And when WHITES engage in LOOTING, what is THAT called? Ah, yes: expansionism, colonisation, manifest destiny, globalisation, "securing freedom and democracy for all [white people]", "free trade", health insurance premiums, ATM and other banking fees, pharmaceutical price gouging, internet music file sharing, and "morally good". (WRONG! That's all LOOTING.)

Revised on 21 January 2010 ECD.

I'm introducing this post with one cracker-ass, mutherfucking, white supremacist, classist, anti-Black IMAGE AND CAPTION which was found--or was it looted??--*here*.

 

Members of WHAT race of people gets to offer themselves million dollar bonuses, annually, for doing a shitty job at work AND getting fired? Whites or Blacks? What groups of people are enslaved globally and genocidally killed, with all their cultures appropriated and natural resources LOOTED? Whites or Black and Indigenous people? Who benefits from capitalism's corporate welfare programs to aid Families With Independent Children? Rich folks or poor folks? Of the Global North and the Global South, which one is rich and which is poor because one LOOTED THE HELL OUT OF THE OTHER? (And which one did what?) In which hemisphere are resources continually being LOOTED to allow the other to thrive while people across other hemisphere barely survive and die?

On a more individualistic and less systemic level, all the white men I know but two: myself and one friend--just one, steal music all day long using their computers. LOTS of white young women steal from clothing stores and other businesses while the clerks and cashiers keep their eyes focused on the people of color with dark skin in the store at the same time. Middle and upper middle class white "shoppers" in mall stores across the U.S. utilise this awareness of anti-Black racism to get away with looting. And should some white upper class person be caught, don't worry; daddy has a lawyer and a doctor who will call it a serious addiction-level compulsion and brain chemistry imbalance.  

What does the media call an upper class white woman who steals from a store? A looter? Nope. 

White media defines her as someone--name not released yet by her attorney--who is a victim of a mental illness, "Experiencing a formerly undiagnosed manic phase of a bipolar disorder". (I'd call it acting on class and race entitlements, mental illness or no mental illness.)

What do white folks call a Mexican man crossing the boarder into the U.S.? Racist answer: one 'illegal alien' who 'shoulda-been-shot already' who has criminally arrived here to take away all our jobs!!!

An alternative answer: an Indigenous man coming home after his family and his people were forced out years ago, by whites.

What do white folks call an African American and Chippewa man in a walking around at noontime in a white gated community in an Ohio suburb? Answer: First they identify him as a trespassing dangerous criminal burglar, and then they call 9-1-1. 

An alternative answer: paying respects to where generations of his family were buried before the sacred ground was paved over for the comfort of land-looting whites.) 

I've added to the title below because as it was stated, it's fucked up. Unless we're going to say ALL colonised nations in the last 500 years are [white] man-made disasters. (That would include the WHM supremacist U.S. and the continental nation of white Australia. And yes, those nations too, are disasters for Indigenous people, people of color, the poor, women, queer folks, children, non-human animals, and the Earth.) And we'd have to include "man-made" suffering that is systematic for women experiencing battery and rape, among other forms of gendered violence experienced by women everywhere around the world, by patriarchal men known or unknown to them.

I find this article to be racist and classist as hell. But it makes a one or two important points. And afterwards, I'm placing another article on WHY what you're about to read is FUCKED UP RACIST AND CLASSIST (among other oppressive things) about it. But see if you can pick it out as you read along. I may help you along by putting some bits in bold and brackets. 

What that follows next is from *here*. (I've added quite a bit in bold and in brackers, actually.)

Much of Haiti[an Suffering Prior to and Following the Earthquake] Is a [White] Man-Made Disaster 

Recovery will require a profound cultural and political change.

By Anne Applebaum
Posted Saturday, Jan. 16, 2010, at 12:13 PM ET

Read more about the Haiti earthquake in Slate.

For the past several days, I have found myself unable to look at the photographs from Haiti. I have also found that when I start reading an article datelined Port-au-Prince, I have to force myself to read to the end of it. I have donated money to Doctors Without Borders, on the grounds that it has been in Haiti a long time and will be able to use the cash quickly. However, I have no illusions about my tiny donation, or about the organization's ability to help. I have no illusions about anyone's ability to help, for this is not just a natural disaster: It is a man-made disaster first and foremost, and so it will remain. [Yes, I agree. But which men made it so? THAT'S important to answer, and Anne doesn't.]

Though the earthquake was a powerful one, its impact was multiplied many, many times by the weakness of civil society and the absence of rule of law in Haiti. [This is all coded gringo lingo for a call to quickly bring in the white supremacist soldiers!] As Roger Noriega has written, "You can literally see [the] dysfunction [wtf???] from space": Satellite photos of Hispaniola, the island split between Haiti and the Dominican Republic, show green forests on the Dominican side and bare, deforested hills on the Haitian side. [I did not know that, and appreciate Anne putting that information in her article. AND, that's not 'dysfunction', and if she can bracket the "the" she can bracket the word "dysfunction" and replace it with "ecocidal, genocidal destruction". That's white supremacist corporate capitalist greed, Anne. So please say so.] Mudslides and collapsing houses were routine in Haiti, even before this disaster. Laws designed to prevent erosion [laws don't prevent erosion. Trees prevent erosion], and building codes designed to prevent criminally shoddy construction, were ignored [by the moral, anti-criminal U.S. white supremacist military and paramilitary forces, like Blackwater?]. [And who benefited from those forests being removed?] The rickety slums of Port-au-Prince were constructed in ravines and on steep, unstable hills. When they collapsed, they collapsed completely. [And what might we call the fucked up, environment-destroying, multimillion dollar dwellings built on the slopes in California? Stupidity-by-design? See, when you're poor, you have limited resources, so when you build, you build with materials you got. When you're uber-rich, you can build with anything and you can build anywhere. So calling poor people's homes "rickety slums" is just a reinforcer of stereotypes and an invisibiliser of rich white folks rank stupidity.]

So weak were Haiti's public institutions, literally and figuratively, that nothing is left of them, either. [This is more of that coded talk for "HURRY UP and bring in the white supremacist colonising soldiers!!!!!"] Parliament, churches, hospitals, and government offices no longer exist.* [Really? EVERYWHERE in Haiti???] The archbishop is dead. The head of the U.N. mission is dead. [FOR THE LOVE OF A WHITE-MALE-SUPREMACIST SKY-GOD, SEND IN THE U.S. MILITARY!!!] There is a real possibility that violent gangs will emerge [OH YES, SHE WENT THERE!] to take their place, to control food supplies, to loot what remains to be looted. [Wait. Isn't that what white people and their corporations do: control food supplies and loot what remains to be looted?] There is a real possibility, within the coming days, of epidemics, mass starvation, and civil war. [And possibly toads and frogs falling like hail from the sky. U.S. MILITARY: GET YOUR WHITE SUPREMACIST ASSES DOWN THERE NOW!!!!]

The same is true in Indonesia. [i.e., all those places in where the darker people live are the same, really.]  It is even possible to read assessments of the worst-hit places, such as the province [check at the bottom to see why these asterisks are here in blue] of Aceh*—from the World Bank, for example—that describe life there as better than ever before. [Well, that's the job of the World Bank: to make themselves look good while committing genocide and ecocide.] I am certain that many disagree. However, there are no scenes there of what everyone always calls "biblical" tragedy. Indonesia is not a society of utopian perfection, and neither is the United States. [Well you've got that right.] But both have enough social cohesion to support indigenous charities, [Exsqueeze me? The U.S. does WHAT?!! Anne, the U.S. commits GENOCIDE and IMPERIALISTIC RACIST WARS and GLOBAL CULTURAL DESTABILISATION of Indigenous people. Those are three of the things it does most, actually (in terms of what it spends the most money on)--and routinely. I know you mean "local charities" but please read INCITE's book on NGOs and other pro-corporate schemes to find out why "charities" don't do anything that is sustainable or that stops globalisation and white male supremacy, including, particularly, the virulent spread of white Christianity.] both have enough educated people [because going to colleges means you know how to live sustainably, doesn't it? Uhhhhhh, no.] to plan reconstruction, both are capable of absorbing lessons learned [unlike who, Anne? The intellectual two year-olds who apparently live in Haiti?], of rebuilding villages and cities [Anne, please read Derrick Jensen's work and learn how fucked up that statement is] with an eye to future floods, of helping their own refugees resettle. [And please WHM sky-god, don't let them come to the U.S.! We whiteys are more and more of a minority as it is!!!]

Haiti does not have these kinds of internal resources, which means that all the reconstruction expertise will have to come from outside. Most of it will come from the United States. [And not with any morality of generosity, I assure you. With economic and political interests firmly in place. Yes, the U.S. does that well.] Yet for all the obvious historical reasons, this outside expertise will be unacceptable to many Haitians, who will see it as a colonial imposition, unwarranted interference in local affairs, cultural imperialism. [That would be "unacceptable", yes. And "see it" means, in this case, "WHAT IT IS"] Armed U.S. Marines may wind up in fire fights with those violent gangs [Oh she didn't go there did she?? Yup, she did. Hey Anne, you racist bigot, the white supremacist military is the world's most powerful GANG.] Local elites—those who remain—may plot to swindle the aid missions out of their food and money. [Because there's no such thing as morality on an island like Haiti--in case you don't catch Anne's drift.]

I hope I am wrong. [I hope Anne doesn't write racist, seemingly pro-humanity but blatantly xenophobic bullshit in the future.] I am sure there are optimists out there, people who think this is Haiti's chance to reconstruct itself, literally and figuratively, to rebuild government institutions, to attract donors and investment. Bill Clinton is such an optimist [no, Anne. He's a sexual abuser of women, and an opportunist who represents white male supremacist corporate interests], and I am very, very glad that he and his wife spent their honeymoon in Haiti. How fortunate, at this moment, that the country has such powerful friends. [Yes. Cynical sarcasm. But you miss the point.] Yet I also know that a successful recovery and reconstruction will require not just friends [does "friends" include the U.S. white supremacist colonising military as well as "FOB"s (friends of Bill)?], not just money, and not just optimism, but a profound cultural and political change, the kind of change that normally takes decades. And Haiti does not have decades, it has days—maybe hours—before fresh disasters strike. [It has less time than that to be described rather than stereotyped in a non-white supremacist way by the U.S. media.]

Correction, Jan. 17, 2010: This article originally stated that Haitian President René Préval was out of the country. (Return to the corrected sentence.) It also incorrectly described Aceh as an island. (Return to the corrected sentence.)

*     *     *
Did  you get it? Here's part of the problem, from *this wonderfully named feminist blog, The Pursuit of Harpyness*.

Stop using the word “looting!”

Posted by SarahMC in Thoughts, Language Matters, Racism, The Media on Jan 15, 2010, 2:02pm | 50 comments

So this morning I decided to check in on What The MSM Is Up To, just out of morbid curiosity. At MSNBC I found this image.

The implication is that Haitians are ungrateful, uncivilized thieves.

Right now, this is the top story over there. “Looters roam Haiti streets as aid trickles in.” Is that so? To “loot” is to rob. What constitutes “looting” in an area that has been reduced to rubble? Not waiting in front of a collapsed grocery store for the cashier to return? I suppose people should not eat until they have the opportunity to pay someone for food? Is that what “civilized” people would do? As Tom Scocca said at The Awl, if there is no other way to get provisions, it’s not looting.

Consider the specific needs of Haitians with Disabilities in the Aftermath of the Earthquake: Physical Disabilities, Post-traumatic Stress, Blindness, and more

[image is from here]

Above, able-bodied Haitian children

display colorfully painted crutches which are now ready

to distribute to people with disabilities.

Haitian Citizens with Disabilities: Not discussed much in the dominant media why? 

Because white folks assume being Haitian is a disability. Poverty, racism, sexism, capitalism, and imperialism are disabling systems of oppression to people. But being a citizen of Haiti means you are human. Some humans have disabilities and some do not.

Thank you to FWD/Forward: feminists with disabilities for a way forward blog. All that follows is from *there*.

As you’re likely aware, an immensely destructive earthquake struck Haiti on January 12, 2010. It was centered in the capital city Port-au-Prince, home to over 2 million residents, and destroyed buildings, food and water systems, hospitals, and seemingly the national government. The information and photos coming out of the country have been disturbing and heartbreaking. The full scope of the damage – to the people, to the country – has yet to be determined, but it is surely catastrophic.

The effect of the disaster on Haitians with disabilities is similarly devastating. Although the earthquake and subsequent building collapses happened so quickly that neither PWD nor TAB had an opportunity to get to safety, conditions after the quake are likely disproportionately difficult for PWDs. The streets are covered in debris and destruction, there is no electricity, and people need to scavenge for any available food and water. Additionally, literally all of the medical facilities in the city were destroyed in the quake, so there is no access to medications, doctors, anything. Even now, four days after the quake, there is extremely limited emergency care in Port-au-Prince, with people traveling 6 hours by car to one of the few undamaged hospitals in the country for emergency surgery.

In addition, there are an untold number of people who are newly disabled due to the catastrophe and its aftermath. Most of the injuries are open compound fractures, where broken bones have penetrated the skin. These require immediate surgery to re-set the bone and close the wound to prevent infection – which injured patients haven’t been able to get. These people haven’t gotten food and water, much less antibiotics.

Dr. Jennifer Ashton reported that “most of these patients have not eaten in three days. They are profoundly dehydrated and they have crush injuries to their long limbs, upper arms, body and, in some cases, open pelvic fractures, which set the scene for some very serious and life-threatening infection. In addition, when limbs get crushed like that, if they don’t have surgical management immediately, they risk losing that limb as the swelling and infection really take off and that’s what we’re seeing.” Ann Curry reported that desperate doctors were performing surgery on injured children without anesthetics. It is also likely that a number of survivors will develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. After the tsunami of 2004, PTSD rates averaged about 10% in the population.

It’s important to note that not everyone injured in the quake is subject to these conditions. American citizens were evacuated by U.S. Air Force planes and other chartered planes to be treated in United States hospitals. This Anchorage woman had her lower right leg crushed by rubble and was then evacuated to a hospital in Miami, where her foot was amputated. These conditions are affecting people without the money or resources to get adequate care. And they are exacerbated by the poverty and unstable infrastructure that existed prior to the quake. (Which the U.S. and France and other colonial powers created and sustained, but that’s more than I can get into with this post.)

It is easy to feel overwhelmed by this, but there are things you can do to help:
FINANCIAL DONATIONS

• Portlight Strategies, Inc. focuses on Haitians with disabilities. It works with a community of Catholic nuns who will be opening shelters in Port-au-Prince for PWDs, and donated funds will go to “defray shipping costs of medical and clinical equipment … and for the purchase of food and other shelter supplies.”
• Healing Hands for Haiti has been providing prosthetic and orthodic services and supplies to Haitians with disabilities since 1998 and will be deploying staff and equipment to help PWDs.
• Christian Blind Mission, an organization focused on PWDs in the developing world, partners with local organizations in a number of medical facilities throughout Haiti. Donations will “support its Partners in the affected area with emergency assistance and long-term rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts.”

IN-KIND DONATIONS

• Aid for AIDS is collecting medical supplies, including unused medications. They are especially interested in antiretrovirals to help Haitians with AIDS whose treatment has been interrupted by the disaster. There are drop-off points throughout the US, or you can send them to Aid for AIDS at 120 Wall Street, 26 Floor
  New York, N.Y. 10005.
• Partners in Health is also seeking donations of these specific items: “need specific items urgently:  orthopedic supplies, surgical consumables (sutures, bandages, non-powdered sterile gloves, syringes, etc), blankets, tents, satellite phones with minutes, and large unopened boxes of medications. No small quantities or unused personal medications will be accepted.“

Please also remember to take care of yourself during this time. It’s been easy for me to spend hours reading articles, looking at photos, watching footage, and feeling increasingly overwhelmed and helpless. Don’t lose track of your own health and well being.

MADRE is working with women in Haiti, MADRE works to stop violence against women

[MADRE logo image is from here]

Haiti: Emergency Relief for Earthquake Survivors

Earthquake in Haiti

The worst earthquake in 200 years struck Haiti on Tuesday, January 12, causing catastrophic destruction in the hemisphere’s poorest country.

The quake struck near the capital of Port-au-Prince, the most densely populated part of Haiti.

Providing Disaster Relief

We are working closely with our partners in Haiti to meet these urgent needs of women and their families in this crisis:

1. We are raising funds for emergency medical supplies, broad-spectrum antibiotics, water purification tablets and food. We heard a report this morning that 90 percent of the population of Port-au-Prince is now homeless. We are working to supply tents as temporary shelters.

2. We are collaborating with organizations in the US (Partners in Health and Circle of Health International) to send teams of care workers, including Creole-speakers and reproductive healthcare providers.

3. We are working to send support to women’s human rights defenders. We are hearing reports of a horror that often accompanies disasters like this – namely, an upsurge of violence against women. It's critical that women human rights defenders in Haiti have the support they need to help survivors and reach out to women who are trying to keep themselves and their children safe in the chaos that has gripped Port-au-Prince.

4. It is critical that women have opportunities to communicate with the international community to talk about what is happening to them. We are working with press and with women's organizations on the ground to create such opportunities for women in Haiti.

Zanmi Lasante's Earthquake Relief

MADRE is partnering with Zanmi Lasante Clinic to get emergency supplies to Haiti. 
Zanmi Lasante is one of Haiti's largest nongovermental health care providers – and the only clinic that delivers comprehensive primary care, regardless of people's ability to pay.

Thanks to its deep roots in the community and its years of experience confronting the frequent disasters that plague Haiti, Zanmi Lasante knows what to do in this crisis. They immediately identified the most urgent needs of women and families devastated by the earthquake and began mobilizing direct aid, such as bandages, broad-spectrum antibiotics and other medical supplies, as well as water tablets to prevent cholera outbreaks.
More on the Zanmi Lasante Clinic

Donate Today.

If you also wish to donate to MADRE's fund to stop violence against women, you may do so by clicking here.

Sexist Backlash Against Gender-Responsive Aid in Haiti Shows Some Men Really Don't Get It

[image is from here]

The title of this blogpost and all that follows is from *here @AlterNet*.

 

Posted by Lucinda Marshall, RH Reality Check at 7:34 AM on January 18, 2010.

News flash: In addition to food, water, shelter, and medical care, there are needs that are specific to women, particularly pregnant women and new mothers.

In Haiti, as is always true in the aftermath of a major disaster, in addition to the urgent need for what we traditionally consider the pillars of immediate aid -- food, water, shelter, medical care -- there are needs that are specific to women, particularly for pregnant women and mothers with new babies and the need to address the added vulnerability to violence that women face when government infrastructures are dysfunctional.
According to the International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (UN-INSTRAW) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA):

(W)omen of reproductive age face limitations in accessing pre-natal and post-natal care, as well as greater risk of vaginal infections, pregnancy complications including spontaneous abortion, unplanned pregnancy, and post-traumatic stress. An increase in violence against women was also recorded…

…(I)n natural disaster situations and in post-disaster recuperation, the cases of violence may increase. "Given the stress that this situation caused and the life in the refuges, men attacked women more frequently.

Additionally as the MIndanao Commission on Women and Mothers for Peace Movement points out:

women suffer most from the impact of climate change and natural disasters because of discrimination and poverty. The same happened to women victims of Hurricane Katrina and the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami as documented in a report on "Gender and Climate Change."

Tracy Clark-Flory addresses these issues relative to providing aid in Haiti in a piece on Salon's Broadsheet:

It isn't just that women often require special care and resources post-disaster; human rights organizations say that they could also play a critical role in distributing much-needed aid. Women "are central actors in family and community life," says Enarson, and are more likely to know "who in the neighborhood most needs help -- where the single mothers, women with disabilities, widows and the poorest of the poor live." Diana Duarte, a spokesperson for MADRE, an international women's rights organization that has joined the relief effort, put it this way: "Women are often more integrated and more aware of the vulnerabilities of their communities."

Even beyond the initial emergency response, there lies a long road to recovery that holds other unique challenges for women and girls. They are "at increased risk of gender-based violence, especially domestic violence and rape but also forced marriage at earlier ages" due to their increased dependence on men for protection and support, says Enarson. After a disaster of this magnitude, there will also be scores of “newly disabled, widowed or homeless women" in need of help. MADRE’s Duarte points out that women’s generally higher "level of poverty negatively effects their ability to access resources to rebuild."

Clark-Flory also points to the work of the Gender and Disaster Network which calls for a gender-responsive approach to aid in Haiti and has a wealth of resources on the topic here.
Madre's Marie St. Cyr and Yifat Susskind offer this excellent view of what such an approach needs to look like in Haiti,

All Haitians are suffering right now. But, women are often hardest hit when disaster strikes because they were at a deficit even before the catastrophe. In Haiti, and in every country, women are the poorest and often have no safety net, leaving them most exposed to violence, homelessness and hunger in the wake of disasters. Women are also overwhelmingly responsible for other vulnerable people, including infants, children, the elderly, and people who are ill or disabled.

Because of their role as caretakers and because of the discrimination they face, women have a disproportionate need for assistance. Yet, they are often overlooked in large-scale aid operations. In the chaos that follows disasters, aid too often reaches those who yell the loudest or push their way to the front of the line. When aid is distributed through the “head of household” approach, women-headed families may not even be recognized, and women within male-headed families may be marginalized when aid is controlled by male relatives.

It is not enough to ensure that women receive aid. Women in communities must also be integral to designing and carrying out relief efforts. When relief is distributed by women, it has the best chance of reaching those most in need. That’s not because women are morally superior. It is because their roles as caretakers in the community means they know where every family lives, which households have new babies or disabled elders, and how to reach remote communities even in disaster conditions.

Moreover, women in the community have expertise about the specific problems women and their families face during disasters.

Unfortunately, in big relief operations, already-marginalized people are usually the ones who “fall through the cracks.

None of this sits too well with the men’s rights movement.  Robert Franklin, Esq. has this to say at Men's News Daily:

(A)ccording to Clark-Flory, "women in general will be in need of ‘hygiene supplies…"  Men and boys apparently will not need those things.  And “women often require special care and resources post disaster.”  Men and boys don’t need those things either.  Is that because men and boys are supermen who don’t need help?  Or is it because they’re less deserving of it than are women and girls?

First of all, the piece did not say that men and boys don't deserve aid, it said that women have some needs that men don’t have that  also need to be addressed. Secondly (having hopefully given female readers time to pick themselves up off the floor from laughing) -- apparently Mr. Franklin, Esq. does not go to the grocery or drug store very often or he would know that hygiene is our oh so clean euphemism for sanitary products -- oh wait, that is a euphemism too -- okay, excuse my indelicacy -- it means tampons and pads that women use when they MENSTRUATE (there, I said the word). As a general rule, most of the people who use those products are FEMALE.  But if Mr. Franklin, Esq. really feels that he needs them, I’m sure we can send him a box with explicit instructions on where to shove them.

As for special care, unless men get pregnant and have babies, they probably do not require that assistance either.

Over at Spearhead (they're not subtle are they?), they also object to Gender and Disaster Network’s "Elaine Enarson (probably a Swedish woman)" saying that,

They are "at increased risk of gender-based violence, especially domestic violence and rape but also forced marriage at earlier ages" due to their increased dependence on men for protection and support.

with this,

So now when men provide women with protection and support they are suspected rapists, child molesters and batterers? Are these strange, foreign women more trustworthy than Haitian girls' fathers, brothers and grandfathers? I try to refrain from inserting my opinion when I am writing these news pieces, but Ms. Enarson is making one of the most offensive insinuations possible with the above statement, and she is dead wrong. It is matriarchal societies where women cannot rely on men for support in which women face the most danger.

Really?  Name one matriarchal society where this is or was so.  And yes, women who are in general more likely to be victims of intimate violence are far more likely to be victimized when they suddenly become more physically vulnerable.
International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (UN-INSTRAW) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) offer this framework for re-prioritizing the way we offer aid:

In the face of obstacles and the needs that have been identified, the evaluation proposes a series of concrete recommendations, amongst which are to: improve the sexual and reproductive health of women and adolescents in natural disaster situations and in post-disaster recovery; ensure access to contraceptive measures, particularly condoms for the prevention of transmission of HIV; provide post-natal care; medicine to combat infections and post-traumatic stress; provide an adequate response to cases of violence against women, girls and boys; include the provision of health and legal services; and improve the security situation of shelters to prevent cases of abuse of power by guards.

The UNFPA is currently working to rush maternal health supplies to Haiti.
As Bill Quigley puts it so eloquently, we need to:

Prioritize humanitarian aid to help women, children and the elderly. They are always moved to the back of the line. If they are moved to the back of the line, start at the back.

There are several organizations that are working to provide aid to meet women’s specific needs in Haiti.  The women’s human rights organization Madre is,

working to send support to women’s human rights defenders. We are hearing reports of a horror that often accompanies disasters like this – namely, an upsurge of violence against women. It’s critical that women human rights defenders in Haiti have the support they need to help survivors and reach out to women who are trying to keep themselves and their children safe in the chaos that has gripped Port-au-Prince.

You can make a donation to help their efforts here.
In addition, the U of t Feminist Law Student’s Association reports that,

V-Day is trying to reach our sisters in Port au Prince who run the V-Day Haiti Sorority Safe House, which provides shelter to women survivors of violence and their children, as well as psychological, legal and medical support. While we have not been able to reach the staff at the Safe House, it is clear that increased help will be needed for women survivors of violence in the aftermath of the earthquake. Reports state that over 50,000 lives have been lost, and that Port Au Prince has been “flattened.”

You can donate to VDay’s Haiti Rescue Fund here.

Tagged as: women, aid, haiti

Lucinda Marshall is the Founder and Director of the Feminist Peace Network. She is the author of the FPN blog as well as Reclaiming Medusa.