Tiempo de restaurar
lunes, 16 de noviembre de 2009
Arys L. Rodríguez Andino / Primera Hora
Cuando vio que su compañero empezó a destruir la casa y la amenazó con un cuchillo no dudó, ni un segundo, de que lo importante en ese momento era salir de allí con sus hijos. Descalza y en bata agarró a los menores, cruzó la avenida y marcó el 911, única llamada que podía hacer sin dinero.
De eso ya pasaron cinco años.
“Un día llegó tomado de madrugada y yo dije: 'No voy a discutir con ebrios', y entonces fue peor el remedio que la enfermedad porque se molestó porque no le hacía caso. Empezó a destruir cosas en la casa y en una de ésas tomó un cuchillo y yo me dije: 'Esto no es para mí'”, narró Myrna Arias, una mujer de 41 años que detuvo lo que pudo ser el principio de un patrón constante de violencia doméstica.
Con asistencia de la Policía recogió sus cosas y se fue a la casa de su padre, lugar que le permitió, dentro de las circunstancias, poner su mente en orden.
Como toda víctima tuvo que repetir, una y otra vez, la situación que había vivido. “Una persona te pregunta y otra te pregunta lo mismo. Estuve desde la mañana hasta las seis de la tarde. Irónicamente, él salió primero porque lo estaba esperando un fiador y yo me quedé esperando a que me dieran la orden de protección porque así funciona el sistema”, explicó Arias, una ex consejera familiar que había dejado de trabajar por petición de quien se convirtió en su maltratante.
Sin trabajar y con una niña y un niño que mantener, Arias se dio a la tarea de buscar opciones. “Tenía una familia que me apoyaba, pero no es lo mismo”, expresó.
“Llegué al Hogar Ruth pero yo no necesitaba albergue en ese momento porque estaba con mis papás”, mencionó.
Referida por una trabajadora del Hogar, llegó a Matria, una organización que atiende a mujeres de todo el país víctimas de violencia doméstica, agresión sexual o acecho.
En Matria consiguió un vale de vivienda transitoria por 12 meses, periodo que aprovechó para tomar un curso de chef de cocina nacional e internacional.
Aunque su interés era trabajar por su cuenta, dirigió una compañía de camiones para reunir dinero y no tener que recurrir a préstamos para iniciar su empresa.
Durante dos años y medio estuvo entre camioneros, un reto grande del que salió fortalecida y lista para su Culinary Adventure, la compañía que creó para ofrecer servicios de catering y de chef personalizado. “Es como en un restaurante pero en el sitio que tú quieras. Nos sentamos contigo y diseñamos el menú”, explicó.
Ya con independencia económica, cuando necesita asistencia para los catering, contrata a otras que, como ella, han sido sobrevivientes de violencia doméstica. “A veces uno tiene las oportunidades, las pones en una esquinita y cuando vienes a ver ya pasó el tiempo y no lo hiciste”, analizó.
Otra que también aprovechó la oportunidad fue Vidalia Cosme Villegas, una joven madre de 29 años que llegó a Matria “derrotada totalmente” por el maltrato emocional al que la sometía su esposo.
“No me daba valor. Todo estaba mal para él. Nunca hice nada para él”, dijo.
Tan convencida estaba de que no servía para nada que se olvidó de que su sueño era ser mecánica, una profesión que conocía porque era a lo que se dedicaban su papá y su mamá.
“Le dije (a la psicóloga) que lo que yo quería era ser mecánica como mi papá y mi mamá y así, el único trabajo que yo podía hacer con ganas y empeño era eso. Intenté estudiar secretarial médico y no me gustó”, confesó sobre sus intentos por prepararse para un trabajo común.
Con la ayuda del personal de Matria, recibió el empuje que le faltaba para ser lo que quería ser. En un año y tres meses se convirtió en mecánica.
Antes de graduarse le pidió trabajo a un amigo que, para ponerla a prueba, la retó a que montara una transmisión. “Me dejó sola y yo lo hice todo. Desde chiquita yo bregaba en mecánica. Él era el que no me creía”, expuso mientras movía sus manos de uñas cortas, llenas de una grasa que “se va con un cepillito”.
Destacada en los estudios, un profesor la contrató como mecánica diésel. Única mujer en el equipo, a los camioneros que atiende les parece “raro” que ella esté ahí.
Aunque no se siente diferente, reconoce que algunos clientes ponen en duda su capacidad. “Han tratado de venderme las piezas que no son y yo digo, 'no es y no es'”, sostuvo enérgica.
Una vez en que tenía que diagnosticar una guagua le dijo al dueño que el starter estaba roto y el vehículo no quería prender. “¿Cómo va a ser si la guagua está bien?”, le insistía el individuo. “Tuve que sacarlo y mostrarle. Si fuese hombre, no pasaba”.
La mecánica no le luce complicada. Ahora, cambiar su mentalidad de derrotada, sí. “Pero ya sé que no hay nada imposible. Ya no me trato de poner obstáculos”.
Como ella, Marolyn Delgado Quiñones trata cada día de vencer las dificultades. Fácil no es. Como no fueron fáciles sus diez años en el negocio de ventas de sustancias controladas.
“Esa etapa es como una película”, recuerda la joven de 34 años, quien llegó a cumplir cárcel y quien aprovechó ese tiempo “como un retiro”. “Duré cuatro meses en Vega Alta y la sentencia mayor en el hogar”.
Al terminar su condena se encontró con que la calle seguía tan dificultosa como cuando la dejó. Por un tiempo trabajó en un restaurante con un salario de $7.00 la hora. De pobre no la sacaba, pero “algo es algo”.
Después de unos meses sin trabajo y las cuentas en aumento llegó a Matria, donde un préstamo le ha permitido abrir una empresa de mantenimiento de áreas verdes, sellado de techos y pintura de residencias.
“Compré una podadora, una sierra y un trimer”, dijo sobre las primeras herramientas de su negocio. En el baúl de un volvo del 86 que le regaló la actriz Elia Enid Cadilla lleva el equipo.
De sus años del punto le queda el recuerdo de no dormir. “Uno no duerme. Tenía que subir las escaleras con una pistola. Tenía a mis enemigos y a la Policía”, expresó Delgado Quiñones, quien atribuye a la muerte de su madre y a las vicisitudes de la pobreza su inmersión en la venta de drogas. Ahora sus energías están puestas en el negocio y, aunque a veces se deprime porque las cosas no marchan con la rapidez que quisiera, ya no se le esconde a nadie. “No me persigue nadie”.
Ir a enlace de la noticia para ver video sobre Matria.
Ver otra noticia aquí.
lunes, 16 de noviembre de 2009
sábado, 14 de noviembre de 2009
Mujeres truenan contra Rivera Schatz
Por The Associated Press
SAN JUAN — El Movimiento Amplio de Mujeres de Puerto Rico (MAMPR) rechazó enérgicamente hoy las expresiones del presidente senatorial, Thomas Rivera Shcatz, contra la senadora Sila Mari González, de quien dijo hay que perdonarla como al personaje bíblico María Magdalena.
En una carta al líder senatorial, el MAMPR indicó que sus expresiones contribuyen a fomentar estereotipos de género y a la marginación política de las mujeres.
“Le cursamos esta comunicación para rechazar de manera contundente sus expresiones sobre la senadora Sila Mari González emitidas el pasado martes en una conferencia de prensa. Repudiamos también la utilización del sistema de gobierno de la Isla y de espacios que se deben a la democracia para discriminar, atropellar y violentar la dignidad de la senadora González”, indica la misiva, copia de la cual obtuvo Prensa Asociada.
El MAMPR, integrado por varias organizaciones defensoras de los derechos de la mujer, indicó que el referido incidente “se suma al patrón de agresiones en contra de la dignidad y los derechos de las mujeres de la Isla que tanto la Legislatura como el Ejecutivo han perpetrado durante el pasado año”.
“Cuando las instituciones de gobierno permiten que se juzgue, o se intente juzgar, a una mujer que ocupa un puesto público a base de estereotipos de género, está colaborando a la marginación política de las mismas y perpetúa el que aún siendo el 52% de la población esté poco representada en los cuerpos políticos del país. Este tipo de actitud no puede ser tolerada”, sostuvo.
El MAMPR también ha denunciado otras acciones legislativas que van en detrimento del bienestar de las mujeres como el desmantelamiento de la Oficina de la Procuradora de las Mujeres a través de la Ley 7 de emergencia fiscal y la constante violación del principio de separación entre Iglesia y Estado.
La carta a Rivera Schatz está firmada por las portavoces del MAMPR Ana Irma Rivera Lassén, Alana Feldman Soler y Adriana Alonso.
SAN JUAN — El Movimiento Amplio de Mujeres de Puerto Rico (MAMPR) rechazó enérgicamente hoy las expresiones del presidente senatorial, Thomas Rivera Shcatz, contra la senadora Sila Mari González, de quien dijo hay que perdonarla como al personaje bíblico María Magdalena.
En una carta al líder senatorial, el MAMPR indicó que sus expresiones contribuyen a fomentar estereotipos de género y a la marginación política de las mujeres.
“Le cursamos esta comunicación para rechazar de manera contundente sus expresiones sobre la senadora Sila Mari González emitidas el pasado martes en una conferencia de prensa. Repudiamos también la utilización del sistema de gobierno de la Isla y de espacios que se deben a la democracia para discriminar, atropellar y violentar la dignidad de la senadora González”, indica la misiva, copia de la cual obtuvo Prensa Asociada.
El MAMPR, integrado por varias organizaciones defensoras de los derechos de la mujer, indicó que el referido incidente “se suma al patrón de agresiones en contra de la dignidad y los derechos de las mujeres de la Isla que tanto la Legislatura como el Ejecutivo han perpetrado durante el pasado año”.
“Cuando las instituciones de gobierno permiten que se juzgue, o se intente juzgar, a una mujer que ocupa un puesto público a base de estereotipos de género, está colaborando a la marginación política de las mismas y perpetúa el que aún siendo el 52% de la población esté poco representada en los cuerpos políticos del país. Este tipo de actitud no puede ser tolerada”, sostuvo.
El MAMPR también ha denunciado otras acciones legislativas que van en detrimento del bienestar de las mujeres como el desmantelamiento de la Oficina de la Procuradora de las Mujeres a través de la Ley 7 de emergencia fiscal y la constante violación del principio de separación entre Iglesia y Estado.
La carta a Rivera Schatz está firmada por las portavoces del MAMPR Ana Irma Rivera Lassén, Alana Feldman Soler y Adriana Alonso.
miércoles, 11 de noviembre de 2009
Cambridge, USA: Catharine MacKinnon and law as courage, emotion, and social change
[Gracias, Myrta, por este maravilloso enlace]
By Jessica Corsi
Published: Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Updated: Thursday, November 5, 2009
When Catharine MacKinnon said goodbye to us at the end of her Sex Equality class on Wednesday October 28, she choked up, and we all choked up with her. The emotion was evident in her voice as she read us a passage from Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own that can be found in the center of MacKinnon’s Sex Equality textbook. The passage entreats us to work: it reminds us of why we work at all, and describes vividly the people for whom we work when we work on sex equality:
“I told you in the course of this paper that Shakespeare had a sister; but do not look for her in Sir Sidney Lee's life of the poet. She died young - alas, she never wrote a word . . . . Now my belief is that this poet who never wrote a word and was buried at the crossroads still lives. She lives in you and in me, and in many other women who are not here tonight, for they are washing up the dishes and putting the children to bed. But she lives; for great poets do not die . . . they need only the opportunity to walk among us in the flesh.
This opportunity, as I think, it is now coming within your power to give her. For my belief is that if we live another century or so—I am talking of the common life which is the real life and not of the little separate lives which we live as individuals—and have five hundred a year each of us and rooms of our own; if we have the habit of freedom and the courage to write exactly what we think; if we escape a little from the common sitting–room and see human beings not always in their relation to each other but in relation to reality . . . then the opportunity will come and the dead poet who was Shakespeare’s sister will put on the body which she has so often laid down.
. . . As for her coming without that preparation, without that effort on our part, without that determination that when she is born again she shall find it possible to live and write her poetry, that we cannot expect, for that would be impossible. But I maintain that she would come if we worked for her, and that so to work, even in poverty and obscurity, is worth while."
Why do we study law? Why do we study Sex Equality and why do we put ourselves through the process of qualifying at the bar and why do we go to work every day? We do all of these things because Shakespeare’s sister is dead and she never wrote a word, despite all she could have shown us and despite how much she could have enriched our lives and fulfilled the purpose of her own. And when we sat in our Sex Equality class, we came into contact with all of the girls and women—and boys and men, too; but mostly women and girls—who are dead or too sick or hurt or too poor or too shut out of education or work to write, to share their gifts, to live their lives and to contribute to ours. In Sex Equality, we engaged in something that often falls by the wayside in legal education: the reality of the lives of those living under and touched by the law.
Legal discourse is theoretically and intentionally rational, but Sex Equality was an emotional class. Contrary to the need to suppress emotion, it was invited into the classroom to inform processes of reason and applications and evaluations of law and legal opinion. Does the current state of rape law make you angry? Well, it should; and that anger is an indication that the law in both the black letter and in its implementation should be modified. Do the horrifying realities of prostitution and legal decisions that blame the victims of these horrors and not the perpetrators of them make you sick? They should.
And instead of throwing your hands up and joining the ranks of the complacent, consider instead what your unique position as a person with elite legal training could contribute to eradicating horrors, and to eradicating all of the other forms of discrimination we face in our daily lives. Why just study the law and obey the law? If the law makes you unhappy, if the law is grossly disconnected from the realities in which we live, if the law perpetuates rather than alleviates the harms of sex discrimination—do something. You are more than equipped. What is a Harvard Law School education good for if not this?
When Professor MacKinnon finished reading from Virginia Woolf, we gave her a standing ovation. Afterwards, I thought about why. I thought about why every day her class was full of people auditing—not just other students but other professors, Harvard staff members, and people from the community. I had received emails from friends of friends who wanted to take off work and come to see her speak. What attracted these people so strongly to her class, I think, is her courage. But not just any courage—courage to speak truth not only to the power of our gendered hierarchies but to the power of the law.
Legal education can make us cowed. We fall into the habit of repeating the law as it is already applied. We are not innovators, and if we are, we innovate on behalf of clients who have no particular reason to be deserving of legal change other than that they have paid for our services. But Sex Equality class was about courage to face down and modify the existing legal structure on behalf of vulnerable and marginalized people—women—who do not have billions of dollars to throw down for our services and for whom legal innovation is not a matter of a better and more efficient merger or a more profitable contract but rather a matter of life and death.
And with this move we return a deeper meaning to the legal profession. Perhaps some of our law school class pursued a law degree for the sole purpose of obtaining a steady, high status job that promises heaps of money. But other people came to law school because they see the law as a tool and they connect emotionally to people that they would like to help through the law. They want to see social change that eliminates discrimination and gives voice to those on the margins of society. Sex Equality gives that back. It reconnects law to emotion and law to courage and law to social change.
We all choked up along with Professor MacKinnon as she read, because we know from our own experiences that what she read is true: we know that Shakespeare’s sister is dead and that she won’t rise up unless we work. We know that Virginia Woolf wouldn’t have been allowed to enter Harvard Law School because it did not admit women at that time. We know it to be true that if we sit here and do nothing women will not advance. And so we tear up and we jump to our feet and we clap our hands, because we’ve made it inside these hallowed institutions that Woolf dreamed of entering, and so now we have the power to resurrect the poet, to let her be born in great numbers in the next generation. We felt our own privilege in that moment, but it was not the usual privilege and arrogance regarding Harvard’s rank in the world and our rank along with it; it was privilege with meaning and power to affect change. It is the privilege to use our law degrees to improve the lives of those who are truly depending on the law for help.
By Jessica Corsi
Published: Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Updated: Thursday, November 5, 2009
When Catharine MacKinnon said goodbye to us at the end of her Sex Equality class on Wednesday October 28, she choked up, and we all choked up with her. The emotion was evident in her voice as she read us a passage from Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own that can be found in the center of MacKinnon’s Sex Equality textbook. The passage entreats us to work: it reminds us of why we work at all, and describes vividly the people for whom we work when we work on sex equality:
“I told you in the course of this paper that Shakespeare had a sister; but do not look for her in Sir Sidney Lee's life of the poet. She died young - alas, she never wrote a word . . . . Now my belief is that this poet who never wrote a word and was buried at the crossroads still lives. She lives in you and in me, and in many other women who are not here tonight, for they are washing up the dishes and putting the children to bed. But she lives; for great poets do not die . . . they need only the opportunity to walk among us in the flesh.
This opportunity, as I think, it is now coming within your power to give her. For my belief is that if we live another century or so—I am talking of the common life which is the real life and not of the little separate lives which we live as individuals—and have five hundred a year each of us and rooms of our own; if we have the habit of freedom and the courage to write exactly what we think; if we escape a little from the common sitting–room and see human beings not always in their relation to each other but in relation to reality . . . then the opportunity will come and the dead poet who was Shakespeare’s sister will put on the body which she has so often laid down.
. . . As for her coming without that preparation, without that effort on our part, without that determination that when she is born again she shall find it possible to live and write her poetry, that we cannot expect, for that would be impossible. But I maintain that she would come if we worked for her, and that so to work, even in poverty and obscurity, is worth while."
Why do we study law? Why do we study Sex Equality and why do we put ourselves through the process of qualifying at the bar and why do we go to work every day? We do all of these things because Shakespeare’s sister is dead and she never wrote a word, despite all she could have shown us and despite how much she could have enriched our lives and fulfilled the purpose of her own. And when we sat in our Sex Equality class, we came into contact with all of the girls and women—and boys and men, too; but mostly women and girls—who are dead or too sick or hurt or too poor or too shut out of education or work to write, to share their gifts, to live their lives and to contribute to ours. In Sex Equality, we engaged in something that often falls by the wayside in legal education: the reality of the lives of those living under and touched by the law.
Legal discourse is theoretically and intentionally rational, but Sex Equality was an emotional class. Contrary to the need to suppress emotion, it was invited into the classroom to inform processes of reason and applications and evaluations of law and legal opinion. Does the current state of rape law make you angry? Well, it should; and that anger is an indication that the law in both the black letter and in its implementation should be modified. Do the horrifying realities of prostitution and legal decisions that blame the victims of these horrors and not the perpetrators of them make you sick? They should.
And instead of throwing your hands up and joining the ranks of the complacent, consider instead what your unique position as a person with elite legal training could contribute to eradicating horrors, and to eradicating all of the other forms of discrimination we face in our daily lives. Why just study the law and obey the law? If the law makes you unhappy, if the law is grossly disconnected from the realities in which we live, if the law perpetuates rather than alleviates the harms of sex discrimination—do something. You are more than equipped. What is a Harvard Law School education good for if not this?
When Professor MacKinnon finished reading from Virginia Woolf, we gave her a standing ovation. Afterwards, I thought about why. I thought about why every day her class was full of people auditing—not just other students but other professors, Harvard staff members, and people from the community. I had received emails from friends of friends who wanted to take off work and come to see her speak. What attracted these people so strongly to her class, I think, is her courage. But not just any courage—courage to speak truth not only to the power of our gendered hierarchies but to the power of the law.
Legal education can make us cowed. We fall into the habit of repeating the law as it is already applied. We are not innovators, and if we are, we innovate on behalf of clients who have no particular reason to be deserving of legal change other than that they have paid for our services. But Sex Equality class was about courage to face down and modify the existing legal structure on behalf of vulnerable and marginalized people—women—who do not have billions of dollars to throw down for our services and for whom legal innovation is not a matter of a better and more efficient merger or a more profitable contract but rather a matter of life and death.
And with this move we return a deeper meaning to the legal profession. Perhaps some of our law school class pursued a law degree for the sole purpose of obtaining a steady, high status job that promises heaps of money. But other people came to law school because they see the law as a tool and they connect emotionally to people that they would like to help through the law. They want to see social change that eliminates discrimination and gives voice to those on the margins of society. Sex Equality gives that back. It reconnects law to emotion and law to courage and law to social change.
We all choked up along with Professor MacKinnon as she read, because we know from our own experiences that what she read is true: we know that Shakespeare’s sister is dead and that she won’t rise up unless we work. We know that Virginia Woolf wouldn’t have been allowed to enter Harvard Law School because it did not admit women at that time. We know it to be true that if we sit here and do nothing women will not advance. And so we tear up and we jump to our feet and we clap our hands, because we’ve made it inside these hallowed institutions that Woolf dreamed of entering, and so now we have the power to resurrect the poet, to let her be born in great numbers in the next generation. We felt our own privilege in that moment, but it was not the usual privilege and arrogance regarding Harvard’s rank in the world and our rank along with it; it was privilege with meaning and power to affect change. It is the privilege to use our law degrees to improve the lives of those who are truly depending on the law for help.
martes, 10 de noviembre de 2009
El hombre que engendró al hijo de Melania...
Al papá de José Alexander no le importaba su hijo
martes, 10 de noviembre de 2009
Darisabel Texidor Guadalupe / Para Primera Hora
Ponce. Lo engendró, pero desde el momento en que conoció de su existencia se distanció de la mujer a quien nunca le profesó amor alguno.
José Álvarez, padre del pequeño José Alexander, a quien su madre Melania de Jesús Serrano le arrebató la vida asfixiándolo el día de San Valentín de 2008, se sentó a testificar muy cerca de la acusada, que sobrevivió a su intento de suicidarse tras matar a su hijo.
El hombre narró al tribunal que conoció a Melania en una iglesia de donde fueron expulsados, ya que no aprobaban las relaciones de concubinato. Dijo que sólo compartían esporádicamente, que nunca estuvieron enamorados y mucho menos planificaron unir sus vidas como una pareja.
Supo que la mujer tuvo un embarazo difícil el día que la llevó al hospital, donde ella pasó muchos meses en reposo. Pero, admitió que nunca fue a verla para conocer su condición de salud ni la de su hijo.
Sobre José Alexander dijo que lo vio por última vez el día antes de su muerte, cuando se reunió con De Jesús para darle el visto bueno a la expedición de un pasaporte para el menor, ya que planificaba enviarlo a vivir con una tía en Estados Unidos. El niño, dijo, se veía contento, pero que la madre lucía preocupaba y llorosa.
“Ella me dijo que estaba mal, que tenía problemas económicos y de salud, y que el niño estaría mejor allá”, dijo Álvarez, a preguntas de la fiscal Caroline Arcelay, tras agregar que le recomendó a De Jesús que buscara ayuda médica para sus problemas de salud.
Álvarez reconoció que se relacionó muy poco con su hijo, que asistió sólo a su primer cumpleaños y “de vez en cuando” lo veía. El hombre, quien identificó el cadáver del pequeño en el Instituto de Ciencias Forenses, no pudo contestar al abogado Carlos Soto Laracuente la fecha en que nació el niño ni cuántos años tenía al momento de morir. Pero, dijo que nunca tuvo quejas de que De Jesús maltratara a su hijo o que ella le negara verlo, sino todo lo contrario, que ella misma le pedía que compartiera más con el menor, quien ni tan siquiera lo llamaba papá.
Durante el interrogatorio al hombre, la imputada permaneció llorando mientras bajaba la cabeza y la ponía sobre el escritorio de la defensa.
martes, 10 de noviembre de 2009
Darisabel Texidor Guadalupe / Para Primera Hora
Ponce. Lo engendró, pero desde el momento en que conoció de su existencia se distanció de la mujer a quien nunca le profesó amor alguno.
José Álvarez, padre del pequeño José Alexander, a quien su madre Melania de Jesús Serrano le arrebató la vida asfixiándolo el día de San Valentín de 2008, se sentó a testificar muy cerca de la acusada, que sobrevivió a su intento de suicidarse tras matar a su hijo.
El hombre narró al tribunal que conoció a Melania en una iglesia de donde fueron expulsados, ya que no aprobaban las relaciones de concubinato. Dijo que sólo compartían esporádicamente, que nunca estuvieron enamorados y mucho menos planificaron unir sus vidas como una pareja.
Supo que la mujer tuvo un embarazo difícil el día que la llevó al hospital, donde ella pasó muchos meses en reposo. Pero, admitió que nunca fue a verla para conocer su condición de salud ni la de su hijo.
Sobre José Alexander dijo que lo vio por última vez el día antes de su muerte, cuando se reunió con De Jesús para darle el visto bueno a la expedición de un pasaporte para el menor, ya que planificaba enviarlo a vivir con una tía en Estados Unidos. El niño, dijo, se veía contento, pero que la madre lucía preocupaba y llorosa.
“Ella me dijo que estaba mal, que tenía problemas económicos y de salud, y que el niño estaría mejor allá”, dijo Álvarez, a preguntas de la fiscal Caroline Arcelay, tras agregar que le recomendó a De Jesús que buscara ayuda médica para sus problemas de salud.
Álvarez reconoció que se relacionó muy poco con su hijo, que asistió sólo a su primer cumpleaños y “de vez en cuando” lo veía. El hombre, quien identificó el cadáver del pequeño en el Instituto de Ciencias Forenses, no pudo contestar al abogado Carlos Soto Laracuente la fecha en que nació el niño ni cuántos años tenía al momento de morir. Pero, dijo que nunca tuvo quejas de que De Jesús maltratara a su hijo o que ella le negara verlo, sino todo lo contrario, que ella misma le pedía que compartiera más con el menor, quien ni tan siquiera lo llamaba papá.
Durante el interrogatorio al hombre, la imputada permaneció llorando mientras bajaba la cabeza y la ponía sobre el escritorio de la defensa.
domingo, 8 de noviembre de 2009
Exitoso repique de la equidad
Anoche, en Caguas, celebramos las historias exitosas del Proyecto Matria. Fue una noche maravillosa, llena de artistas solidarias/os, mesas con las mercancías de valerosas mujeres participantes del Proyecto, y una grata confratenización llena de amor y alegría. ¡Felicidades MATRIA!
En el primer Teatro de Caguas...
Que repique....
Maestra de Ceremonias: Millie Gil. ¡Estupenda!
Directora de Matria, Amárilis Pagán, dio las gracias a quienes tanto han colaborado con el Proyecto.
Las/os artistas solidarias/os:
Tambuye
José Julián Ramírez
Ali Tapia
Fernandito Ferrer
Yolanda Arroyo Pizarro
Ballet Folklórico de Caguas
Chabela
En el primer Teatro de Caguas...
Que repique....
Maestra de Ceremonias: Millie Gil. ¡Estupenda!
Directora de Matria, Amárilis Pagán, dio las gracias a quienes tanto han colaborado con el Proyecto.
Las/os artistas solidarias/os:
Tambuye
José Julián Ramírez
Ali Tapia
Fernandito Ferrer
Yolanda Arroyo Pizarro
Ballet Folklórico de Caguas
Chabela
Otro golpe para las mujeres pobres en E.U: Planes de salud bajo la Reforma Obama no cubrirán abortos
A más de 35 años de que el Tribunal Supremo de los Estados Unidos emitiera Roe v. Wade, 410 US 113 (1973), el asunto del derecho de las mujeres a decidir terminar un embarazo sigue siendo eje principal en las mayores discusiones sociales del país. Así, no es sorpresa que la reforma de salud de la Administración OBAMA, peligrara- en gran medida- por el derecho fundamental del aborto y los problemas de acceso a ese derecho que tienen las mujeres de escasos recursos.
¿El resultado? Miserablemente, una vez más, los fundamentalismos religiosos y machistas se apuntan otra victoria: Los derechos de las mujeres nuevamente quedan desplazados, en aras de otros derechos, que representan un supuesto bien mayor. Todo el proceso de aprobación de la reforma Obama en la Cámara de Representanres, volvió a poner de manifiesto que las mujeres, sobre todo, las mujeres pobres todavía están gravemente expuestas a grandes inequidades e injusticias. Eso va para quién aún lo dude.
Aquí la noticia:
November 8, 2009
Abortion Was at Heart of Wrangling
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN and JACKIE CALMES
WASHINGTON — It was late Friday night and lawmakers were stalling for time. In a committee room, they yammered away, delaying a procedural vote on the historic health care legislation. Down one floor, in her office, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi desperately tried to deal with an issue that has bedeviled Democrats for more than a generation — abortion.
After hours of heated talks, the people she was trying to convince — some of her closest allies — burst angrily out of her office.
Her attempts at winning them over had failed, and Ms. Pelosi, the first woman speaker and an ardent defender of abortion rights, had no choice but to do the unthinkable. To save the health care bill she had to give in to abortion opponents in her party and allow them to propose tight restrictions barring any insurance plan that is purchased with government subsidies from covering abortions.
The restrictions were necessary to win support for the overall bill from abortion opponents who threatened to scuttle the health care overhaul.
The results of that fight, waged heavily over two days, were evident as one liberal Democrat after another denounced the health care plan because of abortion restrictions, even though they were likely to hold their noses in the end and vote for the bill itself.
“If enacted, this amendment will be the greatest restriction of a woman’s right to choose to pass in our careers,” said Representative Diana DeGette, Democrat of Colorado, one of the lawmakers who left Ms. Pelosi’s office mad.
Representative Rosa DeLauro, Democrat of Connecticut, said the bill’s original language barring the use of federal dollars to pay for abortions should have been sufficient for the opponents. “Abortion is a matter of conscience on both sides of the debate,” Ms. DeLauro said. “This amendment takes away that same freedom of conscience from America’s women. It prohibits them from access to an abortion even if they pay for it with their own money. It invades women’s personal decisions.”
But Ms. DeGette, Ms. DeLauro and other defenders of abortion rights said they would nonetheless vote in favor of the health care bill and fight for changes in the final version, to be negotiated with the Senate.
The fight over abortion foreshadows difficult soul searching in the months ahead as Democratic lawmakers confront deepening divisions among their caucus on issues like abortion rights and gun control.
Through the 1980s, the Democrats struggled over abortion. But by the 1990s, the share of Americans supportive of abortion rights had grown. Democrats lost their majorities for 12 years, leaving the most liberal and pro-abortion rights members in office. As a result it seemed to fade as a public issue. Now, however, Democrats once again have a large and diverse House majority, with more members from conservative-leaning districts where anti-abortion rights groups are active.
It was that division that played out behind the scenes late last week, and into the weekend, and came powerfully in the open as the issue.
Earlier Friday, Ms. Pelosi and her supporters thought they had a deal that would quiet the fight between abortion foes. Representative Bart Stupak, Democrat of Michigan, an anti-abortion leader, said he thought so, too — until, that is, Ms. Pelosi called to tell him it was dead.
“We had an agreement at 7:30, 8 o’clock,” said Mr. Stupak, who added that he had called nearly 40 other lawmakers favoring tighter abortion restrictions to make sure they would back the deal. But then Ms. Pelosi called. “The deal’s off,” he quoted her as saying. “It’s not my choice. I can’t hold my side together.”
The sensitivity around the abortion fight — and the likelihood that it would not disappear from the health care debate — was evident from the start of floor proceedings on the health care bill on Saturday.
And it was part of the drama outside the Capitol as well. Roughly 300 protesters who rallied against the health care bill included a number of anti-abortion demonstrators with large placards showing grisly photos identified as aborted fetuses. Inside the building, House Democratic leaders had hoped to spend the day rallying their members around a historic vote. President Obama, visiting the Capitol to make a personal appeal to lawmakers, likened the bill to two of the party’s greatest achievements: Social Security under Franklin D. Roosevelt and Medicare under Lyndon B. Johnson.
Instead, Ms. Pelosi found her caucus caught up in the fierce dispute over abortion.
First, Ms. Pelosi met with leaders of the Pro-Choice Caucus, then she huddled with staff members from the bishops conferences, and with Mr. Stupak and two other leading Roman Catholic lawmakers, Representative Mike Doyle, Democrat of Pennsylvania, and Representative Brad Ellsworth, Democrat of Indiana.
The representatives of the nation’s bishops made clear they would fight the bill if there were not restrictions on abortion. In an extraordinary effort over the last 10 days, the bishops conference told priests across the country to talk about the legislation in church, mobilizing parishioners to contact Congress and to pray for the success of anti-abortion amendments.
The bishops sent out information to be “announced at all Masses” and included in parish bulletins, and urged priests and parishioners to tell House members: “Please support the Stupak Amendment that addresses essential pro-life concerns.” They added: “If these serious concerns are not addressed, the final bill should be opposed.”
In the end the abortion opponents had the votes, and Ms. Pelosi yielded, allowing Mr. Stupak to offer his amendment. At a news conference, Ms. Pelosi denied being angry about it.
“I was part of recommending that it come to the floor,” she said. “Both sides are whipping, the pro-choice side and others who want to support the amendment. But no, that was my recommendation to allow a vote on that amendment.”
Robert Pear and Elisabeth Goodridge contributed reporting.
¿El resultado? Miserablemente, una vez más, los fundamentalismos religiosos y machistas se apuntan otra victoria: Los derechos de las mujeres nuevamente quedan desplazados, en aras de otros derechos, que representan un supuesto bien mayor. Todo el proceso de aprobación de la reforma Obama en la Cámara de Representanres, volvió a poner de manifiesto que las mujeres, sobre todo, las mujeres pobres todavía están gravemente expuestas a grandes inequidades e injusticias. Eso va para quién aún lo dude.
Aquí la noticia:
November 8, 2009
Abortion Was at Heart of Wrangling
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN and JACKIE CALMES
WASHINGTON — It was late Friday night and lawmakers were stalling for time. In a committee room, they yammered away, delaying a procedural vote on the historic health care legislation. Down one floor, in her office, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi desperately tried to deal with an issue that has bedeviled Democrats for more than a generation — abortion.
After hours of heated talks, the people she was trying to convince — some of her closest allies — burst angrily out of her office.
Her attempts at winning them over had failed, and Ms. Pelosi, the first woman speaker and an ardent defender of abortion rights, had no choice but to do the unthinkable. To save the health care bill she had to give in to abortion opponents in her party and allow them to propose tight restrictions barring any insurance plan that is purchased with government subsidies from covering abortions.
The restrictions were necessary to win support for the overall bill from abortion opponents who threatened to scuttle the health care overhaul.
The results of that fight, waged heavily over two days, were evident as one liberal Democrat after another denounced the health care plan because of abortion restrictions, even though they were likely to hold their noses in the end and vote for the bill itself.
“If enacted, this amendment will be the greatest restriction of a woman’s right to choose to pass in our careers,” said Representative Diana DeGette, Democrat of Colorado, one of the lawmakers who left Ms. Pelosi’s office mad.
Representative Rosa DeLauro, Democrat of Connecticut, said the bill’s original language barring the use of federal dollars to pay for abortions should have been sufficient for the opponents. “Abortion is a matter of conscience on both sides of the debate,” Ms. DeLauro said. “This amendment takes away that same freedom of conscience from America’s women. It prohibits them from access to an abortion even if they pay for it with their own money. It invades women’s personal decisions.”
But Ms. DeGette, Ms. DeLauro and other defenders of abortion rights said they would nonetheless vote in favor of the health care bill and fight for changes in the final version, to be negotiated with the Senate.
The fight over abortion foreshadows difficult soul searching in the months ahead as Democratic lawmakers confront deepening divisions among their caucus on issues like abortion rights and gun control.
Through the 1980s, the Democrats struggled over abortion. But by the 1990s, the share of Americans supportive of abortion rights had grown. Democrats lost their majorities for 12 years, leaving the most liberal and pro-abortion rights members in office. As a result it seemed to fade as a public issue. Now, however, Democrats once again have a large and diverse House majority, with more members from conservative-leaning districts where anti-abortion rights groups are active.
It was that division that played out behind the scenes late last week, and into the weekend, and came powerfully in the open as the issue.
Earlier Friday, Ms. Pelosi and her supporters thought they had a deal that would quiet the fight between abortion foes. Representative Bart Stupak, Democrat of Michigan, an anti-abortion leader, said he thought so, too — until, that is, Ms. Pelosi called to tell him it was dead.
“We had an agreement at 7:30, 8 o’clock,” said Mr. Stupak, who added that he had called nearly 40 other lawmakers favoring tighter abortion restrictions to make sure they would back the deal. But then Ms. Pelosi called. “The deal’s off,” he quoted her as saying. “It’s not my choice. I can’t hold my side together.”
The sensitivity around the abortion fight — and the likelihood that it would not disappear from the health care debate — was evident from the start of floor proceedings on the health care bill on Saturday.
And it was part of the drama outside the Capitol as well. Roughly 300 protesters who rallied against the health care bill included a number of anti-abortion demonstrators with large placards showing grisly photos identified as aborted fetuses. Inside the building, House Democratic leaders had hoped to spend the day rallying their members around a historic vote. President Obama, visiting the Capitol to make a personal appeal to lawmakers, likened the bill to two of the party’s greatest achievements: Social Security under Franklin D. Roosevelt and Medicare under Lyndon B. Johnson.
Instead, Ms. Pelosi found her caucus caught up in the fierce dispute over abortion.
First, Ms. Pelosi met with leaders of the Pro-Choice Caucus, then she huddled with staff members from the bishops conferences, and with Mr. Stupak and two other leading Roman Catholic lawmakers, Representative Mike Doyle, Democrat of Pennsylvania, and Representative Brad Ellsworth, Democrat of Indiana.
The representatives of the nation’s bishops made clear they would fight the bill if there were not restrictions on abortion. In an extraordinary effort over the last 10 days, the bishops conference told priests across the country to talk about the legislation in church, mobilizing parishioners to contact Congress and to pray for the success of anti-abortion amendments.
The bishops sent out information to be “announced at all Masses” and included in parish bulletins, and urged priests and parishioners to tell House members: “Please support the Stupak Amendment that addresses essential pro-life concerns.” They added: “If these serious concerns are not addressed, the final bill should be opposed.”
In the end the abortion opponents had the votes, and Ms. Pelosi yielded, allowing Mr. Stupak to offer his amendment. At a news conference, Ms. Pelosi denied being angry about it.
“I was part of recommending that it come to the floor,” she said. “Both sides are whipping, the pro-choice side and others who want to support the amendment. But no, that was my recommendation to allow a vote on that amendment.”
Robert Pear and Elisabeth Goodridge contributed reporting.
Suscribirse a:
Entradas (Atom)