Friday Femme Fatale: Poverty, Stress and Sex Education

by Jen Nedeau

category: Friday Femme Fatale

Published April 10, 2009 @ 11:16PM PT

For this week's Friday Femme Fatale, I am going to start with Nicholas Kristof's Sunday column in the New York Times, which highlights the plight of women in Haiti who have limited access to contraception. The article, Pregnant (Again) and Poor, describes the fundamental reasons why it is so important that women not only have a choice, but also have control of their destiny:

There's simply no way to elevate Nahomie's family, and millions like it around the world, unless we help such women have fewer children. And yet family-planning programs have been shorn of resources and glamour for a generation now. 

As we watch the recession bring everyone deeper into poverty, it's problematic because women are becoming particularly vulnerable. The article, Tulsa's women's shelters full, says that the stress caused by the recession may be the reason these domestic violence shelters are at capacity:

National domestic violence hot lines are reporting a 20 percent increase in calls since the recession began, and numerous states have reported a sharp increase in domestic violence cases, many of them attributed to stress in relationships due to the economy, foreclosures and job loss.

In more pleasant news, Campus Progress interviews the feminist comedian, Sarah Haskins. Additionally, the McKinsey Quarterly publishes a compelling interview with Jacqueline Novogratz titled, Women and leadership: Learning from the social sector:

After many mishaps, including having them steal from me and having them not really know how to sell-I mean they would look down the whole time and have to explain to me that they were considered prostitutes by many; for them to go and look somebody directly in the eye and shake their hands was not exactly a Rwandan-woman kind of thing-so I had to learn to have the humility myself to really listen to their perspectives, and yet not stop there; to have the audaciousness to say, "It's a good starting point, but we want to get you to this other place."

The real lesson for me was how that dignity is so much more important to the human spirit than wealth. And that what these women, as all of us, needed was to know that we could cover basic needs, but to have the power of being able to say no to things that we didn't want, that we didn't want to do. And so leadership as a way of inspiring, listening, and letting people, you know, grow themselves in their own way.

And it was a small experience in some ways, and yet one that I think about all the time that taught me so much about listening and dignity-and laughter as a really, really key component. The more stressed I got, the less anything worked; and the more we could laugh, the more we got done. And so that was probably another really big lesson.

I'm a big optimist. I really believe in setting impossible goals and then making them possible. And I really love people-and I think people feel that from me. So it's probably that sometimes very confusing mix of optimism, idealism, but also high expectations, lots of discipline, and pragmatism.

Additionally, Europe steps up to the plate with it's plans for economy recovery by investing in women. Sylvia Ann Hewlett describes how Europe has embraced not only gender equality, but also gender as a strategic marketing approach:

In Europe, the global recession does not seem to be dampening interest in diversity. On the contrary, interest is ramping up. Which begs an intriguing question: does the continent's new enthusiasm for ensuring talented women are admitted into its highest ranks pose a risk for U.S.-based corporations?

There's no doubt that American organizations continue to value female talent - and remain in the lead when it comes to promoting women into senior roles. However, in recent months, many U.S. companies have cut spending on programs that ensure women continue their upward climb.

Finally, sex education gets another call to action from the Curvature, in addition to a bill being proposed by Health and Human Services that could fund comprehensive sex education.

Basically, we want teens to avoid "sex" more than we want them to avoid sexual violence.  That's what keeps teens like the one that I once was from recognizing abuse, seeking out and forming healthy relationships, and speaking out when abuse is committed.  Because we were, after all, supposed to be avoiding that which got us in trouble. 

There's a lot of other exciting stories here, and here, and oh -- over here, but just not enough time to get into all of them. Thanks for reading - have a great weekend.