Across China, people are taking to the Internet to speak out against the sexual abuse of children. The creative protest is made up of photographs of people displaying the message, Principal, get a room with me. Leave the young students alone. The message is a response to a recent case of sexual assault in Beijing [...]
“Comfort women” was the colloquial and reductive term given to the nearly 200,000 women across Asia who were lured, kidnapped or coerced by the Japanese military into being prostitutes for the Imperial Army during World War II. The “comfort women” system, which was organized and supported by Empire of Japan officials, originally began with impoverished [...]
It wasn’t bad enough that a 23-year-old woman was gang-raped on a bus in New Delhi last December and later died of her injuries. That alone, besides setting off worldwide protests, seemed to open a box of secrets about how women are too-often treated in India. But now, the news out of India is even [...]
South Korea has elected its first woman president, Park Geun-hye, in a closely fought election. Taking the presidency by a narrow 3.5 percent margin, the conservative Saenuri party’s Park will be moving back into the presidential house she called home as a young girl. Park’s father was Park Chung-hee, a polarizing figure in Korean politics [...]
On Friday, Oct. 19, 40-year-old Grace Grande surrendered to the Los Angeles Attorney General’s office; she faces extradition hearings, based on a request from the Philippine government to the U.S. State Department. The request alleges that Grande “stole” jewelry worth around $43,000 from a Nancy Manlangit, an employee of Philippine Congressman Patrick Antonio, with whom [...]
When Wang Mei’s husband first hit her in their Shanghai home, Wang (a pseudonym) instantly acted to protect herself and her newborn baby by calling 110, China’s number for emergency help. That call unleashed a torrent of retaliatory violence and harassment, not just from Wang’s husband but from his extended family as well. Two years [...]
In the Masterpiece series Downton Abbey, Lady Mary Crawley, the eldest daughter of an Earl, cannot inherit the family estate because she is a woman. She finds this demeaning and frustrating, but her future will be well taken care of regardless. Sadly, this isn’t the case for millions of women around the world who struggle [...]
After eight months of working in Japan and seeing my women colleagues relegated to tea service during meetings, it’s still disappointing to discover that workplace sexism isn’t limited to my small, rural town. New data shows that Japan ranks lower in economic gender equality than any G7 nation. The World Economic Forum recently amended Japan’s [...]
The other day, I was reading this post about how Japan’s Princess Aiko has been missing school because of bullying by some boys at her elementary school. While this news is disturbing in itself, what caught my attention was the reference the article made to Aiko’s mother, Princess Masako. Anybody remember this woman? Her story [...]
In China, International Women’s Day is known as 三八妇女节 (san ba fu nu jie: literally, 3/8 women’s holiday) or 三八 (san ba: 3/8) for short. Many working women receive the day off. Offices shower the ladies with gifts, such as expensive Japanese shampoos or pens adorned with fluffy pink feathers. However, as Anna Sophie Loewenberg [...]
