posted by: Jen Marnowski written by: Anastasiya Bolton Date last updated: 4/5/2009 8:32:17 PM
A group recently formed in Denver has that sort of faith. It's up against a culture with deep roots and has plans to radically change it.
It's called "World's Women For Life" and it was formed in the home of Doctor David Kazzaz in March.
Organizers hope to begin teaching about the beauty of life in
Kurdistan, an area in the Middle East where Kurds live. Some of it is
in Turkey, Iran , Syria ,and
Iraq
.
It's Iraqi Kurdistan that this group, formed halfway around the world, wants to focus on.
"We
would like a community center in Kurdistan, yes we would like to help
the women of Kurdistan because that's our focus of our chapter," said
Sharon Linzey, Associate Provost at Vanguard University, an
international lawyer and one of the organizers.
"We would like
women to be able to have voting rights, to be treated equally with men,
to be paid equally with men, to have support services like child care
so they can get jobs. We would like women to be able to run for
parliament. We would like women have the same rights as men," she said.
Linzey has travelled and studied the region extensively. She
admits many of these concepts are culture-altering, but says that's
exactly the point.
"We should promote actively the culture of
life, reconciliation. Peaceful ways to handle conflict. And women are
key to this movement," she said.
World's Women For Life has a lot of work ahead.
The first ingredient for success, the group says it already has: faith.
"I always think change is possible, that's why I'm a
human rights
activist," Fallah said. "Because I think each voice is a voice. And
that's why when the voices get together, we can like raise our voice
and people can hear it."
World's Women for Life primary goal is to change what the group calls "the culture of death" -- to the culture of life.
Organizers say one of their first steps will be to teach
college students that principle so they can, in turn, help educate elementary school children.
If you would like to get involved in this effort, you can send an e-mail to:
This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it
(Copyright Associated Press. All rights reserved.)
