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I believe that women are standing in their own way and using men as an excuse. Sure some men would prefer women to be barefoot and pregnant, but not the majority. Some men are put off by a woman making more money than him, but not the majority.
Women are usually the most critical of other women in government, or running for office. They tend to do anything and everything to put them "in check." They will pretend not to know information so that a man can come to their rescue. They will sit there and say they are not meat, yet work in a strip club because the money is good.

Women hate that men look down on them, but I think men are projecting back what they see, women who look down on themselves.

On your question "Are women making real breakthroughs in the 21st century or is it still one-step forward, two steps back for half the world's population?"
I would like to share my experience as a woman raised in the Caribbean. I am fifty seven years old and as a child the Minister of health was a woman Dr. Eldimire. There were and still are women as head of government in the caribbean islands. Growing up I never heard the term "the first woman to have done this or that" it was a given that anyone, regardless of gender, race or creed is capable of any achievement. I worked in the computer field in the 1960's (Yes!)and earned the same pay as my male colleagues.
I am aware that world over most women have to constantly fight for equal rights,proper health care,or even the right of survival so it is refreshing to see this being discussed

Spokane is very different than Seattle, still 20 yrs behind the times, I worked as professional for 30+ years here and never made more than 1/2 of my male professionals even though I did more work than they did. In this part of the USA I feel we will be one of the last to really recognize a woman and what they can offer. Not like the eastern part of the world but not much different than say the 60's in the USA

Tom Wonacott, Boise, Idaho
"I don't support that any more than allowing millions of unskilled and uneducated immigrants from Mexico and elsewhere to take American jobs, and drive wages down. Many Mexican (primarily) immigrants perform work that Americans will not do, but they have moved into other sectors of our economy, and will work for less. A certain amount is necessary, but too much benefits corporations with abundant available cheap labor, and take American jobs."

If all these American jobs are being "taken" by immigrants, why is the unemployment level in the US so low? If the US had record high unemployment, i would be concerned about this labor pool. But it seems to me that the economy is growing enough to absorbe the workforce available (as it did when women came into the workforce in the 60's and 70's). Does this push down wages? Yes. But whether this is good or bad depends on your perspective. Obviously if you are working in one of these sectors and your salary is not going up, that is bad. But if you are an employer whose biggest cost is labor and you can provide your product or service for less, that is good. If you are a consumer of the product/service, its also good as prices will be less. What this tells me, as an employee, is that i need to continually make myself more valuable to my employer (more education, training, new skills, etc) or find a new job that pays me what i need/want. Most of this seems to me to be a good thing and is how capitalism (imperfect as it is) is supposed to work.

To Mike B.,

Interesting post (December 24, 2006 12:47 PM) but some of it is quite off the mark.

Your comment: Most of those Indian engineers, 2/3 of them in fact, eventually return to India and take with them technical knowledge that is dangerous to the continued existence of this country.

I agree if the cutting edge technology goes to India, we are at serious disadvantage. But I think the technology is being sent there not by Indian engineers but by our own corporations (Intel, Microsoft, Motorola etc..) who are setting up huge factories and design centers in these countries. They are the real culprits.

Your comment: Rather than building the university infrastructure necessary to educate their own people, the Indian government sends their children to OUR colleges and universities, paying their tuition and other fees and taking up positions in our science and engineering programs that ought to go to American boys and girls.

- Let me say upfront that I am an American citizen (for 14 years) of Indian origin. I am also an associate professor at an engineering college of a major state University. I agree with the first part of your statement that the Indian government is not doing enough for building good schools and universities. However, the Indian government has nothing to do with paying tuition or other fees of students in USA. Indian as well as Chinese students have to go through serious financial burdens and also rigorous competitive tests to qualify to study in US Universities.

As for admission I can guarantee (at least for my University) that no American student is turned down in favor of an Indian or Chinese or any other international student.

Finally I agree with you about all the non-sense that is going on under the pretext of globalization and outsourcing. If we try to search for the cheapest engineers anywhere in the world, I am sure we can find them, and get the job done. However, we will do so by harming our own pool of engineers and engineering graduates. Right now it seems India and China are the hot spots for the cheapest talent. But there is no point blaming these countries. Our corporations will soon start outsourcing to other countries with even cheaper wages once India and China start getting expensive.

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MikeB:

My response, above, was to Atheist who believes we shouldn't allow immigration from India based on their cultural values. That is a completely different statement than the one you are making, which is, immigration of Indian-born engineers and scientist are displacing American engineers and scientist because corporations can hire H-1b immigrants for less salary and benefits.

I don't support that any more than allowing millions of unskilled and uneducated immigrants from Mexico and elsewhere to take American jobs, and drive wages down. Many Mexican (primarily) immigrants perform work that Americans will not do, but they have moved into other sectors of our economy, and will work for less. A certain amount is necessary, but too much benefits corporations with abundant available cheap labor, and take American jobs.

I am completely against H-1b educated and skilled workers taking American jobs at lower wages and benefits also. All other things equal (wages, benefits etc.), however, corporations should be able to hire whomever they want to fill a position, immigrant or not. I'm sure American engineers and scientist can compete favorably against immigrants no matter where they are from. Immigration must be used also as a planning tool for future needs, i.e., shortages.

The stealing of corporate or government secrets is not exactly new. The US government and corporations need to be a little careful about who is granted clearance to sensitive material.

One of the "unfairest" of trade practices is when other countries will not open up their markets to US products. Free trade is supposed to help alleviate that problem. I'm not quite sure why you tie free trade only to Republicans (or NEOCONS) since it was Bill Clinton that signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) into law, and many other free trade agreements have been supported by democrats and republicans, as well.

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Tom Wonacott, Boise, Idaho - And I suppose Indian engineers stealing the plans for the B2 bomber, our latest shoulder launched missile, our underwater missile, and other weapons tech ology, selling them on the world black market - and to regimes like those in North Korea and Iran - is all a pr of that Indian assimilation. The facts are, at least 20% of our own highly educated engineers are out of work right now, replaced by cheap Indian engineering talent. Most of those Indian engineers, 2/3 of them in fact, eventually return to India and take with them technical knowledge that is dangerous to the continued existence of this country. Beyond this, rather than building the university infrastructute necessary to educate their own people, the Indian government sends their children to OUR colleges and universities, paying their tuiion and other fees and taking up positions in our science and engineering programs that ought to go to American boys and girls. I know, I've heard the nonsene spouted by Bill Gates and others that Amecian's are falling behind in teaching science and math, but tose positions I am talking about, in every single case, a fully qualified Amercian student was turned down in favor of an Indian or Chinese student. You need to take a close look at Mr. Gates and similar ciorporate educational proposals - stop formal education for most Amercian students at the 10th grade! Why? So we have a read supply of ignorant, cheap, unquestioning labor here.

In the end, this lunacy WILL STOP. It's about being an American and standing up for Amercia and our own people and our own country, or it's about being a traitor. We used to call people who proposed schemes like "globalization" and "guest workers" fuzzy minded one worlders and Communists. They can call themselves Republican's or Neo Conservartives or Free Traders, but they amount to the same thing as they did before. I want to put into us a etter term to describe people who propose these schemes, who wold sell out this counry and the working men and women here - Free Traitors. For traitors is what they are and treason is what they practice.

There was a post about the Iranian female jourmalist who was raped in Iran this year and fled to USA after putting more than 200,000 $ bail. The Iran government confesticated all her properties.

Ironically postglobal of Washington Post censored the news on this very forum instead of publicising her ordeal.
Why? Why the anti-Israeli posts are not censored on postglobal but facts about Iran's crimes are systematically censored here? What is the bias of postglobal?

"...We Westerners must terminate immigration from failed 3rd-world societies like India..."

From Wikepedia:

Asian Indians have outperformed all other minority and majority groups in most measures of socioeconomic achievement[2]. The U.S. Congress passed a resolution on April 26, 2005, (House Resolution 227) to honor the Indian American community and Indian Institutes of Technology graduates [3]. Many individuals, particularly those in the fields of medicine and technology, consider Indian Americans the epitome of the model minority. According to the 2000 U.S. Census Indian Americans have the highest median income of any national origin group in the United States. ($60,093)... This affluence has been matched by a high degree of educational attainment. Indians have the highest educational qualifications of all national origin groups in the United States. According to the American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin, there are close to 41,000 Indian American doctors. According to the 2000 census, about 64% of Indian Americans have attained a Bachelor's degree or more.[4](compared to 28% nationally). Almost 40% of all Indians have a master?s, doctorate or other professional degree, which is five times the national average. (Source: The Indian American Centre for Political Awareness.) These high levels of education have enabled Indian Americans to become a productive segment of the American population, with 72.3% participating in the U.S. work force, of which 57.7% are employed in managerial and professional specialties[5]...

...Generally speaking, however, they are known to assimilate into American culture more easily than many other immigrant groups because they have fewer language barriers (English is widely spoken in India among professional classes), more educational credentials (immigrants are disproportionately well-educated among Indians), and come from a similarly diverse, tolerant, and democratic society..."

While cultural based gender discrimination from Indian immigrants may lead to domestic violence, the US enforces it's domestic violence laws, and the US has a widespread support structure for women in that situation.

Educated Asian Indian immigrants, obviously, are helping to fill gaps in the American shortage of engineering and science positions, and are beneficial to the long term health of the US economy.

To understand the nature of Indian brutality, we must benchmark Indian society against other societies.

By 1945, the Allies had bombed Japan into rubble. Many Japanese were malnourished. In 1947, the Japanese established a democratic society. Within 30 years, the Japanese rose to 1st-world prosperity. Moreover, during the 20 years of poverty after 1945, "honor" killings of women did not occur.

Now, look at Poland. It established a democratic society around 1991. During the period from 1991 until 2006, "honor" killings of women did not occur.

Now, look at Vietnam. After the Vietnam War, Vietnam was impoverished. Again, there was no "honor" killings of women.

What, the hell, is the problem with the Indians? Raping and slaughtering women and children is not correlated with poverty. Raping and slaughtering is highly correlated with culture.

What, the hell, is the problem with the Indians?

Folks, the various Indian writers with the various fake names adamantly claim that the Indians are doing the best under the circumstances. The Indians are lying. They are not doing the best. They are not even doing a mediocre effort. They are doing horribly - deliberately and conscientiously.

The Japanese built a prosperous nation out of barren rock. They did not spend any money on developing nuclear weapons; the Japanese put almost the entire national budget into building the economy. By contrast, the Indians spend millions of dollars on developing such weapons, rockets, etc. Are Indian actions causing the malnourishment of the typical Indian child?

What, the hell, is the problem with the Indians.

We Westerners must terminate immigration from failed 3rd-world societies like India. The only exception is political asylum.

Dear Tom,
I have no problem whatsoever about doing business with India. I simply think we need to be VERY careful about the technology and industrial infrastructre we send them, not to mention the job. Taking jobs from American's and giving them to Indian workers may sound like a humanitarian thing to do, but it harms the Amercian worker who lost his or her job and it does grave damage to the taxpayer who supports this insanity. So, I want to see corporations that outsource jobs taxed to the eyeballs! Since the direct cost is about $40,000 a year, then tax them $40,000 a year per outsourced job AND add on the unemployment, retraining and other costs for the displaced Amercian worker. And, do not allow them to produce good or services at an offshore facility and bring them into this country without paying the usual import and customs fees - make them pay them at the rate of a non-competitive country (for that is what they are). Do the same with H1-B and L1 and J and other guest workers. This, of course, is only fair. It is leveling the playing field between foreign workers and Amercizn workers. If U.S. corporations were forced to pay the same benefits and costs for what is now taxpayer subsidized labor, I don't think that they would be quite so quick to continue their presnt practices.

But a woman's face is not obscene, unless one has a really dirty mind...

Women are heading forward with jet's speed.Besides entering and succeeding in every field they are much ahead in dressing and dancing. I have yet to see a mixed gathering in any part of the world where women cover their body to the extent of their male partners. Rather men would like them to be more uncovered because male can not enjoy if female is in the viel. Right of participation apart there must be differnce between freedom and obscenity

MikeB:

I agree that gender discrimination is widespread in India, much of it is cultural (like the rest of the world, for example), and India NEEDS TO BE CRITISIZED and pressured into enforcing their laws which outlaw many practices that have been mentioned in this forum, but much exploitation of women and children is based on extreme poverty.

The relationship between, POVERTY and prostitution (and the spread of aids, HIV), child sexual exploitation, and many other problems in India is apparent. Most of these very poor people could care less about corporate secrets, terrorism or anything else other than survival, e.g. their next meal.

According to a report to the UN, poverty is defined by Ramon Osiris Blanco (2002) as:

"...poverty as the total absence of opportunities, accompanied by high levels of undernourishment, hunger, illiteracy, lack of education, physical and mental ailments, emotional and social instability, unhappiness, sorrow and hopelessness for the future. Poverty is also characterized by a chronic shortage of economic, social and political participation, relegating individuals to exclusion as social beings, preventing access to the benefits of economic and social development and thereby limiting their cultural development..."

India still has over 250 MILLION people classified as very poor, or in poverty. India alone has more undernourished people (>200 million) than all of sub-Saharan Africa combined. "...It is estimated that India accounts for 40% of world?s malnourished children while containing less than 20 percent of the global child population..."

About 75% of the very poor in India are located in rural areas of India, and most of those are from scheduled caste and scheduled tribes. People from SC and ST are particularly susceptable to intergenerational poverty.

In addition, higher levels of poverty are associated with higher levels of child mortality as well as maternal mortality.

On the positive side:

From the world bank on India, 2006 (statements on India since its independence):

*It has maintained electoral democracy
*Banished the specter of famines
*Reduced absolute poverty by more than half
*Dramatically improved literacy
*Vastly improved health conditions
*Become one of the world?s fastest growing economies with average *growth rates of 8% over the past three years
*Emerged as a global player in information technology, business
process outsourcing, telecommunications, and pharmaceuticals
*Is now the world?s fourth largest economy in purchasing power parity terms.

According to the world bank, "...Severe power shortages are seriously hindering India?s development...", The addition of four nuclear reactors (signed by the Bush Administration) can only help sustain the country's development.

In my opinion, doing buisness with India is a good policy from a moral, economic and political perspective. Attitudes toward women will not change overnight in India, but economic development will lead to better education, health care and better opportunities for the impoverished people in India - especially women and children.

Democracies are noteable for their self-examination and development of human rights. India IS a democracy and is working to eliminate its problems, albeit, slowly when it comes to gender.

From UNICEF:

"...While systematic data and information on child protection issues are still not always available, evidence suggests that children in need of special protection belong to communities suffering disadvantage and social exclusion such as scheduled casts and tribes, and the poor. The lack of available services, as well as the gaps persisting in law enforcement and in rehabilitation schemes also constitute a major cause of concern..."

To: BobL-VA

You raised an intriguing question for the extreme right and or relious fanatics/born again Christians. It is true that according to Blackstone [UK legal history/leagl theory] women were considered chattels.

But your question has another aspect of similarity to it with respect to woman's right and same-sex marriage. Both of these concepts argue against evolution of the homo sapien species. Due to natural constraints the procreation of the our species took a different route than in some other species of animals [e.g. in some deep sea creatures the male is essentially a sperm producing parasite permamently attached to a female]. Our species specialized in larger more muscular [and testerone filled] males, as opposed to smaller females lacking [mostly] in testerone. Thus it came to pass that the female was more/better adopted to raise children [aside from her mammaly glands - which arouses the testerone filled male], and the man to defend the "home" and hunt.

In the first years of the xxi-s century technology allowed our civilization [in richer countries] to free the male from strenuous phisical labor, and also allowed the fairer sex to compete with men in many fields of human endevor. In some areas the equality is essentially achieved [e.g in most professions] as long as the involved female does not take the route of procreation. Procreation limits the freedom of the fair sex due to evolutionay pressures. As in the blog in this forum by Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff [Motherhood kept hostage...] MKs. Bertram [PhD], IL USA argued that equality of proffessional standing is secondary to her child's raising demands.

So I will aver that I am opposed to same-sex marriage for the reason that such is not how nature designed the propagation of the species[is impossible except by "artificial" means}, and moreoever, the development of homo sapiens was designed with two persons of opposite sex raising the child - for the benefit of the child's social and psychological development. I will also aver that I am opposed to equality of the sexes, if and only if, such forces the neglect of the child. Nannies, factory type childraising [as in China in State factories, among many other communist states] is too high a price by society to pay in the maladjustment of the child's development.

So as A Liberal, an answer is given. Now it is the turn of the conservative blogger to discuss the problem you posted from another angle.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

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Connie Chou, Bethesda, MD - You ar obviously very adept at changing the subject. Neither I nor anyone else on this forum has ever denigrated people of Indian ancestory. How you come up with an accusation of racism is beyond me. We HAVE pointed out that India, as a culture, has a long history of barbaric treatment of their poor, their minorities, and of of women. Furthermore, I am other cited generaly accepted statistics and other information with regards to bridal murders and Indian treatment of lower caste people, which you (a) said were not in the cited articles, but when several readers cited the actual post, you changed that to (b) questioning the validity of the cited statistical data and reports. Why not simply admit that you are a fanatic and nothing, no amount of data, no facts, no reason, not reality, not eye witness testimony, will alter your opinion. You are, in a word, incapable of original thought, of accepting facts, of accepting reality. You are no different than your right wing counterparts, the Bush wingnuts. I find that rather sad.

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Mike B. you seem to be completely prejudiced. Also based on your post you seem to have personal hatred against these people/nations. Nobody, including the Indians on the forum are claiming that India is box of cherries. But it is a new democracy, which is trying to get is act together. We need to give them a chance. At least they are in the right direction. Where was USA after 50 years of its independence in terms of human rights, womenís rights, treatment of minorities etc?

To Highwayscribe from Daniel (why I waste my valuable time with this...). You say I am trapped in a liberal/Republican paradigm and assert you never used either term? Please, you trashed Bush for rubbing Merkel's back and then implied that Thatcher was somehow forced to act contrary to her feminine nature to gain legitimacy. Is it really all that difficult to guess that you are liberal? And then you say you could care a less about your feminine idealization having any relationship to politics? There really is no use carrying this discussion forward—you are incapable of such a thing. ——And of course women feel your book is rubbish—any fool could guess that. And no your comment did not flummox me because it was "bereft of politics" as you say (it was full of the most stupid and simple politics).
And as for my saying your ideal feminine is nurturing and non-violent I simply took a guess (and which was really not the important part of the conversation, but then you validated it by blithering on about a non-violent ying balancing out a violent yang...). What a goofball conversation. I must be a complete fool for responding. but here is something you will understand: $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$.

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Salamo - I would agree with you that the wealthest few in this contrry are nothing short of criminal. However, the phenomena of the investors, filthy rich corporate eecutives and their multi-million dollar bonuses, their ouitrageous treatment of workers, manipulation of undocumented workers, and the whole host of evils they have brought upon my country, is something that WILL BE addressed in the very near future. I expect that the American people will try these swine and imprison and otherwise punish them as traitors and subhuman trash, which is exactly what they are. But that is the point. Here we do (eventualy) address the greedy and evil amoungst us while other cultures do not. Bush and the Wall Street CEO's, with their unbridled greed and criminal conduct, are an anomoly that will be discarded on the garage heap of humanity.

Women Rights in Iraq

Under the rule of ex-dictator when economic embargos were applied, living conditions for women in Iraq began to deteriorate. The declining economy caused many women to lose their jobs and abandon their education. Girls and women today are now facing a major learning gap and there has been a sharp decline in adult female literacy. Many women in Iraq now focus all their efforts in search of food and clean water to ensure their family's survival. Some women have even resorted to prostitution to provide for their children and families. Women in Iraq had greatly suffered due to sanctions and anti-women legislation imposed by Hussein's regime since the mid-90s. Under Islamic law, the punishment for a woman who commits adultery is death. But women in Iraq are also being murdered for fighting with their husbands, having a relationship with a man outside marriage, and for being raped, because this brings shame on the family. Women have been stoned to death in public, disabled, disfigured and/or kidnapped. Women had even been kept hostage in their own homes.

A woman beaten, burned, strangled, shot, or stabbed to death is often ruled a suicide, even when there are multiple wounds. Many women are killed and buried in unmarked graves; their very existence is removed from community and clan records. The fact that so many murders go unreported is indicative of the status of women and the role of culture in fundamentalist countries. Men convicted of premeditated murder may be imprisoned for as little as three to six months. Upon their release, friends and relatives treat them like celebrities. Hundreds of women have died from strange and unusual accidents or questionable suicides in Iraq.

Another major issue is the surge in the number of honor killing in Iraq. . Several thousand women a year are victims of honor killings. Numerous murders are ruled an accident, suicide, or family dispute, if they're reported at all. Police and government officials are often bribed to ignore crimes and hinder investigations.

If we look more deeply into the matter, and we realize that the sound of feminist silence about the savage fundamentalist oppression of women has its own perverse logic. The silence is a direct outgrowth of the way feminist theory has developed in recent years. Now mired in self-righteous sentimentalism, multicultural non-judgmentalism, and internationalist utopianism, feminism has lost the language to make the universalist moral claims of equal dignity and individual freedom that once rendered it so compelling.

Today, women are the victims of exploitation and oppression in every part of the world. These are human rights abuses, which we do not hear enough about because they are often cultural practices. Women deserve better. Civilized people and progressives should condemn in the strongest terms this terrible inhumane treatment and behavior. The world community, through individual states, and through the United Nations, must demand restoring the dignity of womanhood and an end to this inhumanity towards women.

MikeB:

I would respectfully suggest that you do not get too carried away with criticizing other nation's treatment of the poor, the minority, the different color, the different religion, for there is transgression of laws in this respect in all nations.

The USA after the treatment of the poor, the destitute, the colored during and after Katherina, leaves a hell of a lot to be desired notwithstanding all the Constitutional Rights of USA citizens as enlisted in your bill opf rights.

Similar claims can be made with respect to education, where the quality of curriculum and quality of teaching staff is directly related to the socio-economic status of the neighbourhood. This not withstanding all the various rulings of your several Supreme Courts, including the SC of USA,

Perhaps after your compatriots and you have created a more equal society, then you would have the moral standing to criticise others, with the caveat that such criticism takes into consideration the difference in overall wealth of the other nation with respect to the USA regarding per person income level.

Indeed, a recent article in your daily, regarding what each class of earners should donate to charity, indicated that the top 10% of your citizens [not including capital gains] should contribute $400 billion plus, for the median income of the top percentages is measured in multi-millions, while the bottom 20% does not have enough for bare subsistence. I would submit to you that such disparity of income is immoral and contrary to your Constitutions promise of equality.

In other words, examine your own society, admit its failures, and if still wishing to criticize the OTHER, be reasonable with respect to that OTHER'S socio-economic pressures. India does not have the wherewithal at this time [nor does more than 3/4 of the world] to create an equality similar to the disequality of the USA in 2006 AD.

Merry Christmas and Happy New YEar.

A month ago PostGlobal did a question on same sex marriage. The conservatives argued (and some very effectively) marriage had always and forever been between a man and a woman. Obviously an historically based argument.

Let's see if the conservatives wish to apply this same logic to women's rights. If so, the argument would have to go like this:

Women have always and forever been treated as second class citizens and property. Why should we as a society change our views on women simply because it seems fashionable to do so today?

Under this logic should women not be considered as inferior to men and on this planet to serve the needs of men since it has always been that way?

(This could be the most politically incorrect post I've ever written, but I'm curious to see the conservative reaction to this post)

raj, Albany, USA -
"...India definitely puts it effort in terms of constitution/laws, yes, there is problem in implementation...."

If you read history at all, you will recognize this from the constitutions of the old Soviet Union, of Turkey, of even Nazi Germany. All had constitutional guarrantees to worship, vote, and human dignity. All are directly reponsible for the murder of millions of people *becasue* they attempoted to worship in freedom, attempted to attend shools, attempted to vote, attempted to live their own lives in peace. So, excuse me! Either a country and culture PRACTICES those things or their "intentions" don't mean squat. India treats it's minorities worse than animals, poor women have virtually no right and are murdered by the thousands every year by inlaws who think their dowery too low, low cast or untouchable people are killed for being so uppity as to try and send their children to a PUBLIC school that the upper caste cockroaches believe is their private turf, and Indian businessmen engage in various forms of legalized espionage on a regular basis. Our country's leaders are insane for trusting nuclear technology and other secrets to India. If past history is any indication, however, India will turn on the U.S. and all of those U.S. corporations doing business with them and use that knowledge against us. We need to recognize that India is not some ideal wonderland of holy men and colorful celebrations but is an independent country with it's own culture that is utterly alien to our own. Sometimes, when our mutal interests coincide, we can and should do business. But we need to watch each other carefully and recognize that those interests are temporary things and our cultural and national interests are very different in the long term.

Irrespective of country or society, if there is poverty, the weaker suffers more and when there is prosperity, the stronger gains more. What society/country should do is to protect the weaker/minority by creating and implementing proper laws.
India definitely puts it effort in terms of constitution/laws, yes, there is problem in implementation. It is very easy to notice as one looks at middle/high class, treatment is very different than when you see at lower class.
Yes, there is castism and there is dowry problem. But it is worth to mention, lower caste has been given reservation/free education/ almost free college tuition etc all the way for long time. In some states other backward castes too are getting some benefit too. A great number have already benefited while a good number are getting benefit more than they should. At the same time, a great deal of work need to be done.
Same is true with dowry etc, law is there which is very strict but in some areas area it is not implemented for various wrong reasons, while in some areas it gets implemented very quickly.
Along with problems, India has its own strengths starting from constitution to democracy to equal rights to upliftment of poor. Some countries have not even embarked on those paths.
Anyone with personal interest can find plenty of faults in any society and country. If thatís the motto, good job being done by some in this forum.

Nivedita Nadkarni, Madison, U.S.A -
Oh, please, just give it break! If someone points out that a particular culture or country mistreats their monorities, their poor and women, it IS NOT racism and it certainly isn't "prejudice" and it doesn't involve "hatred". When I read remarks from some twit call it that, I understand that I am dealing with someone so berift of facts and arguments that they are simply resulting to what today passes for name calling. How childish! If being critical is somehow "prejudice" then we have lost all ability for critical thought. When someone points out that illegal (P.C. term - "undocumented") workers take jobs from American workers and an various "guest workers" are used against Amercian workers for wage and benefit concessions by the parasites running corporate America, it is not racism. If someone points out that homosexuals and women are treated horribly, like a cow or other animal in some cultures, it is not prejudice. If someone points out that our President is an idiot and our war in Iran is illegal and immoral, it isn't anti-American nor is it anti-patriotic. All of this is simply common sense. It is intelligently addressing the central point, the hard truth of these matters. So stop with the nonsense, grow up, read a little, and either have facts to support your argument or simply shut up and quit taking up otherwise valuable space on an important forum.

For all of you who have prejudice in your minds against any country or people, I strongly suggest that you get the hatred out of your system. It will hurt you in the long run rather than the ones you are currently spewing venom against. You are welcome to your opinions, but I would say again, before you attack anyone about being backward, look at your own country. I think its a classic case of the pot calling the kettle black!

For well over one year now, Germany has had a female head of government, Mrs Angela Merkel. I did not vote for her. I did not think much of her leadership qualities. I see things somewhat differently now, although she is far from being a genius. What impresses me to some degree is her plitical style of remaining calm and attentive even with hot issues, in heated debates. She can listen to people. She has some talent of bringing people to cooperate. Though I was a supporter of her predecessor, Mr Gerhard Schrˆder, who from the outset - in contrast to Merkel - ruled out Germany's participation in the Iraq war - I must say her way of handling the cabinet seems superior to Schrˆders.

With that said I want to proceed to my main point. I do believe that in Hillary Clinton the USA have an awsome political talent. I know that she has ardent opponents in the US - just as she has fervent supporters. Her reputation in the non-American world is enormous. I think that with a Hillary Clinton as President of the USA there would be a powerful signal and lift to women's causes all over the world.

In America, yes. The rest of the world lags behind. Spread out a large map of our world. Country by Country, think about living there as a woman. Mideast-no Indonesia-no Africa-no S.America-no on and on being female is brutal. Canada-yes It must be wonderful in Central America... Come on, only in America, sorry world, wouldn't live anywhere else.

To: Tom Wonacott, Boise, Idaho

you asked how is education prejudiced against males:

1., the ed system k-12, is set to the maturation rate of the fair sex, which is on average 2 years ahead of the males at puberty. This involves not just sexual maturation but has implications on emotional, intellectual and social aspects among others.
2.,The ed system greatly emphasizes the no-conflict philosophy, to such a point that friendly jousting among boys maybe/is penalized as agression, often with suspensions.
3., Both math and science, areas in which girls do not perform as well as boys [at least in Anglo-Saxon cultural mileaus], is of lower calibre, and often presented by underqualified teachers as opposed to Asia and East Europe, such official dictat by the USA among others is clearly beneficial to girls.
4., Sexual "abuse", may be persecuted against boys, for actions which are "natural" especially in a society so filled with sexual ads. Case in point today's report of 10 year sentence against a boy for consensual sexual act with a girl. Insanity rules the USA, rather than educational excellence [except in some ELITE Universities].
5., Whereas at the time I went to University the male female ration was 3:1, 35-40 years later the ration is almost 2:1 in the opposite direction. Things like this do not happen by themselves, they are directed.

6.,To a certain extent the very nature of the USA [and similar] economic systems force the family to have two earners. Trades which are more demanding of human strength are not presented in a vocational educational mode in k-12, thus maximizing the dropout rate for males who do not see future in academmic subjects.

7., the requisite of nature, child raising is described as a second rate occupation [such as stay home mothers] by the feminist elites, while at the same time the job opportunities in male oriented physically demanding areas are outsourced to illigal and legal immigrants, who are willing to forego the "comfort level" desired by the USA female a la Keeping up with the JONESES. You will note that the fertility rate for USA born citizens [whatever color] is below replacement value, the sole reason that you are gaining population is that thhe Hispanol legal/illigal immigrants still have a positive fertility rate.

With all the above in mind [and other aspects of the educational/economic/sociological measures of USA [Canada, UK, etc] the high school completion rate for boys becomes very low in comparison to the female sex, and in comparison of the developed world. Once this fatal situation is prevalent, then the University/college entrance rate HAS TO BE SKEWED IN FAVOR OF THE FEMALE SEX, and consequently sop does the graduation rate.

Hope the above satisfies your inquiry, if not will compose some more [hopefully] illuminating sections.
Good Luckl and Merry Christmas to all Bloggers!

Daniel, thanks for your response. the highway scribe can't help but feel you are more trapped in a "liberal/Republican" paradigm than he; who never once uses either term. Is the scribe's feminine a poet's idealization? Perhaps. Does he care about its relationship to GOP or Democratic politics? Not a wit. And the scribe never said women don't think he understands them. He said certain women don't feel the scribe, or any man, should attempt to express feminine realities in literature. Again, the scrivener thinks it's good to walk some miles in someone else's shoes in the name of deeper understanding. Reading your comments the scribe can't help but feel you're twisting yourself in a knot trying to paint him as something "other" than yourself, and is somewhat flummoxed at how a rather whimsical and sentimental post — bereft of real political rhetoric — so repulsed and raised your ideological hackles. There is no "scheme" proposed in that first offering; no call to "superimpose" anything on anyone, and, for the world, the scribe doesn't see where you got any of that. Try "Vedette" (Buy My Book! $$$) You will find nothing in her that is "non-violent, completely nurturing" as you put it. If there is nothing transcendent about the female, if she is not the missing ying to our unbalanced and violent yang, if women are naught but another political interest out to get theirs at the expense of others, then why should we care? Finally, you're right, the discussion is interesting, but woefully underattended by comparison to other GlobalChat topics. That may speak to this question better than all the words spilled between us.

Okay... But I have been to India! I spent a great deal of time there and learned to detest it. It is dehumanizing, at best, as a culture. Indian upper casts, treat the lower casts like garbage. Human beings lowered into sewer pipes to clean them out by hand becasue it is cheaper than buying a machine! Rumors of human sacrifice still being practiced and everywhere, people glorifying the godess that peope were sacrificed under. Violence, sex, the absolute worst conditions I could imagine. One vision that will stay me for the rest of my life was a fat, greasy guy sitting in front of a warehouse stuffed full of food while less than a block away, people startved to death. He just looked a them with dead eyes. India has absolutely NOTHING I want or am intereted in. Women are treated worse there than even in most Islamic countries and minorities, the poor, are treated much much worse. You can look upon India through your rose colored glasses all you want but having experienced it first hand, the National Geographic story about the cast system, violenece, theft, and crime, doesn't even begin to tell the story.

To: Athiest and MikeB,

One should not go simply on reports, but study and experience first hand before amking any judgement. I suggest you both to visit, see and educate yourself first hand about the realities and then only talk about Indian or any other society.

"Connie Chou, Bethesda, MD | Permalink
Stop spreading your hate and lies.
The reference you provided says no such thing about India.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/02/0212_020212_honorkilling.html"

Well Connie, here is the quote! : "In India...more than 5,000 brides die annually because their dowries are considered insufficient, according to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF)." Sounds rather like Boston was dead on the mark to me... You know, one of the indicators of anunstable mind is the inability to see facts and reality without filtering it through some personal distortions. Now, Boston is a conservative and I am a moerate liberal, but we both manage to see the same quote in the same article that you don't. That worries me.

To highwayscribery from Daniel. I thought about your earlier post some more and it seems to me now what you actually did rather than superimpose your liberal beliefs on how you expect women to behave is superimpose something of an idealized feminine on the entirety of existence as poets do...

In other words you have an idea of the idealized feminine toward which liberal politics must move and this of course must replace Republican politics...

I can understand now why liberal women would feel you do not understand them. Instead of emancipating woman you expect her to conform to the idealized feminine and for this to rule the world.

According to your scheme women must not only resist being subordinated (which is correct and liberal) they cannot act as men as Thatcher did without somehow having been forced to act contrary to their nature (forced to act like men to gain legitimacy).

But the latter portion is not conducive to the liberation of women at all. It might be that some women are forced to act like men, but other women actually do have male characteristics and consider the release of them perfectly consistent with liberal politics...

It seems you are so against Republican politics and have such an idea of the idealized feminine that you are something of a super liberal toward which everyone must conform...

What makes it even more strange is that you have a particular idea of the idealized feminine—in other words there is not just one idealized feminine.

Your idealized feminine is totally non-violent, completely nurturing,—a total opposition to male characteristics.

But if you study the features of the statue of liberty or the myth of Pallas Athena or other conceptions of the idealized feminine you find that by no means is there a consensus and that in fact a woman can be quite masculine, beautiful and powerful without this being at odds to womanhood or manhood...

This discussion is getting interesting. I wonder now how much politics is getting both confused and clarified by changing conceptions of the sexes. We have a left and right politically and male and female. How do these dualities influence and interpenetrate each other? How can they be disentangled and then reentangled for maximum movement and development?

Sorry Merkel for misspelling of name. Spelling is not my strongest point....

Please excuse me here, but as an experiment a travelled over to the women's forum here (On Balance) where the topic was the "Daddy Wars". I pointed out that one of the primary cases of fathers not having enough time at home were economic conditions, longer manitory work hours, mothers being forced to work to simply provide food and shelter, etc. You want to know what happened. I had two, TWO woemn comment on that. The rest? They complained about their lyin', cheatin' men, made cattish remarks about other female posters, discussed shopping, sex (lots of sex...and how bad it is lately), and in general demonstrated that they are cows who have about as much an excuse for existence as a gold plated bagel...or Paris Hilton. Women,as leaders, can expect repsect and to be taken seriously when they start acting like serious people, when they cease to act like spoiled children.