[O29] website & Re: Statement

[Huibin Amelia Chew]

hey everyone,

I'm still really confused about the following.  If it's the "Call to
Action" (and not the "Statement") which we asked endorsing groups to
sign onto, why isn't that featured more prominently on the main page
if the website?

Especially since all the endorsers signatures are on the page (right
now they are under the "Statement" as if that's what they endorse,
rather than the action)?

Of course I entered the process late, but it's also not clear to me
that the "Statement" is more representative of group input than the
"Call to Action," which also got feedback and edits over several
meetings.  What is going on here...

-Amee



On 10/6/05, DAVID KEIL <dmkeil at gmail.com> wrote:
> Friends, may I suggest the following  text to be added to the
> Statement of the Coalition, just before the last paragraph?
>
> "In conducting its war policy, the U.S. military finds it useful
> to cultivate an atmosphere of misogyny and homophobia. The executive
> director of the Study Center for Human Rights and Democracy
> in Fallujah reported testimony on the rape of women and girls by U.S.
> soldiers in Fallujah (Dahr Jamail, "The failed siege of Fallujah").
> Surveys have indicated that up to 50 percent of women in the U.S.
> military have been victims of sexual assaults and 78 percent
> victims of sexual harassment (Kari Lydersen, Rape Nation,
> http://alternet.org/rights/19134/). The war and occupation of Iraq
> have undermined rather than improved the status of Iraqi women.
> This war is part of a general assault against women's rights worldwide."
>
> I think that the title and last sentence should be changed to remove
> references to a better world. The purpose of the O29 coalition is not
> to draft a general plan for a better world.
>
> These proposed changes could be circulated to a few people before the
> Monday meeting, with the explanation that the Statement was weak on
> women's rights, and the meeting could adopt the changes after minimal
> discussion.
>
> David
>


--
"There are plenty of women in Fallujah who have testified they were
raped by American soldiers... They are nearby the secondary school for
girls inside Fallujah. When people came back to Fallujah the first
time they found so many girls who were totally naked and they had been
killed."

  -- Mohammed Abdulla, executive director of the Study Center for
Human Rights and Democracy in Fallujah, quoted in
http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/hard_news/archives/newscommentary/000251.php