International Women’s Day

International Women’s Day is a great opportunity to celebrate so many amazing women who have made a difference to our world. And, for me, to remember with gratitude the many incredible women I have had the privilege to know.

It is also an opportunity to recognise the ongoing violence and abuse that affects so many women and girls across the world.

The statistics are horrific.

But even more salutary are the individual stories that lie behind those statistics – salutary not just because of the appalling circumstances so many women and girls have to live with, but also because of the amazing courage, resilience and hope that they embody.

Today also marks one month till our 2018 BASPCAN international child protection congress. And, as it approaches, I am looking forward to it more and more. And not least because of some of the incredible women whom we have lined up as speakers.

People like:

Elaine Storkey, former president of Tearfund, and long-standing campaigner for women’s rights, who has powerfully documented the reality of violence against women and girls in her book, Scars across Humanity

Clare Shaw, our poet in residence, whose poems reflect the depth of expertise held by someone who has walked with trauma

Siobhan Beckwith, whose talk, Hearts in the Goldfish Bowl, draws on her experience coming alongside mothers who have had to live apart from their children

Kish Bhatti-Sinclair, a reader in social policy and social work, who will be challenging us to rethink our own prejudices, discrimination and unconscious bias

Anne Fine, the celebrated author, whose novels capture, in a very human way, the reality of many children’s lives

There are so many more I could mention. And I’m really looking forward to meeting them and hearing what they have to say.

It is not too late to book, so do take a look at the programme on our congress website:

BASPCAN Congress 2018

February 6, 2018

#EndFGM

Women’s Rights

Today is the 100^th anniversary of women being granted the vote in the UK. In the past 100 years great strides have been made in women’s rights. And yet the reality is that both in the UK and across the world, women continue to experience inequality, discrimination, disenfranchisement and abuse. This is particularly prominent in the practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) – a cruel and abusive practice that leaves millions of girls and women scarred for life, both physically and emotionally.

The UN estimates that globally at least 200 million girls and women have undergone FGM, with rates as high as 97-98 percent in Guinea and Somalia. Most of those subjected to FGM are infants and young girls, who cannot possibly understand the awful trauma they are subjected to.

#EndFGM

The Sustainable Development Goals have called for an end to the practice by 2030. Tuesday 6^th February is International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation.

http://www.un.org/en/events/femalegenitalmutilationday/

We, in BASPCAN, are doing what we can to support national and international efforts to end FGM.

One of the keynote speakers at the BASPCAN international child protection congress, Elaine Storkey, has long campaigned for an end to FGM, addresses it in her book, Scars Across Humanity, and will be speaking on the topic as part of her closing keynote speech.

“Power, ideology and children at risk. How can we work together across cultural and faith divides to bring change?”

Children, especially girls, are at risk in cultures across the globe. In India, campaigners suggest that the population has lost 50 million girls over the last few decades, through infanticide and foeticide. Because of a marked preference for sons, the ratio of girls to boys in the population is also decreasing, rather than increasing, with affluence. In other countries, girls are subject to brutal female genital mutilation which leaves them with health problems for the rest of their lives. In the UK, 140,000 women currently live with its aftermath, and 10,000 girls this year may be in danger of being cut. Early enforced marriage, ‘honour’ attacks and trafficking for sexual exploitation all add to the list of atrocities which spell danger for young female populations.

This keynote suggests that behind these practices is not simply ‘culture’ but power, money, organized crime and lack of legal protection. Safeguarding is a global issue which needs to cross many boundaries. Progress is made when organisations and campaigners can work together, despite often deep-seated differences to address attitudes and develop strategies for change. We will explore how.

The issues faced in providing services locally for women and girls who may have undergone or be at risk of FGM are also the topic of a symposium by Dr Deborah Hodes and colleagues from University College London Hospitals.

Look out also for an interactive poster from Rasul Alis on ‘Why haven’t there been any prosecutions for FGM?’

The full congress programme, further information and registration details are available on our congress website:

https://www.baspcan.org.uk/congress-2018/

February 3, 2016February 3, 2016

Scars across humanity

This being the inaugural sexual abuse and sexual violence awareness week (#itsnotok), it seems pertinent that I should have just received my copy of Elaine Storkey’s new book, Scars across humanity: understanding and overcoming violence against women.

What a powerful, accessible, and challenging book.

Elaine Storkey, a feminist sociologist and theologian, has painstakingly explored the issues of violence against women across the globe, starting from the premise that violence against women is never acceptable.

“There is one universal truth, applicable to all countries, cultures and communities: violence against women is never acceptable, never excusable, never tolerable.”

– United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon

Elaine has somehow managed to combine the dispassionate objectivity of academic rigour with a very human compassion for those countless women who have suffered as victims and survivors of violence. Drawing on her encounters with women across the world in her role as President of the International Aid Agency, Tearfund, Elaine has carefully compiled both data and human stories from as far afield as the United Kingdom and Ecuador, the United States and Afghanistan, to provide a comprehensive overview of the nature and impact of violence.

But Elaine does more than simply record facts and stories on issues as diverse as rape, trafficking, selective abortion and female genital mutilation. Through the pages of the book, she offers a unique critique of both sociological and religious understanding of women and their place in society, and our cultures that permit such violence to occur.

“Rape travels alongside trafficking and prostitution as the exercise of power over vulnerability. And that power is often layered and multi-faceted, pitting the economic, political or social status of the perpetrator against the insignificance of the victim. When the unbalance is made even more uneven by the lack of safeguarding measures, or indifference from authorities, trying to bring redress can simply feel like a task too overwhelming, and impossible to achieve.”

– Elaine Storkey

The book makes for harrowing reading. But it is a book that is also full of hope, presenting a vision of a future in which violence against women is no longer accepted, stories of change and progress, and holding out the possibility of healing and restoration for those affected by such scars across humanity.

“And I have seen the ugly face of hatred

As it ripped my flesh and seared my soul

Mocking my refusal with malicious, brutal force.

But I am learning to erase that gaze

And seek instead the gentle face of love

Which stoops to soothe my fear with tender touch

And travels patiently in step with me

On the long journey towards peace.”

– Survivors’ workshop