Day Fourteen features a photograph by the BB team. Fists Don’t Listen By Abdul Halik Azeez Fists don’t listen in my blurry state I’m a dog without a home My psyche can’t love; slave to a world that never throws me a bone The system rules the outer world My task is your sustenance The [...]
The good news- Sri Lanka is a ‘low prevalent country’ for HIV AIDS. The bad news- With the country’s precipitant development, the risk of HIV AIDS spreading wildly is a burning problem. What’s worse- The youth are highly vulnerable to contraction of the virus due to the “increase in migration internally, externally and internationally due [...]
…in our quest to crush evil and restore peace in the world! And the best part is you won’t have to wear a spandex suit and your undies on the outside (unless you want to…). All right, on a more serious note- we are on a recruitment drive. Beyond Borders (BB) is a youth led [...]
Day 3 features a photograph by TheGargoyleInJeans. Domestic violence is common world wide and it’s quite rampant in Sri Lanka. Most often women don’t leave their abusive husbands because- she has no where to go, her husbands apologises each time he assaults her saying he loves her or threatens to kill her/ her children if [...]
Day Ten features a photograph by Hyshyama Hanim. Call it what it is. Despite decades of grappling with gender based violence issues, the world still lies to itself, culture still sets up excuses, society still believes in myths around abuse, violence and discrimination of women. You and I are still trying to understand its root cause. No [...]
Several months back, I was asked by a few friends to come be a part of a network of young girls (and then some guys joined too!) who were working towards creating a safer space for women in Sri Lanka. Their initial work started in Colombo. As part of ‘reaching out’ to society, the Reach [...]
Day 2 features a photograph by Megara Tegal. This picture is about the universality of gender based violence (GBV). It’s not restricted to a particular demographic. GBV is stifling women in all societies- whether it’s verbal or physical abuse. Watch this blog for the next 14 days. We’ll be posting a featured photograph each day [...]
What’s One Billion Rising (OBR) and why should you rise? Kamla Bhasin, world famous feminist writer and activist, who’s leading OBR in South Asia– gave us a quick interview on the worldwide campaign.
Day Five features a photograph by Gerald Pereira. Gender based violence is not restricted to adult women. Children are subjected to gender based violence as well, such as genital mutilation, molestation, incest and sexual abuse, differential access to food, medical care, and education and child prostitution. UNICEF Statistics- Adolescent birth rate- Number of births per [...]
A week long treat for photo-enthusiasts is brought to you by Rotaract Club of Pandura. Rotaract Shutterbug has a line up of a fascinating sessions ranging from photojournalism (which will be held today), followed by a session on new media tomorrow and an exhibition of photographs from November 03 to 05. Be sure to call [...]
Day seven features a photograph by Ramzi Zaindeen. In most cases of Gender Based Violence, be it street harassment, rape or domestic violence, women don’t seek help. The reason for this may be anything from feeling at fault for what happened to them or not having faith in the police or justice system. Unfortunately, as [...]
Come. Join us as we take you back in time, centuries into the past when Sri Lanka was an unexplored little island. We’ll trace back to how your ancestors got to the speck of an island that you call home– whether you’re Sinhalese, Tamil, Burgher, Moor or Malay or smurf. Expert on the Subject, Asiff [...]
So, The WMC is having a 16 days of activism thing-> Link. which hopes to inform people about gender based violence and things. I had no idea what gender based violence in Sri Lanka is like, so I googled it. There is some violence against men, but I couldn’t uncover much about that and the whole [...]
Day eight features a photograph by Abdul Halik Azeez. Use A Dictionary. The genders often speak in different languages. A word that sounds harsh and coarse can actually denote love and tenderness when translated though the specific emotional and situational context your counterpart is in. Practice patience and empathy, understand the multifaceted meaning and not merely the shallow [...]
Day thirteen features a photograph by Rushda Mohinudeen. While gender-based violence has recently emerged as a salient topic in the human security community, it has been framed principally with respect to violence against women and girls, particularly sexual violence. In this article, I argue that gender-based violence against men (including sexual violence, forced conscription, and [...]
For the guys there was a huge risk factor involved. There was a fair chance the commuters on the bus would band together and beat the living day lights out of them. But that was what Reach Out and Beyond Borders had set find out when we conducted disruptive theatre in buses recently. Despite it [...]
In the run up to the 2012 Galle Literary Festival in which Beyond Borders will be participating in two sessions, we decided to run down to Galle to gather some ideas for our dramas. We didn’t get up early in the morning, as is customary when going our of Colombo, to catch a bus. Rather we decided to go a little [...]
Text can be changed. Day twelve features a photograph by Salaf Tegal. ‘Violence’ is a harsh word. On hearing the phrase ‘violence against women’ what comes to mind may be brutal images of- an acid burnt face, a severed limb, a broken bone or a black eye. Those are the more apparent forms of abuse. [...]
We have just launched a website about the constitution. Now stop that yawn and go check it out, because we’ve tried to convert the heavy worded constitution of the Socialist Democratic Republic of Sri Lanka to something more well, readable. The project is a part of Beyond Borders’ Peace and Governance initiative. The site will [...]
Sri Lanka needs to rise. The injustice is too deeply set– it’s time we snapped out of the apathy and made some noise. Investigations of the Wijerama gang rape victim is against the victim. Yes, you read that right. It was reported that the police suspect she’s a sex-worker and so her claim of being raped [...]