31
January 2021
• Fashion e-Tailer Myntra Forced To Change Logo After
Activist Alleges Signage 'Offensive Towards Women'
• UK Police Impressed With New Zealand-Designed Hijab
Uniform, Trialing Prototype
• An Idaho Woman Said She Had No Choice But To Wear A
Burka 'Like A Muslim' So She Could Avoid A Mask Mandate
• Ignore The Rumours, Covid Vaccines Do Not Make Women
Infertile
• How Afghan Woman Judge Tried To Fend Off Her Taliban
Killer With Her HANDBAG
• These Are The Top 10 Richest Women, Non From Africa -
Bloomberg
• 'A Lost History': The US Women Who Fought For Better
Working Conditions
Compiled By New
Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/fashion-e-tailer-myntra-forced/d/124190
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Fashion e-Tailer Myntra Forced To Change Logo After
Activist Alleges Signage 'Offensive Towards Women'
Myntra changes logo after complaint calls signage
offensive to women
-----
By Digital Desk
30th January
Following a complaint alleging that e-commerce website
Myntra's logo was offensive towards women, the brand has decided to change its
signage, PTI reported on Saturday. The complaint, filed in December, by a
Mumbai-based activist has forced the fashion e-tailer to change its logo on the
website, mobile app and the packaging materials as well. Founded in 2007,
Myntra was acquired by e-commerce giants Flipkart in 2014 and was later merged
with Jabong to expand its base.
The complaint had been lodged last month with the
cyber cell in Mumbai. "A complainant (woman) had approached the cybercrime
police station in the matter. We called a meeting with Myntra following the
complaint, they (Myntra) came and agreed to change the logo. They have sent an
email as well on the same," DCP Rashmi Karandikar of Mumbai Police's Cyber
Crime Department told PTI.
In a tweet, Avesta Foundation said:
"Congratulations to our founder. She did it what apparently seemed
impossible. Thank you, everyone, for your support. We're overwhelmed by the
response. Kudos to @myntra for addressing the concerns and respecting the
sentiments of millions of women".
As per sources, the complainant had alleged that the present logo of
Myntra resembled a naked woman. The decision to change its logo has received a
mixed response across the internet.
https://www.republicworld.com/business-news/india-business/myntra-forced-to-change-logo-after-activist-alleges-signage-offensive-towards-women.html
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UK police impressed with New Zealand-designed hijab uniform,
trialing prototype
By Sameer
30th January 2021
Leicestershire: The UK’s Leicestershire Police not
only got impressed with New Zealand’s decision of introducing hijab into
uniform but also trialing prototype for their female staff members.
The Health and Safety team is currently trialing the
hijab that is being worn by trainee Constable Khadeejah Mansur.
It may be mentioned that the New Zealand Police had
introduced hijab into their official uniform to encourage more Muslim women to
join.
New Zealand Police said that the work to develop the
hijab for its uniform began in 2018. Constable Zeena Ali was the first recruit
to request it as part of her uniform and was invited to take part in the
development process.
During the designing of the hijab, New Zealand Police
undertook international conversations and collated samples from other Police
worldwide.
As per the New Zealand Police release, the
consultation was done with Muslim women who were involved in fabric research,
extensive pattern sampling, prototyping and trialing.
Constable Ali, who was born in Fiji and moved to New
Zealand as a child, had told the New Zealand Herald that she decided to join
the police after the Christchurch terror attack.
“It feels great to be able to go out and show the New
Zealand Police hijab as part of my uniform,” she added.
https://www.siasat.com/uk-police-impressed-with-new-zealand-designed-hijab-uniform-trialing-prototype-2079323/
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An Idaho woman said she had no choice but to wear a
burka 'like a Muslim' so she could avoid a mask mandate
Bre'Anna Grant
31-01-2021
An anti-masker ranted about the "nonsense"
of mask-wearing during a local city council meeting in Idaho.
Katie Dugger is seen at a meeting hosted by the City
of Lewiston on January 25 wearing a colorful outfit which she says is the
"only way she can avoid wearing a mask."
"You know why I'm wearing this?" Dugger
asked city officials, according to video from a Facebook live stream. "I'm
wearing this because the only way I could go to school today was because I had
to act like I had on a freaking burka like I'm a Muslim."
Dugger is a student at Lewis-Clark State College
(LCSC) and said she had to take last semester off because of the mask mandate
"nonsense."
Students, faculty, and staff to wear face coverings in
campus buildings and classrooms. But, face coverings are not required for those
who have medically-based reasons for not wearing them or if people are socially
distanced while outside, according to the school's website.
Dugger said she had to wear the Peruvian-made outfit
all day to school, and said wearing masks affects her schooling.
In the video, she also said that since childhood it
has been "traumatizing for her to wear a mask."
Dugger downplayed some of the COVID-19 protocols put
in place in the city such as plastic partitions and signs saying "masks
required."
"C'mon, what is this gonna do?" Dugger asks
while holding up her scarf. "Do you think the virus is smart enough to say
'Omg, she has on a burka. I'm gonna stop right here and not infect her or
anybody else.'"
Lewiston City Council met on January 25 to determine
whether or not to extend the city's mask mandate.
Many of the residents who spoke during the meeting did
not wear a mask.
Starting Monday, wearing masks on public
transportation will be required, according to a new rule by the CDC.
Wearing a mask was introduced back in the early days
of the pandemic when there wasn't much evidence on whether masks helped prevent
the virus from spreading.
https://www.insider.com/anti-masker-dresses-in-muslim-garb-to-avoid-wearing-mask-2021-1
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Ignore the rumours, Covid vaccines do not make women
infertile
By Catherine Thornton
31 JAN 2021
A lot of conspiracy theories and fake news surrounding
the pandemic are doing the rounds. Among the disinformation is a suggestion
that COVID-19 vaccines might cause infertility in women.
This seems to be based on perceived similarities
between the coronavirus’s spike protein – which is the key part of the virus
that the vaccines target – and a protein found in the placenta called
syncytin-1. This has led to the unfounded theory that antibodies against the spike
protein will attack syncytin-1, stopping it performing its important role in
the placenta.
All proteins are made up of long strings of individual
building blocks called amino acids. SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19,
is made up nearly 10,000 amino acids, of which around 1,300 are found in the
spike protein. Syncytin-1 is made up of around 540 amino acids. Given that
there are only 20 different types of amino acid, it isn’t surprising that many,
many proteins share similarities.
To make a protein these long strings of amino acids
are folded to form a 3D structure. For antibodies to mistakenly recognise
syncytin-1 as SARS-CoV-2, there would have to be sufficient similarity of amino
acids in these strings (which there isn’t) and the critical amino acids would
need to be clustered together in the 3D molecule in a sufficiently similar and
accessible way (which they aren’t).
Spike protein antibodies are made in response to both
natural infections and vaccines. So women who have been infected naturally with
SARS-CoV-2 during pregnancy also have antibodies to the spike protein.
Therefore, studies of the natural immune response of pregnant women to
SARS-CoV-2 – and the effects of infection on pregnancy outcomes – can provide
insight into the risk of spike protein antibodies to pregnancy.
Evidence shows that the risk of miscarriage is not
increased in women who have had a SARS-CoV-2 infection in early pregnancy. This
indicates that even if spike protein antibodies are present within the uterus,
they don’t have a negative effect on implantation or early development of the
placenta.
The mother’s blood supply is not fully connected to
the placenta until the end of the first trimester. The passage of antibodies
from mother to baby across the placenta then follows in the second and third
trimesters. This is a normal part of pregnancy and provides protection to the
baby against infectious diseases. This is known as passive immunity and
continues after the baby is born with antibodies being transferred via breast milk.
SARS-CoV-2 antibodies have been found in the newborns
of women who have had COVID-19 during pregnancy and who continued to carry
their pregnancy to term. (Typically, this is done by analysing umbilical cord
blood collected when the baby is delivered.) This shows that antibodies are
passing across the placenta from mother to baby and are not having a
detrimental effect on the pregnancy. This is despite cells expressing
syncytin-1 being the first point of contact on the placenta for these
antibodies.
At the outset of the pandemic there was much concern
about the potential harmful effects of SARS-CoV-2 on pregnancy and unborn
children. Pregnant women were included in lists of vulnerable people as a
sensible precaution. This was based on experience with other viruses that cause
more severe disease in pregnant women than the general population or can infect
the placenta or the fetus and cause harm. This list of viruses includes
influenza, hepatitis E, and Zika.
But the passage of time has shown us that we do not
need to add SARS-CoV-2 to this list. Yes, pregnant women can develop severe
COVID-19, which can increase the likelihood of being admitted to intensive care
and giving birth preterm. Overall, however, pregnant women are less likely to
experience symptoms of COVID-19 and are more likely to have milder symptoms
when they do.
As a similar precaution, it’s normal practice to not
include pregnant women in the testing of vaccines – or any other form of
medicine – until their safety has been established. Given the short timescale
over which COVID-19 vaccines have been developed, there simply hasn’t been the
time to gather the safety data needed to confirm that it’s safe to enrol
pregnant women in clinical trials.
While pregnant women haven’t been recruited into these
trials yet, due to these trials’ large size, there have been instances when
women involved have become pregnant. In the cases where this has happened,
there has been no adverse effect on the pregnancy.
Likewise, there hasn’t been time to gather enough data
to allow pregnant women to be included in the priority groups for vaccination.
However, the safety data from the general population is sufficient for the
Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists to advise that pregnant women
who are clinically extremely vulnerable or frontline healthcare workers can
consider being vaccinated and should discuss this with their doctor.
These women should not have any concerns that spike
protein antibodies generated in response to the vaccine will have any harmful
effects on their pregnancy.
Catherine Thornton, Professor of Human Immunology,
Swansea University and April Rees, PhD Researcher in Immunology, Swansea
University
This article is republished from The Conversation
under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/uk-news/ignore-rumours-covid-vaccines-not-19736385
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How Afghan Woman Judge Tried To Fend Off Her Taliban
Killer With Her HANDBAG
By RYAN FAHEY
30 January 2021
An Afghan woman judge tried to fight off a Taliban
assassin with her handbag but died after the killer shot her five times in the
chest.
Supreme Court Judge Kadria Yasini, 53, drew her
handbag to her chest to protect herself from the gunman's attack in Kabul
earlier this month.
Shots ripped through her black leather handbag, police
say, leaving the 53-year-old dead at the scene, with at least five bullet holes
in her chest.
While looking through his mother's bullet-riddled bag,
Yasini's son Abdulwahab Yasini, 28, told the Times he thinks his mother was
shot more than police estimates.
'The police told us that Mum had been shot five times
but maybe it was much more,' said Abdulwahab Yasini, 20. 'There are three spent
bullets in the bag, and everything seems to have been shot through.'
A pair of tweezers were bent by the impact of the
shells and the bag, a purse, notebook, water bottle and book on law written by
the 53-year old were all pierced, the Times reports.
Yasini's brother, Haji Mustafa Herawi, was one of the
first at the bloody scene after hearing gun shots ring out through the window
of his Kabul home.
'As a young man I ran into this street and collected
my dead father's brain from the tarmac,' he told the Times. 'Thirty years later
I ran out and found my sister dead in the car in the same place. They had shot
her in the face, head, chest, everywhere. And the wounds of the past came back
again.'
The murders have caused outrage across Afghanistan and
come just three months before the US and Britain withdraw the last of their
fighting forces from the war-torn country.
On the same day the judges were killed, Taliban,
Afghan and US negotiators sat down in Qatar. Among the insurgents' demands was
the release of 5,000 jailed fighters, which experts fear could see them return
to their former strength.
Last year's peace accord with the US government has
restricted the insurgents in carrying out large-scale urban bombing campaigns,
so they have switched methods.
Victims are now killed by trained motorbike assassins,
or detonating magnetic mines under vehicles which engulf them in clouds of
fire.
As the Taliban targets the liberal elite, droves of
the country's most-educated are leaving and applications for Afghan passports
are at record levels, the Times reports.
'People are leaving. Those that remain are becoming
too afraid to speak out,' said Shaharzad Akbar, chairwoman of Afghanistan's
Independent Human Rights Commission.
Akbar fears that public debate is being silenced among
people who choose to stay. For many women, he adds, seeing the two judges
killed after working so hard to rise in such a male-dominated judiciary,
'raises the question in women's minds here: "Is it worth it?"'
'Afghanistan is losing one of its most important
gains, its educated & professional cadre, in what seems to be a systematic
massacre & the world seems to be just watching. This must stop,' tweeted
Akbar.
Killings in Kabul have risen sharply since November,
with 91 civilians and 64 law enforcement officers slaughtered in just 102 days.
Almost 350 people have been wounded.
Following the attacks, President Ashraf Ghani spoke to
the families of Yasini and Herawi and called for the hanging of any Taliban
prisoners found to be involved in the incident.
Vice President Amrullah Saleh called the
'ultra-sensitive and spectacular assassinations', events that have shaken
Afghani society, adding the Taliban was trying to 'humiliate' the government
and target civil society.
Saleh said the reasons behind the attack is that the
Taliban see media, and women, as blockades in the way of their Islamic
state.
The extremists countered authorities' comments with
threats, which concerned UN, US and NATO diplomats as they fear rising public
outrage could hinder already dragging peace talks. ***
America's 2,500 troops are to leave the
conflict-ravaged country by 1 May and
Britain's 1,000-strong battleforce will follow closely behind.
Western forces will leave whether a peace accord is
finalised, or not, and many experts believe an agreement still won't be reached
in the timeframe. Many believe a collapse in talks will lead to civil war.
Two men held by Afghan intelligence have been
interviewed and confessed to being behind the November killing of Yusuf
Rasheed, the CEO of the Free and Fair
Election Forum of Afghanistan Yusuf Rasheed, and his driver.
One admitted to watching Rasheed daily schedule and
planning the attack, while the other confessed he had been in possession and
transported one of the Berettas used.
Twenty-year-old Safi Ahmed told the Times that he'd
been a member of the Taliban since he was 16 and that his superiors ordered
Rasheed's killing.
It is firmly believed that the Taliban have been
behind most of the killings, but some have been claimed by rival jihadist
group, the Islamic State.
Some think that other criminal organisations,
including the country's mafia, could be involved and benefitting from efforts
to cull the liberal elite.
Former news anchor Yama Siawash was killed in Kabul
when a mine under his vehicle exploded on 7 November as he made his way to work
at Aghanistan's state-owned Central Bank.
Mr Siawash was collected 20 minutes after the vehicle
left the bank's secure car park, which suggests the mine was attached on bank
premises.
'Yet now even the word 'democracy' is understood by
our society as a target ... all of these killings are undermining faith in what
democracy actually means here or what place it has in our future.'
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9204867/How-Afghan-woman-judge-tried-fend-Taliban-killer-handbag.html
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These are the top 10 richest women, non from Africa -
Bloomberg
JANUARY 31 2021
By Agencies
The saying “What a man does a woman can do even
better” comes to the mind when you meet the ten richest women in the world
today with a total net worth of $427 billion, according to the Bloomberg
Billionaires Index, a daily ranking of the world’s richest people.
They include Francoise Bettencourt Meyers from France,
the richest woman with her net worth of $72.4 billion, she’s the granddaughter
of Eugène Schueller, the founder of L’Oreal’s.
She has served on L’Oreal’s board since 1997 and is
current chairwoman of the family holding company. Alice Walton-the second
richest woman, with her net worth totalling at $64.9 billion.
She’s the only daughter of Sam Walton, the founder of
Walmart. She has two siblings, Rob and Jim, who work at Walmart, whereas Alice
Walton chose a different career path for herself.
She’s an art curator and runs the Crystal Bridges
Museum of American Art. MacKenzie Scott is the third richest woman with net
worth of $61.3 billion.
She’s a renowned author and the ex- wife of Amazon
founder Jeff Bezos. The fourth richest woman is Julia Flesher Koch with a net
worth totalling $56.1 billion.
Koch and her three children inherited a 42 per cent
stake in Koch Industries – it owns and runs a diverse set of businesses and
industries from her husband, David Koch, who passed away in 2019.
Meanwhile, Jacqueline Mars, the fifth richest person
in the world, at $40.9 billion is a philanthropist, businesswoman and the
granddaughter of Franklin Clarence Mars, founder of Mars, the world’s largest
candy maker. She worked for the company for nearly 20 years and served on the
board until 2016, states Forbes.
She inherited billions of dollars of stock in Apple
and Disney from her late husband, Apple co-founders Steve Jobs. She’s the
founder of Emerson Collective, a hybrid investment, social impact and philanthropic
firm, according to Mag.
Yang Huiyan who hails from China, is the seventh
richest woman with a net worth of $27.4 billion. She owns 57 per cent of
Country Garden Holdings, a real estate developer.
Forbes says the mammoth ownership stake was largely
transferred to her by her father Yeung Kwok Keung in 2007. Gina Rinehart is
Australia’s richest citizen who built her wealth on iron ore.
Abby Johnson at $23.3 billion from the US is the ninth
richest woman. She’s been the chair- person of Fidelity Investments since 2016.
She took over from her father.
Forbes says she owns an estimated 24.5 percent stake
of the firm, which has nearly $2.9 trillion in managed assets.
https://www.thecitizen.co.tz/tanzania/news/these-are-the-top-10-richest-women-non-from-africa-bloomberg-3274998
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'A lost history': the US women who fought for better
working conditions
Michael Sainato
31 Jan 2021
In the early 1970s, a group of female clerical workers
in Boston, Massachusetts, began organizing for better wages, advancement
opportunities, and an end to sexual harassment. Their organizing efforts
spurred a nationwide movement called 9to5, formed to improve working conditions
for women across the board, and eventually toward the goal of forming unions
within the workplace.
A new documentary film on the 9to5 movement from the
Academy Award-winning film-makers of American Factory premieres 2 February on
PBS, and the makers believe the movement has many echoes of today’s social
justice movements from #MeToo and Black Lives Matter.
Women’s participation in the workforce climbed from
33.9% in 1950 to about 51.5% in 1980. As more women began entering the
workforce, they faced glaring pay inequities, rampant gender discrimination,
pregnancy discrimination and sexual harassment.
The film, featuring interviews with leading organizers
of the movement and actor Jane Fonda, who starred in and helped develop the
1980 film 9 to 5 with Dolly Parton and Lily Tomlin, explores the history behind
the movement that inspired the Hollywood film, its successes, losses, and
parallels to the ongoing struggles in the labor movement and for women’s rights
today.
“Women had so few opportunities that working-class
women and middle-class women found themselves with the same problems in the
same workplaces. We were able to bring people together across class, make sure
that we were confronting divisions around race by bringing people together and
finding common cause. And it worked,” said Karen Nussbaum, co-founder and
director of 9to5.
From Boston, 9to5 grew to cities around the US,
creating a space for women and women’s issues in the labor movement in tandem
with the women’s liberation movement occurring in the same era. Rallying cries
of “Raises not roses”, “coffee rebellions” and picketing actions spread to
cities like Chicago, Atlanta, Cleveland, New York City, San Francisco and
Seattle.
Local chapters ran campaigns targeted at employers and
directed toward issues such as securing promotions and hiring opportunities for
women workers, healthcare benefits, pay raises, childcare, receiving back pay,
and organizing women around collective issues impacting them in the workplace.
“It’s a lost history,” said film-maker Julia Reichert.
“We started making this film long before we made American Factory. We didn’t
realize the two films were going to end up talking to each other so much. For
instance, the [American Factory] union drive was clearly defeated because
plenty of workers were fired, and there were those huge mandatory meetings
where workers were told unions were bad again and again. That all started in
the 9to5 movement in the late 1970s and 80s.”
During the 1970s and 1980s, union avoidance developed
into a multimillion-dollar industry as consultants and lawyers actively pursued
employers to utilize their services. According to a 2019 report by the Economic
Policy Institute, US companies spend nearly $340m a year on union avoidance
advisers. In part as a result of the corporate backlash toward the labor
movement, the union membership rate of the US workforce drastically declined
over the past 50 years, from 20.1% in 1983 to 11.1% in 2015, driven primarily
by union losses within the private sector.
“Whenever these votes occur, you might hear about a
union drive and that the workers chose not to have the union. I feel a lot of
people don’t get the kind of pressure workers are under from their boss, who
pays their paychecks, stopping them from voting ‘yes’,” said film-maker Steven
Bognar.
Organizers with the 9to5 movement formed a local
within the Service Employees International Union, Local 925, in the early
1980s. Through their organizing efforts, workers experienced union election
victories, but also suffered defeats at the hands of well-funded, aggressive
anti-union campaigns where consultants utilized captive audience meetings,
fear, and intimidation to suppress unionization efforts.
“Everyone should know that there is an opportunity to
do collective bargaining, working together so that they can have better
decision making, make more money, have better outcomes, and better benefits,”
said Mary Jung, a 9to5 organizer and activist in Cleveland, Ohio, in the 1970s.
“It’s all about that one-on-one contact, how you approach people, how you’re
inclusive, how you try to build an organization, and you just really need
people to meet others where they’re at and see and show them where they can
go.”
Co-founder of 9to5, Karen Nussbaum noted the political
and social conditions that enabled the rise of the 9to5 movement in the 1970s
is similar to the political and social turmoil the US has recently experienced,
from economic recessions to the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter movements.
The new administration under Joe Biden has begun to
take steps toward enacting a $15 minimum wage and reforming labor laws to
facilitate workers to organize unions as public approval of labor unions is at
the highest rate since the 1960s, at 65%, according to the latest Gallup poll,
conducted in August 2020.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, the unionization rate of
the US workforce increased from 11.6% to 12.1% due to the job security
protections afforded to workers who belong to a union. The decline in union
membership over the past few decades has directly correlated to surges in
income inequality, as increasing shares of income has been directed to the top
10% of wealthiest Americans.
After securing a slim majority in the senate, the
Democratic party now has the ability, if they eliminate the filibuster, to pass
the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, which passed in the House in 2019 but
did not reach a vote in the then Republican-led Senate. The legislation would
expand worker protections in forming unions, including raising penalties for
firing workers in retaliation for union organizing and banning captive
anti-union meetings in the workplace.
Aside from labor law reforms, Nussbaum explained
worker-led organizations and unions need to partner together to organize to
create the change similar to what 9to5 was able to achieve and continue to
build on it.
“Unions and the new worker organizations need to have
the kind of partnership that we did,” Nussbaum said. “No amount of foundation
money is going to substitute for organizations that working people own
themselves. And if we don’t have that, we’ll never have the power that we need
to really be a counterbalance to the better corporate power that we have right
now.”
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/jan/31/9to5-pbs-documentary-women-working-conditions
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