1 South African Woman Killed Every 6 Hours

And it's by her spouse.

I'll sum up the article, but please take a moment to read it.

A new study has shown an epidemic in South Africa. 1 out of every 1100 women in Africa is killed by their spouse. This is the highest rate that has ever been reported anywhere in the world. And under 40% of these crimes lead to conviction. Alcohol plays a major factor in this violence.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/africa/05/24/wife.killings.reut/index.html

Has our progression in women's rights stalled? Are we so happy and comfortable with our equality in our industrialized nations that we have forgotten about women elsewhere? Let's not forget that women across the globe are still suffering from inequality even though it may not be in our own backyard. Women are still suffering - and the fight for equality, safety and freedom for women is not yet won.

Does anyone have any good ideas on how a person can help and support the women's equality movement globally? I'd like to hear them.

 

Hi Sera Michele

I live in South Africa and this has always been massive problem here but I don't believe that inequality has much to do with this.

Our society is under an enormous amount of pressure and the abuse of alcohol & drugs is a very real problem. South Africa's history is extremely violent and unfortunately men in particular don't seem to know how else to deal with all the changes that are happening in our country.

South African women do have equality and are working really hard to find solutions that will address the problems of abuse in this country. This country has an extremely violent history and none of these figures are new - they just weren't reported before because we had closed ourselves off from the rest of the world.

The violence is not only directed toward women and children here, we are living in a very violent society in South Africa that is effecting men, women and children.

Love always
Jackie

 

Do you think you have been ignored (up to this point) by the global community? It seems we don't hear much about South Africa, then are hit with this whammy of a report. How could it get so bad before the rest of the world took some notice?

Why has South Africa closed itself off to the rest of the world?

 

I don't believe that the problems we face in South Africa are the rest of the world's responsibility, we created the reality we are living at the moment so we need to now take responsibility for what was done in the past and move forward.


South Africa closed itself off from the rest of the world along time ago when apartheid laws we put into force. The SA government did not want anyone interfering and the rest of the world would not deal with us at all in the business sector or any other for that matter.

I think the stand the global community took was correct because you cannot treat people of colour the way South Africa was with no consequence. Which brings us right back to the problems we now face.

South Africa as I said has an extremely violent history and what is going on now is due to the injustices that were committed in the past. Apartheid fell away 10 years ago and we are now a democracy but we are still going to have to face the consequences of our actions.

Love always
Jackie