life in general: recent violence in african country, ivory coast

The African country of Ivory Coast, or Republic of Cote d'Ivoire as is its official name, is going through tough times currently caused by fighting between two groups.Violence has affected much of the country in the last one week causing pain and suffering all around. 

Here is what one newsreport reports, "..... Mike Sunderland from Save the Children is working in a refugee camp just across the border in Liberia. 

MIKE SUNDERLAND: I have spoken to a lot of children who have walked for two, three, four days through forest and you know, under a hot sun with no shoes and no food and very unsuitable clothing for such a journey. 

There is a girl who arrived at the border just yesterday having been brought there by a woman she didn't know at all. The girl was just two years old and was discovered by the side of the road with no parents, no clothes, just screaming in absolute terror. This is a wave of refugees and she'd somehow lost her mother on the way. She was picked up by another lady. This lady brought her to the border and has since become essentially this young girl's foster mum........."

According to contributors to Ivory Coast entry in Wikipedia, "....Prior to its colonization by Europeans, Côte d'Ivoire was home to several states, including Gyaaman, the Kong Empire, and Baoulé. There were two Anyi kingdoms, Indénié and Sanwi, which attempted to retain their separate identity through the French colonial period and after Côte d'Ivoire's independence.[7] An 1843–1844 treaty made Côte d'Ivoire a "protectorate" of France and in 1893, it became a French colony as part of the European scramble for Africa.
Côte d'Ivoire became independent on 7 August 1960. From 1960 to 1993, the country was led by Félix Houphouët-Boigny. It maintained close political and economic association with its West African neighbours, while at the same time maintaining close ties to the West, especially to France. Since the end of Houphouët-Boigny's rule, Côte d'Ivoire has experienced one coup d’état, in 1999, and a civil war, which broke out in 2002.[8] A political agreement between the government and the rebels brought a return to peace.[9] Côte d'Ivoire is a republic with a strong executive power invested in the President. Its de jure capital is Yamoussoukro and the biggest city is the port city of Abidjan. The country is divided into 19 regions and 81 departments. It is a member of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, African Union, La Francophonie, Latin Union, Economic Community of West African States and South Atlantic Peace and Cooperation Zone.
The official language is French, although many of the local languages are widely used, including Baoulé, Dioula, Dan, Anyin and Cebaara Senufo. The main religions are Islam, Christianity (primarily Roman Catholic) and various indigenous religions.
Through production of coffee and cocoa, the country was an economic powerhouse during the 1960s and 1970s in West Africa. However, Côte d'Ivoire went through an economic crisis in the 1980s, leading to the country's period of political and social turmoil. The 21st century Ivoirian economy is largely market-based and relies heavily on agriculture, with smallholder cash crop production being dominant....."

Here is a Guardian newspaper report on the recent developments in Ivory Coast:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/03/ivory-coast-ouattara-militias-mass

Ivory Coast prepares for showdown as Ouattara's men mass north of Abidjan

Four days of fighting have stopped Ouattara supporters' rapid advance and prompted UN to evacuate civilian staff

• Pauline Bax in Abidjan, David Smith in Johannesburg and Kim Willsher in Paris
• guardian.co.uk, Sunday 3 April 2011 20.26 BST
• Article history



Civilians pass a pro-Gbagbo soldier near the presidential palace in Abidjan. Photograph: Luc Gnago/Reuters

The UN has evacuated civilian staff from its base in Ivory Coast as thousands of rebel troops gather outside Abidjan for what looks set to be a bloody final offensive. France took control of the city's airport and increased its military presence, fuelling president Laurent Gbagbo's hostile rhetoric against foreign "occupation". The heightened tensions came as Alassane Ouattara, winner of last November's presidential election, denied an accusation by the UN that his forces were responsible for a massacre of hundreds of civilians in a western village. The UN evacuation followed four days of attacks on its headquarters and patrols by Gbagbo's republican guard. Eleven peacekeepers have been injured in two days, including four on Saturday when Gbagbo's forces fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a UN armoured personnel carrier. The office of the chief of the mission has also been targeted. One UN employee was killed by a stray bullet last week. The UN flew 170 civilian staff to the rebel-held city of Bouake, where it had begun expanding its logistical base after Gbagbo's regime stepped up anti-UN propaganda and tried to cut off fuel and food supplies to the UN headquarters. Yesterday's fighting was less fierce than in past days, but the coming days could witness a conclusive battle for Abidjan. Thousands of pro-Ouattara troops massed on the northern edge of the city. An adviser to Ouattara, who did not wish to be named, said they are preparing for a final push to depose Gbagbo. But after swiftly capturing swaths of the country, pro-Ouattara forces have met fierce resistance in Abidjan in the past four days. Gbagbo troops have held positions around the presidential palace, Gbagbo's residence, and the state TV building. The president's forces could be seen regrouping on Sunday. Boatloads of young men were ferried into the centre of the city and marched in the streets, carrying rudimentary weapons such as pieces of two-by-four wood and metal bars. Hundreds answered Gbagbo's call to form a human shield around his residence. "There was an attack planned on the presidential residence, but it didn't happen, possibly because of the human shield," a western diplomat told Reuters. "But it seems to have started up again. I'm hearing some booms from the direction of RTI [state TV]." A military source also told Reuters that the head of the army, General Philippe Mangou, had left the residence of the South African ambassador in Abidjan and rejoined forces loyal to Gbagbo. As French troops moved to secure the airport, cargo planes arrived with 300 soldiers to reinforce the mission, said Commander Frederic Daguillon of the French force, which is now around 1,400 strong. Gbagbo's state TV accused the French of preparing a genocide like that in Rwanda in 1994 in which more than 800,000 people were killed. A caption onscreen read: "[French president Nicolas] Sarkozy's men are preparing a Rwandan genocide in Ivory Coast. Ivorians, let us go out en masse and occupy the streets. Let us stay standing." More than 1,650 foreigners, including 700 French nationals and 600 Lebanese, are sheltering in a French army camp. Sarkozy held an emergency two-hour meeting in Paris on the crisis. Residents of Abidjan braved sporadic shooting and ventured out to get water and food after being trapped inside during three days of fighting. "Many people went to church to pray to God to stop the war in the country," Sylvie Monnet, a resident of Yopougon neighbourhood, told Reuters. But the sight of armed men roaming the streets kept many others locked indoors. One resident of the densely populated neighbourhood of Koumassi told how he peered out of a window to see a group of young men in jeans and T-shirts nonchalantly carrying Kalashnikov rifles. "I have seen guys in military uniform, and I think that our neighbourhood is controlled by the invisible commando," he said, referring to an anti-Gbagbo group that has seized control of some parts of Abidjan. "But if they wear civilian clothing, you can't tell whether they are pro-Gbagbo or pro-Ouattara. It's unsettling. I voted for Ouattara, but I really do not appreciate this." Ethnic tension seemed to increase by the day, he said. "There is so much mutual distrust. There is a feeling that the situation can explode any moment." Some had little choice but to venture out. Pamela Somda, a student, said: "We have nothing more to eat. I have just a single fresh fish at home; after that, I do not know what to do.It is really difficult." Small grocery shops were running out of staples such as eggs, sardines and stock cubes, and prices soared. Electricity has been cut intermittently and water was shut off across the city on Sunday morning, although a few women could be seen on the street filling basins from the lagoon. Meanwhile, Ouattara has clashed with the UN over claims that fighters allied to him had massacred hundreds of civilians, an allegation that threatens to tarnish his credentials as the elected, internationally supported leader. The UN mission said that traditional hunters, known as Dozos, fought alongside Ouattara's forces and took part in killing 330 people in the western town of Duekoue. The International Committee of the Red Cross said at least 800 people were killed in intercommunal violence in Duekoue last week. It is not clear whether that 330 is included in the larger figure. Guillaume Ngefa, deputy head of the human rights division of the UN mission in Ivory Coast, blamed 220 of the deaths on pro-Ouattara forces. He told France24 TV that the killings happened between Monday and Wednesday as pro-Ouattara troops advanced south. Pro-Gbagbo militias killed more than 110, he added. Ouattara's side responded by blaming the UN. Justice minister Jeannot Ahoussou-Kouadio accused the nearly 1,000 peacekeepers based in Duekoue of leaving its civilians to vengeful Gbagbo fighters. "The government notes that the [UN mission] retreated from the town of Duekoue before its liberation by the republican forces at the same time that the town was prey to looting and exactions of every type being committed by the militia and mercenaries of Laurent Gbagbo," he said. The UN said most of its soldiers were deployed at a Catholic mission, protecting 15,000 people who sought refuge there. The mood remained tense as Red Cross workers dug a mass grave. A resident of Duekoue said bodies were lining the streets near Carrefour, which he said was targeted by Ouattara's forces on Tuesday. Carrefour was known as a neighbourhood "where you could only enter if you were a Guere", he said, referring to an indigenous western tribe that is fiercely pro-Gbagbo. It also harboured militias and Liberian mercenaries who regularly set up roadblocks to extort money from trucks and taxis and harass immigrants. "When [Ouattara's] republican forces seized the town, they surrounded the area and killed all the men they suspected of being militias," said the man, who wished to remain anonymous. Workers are trying to collect the bodies. You can see piles, or just one or two lying around. I can't tell you exactly how many, but I would guess up to 200." The total number of people killed since the presidential election in November is now more than 1,300. Aid agencies say expect a quarter of a million refugees to arrive Liberia by the end of June. So far, 80,000 are believed to have fled there. An appeal to raise £25m for the relief effort has been launched.

life in general: ugly violence of political parties through students

Since a couple of decades, political parties in India have infiltrated student bodies across all educational colleges and institutes in the country. They all fund and motivate young students to indulge in all kinds of crass violence. The worst among them all is the Bharatiya Janata Party's Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Pratishad (All India Students Association).

In August 2006, a professor in a town in India was beaten up badly. He died. TV footage clearly showed who the attackers were (ABVP and BJP activitists). The college principal and a few other college officials were witnesses. Later, in the court case, the witnesses retract their earlier testimonies identifying these attackers. The TV footage record disappears from the TV channel's office. The chief minister visits the attacker but not the victim's wife. The high court judge acts lenient on the case and acquits the attackers.

More on the sordid details of this shocking case can be read in this newsreport. I also reproduce below the entire newsreport:

http://www.tehelka.com/story_main42.asp?filename=Ne010809no_one.asp

No One Killed The Professor

Despite dozens of eyewitnesses and incriminating TV footage of the brutal assault, those accused of killing HS Sabharwal have walked free. DIVYA GUPTA reports

Resolute Prem has vowed to appeal against the acquittal of her husband’s alleged killers Photos: SHAILENDRA PANDEY

Photo: NOMESH DUBEY

KOMAL SINGH Sengar, 46, wears the look of a haunted man as he stands atop a mount of dirt and pebbles in a corner of Madhav College, Ujjain. His clothes hang on his emaciated frame. After we exchange telephone numbers in low tones, I tell him it’s important for us to talk. He says, “College mein baat nahin karunga. Saadhe panch baje ke baad. (I won’t talk in the college. After 5:30pm.)” A few hours later, a local police inspector calls me. Sengar has filed a complaint claiming I threatened him and his family with “dire consequences” if he didn’t give me a “favourable” interview.

Sengar is well known in Ujjain. You don’t need an address to find him. Ask an autorickshaw driver or a shopkeeper or a random passerby, and they’ll point you in his direction. Sengar lives with his family in an 800sq-ft house in Alkapuri, a middle- income residential neighborhood. Until six months ago, they lived in a smaller, rented house in the low-income urban sprawl of Desai Nagar. His new house cost him Rs 5 lakh.

“The poor guy had trouble getting a bank loan as nobody was ready to give it,” says Anand Mangal, from whom Sengar bought the house. “He got a private loan, but I don’t know where he got that, whether he sold land or from relatives or elsewhere.”

Sengar’s dubious fame dates back to a single moment nearly three years ago, on a fateful Saturday, when he found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time, with his trusted friend and guru, Prof HS Sabharwal. That day, Sabharwal paid with his life and Sengar, perhaps, with his soul.

VANISHING ACT The ABVP activists ran into Prof HS Sabharwal on campus, brutally beat him up and then ran away. Scenes of the assault were shown live on TV

On Saturday, August 26, 2006, the entire sacred Hindu town of Ujjain seemed to have descended outside Madhav College’s rusted iron gate named Gaurav Dwar. The place resembled a mini battleground with hundreds of police personnel outside the college, along with cavalry, teargas squads, police videographers and photographers. Ujjain’s print and TV journalists were present, too. Simultaneously, hundreds of white kurta-clad Congress workers milled around agitating as part of a jail bharo andolan.

The 120-year-old Madhav College, alma mater of celebrated Hindi poet Shiv Mangal Singh Suman, is reputed to be a fertile breeding ground for future MLAs and MPs. In 2006, the atmosphere there in the lead up to the student union elections was unusually charged. The Congress-affiliated NSUI had won the elections through most of the past decade. In 2003, after the BJP routed the Congress in the Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections, the BJP’s student wing, the ABVP’S political prospects at Madhav College received a shot in the arm too. The BJPled state government announced a new election format. The NSUI, opposed the new format, alleging it would favour the ABVP.

Amidst immense confusion, the college principal LN Verma called a faculty meeting that day and an unanimous decision was taken to cancel the elections. Then, Verma did something puzzling, which later also proved fatal. He had two notices put up in quick succession – one stating that the elections were on, and another saying they had been cancelled.

Predictably, all hell broke loose at the college. First, the NSUI vandalised the principal’s office. A little later, ABVP activists threatened and abused faculty members and smeared mud on a professor’s face. As these assaulters turned back, they ran into Prof HS Sabharwal on the campus and brutally beat him up. Scenes of the assault were broadcast live on TV.

A few minutes later, at 2:06pm, Sabharwal was pronounced dead. The postmortem report said broken ribs and bleeding lungs had stopped the flow of oxygen to his brain, leading to his death.

A creature of habit and routine, Prof HS Sabharwal, head of the college’s political science department, normally drove to work in his car. But on that Saturday, he went by scooter to college. Sabharwal planned on returning home quickly for lunch with his wife, Prem. “He didn’t like leaving me for even two minutes,” Prem reminisces, smiling shyly. “After marriage, when I came to live in Ujjain from Delhi, he preferred that I didn’t work. Even though it was a small town, we had a golden life together.”

Years ago, as a student at Madhav College, Sabharwal had been reputed as a deft hockey player and an excellent orator. Ironically, he had also been the president of the ABVP. At 5 feet 11 inches tall, Sabharwal cut a strong but pleasant figure with a “jolly nature”, as his family and students remember him. “Prof Sabharwal treated the students as his friends,” says LLB student and NSUI leader Rajesh Bathli. “He loved mixing with and spending time with the students.” Sabharwal’s son Himanshu recalls a candid conversation with his father in which the professor freely admitted that teachers rarely took classes, saying, “Why should we suffer the students’ abuses?” Perhaps, in quieter moments, Sabharwal may have also wondered about other critical issues – the politicisation of university campuses beyond recognition; the power play of the political parties in universities and colleges — the first building blocks of their future cadres — which has eroded the sanctity of education and the culture and purpose of learning; the political interference that forces teachers to toe the line of political parties in power.

Timeline SABHARWAL DIED WITHIN three to four minutes after the assault on him by ABVP activists. Why and on whose orders were they let inside the college when it had already been ordered closed? 8:30AM Faculty meeting called by college principal to take a final decision on the holding of elections begins. It arrives at a unanimous decision to cancel elections 10AM – 10:15AM In a puzzling move, principal issues two notices. First, that elections will take place and then, minutes later, another one that elections are cancelled 11 – 11:30AM NSUI activists pour into the college campus. They vandalise the principal’s office. Within 15 minutes, they are caned out of the premises by the police 11:45AM The Principal closes the college and orders a lockdown of both its gates. Faculty, college staff and policemen on duty remain inside the college 12:30 – 12:45PM CSP Manoj Singh escorts into the college a group of 25-30 ABVP activists and BJP corporators, who threaten, abuse and smear mud on faculty members 1:45 – 1:50PM The group of ABVP activists and BJP corporators meet Prof Sabharwal on their way out of the college. They assault and beat him up and run away 2:06PM Prof Sabharwal breathes his last. He is escorted by Komal Singh Sengar and others to the hospital, where he is pronounced dead on arrival

But Sabharwal wasn’t known to be shy of words or as someone easily intimidated by unruly students, says Himanshu. “Fear was far away from him.”

The trial of such a public killing should have been an open and shut case. But the most incriminating evidence — footage shot by Ujjain’s local TV news cameramen as well as the police videographers and photographers, which showed the ABVP activists attacking Sabharwal — vanished mysteriously. The police named 69 eyewitnesses. But these did not include many professors or police officers, including Manoj Singh, YP Singh and K Runwal. Sabharwal’s son Himanshu claims that Principal Verma confirmed to him that three local BJP corporators — Sonu Gehlot, Satyanarayan Chauhan and Mohan Yadav — were in the group that assaulted his father. But the investigating agency, the state CID, did not record their statements. A crucial forensic examination was sent to BJP-ruled Gujarat, after the Supreme Court transferred the case to Nagpur so the trial could happen in a “non-BJP led state.”

FATAL LOOPHOLE The statements of all 69 witnesses in Sabharwal’s murder case were recorded by the CID – evidence not admissible in court. Why did the police not record these statements before a magistrate?

On his part, Principal Verma left the task of reporting the professor’s killing to the college peon, Sengar, and sports coach, Manohar Dodiya. This made both Sengar and Dodiya the prime witnesses on whose testimony the prosecution’s case rested. Both later turned hostile, leading to the acquittal of those accused of the killing. Dodiya told TEHELKA that the FIR for Sabharwal’s killing was lodged “several hours” after the attack. The FIR does not record the time it was registered, which is a mandatory requirement. Further, the statements of all 69 eyewitnesses were recorded by the CID, which rendered these accounts inadmissible as evidence. But why did the police not record these statements before a magistrate? Sabharwal’s son Himanshu claims he handed a crucial piece of evidence to the then Superintendent of Police, Jaideep Prasad, and the investigating officer, BK Vyas. This was a CD that an ABVP activist named Sanwar Patel gave to Himanshu. The CD, says Himanshu, showed the accused ABVP activists and the BJP corporators assaulting Sabharwal. The SP and the investigating officer failed to pass on the CD to the prosecution. Regrettably, Himanshu did not keep a copy of the CD. “I gave the footage to police officers investigating the case,” says Himanshu. “I trusted them at the time.”

The national spotlight was on. Media pressure had built up. A man was beaten to death in broad daylight before hundreds of eyewitnesses and dozens of video cameras. The opposition in the state was waiting in the wings, ready to pounce. Someone had to pay the price, at least for a while. Six ABVP workers — Shashiranjan Akela, Vimal Tomar, Hemant Dubey, Panjak Mishra and Sudhir Yadav — were arrested on charges of murder and rioting.

Things didn’t work out in Ujjain for Sabharwal’s family and they realised they wouldn’t get a fair trial. They petitioned the Supreme Court to transfer the case to a “non-BJP led state”. The request was granted after 18 months. Nagpur became the new venue for seeking justice. The trial at Nagpur began in March 2008. On July 13, 2009, the judge acquitted all the six persons accused of Sabharwal’s murder.

The judge sought cover in the finer points of law to soften the blow. Though they may have been guilty, he said, “justice could not be done to Sabharwal” as the prosecution “failed miserably” to prove the case against the accused. The accused afforded a defense team of some of the country’s most highly paid lawyers, hired to create “reasonable doubt” to use legal parlance, to get them off the hook. The prosecution lawyer, Pratul Shandilya, on the other hand, faced difficulties right from the start. The investigating agencies were slow and selective in forwarding crucial documents to him. The government proved tardy in clearing the payment of his fees . But the most difficult part for him was proving to the court that the statements of the witnesses recorded before the investigating agencies were indeed true. “All the key witnesses turned hostile,” says Shandilya unhappily.

SELECTIVE COMPASSION CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan met accused ABVP activist Vimal Tomar at the hospital soon after Sabharwal’s killing. But he has not met the professor’s widow even once in three years to offer condolences

The supporters of the accused broke into street celebrations. Elsewhere, the slain professor’s widow cried some more, and their son believed a lot less. “Nobody was willing to come forward and say what really happened,” says Himanshu. “The truth is that my father was killed inside the college. The only people who were inside at that point were the ABVP activists group, the professors, the principal, the policemen on duty, Dodiya and Sengar.”

“I had accorded him the status of God after the killing, but I think he was pressured a lot,” said Prem Sabharwal of Sengar, who, before turning hostile, had given a signed affidavit to Himanshu and an interview to TV news channel, NDTV, in which he named all the accused.The court didn’t consider the evidence relevant.

Upon being released from prison after their acquittal, the six ABVP activists went into hiding. “After the unfair media campaign against these innocent men, we don’t trust the media anymore,” ABVP leader Vishnudutt Sharma told TEHELKA.

A secondary schoolteacher in Ujjain, Shashi Ranjan Akela was one of the main accused. When we called his home, his father said Akela had gone away to “offer prayers”. Vishal Rajoria, whose father is a police officer, wasn’t home as well. His sister said it had been a tough three years for the family. Pankaj Mishra, who lives in the Police Officer’s Colony near Ujjain’s Mahakala temple was not at home either. Said his mother: “Woh to hamesha apne ABVP doston ke saath hi gaayab rehta hai. (He always seems to disappear with his ABVP friends.)”

Soon after Sabharwal’s brutal killing, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan met ABVP activist, Vimal Tomar, one of the main accused, at a hospital in the city of Indore. But he has never called on Sabharwal’s widow to offer condolences. Chouhan’s first reaction to Sabharwal’s killing was to call it an “incident”. In three years, his police failed to catch the killers who beat a man to death before dozens of eyewitnesses, watched by millions on national TV.

Clearly, those lower down in the Darwinian social pecking order have become scapegoats in a case, which, in reality, was dead on arrival at the court. It was systematically stripped of all crucial evidence by the state security machinery and investigating agency prior to the start of the trial, with direct support from the chief minister and the ruling dispensation. The road to justice for HS Sabharwal has arrived at a crossing. If we head in one direction, then ours is not the world’s biggest banana republic. If we head the other way, ours is not the world’s biggest democracy.

life in general: sexist jokes encourage male violence against women

As a man, privy to private male conversations between male friends/colleagues, I know how petty and vulgar jokes are passed against females.

This recent research (and a previous one that follows below after the first) shows how it even courages male violence against women:

Recent research:

01/07/2009 - Sexist jokes favour the mental mechanisms that justify violence against women, according to a study

Those are the conclusions of a research work carried out at the University of Granada (Spain) in a sample of 109 university male students aged between 18 and 26 years old The results of this work will be released tomorrow Thursday 2nd of July in the framework of the 'International Summer School and Symposium on Humour and Laughter’, held in Granada

UGR News Sexist jokes (and all the variants of this kind of humour) favour the mental mechanisms which urge to violence and battering against women in individuals with macho attitudes. Those are the conclusions of a study carried out at the University of Granada, that will be released tomorrow Thursday 2nd of July in the framework of the world most renowned international symposium about humour and its scientific applications ('International Summer School and Symposium on Humour and Laughter: Theory, Research and Applications') that will be held in Granada.

In order to carry out this research work, the scientists applied several questionnaires to a group of 109 university male students aged between 18 and 26 years old. They showed them two series of jokes, one of them with sexist jokes where women were denigrated and another one
with common jokes, without any kind of sexist content. Next, the researchers proposed them several scenes with different cases of battering against women, from minor to serious attacks, to ask them how they would react in this kind of situation.

They are more tolerant with violence The work proved that those who had listened to sexist jokes were much more tolerant with male battering than those who had not, this is, that this kind of humour favours the mental mechanisms tolerant with violent behaviour towards women. However, the researchers warn those individuals affected by sexist humour showed a previous tendency to tolerate violence against women, as we can gather from a survey which weighed up sexist attitudes against women.

Some of the items of the scale used by the scientist to measure men’s sexist attitudes were: "Deep down, feminist women intend women to be more powerful than men", "Most of the women do not fully appreciate what men do for them" or "There are many women who make sexual insinuations to men and later they reject their advances just to make fun of them".

This work has been carried out by professors Mónica Romero-Sánchez, Mercedes Durán, Hugo Carretero Dios, Jesús L. Megías and Miguel Moya, of the departments of Social and Experimental Psychology of the University of Granada, and will be officially presented tomorrow Thursday 2nd of July at 5 PM in the Carmen de la Victoria of Granada, within the 'International Summer School and Symposium on Humour and Laughter’.

The results of this research work have been accepted to be published in the renowned US ‘Journal of Interpersonal Violence’.
Reference: Mónica Romero Sánchez. Department of Social Psychology of the University of Granada. Mobile: 699 876 200 E-mail: monicaromero@ugr.es


Previous one:
http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/11/05/being-smart-about-dumb-blonde-jokes/

Nov '07
Jon Hanson recently examined the overlooked effects of sexualized stereotypes in televised advertisements about women, including ads characterized as quasi-public service announcements.

We now bring news of a new study by Thomas E. Ford of Western Carolina University which finds that jokes about blonde’s intelligence and women drivers lead to hostile feelings and discrimination against women. The study will be published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. Below is an excerpt from a Newswise summary of the study.

A research project led by a Western Carolina University psychology professor indicates that jokes about blondes and women drivers are not just harmless fun and games; instead, exposure to sexist humor can lead to toleration of hostile feelings and discrimination against women.

“Sexist humor is not simply benign amusement. It can affect men’s perceptions of their immediate social surroundings and allow them to feel comfortable with behavioral expressions of sexism without the fear of disapproval of their peers,” said Thomas E. Ford, a new faculty member in the psychology department at WCU. “Specifically, we propose that sexist humor acts as a ‘releaser’ of prejudice.”

Ford, who conducted research into sexist humor with three graduate students at his previous institution of Western Michigan University, presents their findings in an article accepted for publication in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, one of the nation’s top social psychology journals. The article, “More Than Just a Joke: The Prejudice-Releasing Function of Sexist Humor,” is scheduled for publication in February.

In the article, Ford and the graduate student co-authors describe two research projects designed to test the theory that “disparagement humor” has negative social consequences and plays an important role in shaping social interaction.

“Our research demonstrates that exposure to sexist humor can create conditions that allow men – especially those who have antagonistic attitudes toward women – to express those attitudes in their behavior,” he said. “The acceptance of sexist humor leads men to believe that sexist behavior falls within the bounds of social acceptability.”

n one experiment, Ford and his student colleagues asked male participants to imagine that they were members of a work group in an organization. In that context, they either read sexist jokes, comparable non-humorous sexist statements, or neutral (non-sexist) jokes. They were then asked to report how much money they would be willing to donate to help a women’s organization. “We found that men with a high level of sexism were less likely to donate to the women’s organization after reading sexist jokes, but not after reading either sexist statements or neutral jokes,” Ford said.

In the second experiment, researchers showed a selection of video clips of sexist or non-sexist comedy skits to a group of male participants. In the sexist humor setting, four of the clips contained humor depicting women in stereotypical or demeaning roles, while the fifth clip was neutral. The men were then asked to participate in a project designed to determine how funding cuts should be allocated among select student organizations.

“We found that, upon exposure to sexist humor, men higher in sexism discriminated against women by allocating larger funding cuts to a women’s organization than they did to other organizations,” Ford said. “We also found that, in the presence of sexist humor, participants believed the other participants would approve of the funding cuts to women’s organizations. We believe this shows that humorous disparagement creates the perception of a shared standard of tolerance of discrimination that may guide behavior when people believe others feel the same way.”

The research indicates that people should be aware of the prevalence of disparaging humor in popular culture, and that the guise of benign amusement or “it’s just a joke” gives it the potential to be a powerful and widespread force that can legitimize prejudice in our society, he said.

life in general: goondaism recycled

Exactly a week back, fanatic followers of Raj Thackeray (Raj T), the founder of the split faction of Shiv Sena (SS), Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), brutally attacked some Railways-exams' giving students who had come from outside Bombay for giving the exams. Shocking though it was to see it happen, it was not the first time Raj T was stage managing such attacks against north Indians. This has been happening since about two years now. But this time the hue and cry was so much that next day, Raj T was arrested by the police and kept in the police lock-up for 24 hours. This was a simple implementation of the rule of the law and MNS hooligans went on a rampage holding Bombay, Thane, Nasik, Nagpur and Pune cities to ransom.
My heart goes out to the ones who, in the past many months, have been injured—or whose shops/property have been damaged—by MNS goons. But I don't get much shocked anymore by such violence. This is India's—and in this particular case—Bombay's and Maharashtra's ugly truth.
Raj T and his MNS have now replaced SS in such violent and extortionist techniques. Shiv Sena, under an ailing and aged Bal Thackeray is more or less dead now. The rowdyism of SS is now the rowdyism of MNS. Raj T is the son of Shrikant Thackeray (Bal T's brother) and Kunda (sister of Bal T's wife Meena).
During 1966-7, Bal Thackeray, and his newly-formed Shiv Sena, rose in prominence due to their violent agitation against south Indians. Just like Raj T is now building his political capital with the huge Maharashtrian voter base using the loss of jobs for locals due to north Indians, so had Bal Thackeray used the same excuse (but against south Indians) to build his fledgling SS into a larger political party. Subtle, yet shameless, encouragement and handing out respect to such goon parties is given by Congress party to Bal T in the 1960s and 70s and now Congress-Nationalist Congress Party alliance to Raj T. The Bombay police, and Maharasthra police, are, as always, puppets in the hands of the ruling parties (be it Congress-NCP, or SS-BJP, or in the future a potential MNS-BJP alliance).
The south/north Indians issue is just a ploy to gain political capital and Bal T never meant it to be permanent nor does Raj T mean it to be now. Sooner or later, these goons come back to Hindu identity politics. Two decades after his first agitation, Bal T, turned his violence against Muslims (the horrendous SS violence on Muslims in January 1993). I do not rule out Raj T doing the same 5-10-15-20 years from now. Such is one of India's ugly faces. The mindless violent reaction that one is currently seeing in Bihar and Jharkhand to MNS is another one. In fact, it is not just Bombay and Maharashtra where one such sees dirty political games. Go to Madras, Bangalore, Calcutta, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Baroda, Surat, Pune etc and one gets to see the non-locals being treated unpleasantly.

(An update on the above is in my 2 Nov '08 post)