I've got mulitple screens open right now so please make a point to scroll down from the top if you've been online for a bit and are looking for entries. (Mark e-mailed wondering where the Iraq entry is. It's posted below the Judy Collins' entry. Blogger puts on a time stamp based upon when you open the "Create" post window. Not when you actually publish the entry. I'll try to adjust the time but in case I forget, please scroll around if you're looking for something.)
In These Times has posted the article that a number of us have been waiting on. So this entry is just a head's up to Erin Mosely's "Light and Solidarity." Here's an excerpt:
Susan Plum is challenging the Mexican government's massive failure to effectively investigate and halt the killing spree in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, which has taken the lives of more than 370 women in the past 12 years. Plum, an artist who lives and works in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, has decided to shed light on the mysterious string of female abductions and murders--one candle at a time.
Last summer she began circulating via e-mail the idea for "Luz y Solidaridad" ("Light and Solidarity"), an art project that calls for people everywhere to help her "bring light to Juárez, especially to the mothers and the families of the young women and girls who have been murdered." The installation exhibit and performance, set to open February 4, 2006, at the Museo de la Ciudad in Querétaro, Mexico, will incorporate photographs of votives that have been lit all over the world for the women of the Mexican border town.
According to Amnesty International, 137 of the 370 murders in Juárez and the surrounding area of Chihuahua, have involved sexual assault. Additionally, somewhere between 70 and 400 women and girls remain missing.
Many of the women killed have been abducted near their workplaces--the maquilas (factories) located on the outskirts of Juárez. Kari Lydersen writes in her new book, Out of the Sea and into the Fire, "They disappear while waiting for or leaving the buses that take them to and from work, or after visiting the bars that are popular with maquila workers on Friday nights." Pervasive machismo and a culture that demeans women are also to blame for the pattern of violence. As National Public Radio's John Burnett reported, "It's a common joke [in Juárez] when two men see a provocatively dressed woman, for one to elbow the other and say, 'She better watch out or she’ll end up in the desert.'"
Again, it's an excerpt, read the full article.
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