Category Archives: Government Oppression

The situation in Syria is worse now than ever for women and girls, the United Nations Population Fund (U.N.P.F.) reported in May. This worrisome message has become a refrain over the past few years.

After over a decade of fighting, war has become the face of Syria. What began as a revolution for progress in 2011, similar to other countries participation in the Arab Spring, soon became a whirlwind of never-ending violence. Around 26.5 million people are in need of assistance, and an estimated 11.7 million remain internally displaced or refugees in neighbouring countries.

Beyond casualties and displacements, gender-specific issues are also on the rise, particularly pertaining to insufficient sexual and reproductive health (S.R.H.) services. According to U.N.P.F., there are 1.7 million women in need of S.R.H. services. As the conflict has sent a devastating majority into poverty, the number of children forced into marriages in exchange for money and relative protection has risen exponentially as well.

Overall, the conflict has put women and girls at increasing risk of sexual violence and exploitation: in urban areas, shelters, and refugee camps. In these settlements, women often fall victim to sexual exploitation and, having limited mobility, cannot escape who hurt them, Women of Influence explains in a 2021 article. Sexual violence, W.O.I. says, is a weapon of war, used by parties complicit in the Syrian conflict, [and] serving to demonstrate who holds more power.

[In] a country where the honour of a woman is considered sacred, rape is being used to cause unrest amongst the population, the W.O.I. article says. When a womans honour is violated, entire families experience stigma and social exclusion. Hence, in Syria, women are being killed for allegedly bringing dishonour upon their families.

Syrian womens human rights and basic needs are disproportionately neglected, without a doubt, and they, like all women, should be able to enjoy their rights as stated. What is happening in Syria is a tragedy, and the numbers above are a slap in the face of womens emancipation. However, it is critical to phrase such statements with utmost caution, because another number that has risen is the stereotypical perception of the Middle-Eastern woman that women in the Syrian refugee diaspora bear.

Those who are not present in the conflicted country receive their information from whats scattered through the media. Thus, journalists must take care not to feed such impressions with statistics and headlines that lack a broader context.

Western aid organizations and feminist organizations have a history of addressing humanitarian issues in the third world or developing countries from a narrating approach instead of a collaborating one. These groups often write about situations from a distant, third-party perspective that fits their ideas, as outsiders, of what the situation looks like on the ground, depriving locals of their agency and creating a phantasm that all third-world women suffer from the same oppression which the Western world can save and protect them from.

For example, the W.O.I. article. Although its statements about women being killed for bringing dishonour on their families are not entirely untrue, this phrasing both relies on and reinforces pre-existing stereotypes about Syria being a backwards, conservative, and unemancipated country.

The danger in stating that humanitarian responses to those affected by the war need to be altered to provide Syrian women and girls with better protection lies with the fact that it merely victimizes women. There is no space for active engagement with the women that are supposedly in need of protection.

Advocating for protecting and empowering Syrian women does not deal with the problem at its root. Why is sexual violence happening in Syria, and what are local actors and internal movements doing to take on the problem? Rather than trying to protect Syrian women as outsiders, humanitarian aid groups should ask these questions and provide local groups with the tools to realize their goals.

There is an abundance of articles like this one, and too few about Syrian womens achievements. However, Al Jazeeras 2021 article How Syrian Women are Fighting a War And Patriarchy is an example of the latter, focusing on Syrian women who have taken on active roles in the Revolution the women who Lina Sergie Attar, Syrian-American architect and co-founder of a refugee foundation, calls the invisible warriors of the war and how the fight has affected them. But it also discusses womens lack of voice. [W]ithout their voices being heard, the article asks, how will womens rights be protected in the development of their countrys future?

[The] main problem in Syria is that men are in control of everything, from civil society to humanitarian organizations, said Ghalia Rahal, a 47-year-old who converted her hair salon to a vocational training center for women in 2013.

Despite womens great participation in the Revolution, protests, organizations, and as individual agents of change, they are severely politically underrepresented. Amnesty International stated in 2019 that womens participation in political processes is fundamental for achieving gender equality and human rights for all. The international community, it said, must consult with women and ensure that they are represented effectively in peace talks, negotiations, the drafting of the constitution and other peace-building processes.

Besides the absence of institutionalized mechanisms to ensure the protection of women and vulnerable groups, the Womens International League for Peace and Freedom (W.I.L.P.F.) also notes the very limited representation of women in Syrian institutions and media. The W.I.L.P.F., a non-violent movement that works closely with local and involved partners, launched the Feminist Movement for Change together with 24 Syrian organizations in 2017. (The project re-launched in 2021.) They are focused on fitting Syrian womens needs to their beliefs, de-victimizing them, re-defining them from woman- or wife-status, and generally providing an alternative look at a justice process.

Syrian women are individuals, not a monolith, just like women from any other arbitrary country. And not every woman aspires to a Westernized ideal of emancipation. Being the voice that changes a country, filling a government chair, or breaking with traditional gender roles are not the only ways to be empowered. Empowerment is the freedom to choose ones own path regardless of what others believe that path should look like.

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Risks For Syrian Women And Girls Increase And So Do The Stereotypes - The Organization for World Peace

Confronting injustice

For decades, Indigenous Peoples, people of colour and their allies have been fighting environmental racism, and highlighting its many injustices. Today, a new report from Greenpeace and the Runnymede Trust gathers these stories and struggles together. It should be a rallying point for those already working on racial justice issues, and a call for the wider environmental movement to join them.

The report cites examples of environmental racism from all over the world, but they all connect back to the UK. Its crucial to understand our countrys central role in these injustices. The UK is the birthplace of the industrial revolution, a global financial hub, and an imperial power that has invaded or colonised practically every country on earth. This ubiquity has left our fingerprints on all the overlapping crises of our age, and gives us a special responsibility for how they play out. The centuries of exploitation and discrimination is behind the environmental inequalities that split our world apart today.

People of colour across the globe are disproportionately losing their lives and livelihoods as a result of the environmental emergency. These impacts fall heaviest on those who did the least to cause them and have the least resources to be able to cope with it. Much of the carbon from fossil fuels in the atmosphere today came from Europe, the US and other wealthy countries in the global north, yet nearly all the countries most impacted by the climate crisis are in the global South.

Beating an indigo vat by hand, Allahabad, India, 1877, by French photographer Oscar Mallitte. In the early 19th century, British colonisers exploited people, land and resources, establishing indigo plantations across India to farm and process this highly profitable crop. The demand for the blue dye in Europe gave it a status similar to commodities like tea, coffee, silk, and gold. SSPL/Getty Images

These injustices, and the exploitative relationships that underpin them, are the legacy of colonialism. The British empire, and the corporations it sponsored, raked in enormous riches from slavery, cheap labour and the plunder of raw materials worth trillions of dollars. Thanks to technological advantages and colonial oppression, rich countries have squeezed huge profits out of the fossil fuel economy while setting the globe on a path of dependence on fossil fuels and causing much of the associated emissions, leaving the global South poorer and more exposed to the environmental emergency as a result.

The treatment of entire groups of people as inferior or less deserving of a decent life is still allowing governments and industry to dump environmental impacts on to the global South. Since the heaviest impacts of the climate crisis fall onto poorer, less powerful countries, fossil fuel giants and governments in the global North feel less pressure to get to grips with the problem. Since the UKs plastic waste is shipped off to some of these same countries, the plastic industry and our government can get away with not tackling our plastic problem at the source. And since its mostly Indigenous peoples and local in the global South that suffer from the destruction of the worlds rainforests to produce palm oil, meat or timber, companies and governments can carry on chopping down this climate-critical ecosystems with near impunity.

Fridays for the future MAPA (Most Affected People and Areas) activists, calling on the UK Government and world leaders to stop failing us on the climate crisis, outside the 26th UN Climate Change Conference, (COP26), in Glasgow, UK, November 2021. Activists (from left) are Farzana Faruck (Bangladesh), Maria Reyes (Mexico) Jakapita Faith Kandanda (Namibia), Edwin Moses Namakanga (Uganda). Their placards read Pay your climate debt, Climate reparations, Denial is not a policy! and You cant cheat nature. Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert / Greenpeace

As it will be clear by now, these are huge and complex issues. Theres no single magic bullet that will solve them all at one stroke. But recognising these inequalities and where they come from has to be the first step towards putting them right.

These are some of the things that need to happen if we are to tackle the fundamental injustice at the heart of the nature and climate crisis:

The fight for the environment is a fight for equality and justice. And the simple truth is that environmentalism that excludes people of colour and other marginalised groups can never win. It will miss out on a wealth of knowledge modern and traditional on how people can live well with nature. But just as importantly, it will miss out on the energy of those with the biggest stake in its success. The environment connects to everything. Its time environmentalism did too.

Read the full report

Find out more about Dr Mya-Rose Craig on Birdgirl. Guest authors work with us to share their personal experiences and perspectives, but views in guest articles arent necessarily those of Greenpeace.

The rest is here:

Why we can't tackle the environmental emergency without tackling racism - Greenpeace UK

Recently, I got a barrage of the same text message. The New York Times wrote about Haiti and it was important because The New York Times wrote about it.

The Timespublisheda lengthy article about the history of Haiti and its interaction (read: abuse) with the rest of the world on May 20, 2022. The article was long and interesting; It was well-researched. It was thoughtful, it was objective and it was careful.

It was also not new.

The article itself discusses the double debt and ransom placed upon post-colonial Haiti after their victory of freedom over the French. It covers Haitis dictators, the occupation by the United States and the democratic election of Jean Bertrand Aristide.

One of the authors, Catherine Porter, appeared on The Dailywhere she further explored the research and answered any questions that may have been lingering.

During her appearance on The Daily, one of the quotes that stood out the most is what she had to say about when you ask people about Haitis poverty.

The answer you normally get when you ask people this deeper why is corruption. Porter asserts.

I wonder if the people Ms. Porter was referring to included Haitians. Im almost certain it did not. Seemingly small, referring to the mainstream (read: white) as the normative is dangerous and it is violent. You seldom meet a Haitian person in the United States that does not know this. While anecdotal, Ive heard several times from strangers, often when I point out Haitians contribution to the world, that you never meet a Haitian that wont tell you about the history (and thereby present-day) of Haiti. Its commonplace. Perhaps this was Ms. Porters experience, but to position it as the norm is to emphasize ones own privilege and existence.

Suggesting theyve broken a case in the why of Haitis poverty is excruciatingly oblivious and purposely naive.

Its a fair point to make that many folks blame the poverty in Haiti on corruption amongst government officials. The reference in both the interview and the article requires more attention.

Story continues

The thing about corruption is it seldom lives in a silo. There is an assumption that the corruption that exists in Haiti is shouldered by the Haitian government. It is. Though, it is encouraged and perpetuated by world powers, including the United States. The Times does mention the external participation in the ousting of Aristide. But it does not discuss the decades and decades of U.S. participation in Haitian politics, their support of the Duvalier dictatorship, their creation of puppet governments and the overall perpetuation of the idea that Haiti just cant seem to get it together. The United States has groomed future leaders of Haiti and then wagged its finger at them once theyve completed their bidding.

This superficial mention of corruption with little to no background, foundation and analysis leaves the reader believing that corruption is an open and closed case that it is something that we can continue to blame.

Im not a hater. Im happy that the New York Times has presented this information to a different audience. I wrote my Masters thesis about traditional and neo-colonial relationships with Haiti, much of which included the information shared in the article. I dont believe many have two years to research and read about the history of Haiti, but I know that the information exists.

And this is the unfairness in their argument. The article perpetuates what people of color continue to fight against: white people saying something matters more than when Black people say it.

When it comes to international development work and its coverage, its an unfortunate commonplace. White privilege envelopes the researchers, writers and podcast hosts in a shroud of gold, their assertions are worthy of attention. And if they say its new information, then it must be.

The story is about access, white privilege and about the power to change a narrative when one feels like it. The article and the platform it appears on present a consistent, frightful juxtaposition: liberation can only be achieved should white people decide so. This information is deeply connected to liberation, as it can be monetized, celebrated and, in this case, believed. It disavows the homework assignments and the arguments over dinner and, what Haitians love the most, the political conversations over dominoes, fritay, at barbershops or during Sunday exchanges.

Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and Founder of The Haitian Times,Garry Pierre-Pierre,respondedto the article thoughtfully, suggesting it doesnt matter who gets the credit. I respectfully disagree. Though he did make me think twice.

The thing about The New York Times article is that it reinforces an uncomfortable truth: the only things that matter are the things that come out of the mouth of white people; Black history isnt interesting or titillating or oppressive until white people say so. And when white people take credit for work that has already been done many times over, it continues this narrative that they are the intellect, the bringer of truths, the ones worthy of trust.

The New York Times says that this work hadnt been done before, that the numbers were buried, that no one knows this history. The New York Times ignores the stories Haitians have been telling their children for generations; these sentences allude to an idea that the research hadnt been done previously. Its tacit erasure.

I wonder if the New York Times considered the Haitian academics. (A few contemporary ones were included in writing the article, while there were Haitians whose opinions were included.) Ms. Porter also made sure to point out that they used a number of Haitian and Haitian American translators on the ground in Haiti and Florida. TheHaitian Timeshosted the NYT authors on a panel on June 20, where I asked this question and another about the role of white privilege in their telling of Haitis story. Time ran out before it got to be answered.

The fact that one white woman, two white men and a woman from East Africa got to tell the story of Haiti as the experts is an indication of a racism that may never cease. Again, this is not hate. This is an observation of the systems that maintain oppression.

And that is my issue. White supremacy isnt the authors fault, but they surely participate and benefit from it.

____

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Continued here:

A NYT Article About Haiti Is Further Proof That Black History Only Matters When White People Tell It - Yahoo News

COLOMBO (News 1st); Oppositionn Leader Sajith Premadasa says that the Government has initiated a wave of oppression against the people amidst the continued calls for both the Prime Minister and the President to resign.

He says that the wave of oppression with guns and other arms has been initiated against unarmed protestors.

While condemning the oppressive measures which are being taken by the Government, the Opposition Leader demanded whether the President actually resigned or whether he simply paused for a moment.

Therefore, he emphasizes that the current administration, which continues to oppress the people, should resign, without dragging the country into a much worse situaton, and stated that they cannot continue to swear into positions as they require.

Accordingly, he appealed the tri-forces and the Police forces of the country to think of the unarmed protestors, and to not to become tools of the President and the Prime Minister, and to not to proceed to harm any protestors in the process.

He also added that the Party Leaders meeting which was supposed to be held today, was cancelled, and demanded whether the Parliament is not taking any steps to appoint a new President in the near future, as previously planned.

The Opposition Leader also requested the protestors to not to cause harm to any public property, and to peacefully continue their dissent.

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Govt initiated a wave of oppression - Newsfirst.lk

HAVANA -- A year ago, thousands of people filled Cuba's streets and public squares in the country's largest outpouring of protest in decades.

On Monday's anniversary, its main cities looked relatively normal students sat in schools and people went to work, and as usual there were long lines of people looking for food or waiting for a bus as the island faces shortages in an economic crisis.

Hundreds were arrested during the unrest last July, and some have been sentenced to up to 25 years in prison. That is about all the two sides agree on.

Critics of the government said the events showed Cubans fighting against oppression. The authorities portrayed it as a moment when Cuba avoided a soft coup fomented by the U.S.

On July 11 and 12, 2021, protesters took to the streets to vent their frustrations over shortages, long lines and a lack of political options. Some were drawn to the marches by calls on social media, while others joined in spontaneously when marchers passed by.

The economy is still in crisis, with rising prices for what goods are available, and there has been a spike in migration to the U.S.

Cuba's economy also remains hobbled by U.S. sanctions. Despite his promises while campaigning to end the sanctions, President Joe Biden has only eased some, including allowing U.S. residents to send more money to Cuban relatives.

Since the protests, relations between the two countries have been tense.

In a message to Cubans on Monday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that Americans watched with admiration on July 11, 2021, as tens of thousands of you took to the streets to raise your voices for human rights, fundamental freedoms and a better life. He said the U.S. stand with the marchers.

Cuba's government offered a different take.

"There was vandalism, some with cruelty and tremendous belligerence, Cuban President Miguel Daz-Canel said in comments published in official media Monday. If there's anything to celebrate it is the victory of the Cuban people, of the Cuban revolution, before the attempts of making (the protests) into a soft coup."

Responding to Blinken, Foreign Minister Bruno Rodrguez said his message was a confirmation of the direct involvement of the U.S. government in attempts to subvert order and peace in Cuba.

Authorities havent said how many people were arrested during the protests, but an independent organization formed to track the cases, Justice 11J, has counted more than 1,400. In June, Cuba's prosecutors office said courts had imposed sentences on 488 protesters, ranging up to 25 years in prison.

The government insists protesters were not arrested for political reasons but for violating laws against public disorder, vandalism or sedition. It says many acted at the instigation of U.S.-based opposition groups using social media to attack Cuba's communist system.

Saily Nez's husband, Maikel Puig, was among the protesters. He has been sentenced to 20 years in prison.

More than a sad day, I feel proud that my brave (husband) was there on the streets, Nez said on her Twitter account Monday.

Read the rest here:

On protest anniversary, Cuba, US far apart on what happened - ABC News

For the first time, a United Nations committee focused on addressing torture will scrutinize the actions of the Palestinian Authority and its treatment of those under its care.

The U.N. Committee against Torture (CAT) a subsidiary of the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) convenes today in Geneva, where it will investigate instances of enforced disappearances, violent interrogations and the holding of the remains of Israeli soldiers, among other issues. In addition to investigating the Palestinian Authority, the committee will also probe Botswana, Nicaragua and the United Arab Emirates.

CAT, which holds broad powers to probe incidents of torture and cruel treatment, is expected to review reports submitted by American, Palestinian and Israeli NGOs, including Human Rights Watch, the Palestinian Coalition Against Torture, the Hebrew University of Jerusalems Clinic on International Human Rights and others.

We welcome the fact that for the first time ever the Palestinian Authority will come under scrutiny at the United Nations for its record on torture, Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, an independent non-governmental organization based in Geneva, told Jewish Insider.

In preparation for the session and in accordance with the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (from which CAT derives its authority), the Palestinian Authority (PA) was required to submit a report of its current adherence to the convention.

The PA begins its report by reiterating its territorial claim to the Gaza Strip, with the caveat that it is not responsible for the actions of the Hamas-led government that controls the area. The Gaza Strip is legally subject to the authority of the State of Palestine and the actions taken by Hamas there since [2007] are inadmissible and illegal in the eyes of the Government of the State of Palestine, the report reads.

In response to the claim, Joe Truzman, research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told JI, Hamas rules Gaza, thats pretty much it. He continued, Even though [Palestinian Authority officials] say Gaza is theirs, I think they just they say it because they want to make it appear that they have power in the enclave, but they dont they barely do.

A July 5 meeting between PA President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas senior political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Algeria, Truzman suggested, might indicate attempts at reconciliation. However, he said, Theres still a long way to go. Theres a lot of grievances and a lot of obstacles to overcome before that even happens. There are efforts there, but its not happening anytime soon.

As U.N. Watch notes in its alternative report on torture in the Palestinian state which CAT will also consider aside from initially placing blame for Gazas dire economic problems upon Hamas, the Palestinian report makes no mention of the treatment by Hamas or the PA of those within its territory, including Gaza. Instead, the Palestinian report is focused largely on calling out Israel for ill treatment. The report also omits Palestinian human rights abuses, such as the PAs 2021 assassination of Palestinian human rights activist Nizar Banat.

Regrettably, the Palestinians own report to the U.N. committee seeks to waste its time by attacking Israel, omitting critical information about their own record, when the review is supposed to be about the Palestinians, said Neuer. This is a pattern at the U.N. whenever the Palestinians are reviewed, they try to deflect attention from their systematic abuse and oppression of their own people, and their antisemitic policies and practices targeting Israeli Jews.

Asked about the potential for future investigations of Palestinian human rights abuses, Truzman said, Theres a huge lack of detail and information on Palestinian abuses. I still havent figured out why. Now, some say, Oh, its because the U.N. has an anti-Israel agenda, some say, []theyre just being lazy. Its tough to say but its just [that] the U.N. has a track record of not doing I think their due diligence when it comes to the Palestinian side of the conflict and their potential abuses. So Im not hopeful to see more of it, just because of their history.

The PA report was initially due in 2015, but was not submitted until 2019 a delay not addressed in the report.

CAT works closely with the Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (SPT), which has a mandate to investigate torture and abuses of human or civil rights on the ground. Because the PA is a party to the Optional Protocol, SPT will have the authority to investigate reports of torture and other abuses on the ground.

CATs concluding observations, in which they will outline their recommendations for reform, are expected to be released on or about July 29.

Read more:

UN to review reports of torture carried out by the Palestinian government - Jewish Insider

Does government intervention create its own externalities (or neighborhood effects)? Many economists think so and the question appears especially important in the current storm of dirigisme. Sixty years ago, Milton Friedman defended the idea in his influential book Capitalism and Freedom. A mainstream neoclassical economist and moderate classical liberal, Friedman wrote (p. 32):

Our principles offer no hard and fast line how far it is appropriate to use government to accomplish jointly what is difficult or impossible for us to accomplish separately through strictly voluntary exchange. In any particular case of proposed intervention, we must make up a balance sheet, listing separately the advantages and disadvantages. Our principles tell us what items to put on one side and what items on the other and they give us some basis for attaching importance to the different items. In particular, we shall always want to enter on the liability side of any proposed government intervention, its neighborhood effects in threatening freedom, and give this effect considerable weight. Just how much weight to give to it, as to other items, depends upon the circumstances. If, for example, existing government intervention is minor, we shall attach a smaller weight to the negative effects of additional government intervention.

This is an important reason why many earlier liberals, like Henry Simons, writing at t time when government was small by todays standards, were willing to have government undertake activities that todays liberals would not accept now that government has become so overgrown.

Technically, externalities are usually modelled as non-intentional effects of activities carried on for other purposes. Otherwise, everything that imposes indirect costs or benefits on somebody would be an externality; pretty much all activities would fall in that category. It seems to follow that the typical government intervention should not count as a positive or negative externality, because it is explicitly designed to create benefits for some groups and impose corresponding costs on others. However, if it also has indirect consequences on everybodys liberty, it can be considered as creating freedom externalities, as Friedman suggests. (In this perspective, a government intervention whose purpose is to increase government power and to decrease individual liberty would not generate freedom externalities, but only direct freedom costs.)

Does growing government intervention, besides increasing freedom externalities, also increase their rate of increase, as the Friedman criterion above seems to say? For any individual, the cost of a given intervention in terms of his own individual liberty will conceivably be larger the higher is the starting level of government intervention and power. One reason would be that, at higher thresholds of power, the more likely an additional intervention will combine with existing controls to give irresistible power to government and seriously undermine the liberty of the subject (or citizen). If government surveillance is widespread, for example, the more likely a new public morality or lifestyle law can be used to harass unpopular minorities. Another reason is simply that, as individual liberty decreases, the more an individual will find the remainder valuable.

Note how in other to avoid the serious problem of cost-benefit analysiswhich is that no scientific basis exists for weighing the benefits of some individuals against the costs imposed on otherwe should formulate the problem of freedom externalities la James Buchanan: each individual estimates his own cost and benefit from a given intervention and can be presumed to consent to it only if, for him, the latter is larger than the former. The only assumption made here is that, everything else equal, no individual wants to be more oppressed; oppression is a cost, not a beneficial or neutral condition. If some individuals like to be slaves for the mere pleasure of servitude, freedom externalities are not unambiguously positive or negative. The problem then becomes more complicated.

Considering only negative freedom externalities, Friedmans warning is valid: the higher the level of government intervention, the larger are the negative freedom externalities of any new proposed intervention. I suggest that it is not easy today to find any new government interventionor at least any net interventionthat would survive the Friedman criterion.

See the article here:

Government Externalities and the Friedman Criterion - Econlib

The Kansas Reflector welcomes opinion pieces from writers who share our goal of widening the conversation about how public policies affect the day-to-day lives of people throughout our state. Sharon Brett is legal director at the ACLU of Kansas.

Two decisions issued by the U.S. Supreme Court last month one overturning Roe v. Wade and the other allowing for religious prayer at public school sporting events signal an alarming shift toward allowing personal religious beliefs to dominate public policy.

After reading the decisions in Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization and Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, the message from the Supreme Court was clear: Anyone who believes in religious liberty should be alarmed.

The debate about religious liberty and abortion access will collide this summer when Kansas becomes the first state to vote on the right to abortion health care in a post-Roe world.

As a civil rights attorney, I believe deeply in the right of people to practice their religion. But I believe just as deeply in the right of people to live free from any government entanglement with religion.

I am also Jewish. This means that when the government uses religion (in this case, a narrow, extremely conservative Christian worldview) to justify policy, it doesnt always line up with the religion I and millions of others practice. This is all the more reason to keep religion completely out of government: Religion is complex and nuanced, and allowing it to animate laws particularly laws that infringe on peoples rights risks the unintended oppression of non-dominant religions.

Dobbs and Kennedy were issued back to back, and although they deal with different areas of the law, when read together their message is clear. Religious freedom for non-Christian people hangs in the balance.

Lets start with Dobbs. By overturning 50-year-old precedent, the Supreme Court granted license to conservative state legislatures to pursue abortion bans in all circumstances. Anti-choice advocates often have used religion as a justification for enacting restrictive measures that remove health care decision-making authority from pregnant people. Dobbs opened the floodgates for such laws.

Then came Kennedy, in which the court held that the coach of a public high school football team could lead his team in Christian prayer on the field at the end of games. The court did not concern itself with the discomfort non-Christian athletes might feel, or the signal such prayer would send about the school districts endorsement or favoritism of one religion over another. In doing so, as Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in her dissent, the court set our country on a perilous path toward entangling states with religion, which, Is no victory for religious liberty.

Most voters would not want school districts pressuring their children to pray with a coach who practiced a religion different from their own at the end of a football game. And most voters wouldnt want lawmakers to interfere with their personal health care decisions, particularly when those decisions are animated by the lawmakers religious faith.

But the signal from the court at the end of this years term was that both of these things are perfectly fine.

On Aug. 2, Kansas voters will decide on a constitutional amendment that would fundamentally alter our constitutional landscape and, in the wake of Dobbs, potentially lead to legislation next session outlawing abortion in all circumstances. These laws would apply to all Kansans, regardless of their religious beliefs.

My faith Judaism doesnt align with the religious rights view on abortion. Jewish teachings, including from the Talmud (a key text in interpreting Jewish law), and the Mishnah (a book of Jewish legal theory) clearly indicate that abortion is permitted indeed, required when the life of the mother is at risk.

My faith Judaism doesnt align with the religious rights view on abortion. Jewish teachings, including from the Talmud (a key text in interpreting Jewish law), and the Mishnah (a book of Jewish legal theory) clearly indicate that abortion is permitted indeed, required when the life of the mother is at risk.

Even the Orthodox Union, representing a decidedly more conservative branch of the Jewish faith, put out a statement in May that Jewish law prioritizes the life of the pregnant mother over the life of the fetus such that where the pregnancy critically endangers the physical health or mental health of the mother, an abortion may be authorized, if not mandated, by halacha (Jewish law) and should be available to all women irrespective of their economic status.

In my religion, personhood belongs to the person bearing the child, first and foremost; and only after that is secure do rights convey to the fetus. But abortion laws that have begun passing in states like Oklahoma and Texas and which would undoubtedly come to Kansas, if the constitutional amendment passes run contrary to this belief.

So the decision in Dobbs, although not explicitly about freedom of religion, serves to foreclose my ability to make health care decisions in a way that is consistent with religious liberty. In that way, overturning Roe sets us down the same perilous path towards dismantling the separation of church and state as the courts decision in Kennedy.

As a civil rights lawyer; as a Jewish woman; and perhaps most importantly, as the mother of two young children who I hope to raise in a state (and a world) where their religious rights are as respected as much as anyone elses, I realize how much is at stake Aug. 2.

Through its opinion section, the Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.

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With abortion rights at stake across US and Kansas, whose religious freedom do we value? - Kansas Reflector

The French Revolution (1789-1799) lasted until the ascent of Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821). Years of medieval oppression and financial mismanagement led the French people to want changes in politics and institutions. They overthrew the monarchy and took charge of the government. King Louis XVI tried to use his absolute power to improve the life of his people, reform the monarchy, the government, and the society. Doing this left the country on the verge of bankruptcy.

Merchants, manufacturers, and professionals were excluded from political power. Two decades of poor harvests, drought, and disease led to economic crisis. Peasants and the poor turned against the monarchy. Intellectuals wanted societal reforms to bring greater equality and equity.

The trigger to revolution? The controller general of finances, Charles-Alexandre de Calonne, increased taxes. Tempers flared.

Louis called for a meeting on May 5, 1789, of Frances clergy, nobility, and middle class. Sessions stalled on June 17. On July 14 a mob attacked the Bastille for weapons and gunpowder starting the French Revolution. Peasants attacked the homes of the elites. The government abolished feudalism on August 4. On August 26 it adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen proclaiming liberty, equality, freedom of speech, popular sovereignty, and representative government. The first constitution was adopted on September 3, 1791 but was attacked by radical leaders as neither including a true republic, nor holding the king accountable. In October 1789, Louis, his family and others were taken from Versailles to a prison in Paris.

The period from 1793 to 1794, known as the Reign of Terror was the darkest period of the revolution.

Maximilien de Robespierre was an official representing the Jacobin Party and a principal planner of the Reign of Terror. He led the National Convention and the Committee of Public Safety. He passed laws that said anyone suspected of treason could be arrested and executed by guillotine. Thousands of people were executed. On January 21, 1793, Louis was condemned to death for high treason and crimes against the state and sent to the guillotine. His wife, Marie-Antoinette, was hated by commoners for her extravagance and was decapitated nine months later.

There were harsh wars with several European nations. In June of that year the Jacobins secured a majority of the National Convention. They established a new calendar and eradicated Christianity as a controlling agent of the country. Ironically, in July 1794 Robespierre was accused of treason and executed. The National Convention approved a new constitution with a bicameral government on August 22, 1795. Unfortunately, the new government was riddled with corruption. Young General Bonaparte took charge of the Army which staged a coup dtat on November 9, 1799, beginning the Napoleonic era and ending the French Revolution.

Today we face similar conditions with different twists. In 2020, U.S. voters cast aside DonnyT, who thought himself a king. He thought he had absolute power to make himself ever richer and punish those who opposed him. (The House Select Committee on January 6 Attack has revealed facts about his complicity.)

The COVID pandemic has brought death to over one million Americans. Climate change is real and is causing expanding food shortages. Instead of extending rights, the GOP and super majority on the Supreme Court have curtailed womens rights, and if left in power will prevent birth control, same sex marriage, medical aid for transgenders, and who knows what else (ask Clarence Thomas if biracial marriage will become forbidden). There have been over 300 mass shootings so far in 2022 in the United States. As for wars, we have a bin full. We must support Ukraine and Taiwan. Democracy must not change to totalitarianism. Search for facts and determine truth.

Ed Fisher writes a weekly column for the Morning Sun.

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Column: Comparing the French Revolution with the US today - The Morning Sun

KRAKOW, Poland

Reproductive-rights activists in Poland, where abortion laws are among Europes strictest, have a stark message for their American counterparts: Its going to be a long struggle. And some people are going to die unnecessarily.

In this predominantly Roman Catholic country on Europes eastern edge, where a hard-right ruling party holds sway, legal prohibitions on abortion are strikingly similar to those in U.S. states that have embraced the Supreme Courts dramatic unraveling of half a century of American abortion rights.

That hasnt always been the case in Poland. Decades ago, especially in the 1970s, when much of Europe had stricter abortion laws, the procedures availability made this nation a destination for those seeking to end unwanted pregnancies.

After the country shook off Communist rule in the 1990s, however, an intense campaign by religious authorities Pope John Paul II was born 30 miles from this southern city of cathedrals, crucifixes and stained glass yielded a swift reversal of most abortion rights.

But even here sentiments are shifting.

We very much want this child, said Basia, a heavily pregnant 24-year-old strolling on a cloudy day with her husband beside a verdant park on Krakows outskirts. But she did not want her full name used, because she knew that what she said next would be anathema to many close relatives.

If she had accidentally become pregnant while her husband was finishing up his graduate degree and the two were scraping by on her meager salary, she said, she would likely have sought an abortion. He nodded in sober agreement.

Womens rights activists hold a sign reading You have blood on your hands near dummies in the street to signify women who are suffering because of Polands restrictive abortion law and a proposal for further restrictions, during a demonstration in front of parliament in Warsaw on Nov. 30, 2021.

(Czarek Sokolowski/Associated Press)

The fight to outlaw abortion fits neatly with the conservative-nationalist agenda of the Law and Justice Party, which took power in 2015. Since then, it has waged what critics say is a broad assault on the rule of law and Polands independent judiciary, drawing strength from a traditionalist constituency whose worldview would not be out of step with that in much of red-state America.

During the partys time in power, restrictions inexorably tightened, and by 2021, the ban had been broadened to scrap a final major exemption: cases of confirmed fetal abnormalities. Today, many Polish citizens and some Ukrainian refugees who have taken shelter here routinely travel elsewhere, or obtain abortion pills, often from abroad, to end unwanted pregnancies.

The increasingly severe restrictions at home, however, have given rise to a small-scale but horrifying phenomenon: patients who suffer late-term pregnancy complications being denied lifesaving care if a fetal heartbeat can still be detected.

Izabela was dying, said Jolanta Budzowska, a personal-injury attorney based in Krakow. She represents the family of Izabela Sajbor, a 30-year-old hairdresser whose death is now one of at least three maternal fatalities blamed by abortion-rights advocates on restrictive laws and the medical systems overly zealous response to them.

Already the mother of a young daughter, Sajbor had learned in the second trimester of a wanted pregnancy that the fetus she was carrying had severe defects, her family said. The complication, a chromosomal abnormality known as Edwards syndrome, generally results in fetal death, or only brief survival for a baby carried to full term.

Sajbor was hospitalized in September 2021, after her water broke prematurely. Alone in the hospital due to COVID-19 restrictions in place at the time, she declared, in her final agonizing hours, that the countrys abortion measures reduced women to incubators.

In frantic texts she sent to her mother and husband, she wrote that doctors only real concern seemed to be the detection of a fetal heartbeat not her own worsening state.

Polish abortion law does allow for exceptions to the ban if the womans life or health is in danger. But Budzowska says the chilling effect of restrictions, and ambiguities in legal interpretation, mean some medical professionals delay or reject intervention even when it is clear the woman is in peril.

In the case of Izabela, abortion was theoretically permissible, said Budzowska. But even once Sajbor had developed sepsis, a life-threatening reaction to infection, doctors assumed that the fetus would die on its own, and they would not have to explain about performing an abortion or terminating a live pregnancy, the lawyer said.

In Ireland, the similarly harrowing death of 31-year-old Savita Halappanavar in 2012 galvanized the legalization of abortion to protect the womans life; in 2018, first-trimester abortions became legal after a referendum repealed a constitutional ban.

Across the European Union, abortion access in some form is the general norm, with Poland and Malta as the blocs main outliers. Last week, the European Parliament voted in favor of a resolution calling for safe and legal abortion to be included in the EUs charter of fundamental rights. It also condemned the U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

Liberalization efforts in Poland have repeatedly been stymied, even though the near-ban on abortion set off some of the biggest street protests of the post-Communist era. From 2016 onward, demonstrators by the thousands wielded black umbrellas, even on clear days, as a symbol of what they called the governments oppression and intrusion into private lives.

People place candles in tribute in Warsaw on Nov. 1, 2021, to a woman who died late in her pregnancy.

(Czarek Sokolowski/Associated Press)

Although Polish public sentiment appears mixed about the degree of restrictions that should remain in place, opinion polls point to solid majority backing for legal abortion under at least some circumstances.

The number of people supporting a more progressive law is increasing, said Kamila Ferenc of the Federation for Women and Family Planning, a Warsaw-based advocacy group known as FEDERA.

But so far, public opinion alone has not been sufficient to bring about change. The final significant exemptions to the abortion ban were scrapped by Polands highest court, which is controlled by judges loyal to Law and Justice. The conservative party is also the largest in Parliament, which last month rejected a measure that would have allowed terminations during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.

As for any external pressure on Poland, the war in Ukraine is seen as giving the ruling party greater leverage in its dealings with the EU. Poland, a staunch supporter of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskys government, has played a key role in helping arm Ukraine, and has taken in millions of Ukrainian refugees.

In the meantime, recent years have seen a pattern ominously familiar to abortion-rights advocates in the United States: a growing campaign to criminalize assistance to those seeking abortion. Activists can face prison for providing abortion pills to those in need.

One such activist, Justyna Wydrzynska, is currently on trial and scheduled to appear in court this week. She fears that authorities may seek to make an example of her; if convicted, she could be jailed for three years, or even longer. That didnt keep her from acknowledging that in 2020, she tried to send pills to someone who begged her for help, under circumstances that were wrenchingly familiar.

That same thing had happened to me, said Wydrzynska, 47, a mother of three who escaped what she described as an abusive relationship with a man who tried to force her to go through with an unwanted pregnancy. She defied him and obtained an abortion; three years later, in 2009, she managed to divorce.

I knew the risks; still, I wanted to help, she said. Now, as part of a pan-European network called Abortion Without Borders, Wydrzynska confines her efforts to counseling Polish women about where to obtain pills and how to use them not providing them directly.

The turmoil has served only to heighten the determination of groups fighting to seal off what they consider to be remaining loopholes in Polish abortion ban. Chief among them is the Catholic organization Ordo Iuris, which lobbied hard for the end of the exemption over fetal abnormalities.

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Katarzyna Gesiak, who directs the groups Center for Medical Law and Bioethics, said allowing for such exceptions amounted to eugenics, and denied that the law as it stands strips women of necessary medical protections.

We were very happy about this judgment; that was the main issue that we wanted changed, she said. But Gesiak was critical of prosecutors she said were insufficiently rigorous in pursuing those who help women obtain medication abortions.

They dont want to chase these crimes, she said.

In the face of calls for an even harsher judicial environment, Polish abortion-rights advocates say their struggle is a lonely one at times, but that they are bolstered by their European partnerships.

That sense of sympathy and solidarity with Polish counterparts now extends across the Atlantic as well, said Irene Donadio of International Planned Parenthood Federations European network.

Watching what is happening in a country that has stood for freedom the United States is a shock to see, said Donadio, who, along with other advocates, views abortion access as a basic human right.

But what has inspired me in Poland is the fight of citizens, when theyre so determined, she said. When it comes to protecting rights, we can all learn from one another.

Excerpt from:

Poland's abortion near-ban offers grim glimpse of US future - Los Angeles Times