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First international day of the girl
October
11
2012
Girls' school in Pakistan, 2007. Photo: Caroline Suzman/World Bank
Today, my thoughts are with all the girls of the world, but especially with brave 14 year-old Malala Yousafzai in Pakistan, who has fought for her and other girls’ right to go to school. Because of her struggle, she was shot by the Taliban. It seems as though she will survive. I sincerely hope that she will make a full recovery and that the person responsible for the attempt on her life will be brought to trial. The courage and strength of Malala is admirable, but children should not have to push political change on their own. We, as adults, have to shoulder the responsibility of ensuring that children can grow up safely and go to school.
Today, we observe the first annual international day of the girl child. It is one of the international days of the United Nations and was established last year, to put focus on the especially vulnerable situation of girls. Observing this day does not mean that we ignore the vulnerability of boys, only that we focus on the special situation, often overlooked, that many girls are in.
Girls around the world are more often subject to marginalisation and neglect, they are worse off when it comes to health and access to healthcare, and they become victims of violence – including rape – more often than boys. They are doubly discriminated against, both because of their age and their gender. Girls the world over are also, to a larger extent, suffering from malnutrition, they have less access to education and are subject to forced marriages. They become victims of human trafficking to a much higher degree than boys, sold and forced into prostitution.
Fighting for girls’ rights once a year is not enough. However, the international day for the girl child can give a welcome push to political initiatives aimed at improving the everyday lives of girls around the globe.
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Dear Commissioner Malmstrom :
In the opinion of many, the best gift that we can give to all the Girls, Woman and Youth of the World is an open Internet, where the next Generation can share and express their opinions freely. Free Speech , Free Media and the Right to Assembly online is the best set of tools the Youth can have to defend themselves against radicalisation, ignorance and fanatism and against corruption and greed. So far the EU is doing a good job, but already around the World we see how certain groups are trying to block Free Speech :
a ) this December at the ITU Standards Meeting
http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-T/wtsa12/Pages/default.aspx
some countries are proposing changes to the core of the Net and the Web, changes to control access and control speech in blogs and controls over VoIP, over video, over HTML5 and TCP/IP , etc., etc., and this could be a disaster for Free Speech and the Free Media we all want the next Generations to have so that they can defend themselves against abuse , fraud and oppression.
b ) Already here in the EU, USA , etc. area, we see how some sites like Facebook , Yahoo , G+/Google Groups/Usenet and Huffington Post, etc., are in some cases blocking posts that contain personal opinions about speculators , neocons , shorters, Hedge Funds , Asset-Money Managers, Private Equity , etc., that are shorting currencies like the Euro and political unions like the EU, they connect all the posts from all the sites and they start by asking the user his/her phone number and other ID data, and if the poster refuses, they denied him/her access to the site and cancel their account, and how can they do that ? why ? where is the free speech ?
When posters want to start a blog investigating who is pushing for wars, who is promoting wars, who promotes fights and division and conflict by using media , reporters , gossip and rumours , they get deleted, why ?
Many people have been asking for a full report about which media – newspapers and radio – was pushing for war from 1931 to 1941 in the EU and the World , and they get deleted on the spot , why ? the same about the Korea, Vietnam and Iraq Wars, and why ? why the neocon controlled media refuses to ask these vital questions ? Most EU and USA Taxpayers do not still know that most media is controlled by neocon interests, why?
c ) in some other cases, they target minors , as young as 10 or 12 years old, they demand for private data and later they refuse to delete it, so these sites keep for years this private data and profit from it, and how is that possible ?
How can we keep the Free Speech so basic and vital for our Culture to grow while defending the Youths private Data ?
Very difficult work, Commissioner. To you and all the girls and Woman in the World, the very best and good luck.