Women's Online Resources.

[Christine Murray]

There is not yet a women's fora on P.ie, though the matter has indeed been
discussed on a separate thread:

http://www.politics.ie/chat/36750-womens-forum.html

So I thought I would make mention of some of the groups that are operating
both here in Ireland and internationally with a women-centred focus, from
communications/media through political activism. The posh word for these
groups is Civil Society Activist Groups; and they tend to be outside
of the political arena but effective in concentrating activity round issues
of Women's Visibility in all levels of society.

I have decided not to do a big link list and to maybe confine that to my blog
for the moment and over the next day or two; but to provide here a brief
introductory to these organisations. Interestingly they use tech that is
both Mainstream and in newly developed free open software systems, as well
as the board system that we are all familiar with.

There are women's Groups concerned in how we are portrayed and
represented in media ranging from .

IWMF : International Women's Media Foundation - Home through IFEX
and a group called AMARC.
Oftentimes Net Culture operates at a high level of development with a
concomitant loss in basic ethics thus women such as Linuxchix and
Genderchangers (who utilise and develop software for women net users)
organise LRC and chat channels with regard to increasing education and
visibility. This has resulted in an increase in communications throughout
the developing world on issues such as marital rape/Aids and sustainability.

Groups such as http://www.ipwwc.org and http://www.isiswomen.org have
worked at UN level to increase visibility on issues of enforced IVF/
Marital rape and imprisonment of women activists all over the globe.

Safety issues include Stalking and Harassment and groups are working on
developing charters for net behaviour based on issues arising from working
within high-tech environments. These basic safety procedures include
reportage of abuse and methodolgies of dealing with issues in a similar
manner to 'real-world' structures such as employment tribunals &c.

Finally Net usage for women has increased considerably, extending
into Farming,Art, medical-care, creative,artistic and business areas
bringing a whole new window of opportunity to groups engaged in
communication and media. I intend to list these contacts over the next
few days on the Dot's Spot bloggie.