If comments left on Facebook are any indication, Taiwanese women are dissatisfied with how far women’s rights have advanced in today’s society, a women’s organization said yesterday ahead of International Women’s Day on Tuesday.
“Although Taiwan has been making legislative progress in protecting women’s rights over the past few years, the government has refused to promote gender equality as an important social value,” said Yang Wan-ying (楊婉瑩), chairwoman of the Awakening Foundation.
She said, for example, that officials did not fully consider women’s needs when they decided to boost the declining birthrate by giving out cash for childbirth.
Photo: Chien Jung-fong, Taipei Times
“What women really want is a high-quality public daycare system,” she said at a press conference.
“We are not vending machines into which you throw some coins in return for a baby,” wrote one Internet user, ridiculing the government’s plan.
Fan Yun (范雲), an associate professor at National Taiwan University’s Department of Sociology, added that although women are allowed up to six months of -maternity leave according to the Gender Equality in Employment Act (性別工作平等法), it is not uncommon for private employers to simply fire female workers who are pregnant and who apply for leave.
A visiting female academic from Beijing also shared her disappointment over gender stereotyping at the press conference, even among educated individuals.
“My best friend said that I abandoned my family in China just to have fun for myself, but I came here for research, just as my husband does when he visits the United States,” she said.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
The National Immigration Agency has banned two Chinese from returning to Taiwan, after they published social media content it described as disrespectful to national sovereignty. The agency imposed a two-month ban on a Chinese man surnamed Liang (梁) and a permanent ban on a woman surnamed Yang (楊), an influencer with 23 million followers, in October last year and last week respectively. Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) yesterday said on the sidelines of a legislative meeting that Chinese visitors to Taiwan are required to comply with the rules and regulations governing their entry permits. The government has handled the ban and
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