Virginity testing. Yes, you read that correctly. According to Amnesty Int'l, three women in Egypt arrested at a peaceful protest on March 9th were forced to take virginity tests or face charges for prostitution. This is just one of the many ways women around the world continue to be degraded. I realize that Egypt's societal norms are very different from those in the USA but Egypt is supposedly one of the more progressive nations in the Middle East & this is how they treat their women. Unacceptable.
Wasting vast sums of money. I read in Sports Illustrated that "Cal" (I'm guessing this means a college in California? I don't speak college sports lingo) managed to raise between 9-12 million dollars to save a number of sports programs that were going to be cut due to budget constraints, including women's lacrosse. Oh no, a handful of women can't play lacrosse! The world is going to end. Now, really, the sports themselves aren't the issue. To me, the issue is that those millions of dollars could have gone towards feeding the impoverished in our own nation. According to the US Census, in 2009, the poverty level was 14.3%. 14.3%!! There are almost 300 million people in this country, what's 14% of 300 million? A shitload (aka around 42 million)! I'm grateful every day that I have a roof over my head & food to put on my table. I know people who have in the past not been so fortunate & to me it's a miracle they are still alive to this day. Right now, someone is diving in a dumpster looking for food to feed their family. This isn't happening in Indonesia or some country in sub-Saharan Africa, it's happening in the US & it happens every day. I'm not saying we don't owe it to ourselves as a society to do something about the world's poor, I'm saying do something in your own backyard first.
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