Human rights denied by men and for which women fought

Farida Ahmed

Throughout history, women have struggled for their basic rights, paying a heavy price, but they understand that it is necessary, because without their personal struggle they will not get anything.

Driving a car .. 30 years of struggle
On November 6, 1990, 47 Saudi women drove through the streets of Riyadh, a country where women are banned from driving.

That collective rebellion was an attempt to impose a fait accompli, but soon the reaction came, they were all detained for one day after signing a pledge not to repeat their work elsewhere, and were dismissed after their parents were reprimanded by officials, according to the authors of the Nov. 6 book. Hessa Al-Sheikh and Aisha Al-Mana, one of the leaders of that event.

The bold defiance of the laws confused officials, sending 40 police cars to stop the protest about half an hour after it began, the New York Times reported.

In September 2007, Saudi women activists filed a petition with more than 1,000 signatures of King Abdullah at the time, demanding that women be allowed to drive, but nothing happened.

In June 2011, in conjunction with the Arab Spring revolutions in the region, Saudi women felt that the opportunity had come.An activist Manal al-Sharif and others launched the 'I will drive myself' campaign on Facebook, documenting 70 cases of women's leadership in the country over two weeks.

The campaign ended four days later when the authorities arrested her and released her after six hours. She was re-arrested the next day on charges of inciting the leadership and agitating public opinion. The second time she spent 10 days in prison before being released on bail and prevented from driving or speaking to anyone. Informative.

Women did not feel the need to stop to protect themselves after repeated persecution campaigns, but increased insistence and awareness of their rights, and in 2013 and 2014 saw the height of awareness, in late 2013 dozens of people appeared behind the wheel and share photos and videos online despite the discouraged authorities, and in November November 2014 Activists Lujain al-Hathloul and Maysa al-Amoudi were detained for 73 days for terrorism-related offenses after attempting to drive to Saudi Arabia from the UAE.

What Jane Hathloul did was a big difference in the campaign and in the leadership of women in Saudi Arabia in general, and although she is still imprisoned, what she suffered with a large number of Saudi women and paid a high price is paying off, after King Salman's decision to make preparations to allow women to lead 2017, the decision came into force late last year.

Sanitary pads .. A necessity not recognized by men
Most women around the world are suffering from high prices for sanitary napkins and treating them as luxury, prompting House Representative Stella Chrissy in 2015 to demand the abolition of VAT as a necessary commodity. It is a luxury, and this is no coincidence because it is the product of an unequal society, which does not treat women's concerns as much as men. ”However, parliament voted against“ abolition, ”according to the Huffington Post.

The MP's demand for the abolition of VAT came after several women's moves to provide sanitary napkins at affordable prices, especially as one in ten British girls is forced to use socks, newspaper or toilet paper for not being able to buy sanitary napkins, according to the BBC.

In 2014, a feminist activist, Laura Correton, filed a petition to abolish taxes on health products.After 320,000 British citizens signed the lawsuit, Prime Minister David Cameron promised to abolish taxes on women's health products, according to The Independent.

In America, "homeless" came out to explain their suffering during that period through a YouTube video of live testimonies, and New York City Councilwoman Julisa Ferreras in the same video that there are women are forced to sacrifice a whole day meal in order to buy sanitary pads because of the high prices. She adds that this issue must be part of health crises that need legislative intervention to resolve it.

Pressures by women make many states such as New York, Illinois and Connecticut abolish sales tax on menstrual products and tools, leading lawmakers in 24 other states to introduce bills to abolish the tax, according to the New York Times.

Campaigns by a group of women activists have had a major impact, leading to India announcing the abolition of a 12% tax on sanitary napkins in 2018. Canada abolished the sales tax on these products in 2015, and Australia followed suit with purely women's efforts.

Combating harassment by women
One in seven women in Georgia faced physical or sexual violence, and most survivors were unable to report for fear of being blamed.

The country, which saw only eight convictions for rape last year and five convictions before, according to Globalstazin, its parliament adopted a bill five months ago banning sexual harassment and imposing fines on those found guilty of unwanted sexual offenses, with a uniform definition of sexual harassment for the first time. Time as "undesirable behavior that aims or violates the dignity of the individual and creates an environment of intimidation or hostile degrading or abusive".

The announcement came after massive and persistent women's pressures, the most important of which was a women's march only two months before the law was passed, specifically on International Women's Day (March 8). Women took to the streets demanding an end to sexual violence and abuses against women. Law.