Daily Archives: October 16, 2019

Professor John Pollaers

The government needs to act on a number of workforce recommendations before the sector can improve employee attraction and retention, the workforce taskforce chair tells the royal commission.

However, the government has not even responded to the handful of the strategic actions directed to it including a social change campaign around ageing, says Professor John Pollaers, who chaired the Aged Care Workforce Strategy Taskforce.

In opening statements Senior Counsel Assisting Peter Rozen told the hearing in Melbourne on Monday that evidence presented to the inquiry to date was saturated with workforce-related issues.

Peter Rozen

He said challenges known and discussed included the difficulties providers and the sector have attracting and retaining high quality people to work in aged care.

Mr Rozen asked Professor Pollaers about his work leading the Aged Care Workforce Strategy Taskforce and the 14 strategic actions recommended in the taskforces 2018 report A Matter of Care (read our backgrounder here).

Professor Pollaers described the aged care sector as a highly fragmented industry in its adolescence where the voices of provider peaks dont necessarily align or nor do those of the sectors unions.

He said it was an all of government, an all of community and an all of industry responsibility to make aged care a more attractive industry for young people and others to want to work in.

However, he said there were several things government needed to get to before attraction and retention could be addressed properly, and those things map to the strategic actions in the taskforces report.

But the first one is there has to be a very proactive approach to a social change campaign around ageing in Australia, Professor Pollaers told the hearing.

Mr Rozen asked Professor Pollaers about the lack of response to the five strategic actions directed to government, which are:

Professor Pollaers confirmed there has been no formal announcement from government about implementing these strategic actions nor has he received a response to his personal enquiries.

There has been no detailed response at all to each of those recommendations but for a pre-election commitment to fund the Aged Care Centre for Growth and Translational Research [w]hich I havent seen any progress on.

But with all others, I wrote to the minister asking for a point-by-point response to those and did not receive a response. I think theyre important because strategic action 1 is a co-commitment, if you like, between industry and government.

Commissioner Tony Pagone

Its one that needs to be done together but essentially the philosophy of the taskforce was lets see how far industry can go on its own, and then whats left is the work of government, he said.

And industry have been stepping up in this timeframe, they have responded in the main. But on these areas we havent had a sufficient or a response at all from government.

Commissioner Tony Pagone asked Professor Pollaers if his letter to government was acknowledged.

So I got an email response that it was all of the past programs of government and I went back and said, Look, that isnt sufficient. Im asking for a step-by-step response. I didnt get a response to that email at all, Professor Pollaers said.

Professor Pollaers agreed the lack of response was profoundly disappointing and said he took the view at the time to focus on working with industry to get progress there.

I made the observation at the very beginning of the evidence today that I felt that in many ways the industry is undergoing a level of oppression, [which] may be not the right word.

But I do believe that this is not a department that is resourced well enough, that has sufficient experience and/or weight within the current government department it sits, he said.

His sense is that government has positioned itself to say these are industry issues and industry can deal with the unions. And the government uses the fragmentation as a reason to say it doesnt know what the sector is asking because it doesnt have one voice, Professor Pollaers said.

It has been a reasonably successful approach, he said. And if not a strategic approach then [thats] a real shame because the answers to many of these questions have been on the table for quite some time.

Inquiry moves its focus to workforce issues

Royal Commission loses passionate champion for reform

To stay up to date on the latest about the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety go to our special coverage.

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Pollaers calls out government over lack of action on workforce - Australian Ageing Agenda

The winner of the first professionalHearthstoneWorld Championshiptournament hascommented onBlizzard's recent actions. Following aHearthstone Grandmasterstournament in China in which the winning player spoke out against the communist government's oppression of Hong Kong,the company stripped the player of both his title and prize money and banned him from participating in future tournaments for at least a year, prompting the hashtag #BlizzardBoycott to trend on Twitter and sparking outrage fromHearthstoneplayers, politicians, and even Blizzard employees around the globe.

Reportedly, some Blizzard employees walked out of their offices early last week in protest of the company's actions, and although eventually Blizzardreleased a statement explaining theirdecision andconsenting that they may have acted too harsh too quickly, many players are not letting them off the hook so easily. Multipleupset fans even attempted todelete their Blizzard accounts but were inexplicably barred from doing so at the time, prompting even more anger at the company.

Related: Riot Issues Statement On Expressing Personal Views In Its Broadcasts

As reported by Gamespot, even the first everHearthstone World Champion, James "Firebat" Kostesich, doesn't agree with Blizzard's decision-making process. Although he consented the player in question, who goes by the handle Blizchung, definitely violated the rules of the Grandmasters tournament by voicing his opinions, he thinks the degree of punishment Blizzard handed out was far stricter than need be. "It's definitely ridiculous how much he was punished for it,"Firebat said of Blitzchung. "It's very sad to see. I wish they would support their players more."

Although the president of Blizzard Entertainment,J. Allen Brack, reiterated in his statement their company's relationship with China had nothing to do with their decision to suspend Blitzchung for voicing his support of the Hong Kong protesters, many players, including Firebat, don't seem to be buying it. "I agree that there's probably something else going on," Firebat said. "They want to make an example of him or something, because it's just so unreasonable."

In their statement, which was curiously released late in the day on Friday, Blizzard's president said there are consequences for disrupting game broadcasts and taking the conversation away from the purpose of the event, amessage eerily reminiscent of another politically-charged sports controversy. A few years ago, players in the NFL who began kneeling and sitting during the national anthem to protestracial injustice were treated in much the same way asHearthstoneplayers are being treated now,perhaps because sports league owners don't want their players to have opinions on anything other than the sports they are playing. Opinions are bad for business because they tend to separate fans, but something even worse is separating fans from the product itself. With BlizzCon only a few weeks away, it will be curious to see how Blizzard handles any otherHearthstone controversies which may arise before then.

Next: Blizzard Is Banning Gamers For Political Speech - But Fortnite Won't

Source: Gamespot

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Blizzard Gets Annihilated By First Hearthstone Champion Over Punishment - Screen Rant

WASHINGTON By NBA Social Justice standards, it reads almost like an innocuous tweet: "Fight for Freedom. Stand with Hong Kong. But Daryl Morey typed that tweet. Because Morey is the general manager of the Houston Rockets, the most popular team in China since Hall of Fame center Yao Ming played there, those two sentences may go down asthe most expensive two sentences in the three-decade history of the Internet. That's not an exaggeration.

Sports business analysts and more are saying the tweet could cost the NBA $1.5 billion or more, that it's already devalued franchises by millions and is expected to affect future salary caps. Even more, it could very well end the NBA's 30-year relationship with mainland China.

All because a team official showed solidarity with some of the world's voiceless -- people who want independence from a brutal authoritarian government. That government condemned that tweet, Adam Silver's delayed support for freedom of expression, and any support for democratic reform in Hong Kong. Mainland China, we now know if we didn't already, has two ways of doing things: their way and the wrong way.

Now, Chinese businesses refuse to sell NBA products, state television has canceled NBA games and this barnstorming preseason tour to China -- which includes LeBron and the Lakers and the Brooklyn Nets -- has been marred by a real geopolitical crisis, Adam Silver. Silver -- a guy I like, respect and peripherally have known for 25 years -- has had to answer the most seminal question of his stewardship: Is it still okay to be 'Woke If My League Starts to Go Broke?'

His original response? No.

The NBA originally took issue with Morey's tweet and said it doesn't represent the league. James Harden, showing how unaware and uneducated many players are with China's atrocious human rights record, actually apologized to the government on behalf of the Rockets for Morey's tweet, essentially saying, "Sorry, Beijing, we don't support those ingrates in Hong Kong who want independence from your undemocratic nation." Morey, whom the Chinese government demanded to be fired, even got on the apology bandwagon:

New Nets owner Joseph Tsai, a Canadian Taiwanese businessman, verbally smacked Morey as well, minimizing Chinese oppression by using a Facebook post to give a condescending history lesson on territorialism in China.

Steve Kerr's first response blew me away the most. Kerr, who's gone after a sitting U.S. president for his racial insensitivity and whose team twice refused to attend a Trump White House champions celebration, went mute on the NBA-China divide when first asked, pleading ignorance on the topic.

It was as if Chinese officials had originally scripted the NBA's response: We disavow any connection to that rogue idiot in Houston who thinks a province of mainland China deserves to be free.

Beijing basically said, "Shut up and Dribble," and LeBron and the NBA shut up and dribbled.

Remember, these are the same athletes and coaches boycotting trips to the White House. These are the same people that will wear "Black Lives Matter" T-shirts before games in solidarity for another young African American child wrongly killed by law enforcement.

Everybody in the NBA, it seems, was down for the cause -- unless it conflicted with their wallets. Of all ironies, for at least 24 or 48 hours, most people in the NBA supported communism because it helped their own capitalism.

But I will give Adam Silver this: he got wise within a day.

Facing incredibly ugly backlash at home, he quickly issued support for Morey in his second and third statements released by the league, and thereby alienated the Chinese government. Even though it appeared as if he was putting his finger in the wind and deciding which way the economic winds blew, it doesn't matter. The commissioner came to his senses, and the owners have now become resigned to the notion that it's better to piss off people buying sneakers in Beijing than in Boise.

I'm not going to eviscerate the players and officials of the NBA for showing hypocrisy in this matter before doing an about-face. I just don't want to hear how they remind us all of Muhammad Ali and Arthur Ashe, who went to South Africa at the height of apartheid to protest. That generation of change agents made it possible for this generation of change agents to speak their minds. They didn't care about the dollars. They were all about dignity. They sacrificed everything for what was right.

If there was one lesson to take away from this, it's that we don't get to be part-time social justice warriors when we sign up for this kind of work. We don't get to be outraged against blackface and then plead ignorance when some warped Cleveland Indians fans wear red faceand a logo that looks like a Native American sambo caricature. We don't get to be selective advocates, speaking up for some of the voiceless but not all. We need to self-educate with the people we do business with, and understand that if their values run so counterculture to our own, then maybe it's time we either got out of the Beijing business or the social conscience business.

Because when it comes to a place like China, you can't be both.

RELATED: Wise: The Mystics need more than a parade. They need salaries that pay elite female athletes their worth

RELATED: With China rift ongoing, NBA says free speech remains vital

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The NBA vs. China forced Adam Silver, league to decide if the cost of being woke was worth going temporarily broke - WUSA9.com

A Chinese human rights activist and former political prisoner has called for renewed focus on the countrys practices of mass detention, religious oppression, and reports of organ harvesting.

Speaking at an event Wednesday, Chen Guangcheng told listeners at the Catholic University of America that there is no doubt about the Communist regimes determination to hold onto power by any means necessary.

Human rights have declined and today are very bad, Chen said of the current situation in China. The ruling Chinese Communist Party is afraid of losing power, he said, and so anything that threatens its power will be a target for violence.

Chen, a blind human rights lawyer, was imprisoned in China after he educated poor Chinese farmers on their rights and initiated lawsuits against the ruling Communist Party, and spoke out against the forced abortions and sterilizations under the countrys one-child policy, now a two-child policy.

He eventually escaped house arrest, arrived at the U.S. Embassy, and weeks later flew to the U.S. in 2012.

On Wednesday, Chen, who is a distinguished fellow at Catholic University, gave the second annual lecture hosted by the Institute for Human Ecology at Catholic University as part of its human rights program. The previous speaker was Professor Robert George of Princeton University.

William Saunders, a lawyer and Director of the Program in Human Rights at the Institute for Human Ecology, told CNA that the threats posed by the Chinese Communist party to its own citizens and to the United States could not be clearer.

Thirty years after the Tiananmen Square massacres, and while the protests in Hong Kong enter their fifth month, no one has greater authority to speak about what has happened in the years since Tiananmen, and is happening now, in China than Chen Guangcheng, Saunders said.

The Communist Party is committed to denying basic freedoms to its people. Americans and American companies should not give into threats but should help the Chinese people gain their freedom."

In recent weeks, China has faced increasing public criticism in the U.S. for its political repression and human rights abuses, with the National Basketball Association coming under heavy criticism for appearing to censor an employee of the Houston Rockets for offering public support for pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong.

Widespread protests in Hong Kong began in the spring, following a proposed law that would have allowed the extradition of citizens of Hong Kong to the mainland for trial. Despite the bills suspension, have since grown in opposition to alleged police brutality and in favor of more open democracy.

Last week, a pro-democracy protester was shot by police during a series of mass demonstrations over a period of weeks.

Many people in mainland China are not speaking out openly about Hong Kong, Chen said, but in their hearts, they support Hong Kong.

The event at Catholic University was set against the backdrop of the recent 70th anniversary of Communist Party rule, which many human rights advocates used to highlight the long history of oppression in China.

For decades, the Chinese Communist Party instituted a coercive one-child policy. While the cap has now been increased to two children per family, reports of forced sterilizations and abortions have continued.

Chinese president Xi Jinping has also embarked upon a comprehensive campaign to bring religion in China under the control of the Communist Party. In 2016, he gave a speech at the National Religious Work Conference, where he explained his demand for the sinacization of religion, or the effort to make religion conform with Chinese culture and the CCP party line.

Under the Chinese "Regulations on Religious Affairs" that were implemented beginning in February of 2018, unauthorized religious teachings have been effectively banned in China.

Government officials believe that freedom of religion threatens their power, Chen said, and so the regime has undertaken a brutal crackdown on religion.

Chen also called the 2018 agreement between the Holy See and China to regularize the state-sanctioned Catholic Church and grant the Communist Party a say on the selection of bishops a bad agreement, but said that its still hopeful for Catholics in China.

Last month, during the recent meeting of the United Nations General Assembly, the U.S. co-hosted an event on The Human Rights Crisis in Xinjiang, along with Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK. A Uyghur survivor of Chinese re-education camps, along with an advocate and a family member of a Uyghur detainee, testified on the brutal imprisonment, torture, and mass surveillance of Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, ethnic Kyrgyz, and members of other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang.

Over one million individuals in the region are estimated to be detained by Chinese authorities, and some estimates are as high as three million detainees. There have also been reports submitted to the United Nations China Tribunal detailing organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners and other political and religious prisoners.

Regarding the religious freedom abuses, the CCP propaganda machine denies all of these things, Chen said, but despite massive censorship by the government, many Chinese know the truth, including the Hong Kong protesters.

Chen also accused the Communist regime of practicing despotism at home while trying to whitewash its human rights record abroad.

The CCP is extending its fingers around the world. It is trying to influence democratic countries, especially western governments, he said, citing the purchasing of U.S. radio stations, putting up of advertisements in Times Square, buying of stock to influence U.S. media companies, and having officials pose as businessmen to influence politicians.

Chinese government-sponsored Confucius Institutes are being set up on college campuses in agreement with college administrations, purportedly as a way for American students to learn more about Chinese culture. These institutes, Chen said, are meant to control what people see about China on American campuses, he said. Colleges sign contracts that limit what is said about China.

Yet despite the regimes human rights abuses, the Communist Party is not the same as the Chinese people, he said. I believe in the Chinese people.

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Anything that threatens Communism is a target - Angelus News

The only trouble with capitalism, said Herbert Hoover, is capitalists; theyre too damned greedy.

Hoovers insight today helps explain the disgust and revulsion political leaders, from Ted Cruz to AOC, are expressing over the groveling of the National Basketball Association before the government of China, one of the most oppressive, autocratic, and authoritarian regimes on earth. The NBA says it respects Chinas culture and history; its critics on both the right and the left say the NBA respects nothing but the bottom line, thereby carrying devotion to profit for its own sake to sickening extremes.

What touched off the controversy was a tweet from the general manager of the Houston Rockets expressing sympathy for demonstrators in Hong Kong protesting Chinas growing control over their political system. The Chinese consulate in Houston protested, and while the tweet was quickly deleted, the Chinese government and Chinese broadcasters and other companies in partnership with the NBA and its teams began to sever their business ties, thereby threatening NBA profits. As of this writing, even the most groveling protests and apologies and pledges of love for China from the NBA jellyfish have failed to appease this most ruthless of authoritarian regimes.

Perhaps the NBAs kowtowing to China would not have seemed so bad had its leadership taken the attitude that it was simply a business organization dedicated to promoting basketball, and that criticizing other political systems was outside the scope of its mission. But the NBA has wanted to portray itself as more woke than Major League Baseball or the NFL. Its boasted that its dedicated to the protection of its members right to free expression, and to the promotion of social justice. To that end, when the President of Turkey complained that a basketball player compared him to Hitler, the NBA stood by its man. When North Carolina passed a bill requiring people to use bathrooms consistent with their genders at birth, the NBA threatened boycotts of the state. Now, thanks to the NBA, males can call themselves females, and use the bathrooms of their choice. You cant get more woke than that.

But what about China? But what about its oppression of Tibet? What of its concentration camps for Muslims and its routine oppression of Christians and the Falun Gong? What of the routine suppression of all the civil liberties which we Americans take for granted? If the NBA has its way, Turkey and North Carolina will be fair game for retribution from the woke, but not China. The reason for the NBAs double standard is obvious: Neither Turkey nor North Carolina offers as much potential profit as does China.

In fairness to the NBA, it should be noted that it is by no means the only business prostituting democratic values to appease China. A long list of other corporations, both foreign and domestic, which have sought to appease China by altering their product lines, or firing their employees for criticizing China, or practicing various forms of self-censorship, can be found here: https://github.com/caffeine-overload/bandinchina. Their leaders have been aptly described as spineless weaklings [who] have shamed their country, as discussed by the Washington Post at https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/10/11/maybe-woke-nbas-hypocrisy-china-has-awakened-us-consumers-about-their-own/. And perhaps some of the blame rests with those of us who likewise patronize these businesses without protesting some of their policies. Ill admit to wearing some Nike apparel, and patronizing some of the hotels and airlines listed on the websites in my own travels around the world.

So how do we know when capitalists become too damned greedy? There may be no clearly defined line separating legitimate profit-seeking from excessive greed. But when people and corporations, in the name of profit-seeking, do the bidding of a ruthless totalitarian regime seeking to stamp out all dissent, and when they make every employee and customer potentially complicit in their effort to protect that regimes reputation and obscure its oppressive cruelty, then they have gone too far over the line, wherever it may be.

Malcolm L. Cross has lived in Stephenville and taught politics and government at Tarleton since 1987. His political and civic activities include service on the Stephenville City Council (2000-2014) and on the Erath County Republican Executive Committee (1990 to the present). He was Mayor Pro Tem of Stephenville from 2008 to 2014. He is a member of St. Lukes Episcopal Church and the Stephenville Rotary Club, and does volunteer work for the Boy Scouts of America.Views expressed in this column are his and do not reflect those of The Flash as a whole.

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The Only Trouble With Capitalism - The Flash Today

Top Chinese AI Firms Added to Export Blacklist

The United States added twenty-eight Chinese companies and government offices to the export blacklist this week, citing their role in the oppression of the minority Muslim population in Xinjiang. Included in the blacklist are some of Chinas top AI companies, including surveillance firm Hikvision, speech recognition firm iFlyTek, and facial recognition firms SenseTime and Megvii. While the Commerce Departments action is unlikely to significantly disrupt the companies operations, which have worked to diversify their supply chains in recent months, it is a symbolic hit at Beijings AI ambitions, targeting six of the fifteen teams designated by China as part of its AI national team. China has signaled it will retaliate to the blacklist additions. The final status of Washingtons efforts to blunt Chinese tech development will not be known until the trade talks are resolved, as President Trump once again suggested he may be open to allowing the sale of non-sensitive goods to blacklisted companies, namely Huawei.

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Cryptocurrencies and Blockchain Technology

Iran

Iranian Hackers Target 2020 Campaigns

Cyberattacks sponsored by the Iranian government are targeting U.S. presidential campaigns, laying the groundwork for possible interference in the 2020 presidential election. Microsoft reported that it observed over 2,700 attempts by Iranian hackers to access the accounts of current and former U.S. officials, journalists covering campaigns, and the campaigns themselves, though no accounts associated with a presidential campaign or official were compromised. Anonymous sources have said that President Trumps reelection campaign was targeted. Researchers from ClearSky Cyber Security, which exposed the hackers operations last month, say they have also been targeted by the Iranian hackers.

Uncertain Future for Libra Cryptocurrency

The viability of Libra, the Facebook-led cryptocurrency-based payments network, suffered a serious blow this week. PayPal, eBay, MasterCard, and Stripe have pulled out of the originally 28-member association, with Visa and other financial partners also reconsidering their involvement due to intense political and regulatory scrutiny over money laundering, tax evasion, data privacy, and financial stability concerns. The Bank of England this week said that Libra, with the potential to be systemically important to the financial system, must meet its highest standards to be approved, including joining the U.K.s financial services deposit protection scheme, holding reserves, participating in central bank stress tests, and providing rigorous end-to-end security across the payment chain. Likewise, French officials have said they will block the development of Libra until their concerns over consumer risk and governments monetary sovereignty were addressed. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg this week agreed to testify before the House Financial Services Committee later this month on Facebooks cryptocurrency plans.

U.S. Companies Confronted by Beijings Censors on Hong Kong

Several U.S. tech and entertainment companies have buckled under Chinese pressure this week as anti-government protests in Hong Kong rage on. Apple and Google this week both removed the HKmap.live app, which crowdsourced information on Hong Kong police activityand Google removed The Revolution of Our Times app that allowed players to role-play as protestersafter facing criticism from China. Similarly, American gaming company Blizzard suspended a prominent gamer after he voiced support for the Hong Kong protests. U.S. officials widely pushed back against companies who seemed to be bending to the will of Beijing, leading the NBA to reaffirm players, employees, and owners right to free speech after initially apologizing for a tweet from the general manager of Houston Rockets supporting the protesters. Also this week, Senator Marco Rubio, a loud critic of Beijings censorship, requested an investigation of TikTok, the Chinese-owned social media app, out of concerns the company is censoring content to satisfy Beijing. NSA Director Nakasone also spoke out against the Chinese governments role in weaponizing technology and spreading disinformation about the Hong Kong protests.

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Twitter Used User Email Addresses and Phone Numbers for Advertising

On Tuesday, Twitter announced that email addresses and phone numbers used for two-factor identification had accidentally been used to target users for advertising purposes. Twitter said that email addresses and phone numbers were used for its Tailored Audiences product, which allows advertisers to target ads to customers based on the advertisers own marketing lists. While Twitter does not have an estimate of how many users were impacted by the error, the company has apologized for the oversight and assured users that no data was shared with third parties that used the feature. This mishandling of user data by Twitter is similar to a case where Facebook did not disclose to users that it was using their phone numbers for advertising purposes, which resulted in a $5 billion fine by the Federal Trade Commission.

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Cyber Week in Review: October 11, 2019 - Council on Foreign Relations

Boris Johnsonhas been accused of hypocrisy over his old comments about ID cards.

The Conservative government has announced plans to prevent people from voting unless they produce photo ID at polling stations.

Back in 2004, Johnson said he had spent the past few years travelling up and down the country complaining about the proposals.

He added that he would physically eat his ID card if he was ever forced to produce it.

And at another point, reportedly also in 2004, he described ID cards as a recipe for tyranny and oppression.

Of course, ID cards and presenting ID at polling stations are separate issues, but the fundamental point from Johnsons 2004 piece still stands.

Why should someone have to produce evidence that they are who they say they are when they have, in Johnsons own words, done nothing wrong?

Some supporters of the plans haveargued voter ID is needed to stop electoral fraud but there isnt very much evidence to support that argument.

For example...

In 2018, the Electoral Commission said there was no evidence of large-scaleelectoral fraud, with only one conviction from the 266 cases investigated by the police.

In 2017, there was also only one conviction, while eight suspects accepted police cautions for their actions.

The flimsy justification for voter ID has caused Labour and the LiberalDemocrats to accuse Johnson of attempting to suppress election turnout in his favour.

Some demographic groups are especially likely to not have a version of photo ID - although the government has promised free ID will be available.

Darren Hughes, the chief executive of the Electoral Reform Society, told the Guardian on Sunday:

When millions of people lack photo ID, these mooted plans risk raising the drawbridge to huge numbers of marginalised voters including many elderly and BAME [black, Asian and minority ethnic] voters.

That's one of the major reasons why opposition MPs are suspicious of the government's plans.

The other major reason is the proposal is expected to cost up to 20m to enforce per election, which is a lot of money for a problem that appears to barely exists.

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Boris Johnson's old comments about 'eating' his own photo ID have not aged well - The indy100

KUALA LUMPUR: Although as many as 70% of Muslim women agree with men practising polygamy, only 32% of these women are actually agreeable to allowing it in their own marriage, a survey by Sisters in Islam (SIS) found.

It also discovered that 97% of Muslim women agreed that they must obey their husbands and take care of their children, and that a womans obedience defined her as a good wife.

The European Union-funded survey, which polled 675 women aged between 18 and 55 nationwide, also found that 21% of women believed that a husband had the right to beat his wife, citing nusyuz (disobedience) as justification.

A majority of respondents agreed that it would be nusyuz if a wife was to leave the house without her husbands consent, refuse to move with the husband (54%), refuse to have sexual intercourse (52%), refuse to open the door for the husband (50%), or refuse to answer the husbands calling (46%).

Under these circumstances, they believe a husband may beat his wife.

As a wife, a Muslim woman encounters far greater levels of discrimination than in other roles, said SIS in its survey titled Perceptions and Realities: The Public and Personal Rights of Muslim Women in Malaysia launched yesterday.

Prominent social activist Datin Paduka Marina Mahathir invited policymakers to read the full survey and engage with SIS on some of the issues highlighted in order to achieve policy shifts towards gender equality.

My only hope is for them to read the report rather than respond to headlines.

The survey showed the disconnect between what Muslim women expected and what is happening to them in real life as well as their inability to challenge the reality of life to align it with their expectations, Marina told reporters at the Islam Unsurrendered: Women Rising Against Extremism conference at a hotel here yesterday.

She said in a society like Malaysia where obedience to any authority, be it husband or the government, was considered a norm, it took a lot for women to go against the authority, especially when the figure was someone close to them.

What we have to do is unpack that and show that religion does support a womans personal happiness.

In fact, Islam came at the time when women were extremely oppressed and it lifted that oppression. We seem to have forgotten that, said Marina.

The survey also found that the pressure for Muslim women to conform started from childhood and that they felt a pervasive need to project an image of a proper Muslim woman in their behaviour and dress codes to avoid other peoples negative perceptions.

A total of 80% of respondents agreed that they faced challenges relating to social conformity and 59% experienced moral policing and body shaming, said the survey.

Marina said many things that used to be considered as radical or extreme back then in Malaysia had now become the norm in society such as polygamous marriages, wearing the hijab (headscarf) and donning the niqab (face veil) for Muslim women.

Polygamy used to be hush-hush, something you dont tout openly but now men do that because they think that this is a sign of their power, she said.

SIS programme manager Shareena Sheriff said the group was recommending policymakers to require equality in the family to be a recognised concept within the Islamic family law, and that they were ready to engage with any willing lawmakers.

What we recommend is a relationship that is equal and for egalitarian rights of men and women within the family, something that other Muslim countries have moved to, she said, citing Morocco and Tunisia as examples.

EU Delegation to Malaysia head Maria Castillo Fernandez said gender equality was at the core of European values and that it was important for women to have agency over their decisions.

We will continue working to create a space to ensure that all over the world, men and women can achieve equality, she said in her speech.

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Okay with polygamy, but not in their own marriage - The Star Online

By Sarah Clifford & Scott N. Romaniuk

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was not in office when Canada pulled its troops from Afghanistan in March 2014, but its effects emanate throughout his administrations policies. With the upcoming federal election and Trudeaus renewed feminist strategy, now is an ideal time to revisit his most praised and criticized policies to evaluate their success, while keeping in mind their historical relevancy to one of Canadas most dramatic military engagements: the UN-sanctioned invasion of Afghanistan as part of the broader War on Terror.

Throughout his first term, Trudeau implemented programs such as the Canadian Fund for Local Initiatives in Iraq, Canadas Feminist International Assistance Policy and is a key participant in the UNs 16 Days of Activism. These policies champion, among others, gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, while drawing attention to the need to end gendered violence. Yet, under the guise of Trudeaus feminist policies, his aid programs have lacked both precision guidelines for their implementation as well as concrete understandings of their implicit consequences as the policies do not pay attention to their imperialistic and thus, racialized notions with which they are saturated.

With its promise of funding for nations such as Afghanistan, the Trudeau government has perpetuated a system of domination and patriarchy by determining which countries are aid recipients. The Canadian state allocates aid to an organization whose policies and practices it approves of. As such, by forcing organizations to follow Canadian guidelines as to how they spend their money, the state becomes the funder and controller, while those receiving aid become the controlled. The loss of Afghan autonomy due to Canadian involvement and moreover, Western domination, showcases the uneven power dynamic between the Western provider and the Middle Eastern recipient. This has resulted in Canadian aid projects not succeeding in their intended purpose of liberating the Afghani people from oppression.

Melanie Butler addresses how the federal governments feminist policies also lack self-awareness in their construction of the other by unconsciously identifying women of non-European descent, specifically Muslim women, as the oppressed who need to be saved from their potentially controlling and violent male counterparts. This notion, reminiscent of the justifications behind Canadas involvement in the War on Terror through the emancipation of oppressed Afghani women, points to Canadas inability to acknowledge its racialized policies, and thus, perpetuates the Canadian states patriarchal inclinations and its role as the colonizer.

Why does Trudeaus failed feminist platform matter for Canadians?

Canadas imperialistic and white savior complex is not only evident within its past and current aid projects abroad, but also domestically. Recently in Alberta, an upsurge of odious anti-Muslim discourse and actions have sparked confusion over their origins and the lack of policies in place to mitigate them. When analyzing this newfound issue of radicalization, both the Albertan and Canadian governments failed to acknowledge radicalizations intrinsic connection to the legacy of the War on Terror, demonstrating the states inability to address the relationship between race and gender in its feminist policies.

Through the lack of acknowledgement toward those deemed a threat to Canadian society, often associated with those of Middle Eastern descent, and those who are threatened, often characterized as the dominant white class of Canadians, Canada effectively constructed an us versus them system that: (1) subjugates those seen as outside the superior racial class, and (2) establishes a desire for Canadian to save those belonging to a supposed inferior class. By reasserting the belief that vulnerable and helpless Afghan and Muslim women need saving by non-Muslims, Canada cemented both gender norms and a racial hierarchy within society that has led to an increase in hate crimes and a heightened fear of radicalization.

Even with an increased focus on combating radicalization, such as a $4 million Federal grant given to the Albertan government in 2018, the systemic issues of the War on Terror will not be adequately or effectively addressed. By stumbling forward unaware of the intrinsic relationship between gender and race, Canada has become deeply complicit in the promotion of radicalization. Therefore, aid packages of any magnitude, and further, Canadas feminist policies are unlikely to ameliorate the problem immobilizing Trudeaus feminist agenda and Canadas aid projects.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect Geopoliticalmonitor.com or any institutions with which the author is associated.

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Canada And War On Terror: Imperialistic Notions Of Trudeau's Failed 'Feminist Foreign Policy' OpEd - Eurasia Review