Lebanon II

One of the things that I've totally become enamoured of is Al-Jazeera TV - the English version, of course, as I still understand very little Arabic, unfortunately. I am particularly a fan as they are stridently opposed to the regime in Saudi Arabia, and are in fact, banned from the air in that country. One show which I would highly recommend is called EveryWoman, which focusses on stories affecting women around the world, and highlighting their general plight. For example, on today's show, the stories that they covered included that poor Saudi girl who was gang-raped and SENTENCED to 200 lashes and 6 months' in prison - for being a rape VICTIM. Some of the perpetrators were also sentenced between 3-5 years in prison, but some were not. They also spoke about paraquat use in developing countries (despite it being a health hazard and banned in Western countries), and seeing as most crop sprayers are women, the physical damage that it is causing amongst some of the poorest and most vulnerable women in countries' attempts to become "economically progressive". The last story they covered was in Jodphur, where, for one day a year, the women get to "act" like men, as a celebration of a story of an argument between a Hindu god and his wife. This means they get to dress up like men, and then beat the men in the city with sticks. Ummm, I think that it's good that the men get a very small taste of their own medicine, but I find it very telling that the main action that is involved in "being a man" is beating women. And, of course, everything goes back to normal for the other 364 days in the year....