Violence Against Women is a Global Abomination
By Tushar Mehta
Run for the Earth promotes environmental conservation, but also the link between ecology, human development and compassion towards all life. The issues regarding violence towards humans, nature, and animals are all one and the same. Far too often, people see these issues as being separate. Violence and cruelty to animals, nature, and humans are all part of the singular problem of violence and cruelty. Humans have the capacity of intelligence and choice, which are fundamental to our ethical responsibility. When we choose to ignore or take profit from the suffering of another life, we break the wholeness of our compassion. As a society we tend to ignore the major victims, when instead we should be thinking and working for them every day.
As we address compassion towards our forests, natural places, and animals, we must realize that that international development, human rights, and the deeper well-being of all people is also profoundly important to the ecology of the Earth. Discontent humans will not live in harmony with each other, let alone with other life forms. Violence towards women is perhaps the quintessential issue that is ignored by our society. This is not just the women in our city, in the latest news story, or in particular place, but it is a worldwide issue in both developing and developed countries. According to the World Health Organization, one third of all women in the world have faced violence in a physical sexual manner, as well as other forms of abuse.
How can this scale go unnoticed? The lack of understanding is the same that occurs towards the victims of any mass violence. So this is an issue about understanding of gender issues, but also an issue that requires cultivation of our total compassion towards all life - unbroken and whole. This is best explained in the first five minutes of my favourite documentary, Earthlings. Watch those five minutes here for free: http://earthlings.com/?page_id=32.
As individuals, yes we have to be smart and take care of ourselves, but we can simultaneously put others ahead of ourselves. That is when we derive our greatest life satisfaction as individuals. That is also when we solve world problems as a collective.
Please read and study the links below for a more in-depth knowledge of issues facing women worldwide, including the link to the UN documents that study these issues.
World Health Organization Report: http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/publications/violence/9789241548595/en/index.html
BBC News Coverage: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-22975103
