Save the Boys, forget the girls

The Lost Boys have become the current cause celebre for liberals looking for an issue to assuage the vague guilt that tickles the edges of their consciousness. I caught a morning news report that had several "Lost Boys" being fawned over by celebrities in Hollywood. One well dressed woman bedecked with jewelry and a designer dress told them over and over again, in her Boston/New York upper crust accent, what heroes they were to her. I kept expecting her to invite them to a dinner party where they could be jockeys on her lawn. I’m sure she tut tutted over the Kurds and sang “We Are the World” before returning to her opulent life.

This really isn't about celebrity hypocrisy but gender discrimination. Why aren't women and girls being offered these types of massive resettlement? While the Lost Boys have had a horrific experience, is what they have suffered worse than what the girls have experienced? Or are currently experiencing?

Let’s put this in a broader context:

At any given time there are at least 20 wars raging on the African continent, these wars are being fought over control of the vast resources of Africa. The primary casualties of the conflicts are women and children. Calling the conflicts “wars” is probably a misnomer, a more accurate word would be genocide. Women are the strength and power keeping tribal social structure and self sufficiency alive, this form of life has no place in the modern world, so the women must be eliminated. Along with murder women also bear the brunt of sexual torture that is one of the primary weapons used by the agents of Western corporate interests. How many millions of women and children would welcome genuine help or resettlement to America to escape this?

So why are we focused in on this one particular atrocity?

Why are we focused on only the male suffering in this one atrocity?

The US government and mainstream media wouldn’t be investing so much time, attention and money in an issue like this if there weren’t some strategic interest involved, there’s not much in Sudan that has value to theUS but the regions proximity to key energy resources has kept the US very interested in the area. OK, that’s fine but if the US wants to cultivate closer ties with the Sudan by exporting thousands of males to America, why are women not being included in the deal? The media information makes it sound like it’s not possible to rescue any girls, it that really true? Taking a look at some actual reports posted on the internet it’s clear that many more girls were available for resettlement than the media implied, but very few were. Is there something more intrinsically appealing about boys? Are they just plain “cuter” on camera? Are girls somehow unclean and dirty? I wonder if the spectre of sexual violence makes females somehow poor candidates for public sympathy, much easier to describe the trials and tribulations experienced by the boys than the trials, tribulations AND sexual violence perpetrated on girls. Perhaps this is just a manifestation of a male centric culture that values men more than women. While the reports posted below indicate there is a recognition that women’s suffering and needs may even be greater than men’s, the Lost Boy issue demonstrates that this message may still be lost to US mainstream public consciousness.

The following excerpts are from GBV (Gender Based Violence Report):

"In the late 1980s, thousands of boys and girls fled their homes in Sudan because of armed fighting. They wandered around East Africa for years, with many dying on the way and the rest surviving as best as they could until, in the early 1990s, they eventually reached the Kakuma refugee camp in northern Kenya. The ordeal of the so-called 'lost boys of Sudan' received quite a lot of media attention. After several more years languishing in the camp, 4,000 of the boys, whose parents had either died or were missing, were offered resettlement in the United States. By contrast, no one highlighted the plight of the 'lost girls'. Among those who made it to Kenya there were several thousands girls aged 8–10. Most of them were absorbed by foster families in the camp, with many becoming little more than unpaid servants. No one offered them resettlement. In the refugee camp, the girls suffered from rape, early pregnancies, kidnapping, and forced marriage."

[TOP] Women refugees

Forced migration is one of the most visible consequences of armed conflict. Despite the fact that women and children account for a majority of refugees and IDPs, up until relatively recently their needs and strengths were not taken into account. The gender-based discrimination that affects women and girls in most societies before and during conflict is usually replicated or even exacerbated during forced migration. Although since the 1990s there have been major efforts to improve protection and assistance for displaced females, most female refugees and IDPs still face violence and discrimination. Women seeking asylum

“Women fleeing to other countries often find it difficult to obtain refugee status on their own, instead of as dependents. The 1951 Refugee Convention (Geneva Convention), on which most states' asylum laws are based, considers refugees 'persons outside their country of nationality who have a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion' (Mertus 2000) . Gender-based violence is not explicitly included as a form of persecution, although recently human rights advocates have made some progress in forcing states to recognize gender-based persecution as grounds for claiming asylum and to eliminate discrimination against women refugees. Canada was the first country to adopt such an approach in 1993, making no distinction between public (domestic) and private violence against women. Since then, other countries, like the United States, have followed suit, but the practical results of such advancements still need to be studied. “