International Womens Day 2014: Inspiring Change
Every year the United Nations chooses a theme for International Womens Day
This year’s theme is “Inspiring Change” other themes have been:
There have been many changes since the first International Womens Day in 1908, but there is still a long way to go.
Looking at a list of some of the earlier themes chosen by the UN for International Womens Day and noticing how many times “Violence Against Women” occurs is a reminder of how serious that one single problem is. That is before one even starts to look at equal employment rights, the right to vote, property rights, the right to education, birth control and reproductive rights and many other issues of gender equality and human rights for women.
– 2013: A promise is a promise: Time for action to end violence against women
– 2012: Empower Rural Women – End Hunger and Poverty
– 2011: Equal access to education, training and science and technology
– 2010: Equal rights, equal opportunities: Progress for all
– 2009: Women and men united to end violence against women and girls
– 2008: Investing in Women and Girls
– 2007: Ending Impunity for Violence against Women and Girls
– 2006: Women in decision-making
– 2005: Gender Equality Beyond 2005: Building a More Secure Future
– 2004: Women and HIV/AIDS
– 2003: Gender Equality and the Millennium Development Goals
– 2002: Afghan Women Today: Realities and Opportunities
– 2001: Women and Peace: Women Managing Conflicts
– 2000: Women Uniting for Peace
– 1999: World Free of Violence against Women
– 1998: Women and Human Rights
– 1997: Women at the Peace Table
– 1996: Celebrating the Past, Planning for the Future
– 1975: United Nations recognizes International Women’s Day
Inspirational Quotations for Women
“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”
– Maya Angelou
“Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.”
– Anais Nin
“I know God will not give me anything I can’t handle. I just wish that He didn’t trust me so much.”
– Mother Teresa
“It was we, the people; not we, the white male citizens; nor yet we, the male citizens; but we, the whole people, who formed the Union…. Men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less.”
– Susan B. Anthony
“A woman is the full circle. Within her is the power to create, nurture and transform.”
– Diane Mariechild
“Most people who meet my wife quickly conclude that she is remarkable. They are right about this. She is smart, funny and thoroughly charming. Often, after hearing her speak at some function or working with her on a project, people will approach me and say something to the effect of, you know, I think the world of you, Barack, but your wife, wow!”
– Barack Obama, “The Audacity of Hope”
“People think at the end of the day that a man is the only answer (to fulfillment). Actually a job is better for me.”
– Princess Diana
“It takes a great deal of courage to stand up to your enemies, but even more to stand up to your friends.”
– J. K. Rowling
“You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.”
– Maya Angelou
“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.”
– Alice Walker
“Women have served all these centuries as looking glasses possessing the magic and delicious power of reflecting the figure of a man at twice its natural size.”
– Virginia Woolf
“Somewhere out in this audience may even be someone who will one day follow in my footsteps, and preside over the White House as the President’s spouse. I wish him well!”
– Barbara Bush
“The fastest way to change society is to mobilize the women of the world.”
– Charles Malik
“A world without men would consists of a bunch of fat, happy women with no crime.”
– Jennifer Love Hewitt
Gasland, the Fracking Truth
It’s amazing that what took mother nature millions of years to buid can be destroyed in a few hours with heavy machinery” – Josh Fox
Gasland: The Movie
“The largest domestic natural gas drilling boom in history has swept across the United States. The Halliburton-developed drilling technology of “fracking” or hydraulic fracturing has unlocked a “Saudia Arabia of natural gas” just beneath us.
When filmmaker Josh Fox is asked to lease his land for drilling, he embarks on a cross-country odyssey uncovering a trail of secrets, lies and contamination. A recently drilled nearby Pennsylvania town reports that residents are able to light their drinking water on fire. This is just one of the many absurd and astonishing revelations of a new country called GASLAND. Part verite travelogue, part expose, part mystery, part bluegrass banjo meltdown, part showdown.”
Gasland- Reviews (at bottom of page)
The Oil Industry has tried to discredit the film and the issues it raises via a disinformation campaign, including a video in direct response to the film .
Gasland replied to its accusations in detail on its website.
Green MP Caroline Lucas Arrested in Fracking Protest
Why would Green Party Member of Parliament be willing to face arrest in order to demonstrate against the process of fracking in the UK?
Caroline Lucas, the MP for Brighton Pavilion said:
“Along with everyone else who took action today, I’m trying to stop a process which could cause enormous damage for decades to come. People today, myself included, took peaceful non-violent direct action only after exhausting every other means of protest available to us.
Despite the opposition to fracking being abundantly clear, the government has completely ignored the views of those they are supposed to represent. When the democratic deficit is so enormous, people are left with very little option but to take peaceful, non-violent direct action.”
The Department o Energy and Climate Change did not respond to requests for comment on the protests.
When one reads documentation concerning the effects of Fracking and the Oil Industry on human health and the environment, it becomes very clear why this issue is one worth protesting about.
THE ENDOCRINE DISRUPTION EXCHANGE
“To date, no chemical in use has been thoroughly tested for its endocrine disrupting effects. Traditional toxicological testing protocols were not designed to test for endocrine disruption and to test at ambient or low exposure levels.”
The Endocrine Disruption Exchange is one of the few organisations that has studied the effects of products and chemicals used in the Oil/Gas industry.
Its findings are very disturbing.
Extract:
T he technology to recover natural gas depends on undisclosed types and amounts of toxic chemicals.
A list of 944 products containing 632 chemicals used during natural gas operations was compiled. Literature searches were conducted to determine potential health effects of the 353 chemicals identified by Chemical Abstract Service (CAS) numbers.
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More than 75% of the chemicals could affect the skin, eyes, and other sensory organs, and the respiratory and gastrointestinal systems.
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Approximately 40-50% could affect the brain/nervous system, immune and cardiovascular systems, and the kidneys;
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37% could affect the endocrine system; and
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25% could cause cancer and mutations.
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These results indicate that many chemicals used during the fracturing and drilling stages of gas operations may have long-term health effects that are not immediately expressed.
- In addition, an example was provided of waste evaporation pit residuals that contained numerous chemicals on the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) and Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act (EPCRA) lists of hazardous substances.
- The discussion highlights the difficulty of developing effective water quality monitoring programs.
- To protect public health we recommend full disclosure of the contents of all products, extensive air and water monitoring, coordinated environmental/human health studies, and regulation of fracturing under the U.S. Safe Drinking Water Act.
Extracting, processing, and burning fossil fuels (natural gas, oil and coal) introduces huge volumes of harmful chemicals into our environment. These chemicals, and the tens of thousands of chemical products synthesized from them, are now present in every environment on earth, including the womb. Extremely low concentrations of many chemicals can damage the endocrine system of our bodies by interfering with the intricate, delicate network of natural chemical interactions critical to healthy development and normal function.
n 1991, an international group of experts stated, with confidence, that “Unless the environmental load of synthetic hormone disruptors is abated and controlled, large scale dysfunction at the population level is possible.”
They could not perceive that within only ten years, a pandemic of endocrine-driven disorders would begin to emerge and increase rapidly across the northern hemisphere. Today, less than two decades later, hardly a family has not been touched by Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, autism, intelligence and behavioral problems, diabetes, obesity, childhood, pubertal and adult cancers, abnormal genitalia, infertility, Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s Diseases.
TEDX’s findings confirm that each of these disorders could in part be the result of prenatal exposure to chemicals called endocrine disruptors. TEDX has also confirmed that the feed stocks for most endocrine disrupting chemicals are derived from the production of coal, oil, and natural gas. It is clear that endocrine disruption, like climate change, is a spin-off of society’s addiction to fossil fuels. Setting aside the effects of endocrine disruptors on infertility, and just considering their influence on intelligence and behavior alone, it is possible that hormone disruption could pose a more imminent threat to humankind than climate change
Fracking and Hazardous Waste
Many people and animals have fallen ill since fracking started in their area. The process of fracking pumps toxic chemicals at high pressure into the earth in order to cause minor earthquakes that loosen deposits of natural gas that have been trapped in the rock for millions of years. The process threatens to pollute groundwater and an estimated 30% to 70% of poisoned water is estimated to resurface and continue to surface for the life of the well (20 – 30 years)
Why is this Allowed?
Many of the chemicals used in the process of fracking are considered hazardous waste.
Why are these toxins being allowed to be pumped into the earth all over the USA when they are a real danger to drinking water supplies?
“In his second week in office, George W. Bush created the energy task force, officially known as the
National Energy Policy Development Group, with Vice President Dick Cheney as chairman. In
its mission, NEPDG aimed to: “develop a national energy policy designed to help the private
sector. . . .”
Only when pressed by EPA chief Christie Todd Whitman did Cheney remove a recommendation to
exempt fracturing from the task force’s final report. Whereupon, the Bush/Cheney Energy Bill of
2003 included a provision to exempt fracturing from EPA drinking water regulation — but Congress
removed the provision from the final draft.
Whereupon, in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, Congressmen James Inhofe of Oklahoma and Joe
Barton of Texas inserted language to:
“Amend the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1996 to exempt
hydraulic fracturing related to oil and gas production . . . and, thus, exclude this practice from . . .
regulations related to the protection of underground sources of drinking water.”
– Steve Coffman (on Gasland’s official reply to the Gas Industry’s attempt to discredit the film.)
BBC Horizon Documentary on Fracking
The BBC Program: Horizon made a documentary examining the process of Fracking which questions whether there were indeed (as the Oil/Gas companies would have us believe) no risks involved to people living near the the Fracking wells.
Communities did appear to be experiencing high levels of illness. It seemed strange that so little was understood about the causes of the illnesses. One factor may have been that many people had received compensation and had signed gagging clauses which did not allow them to discuss their situation.
Plenty of people did seem willing to talk about afflictions to themselves and animals in the area that appeared since fracking began.
The reason for lack of clarity about the cause became apparent when the rights of industry to avoid transparency was raised.
Money is More Important than the Health of USA Citizens.
Drilling companies in the USA are allowed to keep the chemicals used in their procedures a secret, even when they may be causing a health risk. This makes it almost impossible for people to know what might have be causing the illnesses that have occurred since the fracking began in their areas.
Medical doctors have managed to get special permission to be request this information from the companies.
Doctors Can’t Tell Their Patients
One doctor has treated people with leisions to their faces that she thinks might be related to chemicals from fracking . The drilling companies only allow her access to the information about chemicals they use, under the strictest of conditions. They insist the doctors sign a confidentiality statement which means they are unable to tell their patients what they have discovered are causing their illnesses.
If a doctor (that has been given the information about the chemicals) has now been able to diagnose the cause of the medical problem decides they need to refer the patient to another medical specialist, they are not allowed to pass on the information to the other doctor or medical specialist.
“for physicians in order to take care of your patients, there needs to be transparency and this completely breaks that down, so yes it’s very upsetting for us because we want people to get better, but if you can’t explain to someone what’s happening to them, how do you get them better… and then how do you find out if other members of their family may have been exposed .. or other people in the area may have been exposed because no one can talk about it. So it really goes against any type of modern medicine“
Reviews of Gasland
Robert Koehler of Variety referred to it as “one of the most effective and expressive environmental films of recent years… Gasland may become to the dangers of natural gas drilling what Silent Spring was to DDT.”[18]
Eric Kohn of IndieWire wrote, “Gasland is the paragon of first person activist filmmaking done right… By grounding a massive environmental issue in its personal ramifications, Fox turns Gasland into a remarkably urgent diary of national concerns.”[19]
Stewart Nusbaumer of the Huffington Post wrote “Gasland… just might take you from outrage right into the fire of action.”[20]
Gasland currently holds a 97% rating on the film site Rotten Tomatoes based on 37 reviews.[21] Mark Kermode of BBC Radio 5 Live gave it a generally positive review, criticizing its similarity to other recent oil documentaries, yet praising its “extraordinary visual kick”. He said “it is a very interesting story which is made better by the fact that the visuals of it are very poetic, very lyrical”, and felt that its themes and ideas were relevant and well presented.
The Denton Record Chronicle said “Fox decides that his own backyard in Pennsylvania isn’t his exclusive property… Set to his own banjo music and clever footage, Gasland is both sad and scary… if your soul isn’t moved by the documentary, yours is a heart of shale.”[22]
Bloomberg News critic Dave Shiflett wrote that Fox “may go down in history as the Paul Revere of fracking.”[23]
Chicago TimeOut gave Gasland four out of five stars.[24]
In Australia, film critic Julie Riggs called the documentary a “horror movie, and a wake-up call.”[25][26]
Fort Worth Business Press writer John-Laurent Tronche talks about the growing number of documentaries “that aim to shed a light on what they call a dirty, destructive practice: shale gas exploration. And although oil and gas supporters have labeled the motion pictures as radical propaganda, a local drilling activist said they’re part of a larger, critical look into an ever-growing industry.”[27]
Read MoreMandela Day: You are The Power of Change
Mandela Day is an international day in honour of Nelson Mandela,
celebrated annually on the 18th of July – Mandela’s Birthday.
It is a call to action for individuals – for people everywhere –
to take responsibility for changing the world into a better place,
one small step at a time, just as Mr Mandela did.
Following the success of Nelson Mandela’s 90th birthday celebrations in London’s Hyde Park in June 2008 and the 4664 concerts, it was decided that there could be nothing more fitting than to celebrate Mr Mandela’s birthday each year with a day dedicated to his life’s work and that of his charitable organisations, and to ensure his legacy continues forever.
The day was officially declared by the United Nations in November 2009. Mandela Day is not meant as a public holiday but is a global call to action that celebrates the idea that each individual has the ability to make an impact and the power to transform the world.
The Mandela Day campaign message is simple: Mr Mandela gave 67 years of his life fighting for the rights of humanity. All we are asking is that everyone gives 67 minutes of their time, whether it’s supporting your chosen charity or serving your local community.
Long Road to Freedom
On August 5th, 1962, an ordinary piece of road along the R103 about 3 kilometres outside Howick in KwaZulu-Natal took on extraordinary significance when armed apartheid police flagged down a car.
The man pretending to be the chauffeur had earned the nickname of the “Black Pimpernel” having evaded capture by the apartheid regime for 17 months. It was in this dramatic manner at this unassuming place that Nelson Mandela was finally captured and was to disappear from public view for the next 27 years.
Mandela had just paid a clandestine visit to ANC President Chief Albert Luthuli to report on his African Odyssey. His meeting was also to request support for an armed struggle, after having spent most of his adult life trying to find peaceful ways in which to end the injustice and suffering caused by the system of Apartheid in South Africa, without success.
50 years later on August 4th 2012, to mark the anniversary of the start of Nelson Mandela’s “long walk to freedom” a quietly powerful new sculpture was inaugurated and unveiled at this spot.
The sculpture is comprised of 50 steel column constructions, each between 6.5 and 9.5 meters tall, set into the landscape of the Natal Midlands. The posts are staggered and the portrait of Nelson Mandela only comes into correct focus when the posts line up at a position 35 meters from the sculpture (a reference to the fact that Mandela proved notoriously difficult for the authorities to find).
From this perspective the sculpture reads as a familiar photograph of Mandela, suggestive of his incarceration as one is aware it is comprised essentially of a series of steel bars, but seen from other angles the design splinters into a dynamic moment of fracture and release.
The artist Marco Cianfanelli comments on the deliberate structural paradox, that, “this represents the momentum gained in the struggle through the symbolic of Mandela’s capture. The 50 columns represent the 50 years since his capture, but they also suggest the idea of many making the whole; of solidarity. It points to an irony as the political act of Mandela’s incarceration cemented his status as an icon of struggle, which helped ferment the groundswell of resistance, solidarity and uprising, bringing about political change and democracy”.
http://www.mandela-children.org.uk/
Read MoreBees: UK Government Ignores Scientific Recommendations
■ £510 million of annual total crop sales in the UK are pollinated by bees and other insects.
■ Replacing bee pollination with hand pollination could cost farmers £1.8 billion a year in labour and pollen alone.
■ The price of many fruits and vegetables would go up without bees. The price of British apples could double.
Hundreds of British Beekeepers and others held a protest in London today to demand that Environmental Minister Owen Patterson backs moves to ban the worst bee-harming neonicotinoid pesticides. Beekeepers were joined by food producers, gardeners and other concerned individuals.
*EFSA scientists have identified a number of risks posed to bees by three neonicotinoid insecticides.
Members of the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) have spent months hearing evidence on both sides of the argument and its report is unanimously in favour of the ban.
Even MPs from the Government’s own Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties agree Ministers should back a neonicotinoid ban – and dramatically improve the process for testing pesticide safety, but so far the Government has refused to follow the advice and implement this ban.
ADD YOUR VOICE
Sign the Bee Cause Petition organised by Friends of the Earth
Sign the Petition on 38 Degrees
Sign the Petition on Avaaz.org
USA:
Sign the Petition on Change.org
One beekeeper interviewed in this video says:
“I’ve lost three colonies of bees, my neighbouring beekeeper has lost four colonies of bees and we routinely had about 80 to 70 jars of honey a year and last year had 4.”
There is enough pressure on bees already to make their survival difficult, without the use of pesticides that are believed to be linked with the loss of millions of bees worldwide.
Some of the other damaging effects on bees are climate change, damage to their natural environments, other chemicals and toxins that humans have already unleashed on the planet.
“Ministers can’t ignore the growing scientific evidence linking neonicotinoid insecticides to bee decline. Their claims to be concerned about bee health will ring hollow if they fail to back European moves to restrict the use of these chemicals.
An ever-growing number of the UK’s leading retailers and manufacturers are recognising the threat these products pose by removing them from their shelves and supply chains – the Government must act now.
If we lose our bees and other vital pollinators it’ll have a devastating impact on our food, gardens and environment. We urgently need tougher pesticide restrictions and a British Bee Action Plan to tackle all the threats they face.”
— Andrew Pendleton — Friends of the Earth’s Head of Campaigns
Fashion designers Vivienne Westwood and Katharine Hamnett helped to deliver a petition to 10 Downing Street
The demonstration took place ahead of the vote in Brussels on Monday that will decide whether Europe will introduce a two-year moratorium on a variety of neonicotinoid pesticides.
“Britain abstained last time and has made no commitment this time, but we want them to support a ban across Europe. Some 73% of the British public support a ban on these insecticides, we want the Government to follow their lead.”
— Matt Shardlow, chief executive of nature conservation organisation Buglife, and one of the organisers of the protest
***
“They started using these pesticides in the 90s. Since then there has been a rapid decline in the abundance and diversity of bee species globally.
There is a mounting body of scientific evidence that these pesticides are having sub lethal effects and in effect making the bees sick. They can make them forget things, such as which flowers are rewarding to them, and impair their ability to reproduce, affecting their long-term survival.
Bees are responsible for a large proportion of the world’s pollination, they are very important economically as well as ecologically.
I would see a two-year moratorium as a start. If it came into effect, we would see bee species start to recover, and would then need to extend the ban further.“
— Robert Mitton, biological research graduate from London, and one of the protesters.
***
A Newcastle University Study found that one in five bees exposed to imidacloprid from the neonicotinoid family of pesticides, that is commonly used on UK crops including oilseed rape, were “unable to learn”.
This means the whole colony is affected because the bees rely on memory to find flowers and bring back nectar to the hive.
Other groups involved with organising the event included Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, Pesticide Action Network UK, RSPB, and the Soil Association.
* The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) is an agency of the European Union that provides independent scientific advice and communication on existing and emerging risks associated with the food chain
Some of the Food Crops Pollinated by Bees…
Read MoreEarth Day 2013 – Share Your Photos
Earth Day 2013: The Face of Climate Change
Climate change has many faces.
A man in the Maldives worried about relocating his family as sea levels rise, a farmer in Kansas struggling to make ends meet as prolonged drought ravages the crops, a fisherman on the Niger River whose nets often come up empty, a child in New Jersey who lost her home to a super-storm, a woman in Bangladesh who can’t get fresh water due to more frequent flooding and cyclones…
And they’re not only human faces.
They’re the polar bear in the melting arctic, the tiger in India’s threatened mangrove forests, the right whale in plankton-poor parts of the warming North Atlantic, the orangutan in Indonesian forests segmented by more frequent bushfires and droughts…
These faces of climate change are multiplying every day.
For many, climate change can often seem remote and hazy – a vague and complex problem far off in the distance that our grandchildren may have to solve. But that’s only because they’re still fortunate enough to be insulated from its mounting consequences. Climate change has very real effects on people, animals, and the ecosystems and natural resources on which we all depend. Left unchecked, they’ll spread like wildfire. 
Luckily, other faces of climate change are also multiplying every day.
Every person who does his or her part to fix the problem is also a Face of Climate Change: the entrepreneurs who see opportunity in creating the new green economy, the activists who organize community action and awareness campaigns, the engineers who design the clean technology of the future, the public servants who fight for climate change laws and for mitigation efforts, the ordinary people who commit to living sustainably…
Between now and Earth Day, we’ll collect and display images of people, animals, and places directly affected or threatened by climate change – as well as images of people stepping up to do something about it. We’ll tell the world their stories.
But we need your help. We need you to be climate reporters. So, send us your pictures and stories that show The Face of Climate Change.
On and around Earth Day, an interactive digital display of all the images will be shown at thousands of events around the world, including next to federal government buildings in countries that produce the most carbon pollution. The display will also be made available online to anyone who wants to view or show it. Together, we’ll highlight the solutions and showcase the collective power of individuals taking action across the world. In doing so, we hope to inspire our leaders to act and inspire ourselves to redouble our efforts in the fight against climate change.
http://www.earthday.org/2013/about.html
Read More