By Kasey Stricklin
In most modern countries, including the United States and Russia, women still lag behind men in more ways than one. Though society tends to focus more on the statistics of race and socioeconomic class, the fact remains that around half the population (women) still must fight everyday for the samel rights that men already enjoy. While constitutions around the world show that females should have everything in keeping with their male counterparts, women are still disadvantaged in many aspects of life. It takes looking at these problems and recognizing that they still exist in order to fix the discrepancies and actually achieve equal rights.
In Russia, as in the United States, the majority of those working in health services and education are women. In fact, 85 percent of workers in health services and 81 percent of educational employees are female (with the lowest share of women being in construction as only 22 percent of construction workers are female). After the fall of the Soviet Union, many women lost their jobs or moved on to jobs where they didn’t put their skills to use because their current jobs lacked proper pay. Because jobs in education and health care are often classified in the lowest pay brackets, many women are trapped in careers with small wages and little hope of advancement.
In the Soviet era, women also enjoyed benefits such as accessible day care and child allowances. In modern times, these perks have disappeared and, while it is now required that employers give three years of paid maternity leave to employees, this just means that a large number of employers discriminate against younger applicants and hire women who have already had children. While there are protective laws in place to ensure women don’t undertake jobs that are too straining, including lifting heavy items or working at night, a law allowing ‘temporary’ contracts for these jobs means women can still be seen undertaking such tasks. While the notion of equal pay for equal work is in the constitution, men still prevail in leading positions. Women make up 45 percent of the unemployed population and, though the pension age for women is 55 (it is 60 for men), they only receive around the equivalent of $50 compensation, barely enough to eat with for a month. This means many older women who would be able to retire and relax if they lived in America have to, instead, take up a small part-time job.
Domestic abuse is very much a problem in modern day Russia. According to Amnesty International, 36,000 women are beaten each day by their husband and a Russian woman is murdered every 40 minutes in an act of domestic violence. Studies show that 30 percent of married women are subject to physical abuse. Lara Griffin, an Amnesty International advocate, explains that economic difficulties have meant that many families are strained and an upswing in domestic violence has resulted (with women most often the victims). Also, the law and society of Russia tend to view domestic abuse as a private matter, not a crime.
In addition, numerous female activists and journalists have been assassinated in recent years for their efforts to fight for human rights and expose the government’s wrongdoings. Natalya Estemirova, who can be connected to the human rights organization Memorial, was murdered in 2009 in Chechnya. President Medvedev promised to investigate the murder, but the killers are still unknown. In the 2008 annual report issued by the international organization Reports Without Borders, Russia was included in the list of high-risk countries for journalists.
In summer 2008, CNN reported on Moscow’s booming sex slave industry and cited a recent surge in prostitution. The fast pace of development in Moscow has fueled a demand for cheap labor, and this includes prostitutes. Young women are often lured in with the promise of education or a good job, and some girls are even kidnapped from their hometowns and forced into a life of prostitution. Police say the problem lies in Russia’s virtually open borders and badly controlled migration flows from other countries. There is also no basic law that defines victim’s rights and, instead, the problem is mostly pawned off on aid agencies.
Russia, like nearly all countries in the modern day, still has a lot of catching up to do for women to truly enjoy the rights and freedoms that men have. One step in the right direction is the celebration of International Women’s Day every March 8 during which countries celebrate the past, present and future achievements of women. This is a national holiday in Russia and hopefully it can be used as a tool to draw attention to the continued plight of women around the country and the world.
Sources:
http://www.waytorussia.net/
http://www.ehow.com/about_
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/
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