I do believe that this is one of the most urgent duties of Catholic everywhere--please, please, if you value any dignity of the human person, man and woman alike, call, e-mail, smoke-signal if you must your local representatives and oppose CEDAW, the "United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women."

This thing, if enforced, will likely make the United States implode on its own Culture of Death.

More information:

Exposing CEDAW: http://www.cwfa.org/library/nation/2000-09_pp_cedaw.shtml

The Radical Agenda of CEDAW: http://www.senate.gov/~helms/Speeches/CEDAW/cedaw.html

SEDAW Sells out Women and Families: http://www.cwfa.org/library/nation/1998-09-10_pr_un-cedaw.shtml

Copied from US News and World Report, July 1, 2002:

They hate your mommy

By John Leo

Once again the push is on for the Senate to ratify CEDAW, the United Nations women's rights treaty that has been hanging around since 1979. CEDAW is the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. There's a good reason that the Senate has ignored it for a generation: It's an incredibly toxic document, the work of international bureaucrats determined to impose a worldwide makeover of family relations and "gender roles." CEDAW is a blueprint for foisting the West's radical feminism on every nation gullible enough to sign. (Talk about cultural imperialism.) Some 167 nations have signed the treaty, many with no intention of observing it. But CEDAW ferociously monitors every nation's compliance. It has a few enforcement mechanisms and plans more. The idea is that someday, nations may not be able to resist.

CEDAW is a more perverse version of American radical feminism, circa 1975: It bristles with contempt for family, motherhood, religion, and tradition. Parents and the family don't count. The state will watch out for children's rights. The treaty extends access to contraception and abortion to very young girls and imposes "gender studies" on the schools and feminist-approved textbooks on students.

The committee criticized Belarus for reintroducing Mother's Day ("a sex-role stereotype") and strongly urged Armenia to combat the image of "the noble role of mother." It complained that voters in Ireland seem to be voting in line with Catholic values and warned Libya that the Koran can be followed only within "permissible" limits sets by CEDAW. Feminists will decide what religions may teach.

Free to be . . . a hooker? One of the CEDAW committee's techniques is to use broad language, which is then tightened and given a radical interpretation after signatories have accepted it. CEDAW did not announce that women's "right to free choice of profession and employment" would turn out to mean (as the CEDAW committee now says) that prostitution must be decriminalized around the world. Similarly CEDAW's ban on "any distinction, exclusion, or restriction made on the basis of sex" seems to make legal approval of homosexual marriage mandatory. Some analysts think CEDAW's ban on "orientation" bias will make pedophile sex legal, since some people are "oriented" toward children. Linguistic sinkholes are so common that Muslim women wanted assurance that the term "sexual slavery" would not be defined later as including marriage.

CEDAW reflects the rising importance of international conferences and the U.N. nongovernmental organizations. CEDAW bureaucrats constantly monitor and hector the world nations to comply. The World Bank now seems primed to serve as an enforcer for CEDAW. One World Bank document is titled "Integrating Gender Into the World Bank's Work: a Strategy for Action." The feminists talk about the World Bank's "accountability mechanisms." Translation: no CEDAW compliance, no loan.

Worse, CEDAW backers intend to use the new International Criminal Court as an enforcement tool. Patrick Fagan of the Heritage Foundation, who follows CEDAW closely, predicts that the CEDAW committee will bring an ICC case against Catholic hospitals to force the hospitals to perform abortions. Language setting up the court is so vague that radical prosecutors and judges might be able to jail clerics who refuse to perform same-sex marriages or who decline to ordain women.

The lesson here is that small groups of dedicated bureaucrats, out of the public eye, can make rules affecting the domestic affairs of countries that would be difficult or impossible to achieve democratically. The trick is to create "customary international law" out of marginal views, constantly repeated on the world stage. Rita Joseph, an Australian human-rights specialist, says, "The basic plan is ingeniously simple. The idea is to couch the feminist agenda in the language of human rights" and then assert the ascendancy of human rights over the sovereign rights of nations.

Still, over the past five or six years, as awareness of the radicalization of the United Nations has set in, nonradical American NGOs have mounted resistance, often with the help of the Vatican and Muslim nations. This alliance has had some success in exposing the language and parliamentary games played by the radicals.

CEDAW is coming up again now because of a fumble in the State Department. Someone listed CEDAW as a treaty the administration considered low level but acceptable. President Bush now has to choose between antagonizing his base by calling for Senate ratification or antagonizing female voters by seeming to come out against women's rights. But if he can't dodge the issue, he will have to oppose the treaty. CEDAW is dangerous as well as stupid.

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), July 25, 2002

Answers

Thanks for the heads up, I'll be writing to support it. Yes, it has some areas I don't agree with but at least it will protect some women from overbearing,controlling abusive husbands & boyfriends. Unless you work with abused women & girls it would be difficult to understand their pain & shame. Call me a feminist if you choose but I will not go quietly into the night. I will pass this on to all the others who think women are people too!!

-- Freedomforwomen (nospam@nomad.com), July 25, 2002.

First of all, how presumptuous of you to say that those who don't work with abused women are less likely to "understand." Look man, if CEDAW were all about stopping the abuse of women, I'd support it a hundred times over.

But by obliterating the family, legalizing prostitution, and making young girls vulnerable to sexual contact and Big Death (the abortion industry), this things is overwhelming hostile to women.

But then, you probably didn't even read the above articles, did you?

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), July 25, 2002.

I agree with you, Skoo!!!! Pushing a bill for harder criminal time for abusive fathers and spouses is one thing, but CEDAW is entirely different. I AM A WOMAN, and anything that would legalize prostitution which totally demeans a woman, is not a good thing for women. I AM A MOTHER, and anything that would trivialize the gift of motherhood, such as contraception and abortion (besides the obvious fact that reintroducing Mother's Day in *whereever it was* was a source of aggravation for them) is not a good thing for mothers or women.

Holy Mother of God, pray for us. Mary, most Holy, pray for us.

-- Isabel (isabel1492@yahoo.com), July 25, 2002.

You guys are just nuts. Ask any woman brutalized by the Taliban, or beaten to a pulp by her husband who thinks he is her lord and master if she does not think this agreement regarding women's rights is one that should be ratified. Currently we are holding hands with some of the countries most dedicated to the abrogation of licit women's rights. Do you like to know that Syria and Libya agree with you. I am a Catholic by birth & by practice and I am ashamed of what this guy Leo says in the name of MY church! Margoli

-- Margoli Sullivan (sandi@ridethetidalwave.com), July 26, 2002.

Margoli,

I don't think you understand precisely what we're getting at.

CEDAW is not about women's rights, and it is not about women's equality. It is an anti-family, anti-motherhood, pro-contraception, pro-abortion, pro-prostitution radical feminist constitution. It is robed in the language of "human rights" because most people (like you and me) love human rights and fight for them. But it destroys rights.

I have an excellent analogy for you, courtesy of Steve Martin:

"Side Effects by Steve Martin

Dosage: Take two tablets every six hours for joint pain.

Side Effects: This drug may cause joint pain, nausea, headaches or shortness of breath. You may also experience muscle aches, rapid heartbeat, or ringing in the ears. If you feel faint, call your doctor. Do not consume alcohol while taking this pill; likewise, avoid red meat, shellfish and vegetables. Okay foods: flounder. Under no circumstances eat yak. Men can expect painful urination while sitting, especially if the penis is caught between the toilet seat and the bowl. Projectile vomiting is common in 30 percent of users - sorry: 50 percent. If you undergo disorienting nausea accompanied by migraine with audible raspy breathing, double the dosage. Leg cramps are to be expected; up to one knee-buckler per day is allowable. Bowel movements may become frequent, in fact every ten minutes. If bowel movements become greater than twelve per hour, consult your doctor, or in fact any doctor, or anyone who will speak to you. You may find yourself becoming lost or vague; this would be a good time to write a screenplay. Do not pilot a plane, unless you are in the 10 percent of users who experience "spontaneous test pilot knowledge." If your hair begins to smell like burning tires, move away from any buildings or populated areas and apply tincture of iodine to the head until you no longer hear what could be considered a "countdown." May cause stigmata in Mexicans. Do not sit on pointy conical objects. If a fungus starts to grow between your eyebrows, call the Guinness Book of Records. Do not operate heavy machinery, especially if you feel qualified for a desk job; that's good advice anytime. May cause famine and pustules. There may be a tendency to compulsively repeat the phrase "no can do." This drug may cause visions of the Virgin Mary to appear in treetops. If this happens, open a souvenir shop. There may be an overwhelming impulse to shout out during a Catholic mass, "I'm gonna wop you wid da ugly stick!" You may feel a powerful sense of impending doom; this is because you are about to die. Men may experience impotence, but only during intercourse. Otherwise, a powerful erection will accompany your daily "walking around time." Do not take this product if you are uneasy with lockjaw. Do not be near a ringing telephone that works at 900 MHz, or you will be very dead, very fast. We are assuming you have had chicken pox. You may also experience a growing dissatisfaction with life, along with a deep sense of melancholy - join the club! Do not be concerned if you arouse a few ticks from a Geiger counter. You might want to get a one- month trial subscription to Extreme Fidgeting. The hook shape of the pill will often cause it to get caught on the larynx. To remove, jam a finger down your throat while a friend holds your nose to prevent the pill from lodging in a nasal passage. Then throw yourself stomach- first on the back portion of a chair. The expulsion of air should eject the pill out of the mouth, unless it goes into a sinus cavity or the brain. WARNING: This drug may shorten your intestines by twenty-one feet. Has been known to cause birth defects in the user retroactively. Passing in front of a TV may cause the screen to moire. While taking this drug, you may want to wear something lucky. Women often feel a loss of libido, including a two-octave lowering of the voice, an increase in ankle hair, and perhaps the lowering of a testicle. If this happens, women should write a detailed description of their last three sexual encounters and mail it to me, Bob, trailer 6, Fancyland Trailer Park, Encino, CA. Or e-mail me at "hot-guy.com" Discontinue use immediately if you feel your teeth are receiving radio broadcasts. You may experience "lumpy back" syndrome, but we are actively seeking a cure. Bloated fingertips on the heart-side hand are common. Be sure to allow plenty of "quiet time" in order to retrain the eye to move off stationary objects. Flotation devices at sea will become pointless, as the user of this drug will develop a stone-like body density; therefore, if thrown overboard, contact your doctor. This product may contain one or more of the following: bungee cord, plankton, rubber, crack cocaine, pork bladders, aromatic oils, gum Arabic - pardon me, an Arab's gums - gunpowder, corn husk, glue, bee pollen, English muffins, poached eggs, ham, hollandaise sauce, and crushed saxophone reeds. Sensation of levitation are illusory, as is the feeling of a "phantom third arm." User may experience certain inversions of language: Acceptable: "Hi, are how you?" Unacceptable: "The rain in Sprain slays blainly on the phsssst." Twenty minutes after taking the pills, you will experience an insatiable craving to take another dose. AVOID THIS WITH ALL YOUR POWER. It is advisable to have a friend handcuff you to a large kitchen appliance, ESPECIALLY ONE THAT WILL NOT FIT THROUGH THE DOORWAY TO WHERE THE PILLS ARE. You should also be out of reach of any weaponlike utensil with which you could threaten friends or family, who should also be briefed to not give you the pills, no matter how much you sweet-talk them. Notice: This drug is legal in the United States only when the user is straddling a state line."

I hope you get our drift.

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), July 26, 2002.

I know it's too late at this point, but I apologize for graphic and profane language in the above post. I should have read it thoroughly before copying it here.

If no one objects, however, I would suggest that it remain as an illustration of the evil of CEDAW.

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), July 26, 2002.

The drift I get skooby doo, is you are an immature, undereducated, misogynisic, insecure, egoic twit. You spread false information, and bring a clear understanding to those who have a need for life-time celibacy and why they are in need of mental health intervention!

-- Bb (Bigbear@minspring.com), July 27, 2002.

Houston Chronicle July 25, 2002, 6:31PM By HELEN THOMAS

PRESIDENT Bush won worldwide acclaim when he spotlighted the ruthless treatment of women by the Taliban regime. His bold stance on the issue contributed heavily to the international backing he received when he decided to attack terrorists in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

But now he risks losing much of that support by withdrawing his earlier approval of an international women's rights treaty.

The pact, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1979, was signed by President Carter in 1980 but has languished in the Senate since then, although 170 nations have ratified it. Senate ratification requires a two-thirds majority of those balloting.

Last week the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was poised to send the treaty to the Senate floor for a vote. But Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., the top-ranking Republican on the panel, served notice that he would delay its vote.

The pact, the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women, is expected to be discussed Wednesday by the committee, and Helms is expected to block it.

Six months ago the Bush administration told senators that CEDAW was "generally desirable and should be approved." But later the administration began equivocating. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the administration supports the treaty's "general goal of eradicating discrimination across the globe" but now feels the pact's "vagueness" and "complexity" require a Justice Department review.

Translated: The administration has reneged. Fat chance that Attorney General John Ashcroft will give it a fair shot. He was one of the most vocal opponents of the treaty when he was a senator from Missouri.

What has happened is that the administration has heard from its conservative constituency. Helms reflects that view and has many objections, including claims that the convention permits abortions and decriminalizes prostitution.

Actually, the treaty commits ratifying nations to overcome discrimination against women in such areas as legal rights, education, employment, health care, politics and finance.

Standing with the United States in failing to ratify the convention are nations known for their oppressive treatment of women, such as Afghanistan under the Taliban, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

In the Capitol Hill battle, more than 165 religious, civic, professional and human rights organizations are backing the treaty. Opponents include Christina Hoff Sommers, a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute who charged recently in The Wall Street Journal that the pact would not really help oppressed women.

Sommers, an anti-feminist who wrote The War Against the Boys, argues that many nations are unlikely to uphold the treaty, and therefore the United States should stay out of it. She contends our society has for the most part eliminated sexism.

That's baloney. I have a feeling Sommers would have felt the same way about women's suffrage had she lived in the early 20th century.

Supporters say Uganda, South Africa, Brazil, Australia and others have incorporated the treaty's provisions into their constitutions and domestic legal codes.

Supporters note that Ukraine, Nepal, Thailand and the Philippines have passed new laws against sexual trafficking, the practice of selling women and girls into sexual slavery.

CEDAW backers also note that Colombia, after ratifying the pact, made domestic violence a crime and required legal protection for victims.

The supporters say other ratifying nations -- Nicaragua, Jordan, Egypt and Guinea -- "saw significant increases in literacy after improving access to education for girls and women."

Monumental problems remain. At least 4 million women and girls around the world are still sold into sexual slavery each year. Two-thirds of the world's 875 million illiterate adults are women; 510,000 women die each year from pregnancy complications; at least a quarter of all women suffer from domestic violence. Millions of women still lack full legal and political rights.

Even in the United States, gender equality in the workplace is not complete until women receive equal pay for equal work.

The treaty is not perfect, but it has already showed that it can move societies forward, especially societies where women have few if any individual rights.

The Washington Post quoted a White House official last week as saying that the women's rights issue "matters to the first lady and to the president."

That is good to know. I just wish they would be willing to fight for it.

Thomas is a Washington, D.C.-based columnist for the Hearst Newspapers. (helent@hearstdc.com)

-- ss (sss@ss.sss), July 27, 2002.

I don't think I'm any of those. All I know is that, based on the first article I read from USNews, and the other articles written by CFWA (Concerned Women for America), that CEDAW is a fundamentally anti-Catholic treaty.

We can fight domestic abuse in our own country using national law. We don't need the tainted goods of this international treaty.

But my Lord, Bigbear and Margoli, you guys make Joan look docile by comparison.

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), July 27, 2002.

Hello again--I'd trust Helen Thomas over George W. any day of the week and twice on Sunday. Anti-Catholic, my aunt Mary!

Margoli

-- margoli (sandi@ridethetidalwave.com), July 27, 2002.

I recommend that everyone read the links posted in the original message.

Like most leftist agendas, this one is totally un-democratic. How can the left believe that it wants the people to have a voice, and then demand that the people be guinea pigs for their social engineering experiments?

OK, this NGO is going to impose a "committee" (un-elected), and that "committee" is going to recommend that more children be put in daycare, because motherhood is contrary to a woman's "freedom." For the same reason (protecting from a life sentence of motherhood), we'll make sure that other countries are forced to allow pregnant women to kill their children--because abortionists "celebrate freedom" every day they kill innocent babies. The insanity goes on and on...

When a committee forces us to act based on their commands, how can they pretend that we have freedom or democracy? This is called tyranny.

What's really insidious about this committee is that it amounts to governmental support of a religion, and goes against the first amendment. One needs only to read the Satanic Bible (not for the faint of heart, by the way), to realize that this is entirely consistant with the Satanic church's beliefs. CEDAW doesn't merely break the imagined "separation of church and state" that liberals talk about. This committee would actually make Satanism the enshrined state religion.

US Constitution, Amendment I: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech..."

For those who aren't informed, I don't bring up Satanism as hyperbole. Satanism isn't just about sacraficing goats in the moonlit rituals. It's a real religion, meant to be user-friendly and appeal to people. It turns ideas like freedom and responsibility upside-down.

The committee sees democracy as contrary to freedom. Citizen-elected legislatures' authority must bend to the alien committee. To CEDAW, democracy is the problem, not the solution. I wonder what happens to this opinion when the call for the destruction of the Church hierarchy to be replaced by the "voice of the faithful." Maybe the "voice of the faithful" is just a code phrase for whatever some leftist committee determines.

God protect us from those supporters of CEDAW who would take away our liberty and impose a tyranny that they claim is "freedom."

Mateo

PS--Big Bear, please turn on your spell check and turn off your anti-Catholic bigotry.

-- (MattElFeo@netscape.net), July 27, 2002.

From the article:

"The feminists talk about the World Bank's "accountability mechanisms." Translation: no CEDAW compliance, no loan."

This is a typical mechanism for dealing with the third world. Basically, the feminists who can influence the World Bank say, "If you don't give up your national sovereignty so we can play our social engineering games, we're not going to loan you money."

Of course, defaulting on loans designed to fail is just another way for first world leftists to destroy third world countries' sovereignty.

Women in the third world now realize that the first world radical feminists (that's redundant) are not allies who look to a relationship of mutual respect. They feel that first world feminists look at these women as not much more than pets to play with. Could it be the forced sterilization programs? How about the abortion programs?

So sad...

Mateo

-- (MattElFeo@netscape.net), July 27, 2002.

Has anyone here ever read CEDAW? In its entirety? Have any of these fine opinionated folks ever lived in a non- developed country?

-- Adian Lynes (adianlynes@aol.com), June 02, 2004.