No Sex for Oil?

One of the nuttier ideas for opposing war in Iraq comes from a feminist-inspired group called The Lysistrata Project, inspired by the famous play by Aristophanes. The Danish-based group is planning a reading of Lysistrata in 56 countries, and also is seriously urging women not to have sex with men who favor war in Iraq.

Danish actress Anne-Marie Helger told the BBC News Online that, “Mrs. Blair, Mrs. Bush and Mrs. Rasmusen should stay out of their husbands’ beds until they call their dogs off.”

The BBC quotes Rhea Leman, an American theater director working in Copenhagen, as saying, “Basically we are saying No Peace, No Sex.”

Blogger Asparagirl has the perfect response to such nonsense,

The project of course assumes that all women are anti-war and all men are pro-war, and that furthermore the only way for women to make their political opinions known is to withhold sex, and further still that any woman would actually want to do that. It also implies that the best way that today’s women have of influencing their worlds is not through their writings, speeches, jobs, money or votes, but through their ability to have or not have sex, and that the sex will be solely with men, who are of course the real powerhouses in our society when it comes to shaping world events.

Sources:

Real women don’t wage war? Asparagirl.Com, March 2, 2003.

Sex boycott urged over war. The BBC, March 3, 2003.

Saddam Hussein Allegedly Using Rape for Political Purposes

The UK Sunday Times recently reported allegations that Iraqi dictator is using rape to intimidate opponents of his regime living outside of Iraq. The charges come from former Iraqi general Najib Salahi who fled Iraq in 1995 and now lives in Jordan.

According to Salahi, somebody sent him a videotape depicting an Iraqi intelligence officer raping one of Salahi’s female relatives. Salahi claims, and the Times quotes unnamed Washington sources as confirming, that other high ranking Iraqi defectors outside of that country have received similar videotapes depicting the rape of close female relatives.

If Salahi’s story is accurate, this is a clear case of a war crime and the members of the Iraqi state could and should face trial for instituting a policy of using rape as an instrument of terror. The United States is currently trying to bring a crimes against humanity prosecution against the Iraqi state and Salahi says he is willing to allow the videotape to be played in court as evidence of Iraq’s crimes at such at trial.

Source:

Saddam blackmails rebels with rape. Marie Colvin. The Sunday Times (UK). July 9, 2000.