Global Feminism

I was really shocked and surprised when I first read the "Penguin Atlas Women World". In the introduction the author Joni Seager, express that there has been many improvements in the state of women since the publication of this book in 1986.But she also express that the success is very little. And I agry with her because there is more that can be done to improve the lives of women all around the world. Althought there has been improvements in womens lievs the numbers do not reflect that at all. The numbers and statistics are horrible, women are still being opressed and we are in the 21st century. As I was looking at the book I took note that most of these women issues are effected by the culture and customs in these different countrys. You may thin that the U.S has also improved but there are some areas in which it still has alot of work to do when it pertains to womens issues and equality. One of the first things that caught my I and bothered me was in the first section under In their Place. It said "Venezuela: A provision in the penal code provides that an adult man guilty of raping an adult women with whom he is acquainted can avoid punishment if, before sentencing, he marries her." My jaw droped as I read this, I fealt like this was a slap in the face for all women. It dose not make sense and bothers me that the venezualian government would pass a law like that. it must be horrible to live through an experience like that, marrying your rapist!I am curious to know how they deal with the issue of marital rape, or maybe it is not an issue for them? One of the things that did not surpise me was that most households around the world are heade by women. with that being said they are also smaller and more peole are living alone. So for me this means that if women are living alone or they are the head of the household and they get paid less than men,I have to conclude that women are not living very well because they are paid less and are living at the poverty level or even below. another area that really called my attention was Domestic violence. what bothers me here is the fact that they have the statistics of reported cases of domestic violenece but they also state that there can be more and that many women do not report these cases. it bothers me that there are still women "sufering in silence" especially in Bangladesh with 68%.The U.S does not escape the issue with murder, it is the leading country with women known to have been killed by domestic violence with 1,181. this is rally alarming because compared toother countrys there is no honor killings in the U.S and it has the largest amount of women killed by domestic violence. I have to say that in this book the violence and inequality of women really bothered me.