championed her case. Glamour magazine declared Mai “Woman of the Year.” But now, the Pakistan government has shown that it holds her in considerably lower esteem.
A few days ago, Mai announced that Pakistan has been quietly pressuring her to drop her case against the men who raped her. Qayyum Jatoi, the Federal Minister of State for Defense Production (ignore the silly title, we have 60-odd redundant ministers in our bloated cabinet) wants Mai to quit her six-year battle, now in the Supreme Court. According to Mai, the minister telephoned her uncle and warned him that should she persist, the ministry would ensure that the court rules against her. Minister Jatoi has denounced Mai’s allegations as a ploy by her to garner “cheap popularity” in the media. He denies pressuring Mai to drop the case, of course. The trial is scheduled to start today.
Given Pakistan’s recent history, I’d give Mai the benefit of the doubt. This is a government that has only grown more sinister when it comes to the cause of women. The Pakistan People’s Party, of which Minister Jatoi is a member, has twice put a female prime minister in office, Benazir Bhutto, and still has fully never repealed the anti-women Hudood Ordinances, which were reformed by President Pervez Musharraf but still allow women to be imprisoned for crimes like adultery and premarital sex.
Responding to the government’s pressure, Mai said in a statement to The News, one of Pakistan’s leading English newspapers, that it was ironic this injustice was being meted out to her by Benazir’s party. But it’s not so ironic. In fact, for the PPP, it’s par for the course.
Sardar Israullah Zehri, a tribal leader and senator from Balochistan and a member of the PPP, took to the floor of parliament this past August to defend violence against women. Five women in his province had been buried alive for staining their family’s honor. (Reports from various human-rights groups indicate the number of women buried may actually be as high as ten.) No one knows who the women were; we have snippets—a first name here, a date of birth there—but they’ve been murdered terribly well, erased from public record.
In parliament, a month after the women were buried alive, Zehri defended the killings as “part of our traditional customs.” Three months after his atrocious declaration, he was appointed the Federal Minister of Postal Services (see?) and made an adviser to the prime minister’s cabinet. When criticized for his statements, Zehri shrugged off his critics—five women died and the sky didn’t fall, the charming minister is reputed to have said.
Then, in November, the PPP and its president, Benazir Bhutto’s widower Asif Zardari, appointed Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani as Federal Minister of Education (a cabinet post with actual heft to it). Any Pakistani with a memory should have alarm bells ringing in his head at the mention of Bijarani’s name. In 2007, the chief justice of Pakistan ordered his arrest after he decreed that five girls be handed over, like currency, to the family of a murdered man to settle a feud between their two families. Bijarani was acting as head of a local tribal council similar to the one that had Mukhtaran Mai gang raped. The eldest of the girls was age six, and the youngest were only two years old.
But under this present government, not only is Bijarani is a free man (with an impressive government portfolio to boot), but the chief justice who ordered his arrest now finds himself unconstitutionally unemployed.
Today’s PPP bears absolutely no resemblance to the party that brought Pakistan’s first democratically elected government to power in 1971 and wrote our country’s constitution, yet it is feted across the West as an ally in the War on Terror. If Vice President Joseph Biden has his way, Pakistan will receive a whopping $7.5 billion in nonmilitary aid as part of the Biden-Lugar Act.
This for a country with an impressive vernacular for crimes against women. We have barely two words for “school” in Urdu: madrassa, and the bastardized eskool. But we have an entire language for the official ways in which you can victimize women. Swara, noun: the practice of settling disputes by giving away female children as compensation (see Bijarani); Karo Kari, noun: the murder of a male and female who have stained their respective families' honor; watta satta, the exchange of brides between one family and another; sang chatti, the forced marriage of women and girls to resolve tribal disputes. The vocabulary goes on and on.
Even longer is the list of men, politicians, and ministers who have been rewarded by the state of Pakistan for their misogyny. Mukhtaran Mai’s allegations have been quietly buried in the week since she openly accused the government of meddling in her rape case. As her case goes before the Supreme Court today, there’s little hope for a fair trial. The newspapers have been silent in Karachi, there are no protest rallies in Lahore, and there have been no repercussions against the state in Islamabad.
A few days ago, a friend of mine arrived at Karachi International Airport after a business trip abroad. As she waited in line to have her passport stamped at immigration, a man in his thirties turned to her and sneered, “How can you stand here in a line with all these men?” He called her shameless and said she should separate herself. But he underestimated her docility. She stood firmly in place and told him if her presence bothered him so much, he should ask the government to build a separate airport for women. I wouldn’t put it past them.
Personally, I’d prefer our own country.
Photo Anjum Naveed for AP
Is Pakistan trying to force rape victim Mukhtaran Mai to drop her case? Fatima Bhutto reports on a campaign of intimidation.
In 2002, an illiterate woman named Mukhtaran Mai was punished for something her brother did. He committed the unforgivable crime of falling in love with a young woman outside his tribe. So, in accordance with tribal tradition, a local council of elders decided that instead of punishing him directly, his sister Mai would be gang raped and paraded across her small village of Meerwala half naked.Five days after this rape occurred, Mai did the unthinkable: She pressed charges.
Her defiance of custom—reporting the rape instead of silently accepting it—made headlines worldwide. Nicholas Kristof and Time magazine championed her case. Glamour magazine declared Mai “Woman of the Year.” But now, the Pakistan government has shown that it holds her in considerably lower esteem.
A few days ago, Mai announced that Pakistan has been quietly pressuring her to drop her case against the men who raped her. Qayyum Jatoi, the Federal Minister of State for Defense Production (ignore the silly title, we have 60-odd redundant ministers in our bloated cabinet) wants Mai to quit her six-year battle, now in the Supreme Court. According to Mai, the minister telephoned her uncle and warned him that should she persist, the ministry would ensure that the court rules against her. Minister Jatoi has denounced Mai’s allegations as a ploy by her to garner “cheap popularity” in the media. He denies pressuring Mai to drop the case, of course. The trial is scheduled to start today.
Given Pakistan’s recent history, I’d give Mai the benefit of the doubt. This is a government that has only grown more sinister when it comes to the cause of women. The Pakistan People’s Party, of which Minister Jatoi is a member, has twice put a female prime minister in office, Benazir Bhutto, and still has fully never repealed the anti-women Hudood Ordinances, which were reformed by President Pervez Musharraf but still allow women to be imprisoned for crimes like adultery and premarital sex.
Responding to the government’s pressure, Mai said in a statement to The News, one of Pakistan’s leading English newspapers, that it was ironic this injustice was being meted out to her by Benazir’s party. But it’s not so ironic. In fact, for the PPP, it’s par for the course.
Sardar Israullah Zehri, a tribal leader and senator from Balochistan and a member of the PPP, took to the floor of parliament this past August to defend violence against women. Five women in his province had been buried alive for staining their family’s honor. (Reports from various human-rights groups indicate the number of women buried may actually be as high as ten.) No one knows who the women were; we have snippets—a first name here, a date of birth there—but they’ve been murdered terribly well, erased from public record.
In parliament, a month after the women were buried alive, Zehri defended the killings as “part of our traditional customs.” Three months after his atrocious declaration, he was appointed the Federal Minister of Postal Services (see?) and made an adviser to the prime minister’s cabinet. When criticized for his statements, Zehri shrugged off his critics—five women died and the sky didn’t fall, the charming minister is reputed to have said.
Then, in November, the PPP and its president, Benazir Bhutto’s widower Asif Zardari, appointed Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani as Federal Minister of Education (a cabinet post with actual heft to it). Any Pakistani with a memory should have alarm bells ringing in his head at the mention of Bijarani’s name. In 2007, the chief justice of Pakistan ordered his arrest after he decreed that five girls be handed over, like currency, to the family of a murdered man to settle a feud between their two families. Bijarani was acting as head of a local tribal council similar to the one that had Mukhtaran Mai gang raped. The eldest of the girls was age six, and the youngest were only two years old.
But under this present government, not only is Bijarani is a free man (with an impressive government portfolio to boot), but the chief justice who ordered his arrest now finds himself unconstitutionally unemployed.
Today’s PPP bears absolutely no resemblance to the party that brought Pakistan’s first democratically elected government to power in 1971 and wrote our country’s constitution, yet it is feted across the West as an ally in the War on Terror. If Vice President Joseph Biden has his way, Pakistan will receive a whopping $7.5 billion in nonmilitary aid as part of the Biden-Lugar Act.
This for a country with an impressive vernacular for crimes against women. We have barely two words for “school” in Urdu: madrassa, and the bastardized eskool. But we have an entire language for the official ways in which you can victimize women. Swara, noun: the practice of settling disputes by giving away female children as compensation (see Bijarani); Karo Kari, noun: the murder of a male and female who have stained their respective families' honor; watta satta, the exchange of brides between one family and another; sang chatti, the forced marriage of women and girls to resolve tribal disputes. The vocabulary goes on and on.
Even longer is the list of men, politicians, and ministers who have been rewarded by the state of Pakistan for their misogyny. Mukhtaran Mai’s allegations have been quietly buried in the week since she openly accused the government of meddling in her rape case. As her case goes before the Supreme Court today, there’s little hope for a fair trial. The newspapers have been silent in Karachi, there are no protest rallies in Lahore, and there have been no repercussions against the state in Islamabad.
A few days ago, a friend of mine arrived at Karachi International Airport after a business trip abroad. As she waited in line to have her passport stamped at immigration, a man in his thirties turned to her and sneered, “How can you stand here in a line with all these men?” He called her shameless and said she should separate herself. But he underestimated her docility. She stood firmly in place and told him if her presence bothered him so much, he should ask the government to build a separate airport for women. I wouldn’t put it past them.
Personally, I’d prefer our own country.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Chris Brown and Rihanna: in case you haven't been following...
The Chris Brown controversy continues today as a flood of new reports attempt to shed light on what really went down between the R&B singer and girlfriend Rihanna early Sunday morning.
New reports detail the extent of Rihanna's injuries, allegedly inflicted by Brown. People magazine says the 20-year-old singer suffered a black eye and bruises at the hand of Chris, while a police source tells the magazine that the altercation left Rihanna with "a swollen, split lip and two red and purple contusions on either side of her forehead." E! online reported that Rihanna claimed to the LAPD that Chris choked her while threatening to kill her -- and she lost consciousness.
News outlets also suggest several different scenarios which may have sparked the heated argument. The NY Daily News reports that the "Umbrella" singer lost it when she found a text from another girl on Brown's phone -- citing a music industry source who revealed the details. The source claims that Rihanna attempted to leave the car after the blow-up, and Chris grabbed her to stop her from going. OK! magazine takes that theory one step further, suggesting that heiress Paris Hilton and Brown were flirty, which sparked the fight.
As speculation continues to surround the pre-Grammy incident, reports of canceled concerts and withdrawn radio plays circulate on the net. Rihanna has canceled a second concert which had been scheduled for Thursday in Indonesia, while Brown's songs continue to be pulled from airwaves due to the public outcry against him. The latest radio station to pull his tunes is B103.9 in South Florida. "We asked listeners what they thought," radio host Big Mama dished to NBC 2 News. "They want Chris Brown off the radio."
Today, "Extra" spoke exclusively with Brown's sister, Lytrell Bundy (aka Tootie) about the alleged attack. "He's always been a good boy -- never violent," Tootie says. When asked about how Chris is dealing with his arrest and the fallout, Tootie confesses, "He's doing good. He's coping... He's doing as... as to be expected."
Both Rihanna and Brown have stayed out of the public eye since the alleged altercation -- even foregoing the Grammy Awards, where both were scheduled to perform. Rihanna is said to be flying to Barbados to be with her family, while Brown -- rumored to be in Las Vegas -- is expected to lay low until his March 5 court date.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Break the Silence Project
Breakthesilenceproject.com is the beginning steps of a community project that encourages the exploration of issues surrounding sexual abuse through creative means. Among things to come are a forum and a directory of other creative projects that address these topics.
The main goals of the Break the Silence project are to showcase creative works that deal with sexual violence, to provide a possibility for community-building, and to further raise public awareness and dialogue on these subjects.
Break the Silence is looking for submissions that address the themes of the silence around sexual abuse, reasons people stay silent, and experiences of breaking that silence.
Due by March 15, 2009.
The main goals of the Break the Silence project are to showcase creative works that deal with sexual violence, to provide a possibility for community-building, and to further raise public awareness and dialogue on these subjects.
Break the Silence is looking for submissions that address the themes of the silence around sexual abuse, reasons people stay silent, and experiences of breaking that silence.
Due by March 15, 2009.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
1 year sentence for HIV-positive woman guilty of assault
A Quebec woman living with AIDS has been given a one-year sentence, to be served in the community, for hiding her HIV status from her former boyfriend.
Quebec Judge Marc Bison handed down the sentence on Tuesday, after the woman was found guilty of aggravated assault against her ex-boyfriend for failing to tell him she was HIV-positive when the two started courting.
The woman acted irresponsibly and committed a serious crime by depriving her ex-lover of the right to decide whether he wanted to have sex with her despite her status, Bison said at the Longueuil courthouse.
Anyone with a condition as serious as HIV has a legal duty to inform his or her partner, because the virus is not like a common cold, he said.
The sentence would normally be served in prison, but because of her fragile health, she will serve it in the community, the judge said. The woman is in a treatment centre waiting for experimental drugs.
A publication ban in the case prevents the man and woman from being named, but they can be identified by their initials.
When the couple first started dating in 2000, D.C testified she initially withheld her HIV status from J.L.P., but after three months told him she was infected, the court was told.
J.L.P. decided to stay in the relationship. D.C. testified in court they used condoms from the beginning of the relationship, but the court determined the couple had unprotected sex at least one time.
HIV complaint made after assault charge laid
The couple broke up five years later, after the man was charged with assault following the woman's complaints of domestic abuse.
While his case was pending, J.L.P. alerted police about D.C.'s failure to disclose her HIV status, and she was charged with aggravated assault. J.L.P. was never infected with the virus.
This winter, the Quebec court found J.L.P. guilty of assaulting D.C. and her 18-year old son, but was eventually given an absolute discharge with no criminal record.
The Quebec Coalition of AIDS organizations was disappointed by the case's outcome.
The onus was on J.L.P. to protect himself and practise safe sex, said spokesman Ken Monteith.
The situation would have been different if D.C. had repeatedly had unprotected sex with J.L.P. without telling him, he said.
D.C. has been HIV positive since 1991. She contracted the human immunodeficiency virus from her ex-husband.
Quebec Judge Marc Bison handed down the sentence on Tuesday, after the woman was found guilty of aggravated assault against her ex-boyfriend for failing to tell him she was HIV-positive when the two started courting.
The woman acted irresponsibly and committed a serious crime by depriving her ex-lover of the right to decide whether he wanted to have sex with her despite her status, Bison said at the Longueuil courthouse.
Anyone with a condition as serious as HIV has a legal duty to inform his or her partner, because the virus is not like a common cold, he said.
The sentence would normally be served in prison, but because of her fragile health, she will serve it in the community, the judge said. The woman is in a treatment centre waiting for experimental drugs.
A publication ban in the case prevents the man and woman from being named, but they can be identified by their initials.
When the couple first started dating in 2000, D.C testified she initially withheld her HIV status from J.L.P., but after three months told him she was infected, the court was told.
J.L.P. decided to stay in the relationship. D.C. testified in court they used condoms from the beginning of the relationship, but the court determined the couple had unprotected sex at least one time.
HIV complaint made after assault charge laid
The couple broke up five years later, after the man was charged with assault following the woman's complaints of domestic abuse.
While his case was pending, J.L.P. alerted police about D.C.'s failure to disclose her HIV status, and she was charged with aggravated assault. J.L.P. was never infected with the virus.
This winter, the Quebec court found J.L.P. guilty of assaulting D.C. and her 18-year old son, but was eventually given an absolute discharge with no criminal record.
The Quebec Coalition of AIDS organizations was disappointed by the case's outcome.
The onus was on J.L.P. to protect himself and practise safe sex, said spokesman Ken Monteith.
The situation would have been different if D.C. had repeatedly had unprotected sex with J.L.P. without telling him, he said.
D.C. has been HIV positive since 1991. She contracted the human immunodeficiency virus from her ex-husband.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Lost promise for survivors
A backlog in the testing of rape kits in Los Angeles means that many survivors still wait for answers.
By Sarah Tofte
I spent a recent morning at the Rape Treatment Center at Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center, where women (and men and children) get emergency medical care and counseling immediately after they have been raped. I was researching how the center's nurse practitioners collect evidence for a "rape kit."
According to the Justice Department's most recent National Crime Victimization Survey, only about 40% of sexual assaults are reported to police, though other nongovernmental studies indicate even lower rates of 10% to 20%. But among those who do report a rape, most are taken to a hospital to have a rape kit created. In this age of "CSI" and other forensic science TV series, rape victims believe that DNA and other evidence in their rape kits will help police and prosecutors find and punish their assailants. If only that were more true.
The process -- which can last more than four hours -- begins in a private interview room, separate from the hospital emergency room, where a counselor asks in detail what happened during the rape. The counselor is there throughout the subsequent examination.
If I were a survivor, I would next be led into the exam room and asked to undress while standing on a large sheet of butcher paper so that anything that falls from my clothing or body that may provide links to a perpetrator or a crime scene (hairs and carpet or clothing fibers) can be carefully collected and placed in the rape kit.
I would be examined on a gynecological table with stirrups. My body would be scanned with an ultraviolet light to find otherwise undetectable semen or saliva that might contain the assailant's DNA.
The nurse would check my entire body, swabbing every part the assailant touched. Then she would photograph physical injuries, which might include bruises, bite marks or burst blood vessels in the whites of my eyes from strangulation. A magnifying camera -- designed to be as noninvasive as possible -- would then record tears or other injuries to my mouth, vagina or anus.
With incredible care, the nurse would then collect fingernail scrapings, pubic-hair combings and urine and blood samples, placing each in separate envelopes. The swabs also would be labeled and sealed in containers with evidence tape. All this goes into a large white envelope -- the rape kit.
If I were a survivor, the police officer on duty at the center might drive me home with the rape kit in the patrol car. I might imagine that the police were taking it directly to the crime lab to test the samples for DNA that could identify my assailant or provide evidence against an already identified suspect. In 2004, Californians voted overwhelmingly for Proposition 69, which expanded the number and types of offenders whose DNA goes into local, state and national databanks.
But the truth is, after all of that careful and meticulous collection, the rape kit may never be opened, much less tested.
The National Institute of Justice estimates that at least 400,000 rape kits are sitting untested in police stations and crime labs across the country. In the city of Los Angeles alone, more than 7,000 sit in refrigerated storage in a city warehouse facility and a trailer behind police headquarters. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department likely has its own backlog, but the sheriff has never disclosed its size.
Law enforcement officials blame a lack of resources -- for starters, they need more crime lab staff. But it's hard not to surmise that the problem is, in reality, a matter of priorities. Among L.A. City Council members, only Jack Weiss has insisted on budget increases to address the rape kit backlog. This year, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa rejected the LAPD's funding request to hire more crime lab staff.
If I were a survivor, I might never know whether my rape kit was opened. I might assume that silence from the police meant that the crime lab just didn't find any DNA, or none that identified my assailant. Although not every tested rape kit yields a database match, when New York City processed all its backlogged rape kits in 2003, the effort led to about 2,000 hits.
The morning I visited the Rape Treatment Center, three women came to report that they had been raped and to get care. They consented to the extensive, lengthy exam because they had entered into a pact with the police: We will submit to this collection of evidence, and you will submit our rape kits for testing.
I wish I hadn't known the likely fate of their rape kits -- to sit on a shelf, frozen and unexamined. It would be devastating.
Sarah Tofte is a researcher at Human Rights Watch.
[This was an opinion piece in the LA Times. Some words were changed/omitted to fit with SACOMSS's pro-survivor mandate. Click the title for the article as it appeared in the LA Times.]
By Sarah Tofte
I spent a recent morning at the Rape Treatment Center at Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center, where women (and men and children) get emergency medical care and counseling immediately after they have been raped. I was researching how the center's nurse practitioners collect evidence for a "rape kit."
According to the Justice Department's most recent National Crime Victimization Survey, only about 40% of sexual assaults are reported to police, though other nongovernmental studies indicate even lower rates of 10% to 20%. But among those who do report a rape, most are taken to a hospital to have a rape kit created. In this age of "CSI" and other forensic science TV series, rape victims believe that DNA and other evidence in their rape kits will help police and prosecutors find and punish their assailants. If only that were more true.
The process -- which can last more than four hours -- begins in a private interview room, separate from the hospital emergency room, where a counselor asks in detail what happened during the rape. The counselor is there throughout the subsequent examination.
If I were a survivor, I would next be led into the exam room and asked to undress while standing on a large sheet of butcher paper so that anything that falls from my clothing or body that may provide links to a perpetrator or a crime scene (hairs and carpet or clothing fibers) can be carefully collected and placed in the rape kit.
I would be examined on a gynecological table with stirrups. My body would be scanned with an ultraviolet light to find otherwise undetectable semen or saliva that might contain the assailant's DNA.
The nurse would check my entire body, swabbing every part the assailant touched. Then she would photograph physical injuries, which might include bruises, bite marks or burst blood vessels in the whites of my eyes from strangulation. A magnifying camera -- designed to be as noninvasive as possible -- would then record tears or other injuries to my mouth, vagina or anus.
With incredible care, the nurse would then collect fingernail scrapings, pubic-hair combings and urine and blood samples, placing each in separate envelopes. The swabs also would be labeled and sealed in containers with evidence tape. All this goes into a large white envelope -- the rape kit.
If I were a survivor, the police officer on duty at the center might drive me home with the rape kit in the patrol car. I might imagine that the police were taking it directly to the crime lab to test the samples for DNA that could identify my assailant or provide evidence against an already identified suspect. In 2004, Californians voted overwhelmingly for Proposition 69, which expanded the number and types of offenders whose DNA goes into local, state and national databanks.
But the truth is, after all of that careful and meticulous collection, the rape kit may never be opened, much less tested.
The National Institute of Justice estimates that at least 400,000 rape kits are sitting untested in police stations and crime labs across the country. In the city of Los Angeles alone, more than 7,000 sit in refrigerated storage in a city warehouse facility and a trailer behind police headquarters. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department likely has its own backlog, but the sheriff has never disclosed its size.
Law enforcement officials blame a lack of resources -- for starters, they need more crime lab staff. But it's hard not to surmise that the problem is, in reality, a matter of priorities. Among L.A. City Council members, only Jack Weiss has insisted on budget increases to address the rape kit backlog. This year, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa rejected the LAPD's funding request to hire more crime lab staff.
If I were a survivor, I might never know whether my rape kit was opened. I might assume that silence from the police meant that the crime lab just didn't find any DNA, or none that identified my assailant. Although not every tested rape kit yields a database match, when New York City processed all its backlogged rape kits in 2003, the effort led to about 2,000 hits.
The morning I visited the Rape Treatment Center, three women came to report that they had been raped and to get care. They consented to the extensive, lengthy exam because they had entered into a pact with the police: We will submit to this collection of evidence, and you will submit our rape kits for testing.
I wish I hadn't known the likely fate of their rape kits -- to sit on a shelf, frozen and unexamined. It would be devastating.
Sarah Tofte is a researcher at Human Rights Watch.
[This was an opinion piece in the LA Times. Some words were changed/omitted to fit with SACOMSS's pro-survivor mandate. Click the title for the article as it appeared in the LA Times.]
Benefits awarded to beaten Hooters waitress
By Clark Kauffman
A waitress was barred from working at the Hooters restaurant in Davenport after a violent physical attack left her bruised and unable to meet company standards for maintaining a "glamorous appearance."
The waitress alleges she was fired after taking time off to recover from the assault. Hooters officials say the waitress abandoned her job, but also say that the woman's bruised body made her temporarily ineligible to work as a "Hooters Girl."
An administrative law judge who presided over a recent public hearing dealing with 27-year-old Sara Dye's request for unemployment benefits ruled against the company and awarded benefits to Dye. Judge Teresa Hillary found that Dye's "inability to work due to bruises" did not amount to workplace misconduct.
According to testimony at the hearing, Dye was the victim of several incidents of domestic violence in 2008, the last of which occurred Sept. 3 after she left work for the day. Dye, who lives in Rock Island, Ill., was badly beaten and her assailant - unidentified at the hearing - cut off some of her hair.
The next day, Dye and her managers agreed that at least for the next few weeks she should not be working in the restaurant. General Manager Gina Sheedy testified that Dye's bruises would have been visible outside the Hooters uniform, which is known for being revealing.
"We told her it was probably not in her best interest to work for a while because of the state of her body," Sheedy testified.
Hillary asked Sheedy whether the restaurant would have agreed to a request from Dye to return to work immediately.
"No, probably not," Sheedy replied. "She probably would not be able to work because of her black eye and the bruises on her face. ... Our handbook states you have to have a glamorous appearance. It doesn't actually say, 'Bruises on your face are not allowed.' It does talk about the all-American cheerleader look."
Sheedy said Dye could now resume working at Hooters, assuming she maintained a glamorous appearance.
"And a glamorous appearance to you means you can't have bruises on your face or your body that show outside the uniform?" Hillary asked.
"Correct," Sheedy replied.
The restaurant's assistant manager, Michelle Duvall, testified that shortly after the attack, Dye talked to her about returning to work after a week of recovery time.
"She told me that she was very badly beaten, she (had been) unconscious, she was in the hospital," Duvall said. "She was like, 'I really want to work next week. ...' I said, 'You need to come in and speak to Gina and let her see your appearance.'"
Hillary asked Duvall what would happen if a waitress's hair had to be cut as a result of an injury from an accident.
Duvall said that according to the company handbook, a waitress's hair "needs to be styled as if you're going out on a big date on a Saturday night, as if you're preparing for a photo shoot."
Dye declined to comment on the case when contacted by a Des Moines Register reporter. She testified that Hooters was supportive of her in the wake of previous "personal problems." She said that when she called the restaurant in late September about returning to work, a co-worker informed her she had been fired.
The owner of the Davenport restaurant, Darren Taylor, said his company valued Dye as an employee and didn't fire her. He declined to comment on the company's standards for physical appearance.
"I won't go into all of the Hooters Girl requirements, because they're contained in about a 50-page book," he said. "But I don't know any restaurateur who would want somebody totally bruised up waiting on his customers."
Dye testified that she understood why she couldn't come to work in the immediate aftermath of the attack.
"My body appearance wasn't up to par," she said.
A waitress was barred from working at the Hooters restaurant in Davenport after a violent physical attack left her bruised and unable to meet company standards for maintaining a "glamorous appearance."
The waitress alleges she was fired after taking time off to recover from the assault. Hooters officials say the waitress abandoned her job, but also say that the woman's bruised body made her temporarily ineligible to work as a "Hooters Girl."
An administrative law judge who presided over a recent public hearing dealing with 27-year-old Sara Dye's request for unemployment benefits ruled against the company and awarded benefits to Dye. Judge Teresa Hillary found that Dye's "inability to work due to bruises" did not amount to workplace misconduct.
According to testimony at the hearing, Dye was the victim of several incidents of domestic violence in 2008, the last of which occurred Sept. 3 after she left work for the day. Dye, who lives in Rock Island, Ill., was badly beaten and her assailant - unidentified at the hearing - cut off some of her hair.
The next day, Dye and her managers agreed that at least for the next few weeks she should not be working in the restaurant. General Manager Gina Sheedy testified that Dye's bruises would have been visible outside the Hooters uniform, which is known for being revealing.
"We told her it was probably not in her best interest to work for a while because of the state of her body," Sheedy testified.
Hillary asked Sheedy whether the restaurant would have agreed to a request from Dye to return to work immediately.
"No, probably not," Sheedy replied. "She probably would not be able to work because of her black eye and the bruises on her face. ... Our handbook states you have to have a glamorous appearance. It doesn't actually say, 'Bruises on your face are not allowed.' It does talk about the all-American cheerleader look."
Sheedy said Dye could now resume working at Hooters, assuming she maintained a glamorous appearance.
"And a glamorous appearance to you means you can't have bruises on your face or your body that show outside the uniform?" Hillary asked.
"Correct," Sheedy replied.
The restaurant's assistant manager, Michelle Duvall, testified that shortly after the attack, Dye talked to her about returning to work after a week of recovery time.
"She told me that she was very badly beaten, she (had been) unconscious, she was in the hospital," Duvall said. "She was like, 'I really want to work next week. ...' I said, 'You need to come in and speak to Gina and let her see your appearance.'"
Hillary asked Duvall what would happen if a waitress's hair had to be cut as a result of an injury from an accident.
Duvall said that according to the company handbook, a waitress's hair "needs to be styled as if you're going out on a big date on a Saturday night, as if you're preparing for a photo shoot."
Dye declined to comment on the case when contacted by a Des Moines Register reporter. She testified that Hooters was supportive of her in the wake of previous "personal problems." She said that when she called the restaurant in late September about returning to work, a co-worker informed her she had been fired.
The owner of the Davenport restaurant, Darren Taylor, said his company valued Dye as an employee and didn't fire her. He declined to comment on the company's standards for physical appearance.
"I won't go into all of the Hooters Girl requirements, because they're contained in about a 50-page book," he said. "But I don't know any restaurateur who would want somebody totally bruised up waiting on his customers."
Dye testified that she understood why she couldn't come to work in the immediate aftermath of the attack.
"My body appearance wasn't up to par," she said.
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