ENGLISH WORK

HUMAN RIGHTS: Human rights are fundamental to the stability and

development of countries all around the world. Great emphasis has been
placed on international conventions and their implementation in order to
ensure adherence to a universal standard of acceptability. With the
advent of globalization and the introduction of new technology, these
principles gain importance not only in protecting human beings from the illeffects of change but also in ensuring that all are allowed to share the
benefits.
SOME SHOCKING FACTS:
1. During the four days of protests, at least 91 women were attacked
and sexually assaulted by mobs, while government leaders and police
stood by and failed to intervene. Some women required extensive
medical surgery after being subjected to brutal gang rapes and sexual
assault with sharp objects. After the protests, survivors came forward
to tell their stories and demand better protections for women. While
the protests led to the end of Morsis presidency, the government
downplayed the violence, prompting international calls to improve law
enforcement and bring perpetrators to justice. These actions proved
fruitless, as security forces again came under fire in August for using
live ammunition against citizens resulting in 638 deaths.
2. Prisoners in the gulags* lucky enough to escape described atrocities
including witnessing a woman forced to drown her own baby in a
bucket. 120,000 people are still thought to be held in gulags. Public
executions by firing squad have also continued at unprecedented
levels under Jong-uns rule, including the execution of the dictators
own uncle and former girlfriend. *( a system of labor camps
maintained in the former Soviet Union from 1930 to 1955 in which
many people died.)
3. LGBT rights took a major step back in other parts of the world.
Uganda abolished the death penalty as punishment for having gay
sex, but it passed an anti-gay law punishing aggravated
homosexuality with life imprisonment. The new provision drew
international criticism by gay rights activists, particularly after
Ugandas parliament expressed that the anti-gay law was a
Christmas gift to all Ugandans. Meanwhile, Indias Supreme Court
reinstated a ban against homosexuality, making gay sex a criminal
offense, prompting human rights groups to file a petition seeking a
review of the decision on the grounds that the law is unconstitutional.
Russias anti-gay laws also came under fire for a bill that banned
propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations."

4. Cases of violence against women grew by 28 percent and females

continued to be treated as second-class citizens. President Hamid
Karzai backed away from government plans to implement a
controversial law reintroducing public stoning as punishment for
adultery after the draft law was leaked causing international outrage.
Womens rights groups condemned invasive vaginal examinations
women are forced to undergo to ascertain virginity every time a girl
is arrested on a morality charge.

5. Young women and girls are kidnapped from their homes and sold to
gangs who traffick women, often displacing the women by great
distances. In order to ensure that the women do not run away, the
men who purchase them do not allow the women to leave the house.
Oftentimes the documentation and papers are taken from the
trafficked women.
Many women become pregnant and have children, and are burdened
to provide for their family.
In the 1950s, Mao Zedong, the first Chairman of the Central
Committee of the Communist Party of China, launched a campaign to
eradicate prostitution throughout China. The campaign made the act
of trafficking women severely punishable by law. A major component
of the campaign was the rehabilitation program in which prostitutes
and trafficked women were provided "medical treatment, thought
reform, job training, and family reintegration."
Since the economic reform in 1979, sex trafficking and other social
vices have revived.
Since the loosening of government controls over society in the early
1980s, prostitution in mainland China not only has become more
visible, but also can now be found throughout both urban and rural
areas. In spite of government efforts, prostitution has now developed
to the extent that it comprises an industry, one that involves a great
number of people and produces a considerable economic output.
Prostitution has also become associated with a number of problems,
including organized crime, government corruption and sexually
transmitted diseases. As the Chinese favor a son more than girls in
the family, there is a disproportional larger marriageable aged men
with no prospects for finding enough women, they also turn to
prostitutes. This is accentuated by many married men and wives who
do not live in one city together and they turn to "consultants" for
help.
6. 'Unfortunately the underlying problem is that the girls are blamed for
selling themselves. Most of these girls have experience isolation at
home or school before they reach that point [of entering the
business].' (Enjo-kasai)

THE TABOOS:
Abnormal sexual relationships:
Human beings consider heterosexual relationships excluding incest as
normal. All other sexual preferences and practices are considered
abnormal and have strong taboos attached to them. Examples
include homosexuality, bestiality, pedophilia, necrophilia and
masturbation. Many of the abnormal sexual acts are both socially and
legally prohibited.
Lauren Billboard: I am a bisexual Cuban-American woman and I am so
proud of it. I am proud to be part of a community that only projects
love and education and the support of one another. I am proud to be
the granddaughter and daughter of immigrants who were brave
enough to leave their homes and come to a whole new world with a
different language and culture and immerse themselves fearlessly to
start a better life for themselves and their families.
I am proud to be a woman. Proud that the sex between my thighs
provides a strength and resilience in me that only other women can
feel, that my body curves in ways that allow me to create life within
me, that my entire life is filled with adversity and doubt and people
questioning my intelligence and my artistic potential and my
expression of myself and my virtue and honor because I am too much
woman. I am proud that I get to prove them all wrong. I am proud that
I have to work even harder for it.
Malala: a Pakistani activist for female education and the youngestever Nobel Prize laureate. She is known mainly for human rights
advocacy for education and for women in her native Swat Valley in
the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of northwest Pakistan, where the
local Taliban had at times banned girls from attending school.
Yousafzai's advocacy has since grown into an international
movement.