Divorce cases can only be handled by judges who are divorced, child custody cases can only be handled by judges who have children, sexual assault cases can only be handled by judges who have experienced sexual abuse, murder cases can only be handled by judges who have killed someone, gangster-related cases can only be handled by judges with a gangster background and drug cases can only be handled by judges who have taken drugs.
These restrictions may sound absurd, but they reflect the fallacious response by Yilan District Court President Liu Shou-sung (劉壽嵩) to the transfer of military cases from the military to the civilian judicial system.
Liu said that his district court plans to determine whether a judge has the ability to issue judgments on related issues based on whether they have the required specific experience.
According to Liu, female judges would not be able to handle military cases because they have not served in the military and do not even understand military ranks.
Reacting to Liu’s discriminatory comments, Hung Tzu-yung (洪慈庸) — the elder sister of army corporal Hung Chung-chiu (洪仲丘) — said that understanding the military rank system was not very difficult and that it only took three days for her to learn it.
Perhaps what Liu meant was that female judges do not perform military service, so they do not understand the authoritarian culture of absolute obedience which is based solely on rank and the view that men are superior to women.
Since most male judges have performed military service, they know that such obedience is the military’s supreme principle.
The Ministry of National Defense has always set restrictions for women who want to join the military by claiming that women would find it hard to adapt to military culture, but still it does not dare face up to the frequent sexual assault cases in the military.
The question is not whether we understand military culture, but whether we are willing to reform it.
Liu’s remarks were not only illogical, but also discriminatory against female judges and dismissive of their abilities.
According to Judicial Yuan data, the number of female judges at courts of all levels has been increasing, making up more than 40 percent of the total number of judges in 2009, and reaching 43 percent in 2011.
Still, 75 percent of female judges are concentrated at local district courts.
At both the Taiwan High Court and the Supreme Court, the ratios of female judges to male judges are lower than at district courts.
This is a result of the culture in legal circles, where there traditionally have been more men than women.
Looking at the gender distribution among presiding judges, there are four times more men than women.
Although female judges account for a considerable portion of Taiwan’s legal professionals, Liu’s remarks show that they are still facing a hostile work environment, which is highlighted by cases such as the president of Fujian Lianjiang District Court sexually harrassing a female judge, and a male judge at Shilin District Court sexually harassing a female secretary.
The idea that female judges are unable to handle military cases due to an unfamiliarity with military ranks has exposed the culture of gender discrimination in legal circles. How do judges with gender-based prejudice properly handle cases?
In a recording from a court session last year released by the Judicial Reform Foundation, Prosecutor Lin Kuan-yu (林冠佑) of the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office told a female victim of a car accident that women should not drive cars and should stay home to take care of their children.
On Tuesday, the Awakening Foundation listed at a press conference a number of absurd rulings issued in cases dealing with sexual assaults in intimate relationships.
Among the examples cited was that of a husband who had forceful intercourse with his wife although she suffered from vaginitis and a urinary-tract infection at the time. She did not scream because she did not want to wake their children, and later filed a lawsuit.
However, the judge was of the opinion that she was obliged to cohabit with her husband and that she should accommodate her husband’s need to give vent to his sexual desire and that the act therefore did not constitute marital rape.
In another example, a judge believed that a boyfriend beating his girlfriend so she would have sex with him was common practice and did not constitute sexual assault.
Not only do these judges lack sensitivity about violence in relationships, they also ignore people’s bodily integrity. Even worse, they treat marriage and intimate relationships as a license to commit sexual assault.
The transfer of military cases in accordance with the amendment to the Code of Court Martial Procedure (軍事審判法) clearly exposed the district court president’s gender bias. The military system is not difficult to understand. What is difficult to understand is gender discrimination.
Lin Shih-fang, a lawyer, is
secretary-general of the Awakening Foundation.
Translated by Eddy Chang
Saudi Arabian largesse is flooding Egypt’s cultural scene, but the reception is mixed. Some welcome new “cooperation” between two regional powerhouses, while others fear a hostile takeover by Riyadh. In Cairo, historically the cultural capital of the Arab world, Egyptian Minister of Culture Nevine al-Kilany recently hosted Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority chairman Turki al-Sheikh. The deep-pocketed al-Sheikh has emerged as a Medici-like patron for Egypt’s cultural elite, courted by Cairo’s top talent to produce a slew of forthcoming films. A new three-way agreement between al-Sheikh, Kilany and United Media Services — a multi-media conglomerate linked to state intelligence that owns much of
The US and other countries should take concrete steps to confront the threats from Beijing to avoid war, US Representative Mario Diaz-Balart said in an interview with Voice of America on March 13. The US should use “every diplomatic economic tool at our disposal to treat China as what it is... to avoid war,” Diaz-Balart said. Giving an example of what the US could do, he said that it has to be more aggressive in its military sales to Taiwan. Actions by cross-party US lawmakers in the past few years such as meeting with Taiwanese officials in Washington and Taipei, and
The Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan has no official diplomatic allies in the EU. With the exception of the Vatican, it has no official allies in Europe at all. This does not prevent the ROC — Taiwan — from having close relations with EU member states and other European countries. The exact nature of the relationship does bear revisiting, if only to clarify what is a very complicated and sensitive idea, the details of which leave considerable room for misunderstanding, misrepresentation and disagreement. Only this week, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) received members of the European Parliament’s Delegation for Relations
Denmark’s “one China” policy more and more resembles Beijing’s “one China” principle. At least, this is how things appear. In recent interactions with the Danish state, such as applying for residency permits, a Taiwanese’s nationality would be listed as “China.” That designation occurs for a Taiwanese student coming to Denmark or a Danish citizen arriving in Denmark with, for example, their Taiwanese partner. Details of this were published on Sunday in an article in the Danish daily Berlingske written by Alexander Sjoberg and Tobias Reinwald. The pretext for this new practice is that Denmark does not recognize Taiwan as a state under