The Network of Women in Media, India (NWMI) has reached out to women journalists in Afghanistan in solidarity. The NWMI has explored ways to support the beleaguered colleagues trying to survive and tell their stories against immense odds there. The interactions have revealed that one of the most urgent needs, as expected, is money. 

The NWMI stated that the rapid Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in early August, and its potential adverse impact on hard-won freedoms, particularly for women’s rights, freedom of speech and press freedom, has now become alarmingly clear. 

Now, under the banner “Journalists for Afghanistan”, the NWMI has launched a fundraiser from sales of stunning photographs taken by well known photojournalists. According to the NWMI, the Associated Press has “generously allowed the use of images from its Afghanistan coverage”. The collection includes photographs by some of AP’s bravest and most talented visual journalists and allows rare glimpses into the daily life in Afghanistan documented over the past two decades. “At a time of unimaginable societal and political upheaval in Afghanistan, and even as its people face an uncertain and frightening future, these images challenge us to reflect on the power of resilience and courage in tumultuous times,” stated the NWMI, adding that “all proceeds of the fundraiser will go towards supporting Afghan women journalists.”

For more details and to buy prints visit: https://journalistsforafgh.wixsite.com/for-afg.  The images can also be viewed on Instagram. 

Journalists continue to be targeted, and beaten up when they venture out to report. Images such as those of reporters Nemat Naqdi and Taqi Daryabi showing bruises as a result of lashings by Taliban have been flooding the social media. The two Afghan journalists, were reporting on the somen-led Kabul protests, when they were thrashed by the Taliban. The photos were shared by American journalist Marcus Yam. Several Afghan journalists covering the Kabul protests have also been arrested, stated news reports.

Painful. Afghan journalists from @Etilaatroz, Nemat Naqdi & Taqi Daryabi, display wounds sustained from Taliban torture & beating while in custody after they were arrested for reporting on a women’s rally in #Kabul, #Afghanistan.#JournalismIsNotACrime https://t.co/jt631nRB69 pic.twitter.com/CcIuCy6GVw

— Marcus Yam 文火 (@yamphoto) September 8, 2021

اطلاعات روز: تقی دریابی و نعمت‌الله نقدی، دو گزارشگر روزنامه اطلاعات روز پس از بازداشت توسط طالبان، به شدت مورد لت‌وکوب قرار گرفته‌اند.
آثاری از شلاق و کیبل‌ بر سر، صورت و بدن این دو گزارشگر اطلاعات روز به چشم می‌خورد. pic.twitter.com/0vuEwYW28b

— اطلاعات روز | Etilaatroz (@Etilaatroz) September 8, 2021

Many media outlets have ceased operations in Afghanistan. The International Association of Women in Radio and Television (IAWRT) has also called upon the international community to “ensure that the rights of women and girls are respected, with special regard to women journalists and media professionals.” Violet Gonda, IAWRT President said, “There are many journalists and female social activists whose lives hang in the balance and whose stories may never be told as the Taliban takes over – once again. These are the brave women who challenged the status quo fighting for fundamental rights, but have been left behind while terror strikes”.  

On Tuesday September 7, 2021 thousands of Afghans took to the streets of Kabul to participate in anti-Pakistan protests. Demonstrators included hundreds of women who defied the Taliban’s traditional stand against women stepping out of their homes. The Taliban then reportedly opened fire to disperse protesters. Nevertheless, brave Afghan women continue to demand equal rights vis a vis education and employment, even as Taliban shows its old face again.

Women’s rights are under threat in Afghanistan, but they refuse to be silenced. ? pic.twitter.com/VWaDOiWcOS

— Amnesty International (@amnesty) September 3, 2021

The NWMI had shared earlier that women journalists they are in contact with are “bearing witness to the utter chaos, terror and uncertainty as the nightmare of a brutal Taliban reign becomes a reality, pushing back decades of hard-won progress for women and girls, upon whom the Taliban has meted out particularly horrific treatment merely on account of their gender.” A woman journalist shared this haunting statement with NWMI: “Last week, I was a news journalist. Today, I can’t even write under my own name or say where I am from or where I am. My whole life has been obliterated in just a few days.”

Related:

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Oppressed but not beaten: Afghani accounts on social media

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Advertising continues to portray women as charming keepers of the home, making it harder to succeed at work. Andrea44/flickr, CC BY-SA

As an Argentinean woman who studies gender in the media, I find it hard to be surprised by Weinstein’s misdeeds. Machismo remains deeply ingrained in Latin American society, yes, but even female political leaders in supposedly gender-equal paradises like Holland and Sweden have told me that they are criticized more in the press and held to a higher standard than their male counterparts.

How could they not be? Across the world, the film and TV industry – Weinstein’s domain – continues to foist outdated gender roles upon viewers.
 

Women’s work

Television commercials are particularly guilty, frequently casting women in subservient domestic roles.

Take this 2015 ad for the Argentine cleaning product Cif, which is still running today. It explains how its concentrated cleaning capsules “made Sleeping Beauty shine.”

The prince could help clean up, but why bother when women can do it all?

In it, a princess eager to receive her prince remembers that – gasp – the floors in her castle tower are a total mess. Thanks to Cif’s magic scouring fluid, she has time not only to clean but also to get dolled up for the prince – who, in case you were wondering, has no physical challenges preventing him from helping her tidy up.

But why should he, when it’s a woman’s job to be both housekeeper and pretty princess?

Somewhat paradoxically, advertisements may also cast men as domestic superheroes. Often, characters like Mr. Muscle will mansplain to women about the best product and how to use it – though they don’t actually do any cleaning themselves.

Mansplaining domestic chores.

More recently, there’s been a shift – perhaps an awkward attempt at political correctness – in which women are still the masters of the home, but their partners are shown “helping out” with the chores. In exchange, the men earn sex object status.

Thanks for ‘helping out,’ hubby.

We’ve come a little way, baby

Various studies on gender stereotypes in commercials indicate that although the advertising industry is slowly changing for the better, marketing continues to target specific products to certain customers based on traditional gender roles.

Women are pitched hygiene and cleaning products, whereas men get ads for banks, credit cards, housing, cars and other significant financial investments.

This year, U.N. Women teamed up with Unilever and other industry leaders like Facebook, Google, Mars and Microsoft to launch the Unstereotype Alliance. The aim of this global campaign is to end stereotypical and sexist portrayals of gender in advertising.

As part of the #Unstereotype campaign, Unilever also undertook research on gender in advertising. It found that only 3 percent of advertising shows women as leaders and just 2 percent conveys them as intelligent. In ads, women come off as interesting people just 1 percent of the time.
 

Britain paves a path

Even before it was forced to reckon with allegations that Harvey Weinstein had also harassed women in London, the United Kingdom was making political progress on the issue of women’s portrayal in the media.

In July, the United Kingdom’s Advertising Standards Authority announced that the U.K. will soon prohibit commercials that promote gender stereotypes.

“While advertising is only one of many factors that contribute to unequal gender outcomes,” its press release stated, “tougher advertising standards can play an important role in tackling inequalities and improving outcomes for individuals, the economy and society as a whole.”

As of 2018, the agency says, advertisements in which women are shown as solely responsible for household cleaning or men appear useless around kitchen appliances and unable to handle taking care of their children and dependents will not pass muster in the U.K. Commercials that differentiate between girls’ and boys’ toys based on gender stereotypes will be banned as well.
 

Sticky floors

The U.K.‘s move is a heartening public recognition that gender stereotypes in the media both reflect and further the very real inequalities women face at home and at work.

Worldwide, the International Labor Organization reports, women still bear the burden of household chores and caretaking responsibilities, which often either excludes them from pay work or leaves them relegated to ill-paid part-time jobs.

In the U.K., men spend on average 16 hours per week on domestic tasks, while women spend 26. The European Union average is worse, with women dedicating an average of 26 weekly hours to men’s nine hours on caretaking and household tasks.

In Argentina, my home country, fully 40 percent of men report doing no household work at all, even if they’re unemployed. Among those who do pitch in, it’s 24 hours a week on caretaking and domestic chores for men. Argentinean women put in 45 hours.

You can do the math: On average, Argentinean women use up two days of their week and some 100 days annually – nearly one-third of their year – on unpaid household labor.
 

Real-world consequences

These inequalities, combined with advertising that reinforces them, generate what’s called the “sticky floors” problem. Women – whether would-be investment bankers or, I dare say, aspiring Hollywood stars – don’t just face glass ceilings to advancement, they also are also “stuck” to domestic life by endless chores.

The cultural powers that be produce content that represents private spaces as “naturally” imbued with female qualities, gluing women to traditional caregiving roles.

This hampers their professional development and helps keep them at the bottom of the economy pyramid because women must pull off a balancing act between their jobs inside and outside of the domestic sphere. And they must excel at both, all while competing against male colleagues who likely confront no such challenges.

Former U.S. president Barack Obama once pointed out this double standard in homage to his then-competitor Hillary Clinton. She, he reminded an audience in 2008, “was doing everything I was doing, but just like Ginger Rogers, it was backwards in heels.”

The sticky floor problem puts women in a position to be exploited by men like Weinstein, who tout their ability to help female aspirants to get unstuck. Until society – and, with it, the media we create – comprehend that neither professional success nor domesticity has a gender, these pernicious powerful dynamics will endure.
 

Virginia García Beaudoux, Professor of Political Communication and Public Opinion, University of Buenos Aires

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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Anna M Vetticad. Photo credit: Firstpost

The Network of Women in Media, India (NWMI) strongly condemns the online sexual abuse of film critic Anna M Vetticad and of other women, notably journalists, online.
 
Vetticad has been facing abuse on social media sites, seemingly coordinated, since her review of the Akshay Kumar-starrer ‘Toilet – Ek Prem Katha’.

Vetticad, like other women journalists, has documented this abuse on her Twitter handle, noting that this is hardly the first time this has happened to her. Women, across the world, face misogynist abuse in online spaces forcing many to self-censor or stay silent. This abuse is only magnified in the cases of women journalists, such as Vetticad, who are subjected to online violence simply for doing their jobs, leave alone voicing opinions.  

In recent times, two NWMI members have faced online abuse, namely Dhanya Rajendran, editor of The Newsminute, and senior independent journalist Kavitha Muralidharan. Vetticad has painstakingly documented the abuse against her, highlighting that much of it appears to stem from certain sections of the political spectrum. In Rajendran’s case the abuse was spearheaded by fans of a Tamil actor.

The NWMI unequivocally denounces such online violence against women journalists, and calls for a greater tolerance for divergent views on social media. It also urges politicians, actors and other influencers to call out such behavior, especially from among their followers and make it clear that such actions will not be condoned.
 
Social media sites must go further in proactively acting against abuse without putting victims of such abuse in the position of having to both suffer abuse as well having ensure appropriate action is taken against it. Twitter and Facebook have a long way in making their sites safe for women. 
 
The NWMI demands that:
 
Twitter and Facebook  be more sensitive to online ambush, specifically of women and institute more robust mechanisms to combat online abuse in regional languages. 
• Film actors, politicians with mass following should speak out in public against such abuse. 
• The Editors’ Guild of India and Press Council of India must take suo moto notice of such online harassment of women journalists and editors and come out strongly in their support.
 
 
 

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