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5 million Indian women just made a 385-mile human chain for equality.

5 million Indian women just made a 385-mile human chain for equality.

The human chain formed by millions of Indian women on New Year's Day makes a powerful statement.

On January 1, 2019, 5 million women in the southern Indian state of Kerala lined up shoulder to shoulder to form a "women's wall" 385 miles (620 km) long. The wall was a statement of gender equality, and a call to end violent protests against women trying to enter Kerala’s Sabarimala temple, a pilgrimage site for Hindus.

The Guardian reports that women of all ages have the legal right to enter the temple, as India's supreme court ruled on the matter in September. However, religious tradition has held that only men and elderly women may enter. Even after the court's ruling, women of menstrual age have been met with violence and abuse as they attempt to worship at the temple.


Women's wall, 620 kilometer long, 5 million women, across all 14 districts of the Indian state of Kerala, refusing to go back to the medieval ages and claiming gender justice. http://bit.ly/2Anzslu

Posted by Aparnesh Dattatreya on Tuesday, January 1, 2019

The wall is also a reminder that India is seen as the most dangerous country in the world to be a woman.

Women in India face various forms of gender-based violence and discrimination, including gang rape, tribal practices, sex trafficking, forced servitude, and more. In 2012, India was found to be the fourth most dangerous country for women according to a Thomson Reuters Foundation poll. In 2018, it climbed to number one.  

India ranks as the worst country in the world for women in several areas measured by the poll, including:

- Cultural practices, which include acid attacks, female genital mutilation, child marriage, punishment by stoning, physical abuse, or mutilation and female infanticide/foeticide

- Sexual violence, which includes rape (domestic, stranger, or as a weapon of war), lack of justice in rape cases, sexual harassment and sexual coercion as a form of corruption

- Human trafficking, including sex slavery, forced labor and servitude, and forced marriage.

(In case you're curious, the United States came in at number 10 on the list this year—the only Western nation to make the top 10.)

This wall of women is a powerful show of unity, letting the world—and their country—know that they're done putting up with gender-based violence.

The abuse of women trying to enter a sacred temple is just one symptom of a much larger gender violence problem in India. Since the brutal gang rape of a female student on a New Delhi bus—an assault that eventually led to her death—gained international attention in 2012, India has been on global organizations' radar for violence against women. However, things don't appear to have improved much since.

In 2017, India began offering state-issued wooden bats to women to fend off drunken abusive partners with a promise that police would not intervene. Oxfam India has helped form a coalition of organizations working to end violence against women in the South Asia region, but clearly more needs to be done to turn the tide.

We've seen time and time again that when women come together and raise their voices as one, change follows. Hopefully this powerful "women's wall" will help move the needle for women in India as they inspire others around the world with their show of unity.

Planet

Easy (and free!) ways to save the ocean

The ocean is the heart of our planet. It needs our help to be healthy.

Ocean Wise

Volunteers at a local shoreline cleanup

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The ocean covers over 71% of the Earth’s surface and serves as our planet’s heart. Ocean currents circulate vital heat, moisture, and nutrients around the globe to influence and regulate our climate, similar to the human circulatory system. Cool, right?

Our ocean systems provide us with everything from fresh oxygen to fresh food. We need it to survive and thrive—and when the ocean struggles to function healthfully, the whole world is affected.

Pollution, overfishing, and climate change are the three biggest challenges preventing the ocean from doing its job, and it needs our help now more than ever. Humans created the problem; now humans are responsible for solving it.

#BeOceanWise is a global rallying cry to do what you can for the ocean, because we need the ocean and the ocean needs us. If you’re wondering how—or if—you can make a difference, the answer is a resounding YES. There are a myriad of ways you can help, even if you don’t live near a body of water. For example, you can focus on reducing the amount of plastic you purchase for yourself or your family.

Another easy way to help clean up our oceans is to be aware of what’s known as the “dirty dozen.” Every year, scientists release an updated list of the most-found litter scattered along shorelines. The biggest culprit? Single-use beverage and food items such as foam cups, straws, bottle caps, and cigarette butts. If you can’t cut single-use plastic out of your life completely, we understand. Just make sure to correctly recycle plastic when you are finished using it. A staggering 3 million tons of plastic ends up in our oceans annually. Imagine the difference we could make if everyone recycled!

The 2022 "Dirty Dozen" ListOcean Wise

If you live near a shoreline, help clean it up! Organize or join an effort to take action and make a positive impact in your community alongside your friends, family, or colleagues. You can also tag @oceanwise on social if you spot a beach that needs some love. The location will be added to Ocean Wise’s system so you can submit data on the litter found during future Shoreline Cleanups. This data helps Ocean Wise work with businesses and governments to stop plastic pollution at its source. In Canada, Ocean Wise data helped inform a federal ban on unnecessary single-use plastics. Small but important actions like these greatly help reduce the litter that ends up in our ocean.

Ocean Wise, a conservation organization on a mission to restore and protect our oceans, is focused on empowering and educating everyone from individuals to governments on how to protect our waters. They are making conservation happen through five big initiatives: monitoring and protecting whales, fighting climate change and restoring biodiversity, innovating for a plastic-free ocean, protecting and restoring fish stocks, and finally, educating and empowering youth. The non-profit believes that in order to rebuild a resilient and vibrant ocean within the next ten years, everyone needs to take action.

Become an Ocean Wise ally and share your knowledge with others. The more people who know how badly the ocean needs our help, the better! Now is a great time to commit to being a part of something bigger and get our oceans healthy again.

Pets

Family brings home the wrong dog from daycare until their cats saved the day

A quick trip to the vet confirmed the cats' and family's suspicions.

Family accidentally brings wrong dog home but their cats knew

It's not a secret that nearly all golden retrievers are identical. Honestly, magic has to be involved for owners to know which one belongs to them when more than one golden retriever is around. Seriously, how do they all seem have the same face? It's like someone fell asleep on the copy machine when they were being created.

Outside of collars, harnesses and bandanas, immediately identifying the dog that belongs to you has to be a secret skill because at first glance, their personalities are also super similar. That's why it's not surprising when one family dropped off their sweet golden pooch at daycare and to be groomed, they didn't notice the daycare sent out the wrong dog.

See, not even their human parents can tell them apart because when the swapped dog got home, nothing seemed odd to the owners at first. She was freshly groomed so any small differences were quickly brushed off. But this accidental doppelgänger wasn't fooling her feline siblings.

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"Body positivity is about saying that you are more than a body and your self-worth is not reliant on your beauty."



Michelle Elman, a body positivity coach, helps people who are struggling to find confidence in their own skin.

After persevering through numerous medical conditions and surgeries in her own life, Elman realized a few years ago that body positivity wasn't just about size or weight. Things like scars, birthmarks, and anything else that makes us feel different of self-conscious have to be a part of the conversation, and she tries to make the movement accessible to everyone.

Sharing her own journey has been one of her most effective teaching tools.

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On Feb. 19, 2023, "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood," turned 55 years old. And the internet was feeling feelings over it.

After premiering on Canadian TV in 1963, Fred Rogers' beloved children's program debuted in the U.S. in 1968, inspiring generations of kids across North America to be more thoughtful, kinder neighbors.

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OK, sure, there are no assigned seats, but you've been sitting at the same desk since the first day and everyone knows it.

So why does the guy who sits next to you put his phone, his book, his charger, his lunch, and his laptop in the space that's rightfully yours? It's annoying.

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Education

The 25-year-old money-saving 'bible' that millennials and Gen Zers absolutely need to read

This book has saved me thousands of dollars and changed my entire perspective on "frugality."

Photo by Josh Appel on Unsplash

"The Complete Tightwad Gazette" offers timeless money-saving advice.

Let me start by saying that young adults these days absolutely do have economics stacked against them. There's no question that stagnant wages, the unaffordability of housing, outrageous college costs, post-pandemic inflation and good ol' American corporate greed have all combined to create a tough financial reality for us all, but particularly for the millennials and Gen Zers who are starting off their adult lives feeling already underwater.

If you're in that boat, allow a Gen X auntie to give you some sage advice. Absolutely, rail against the man and shake your fist at the skyscrapers and vent on TikTok if it makes you feel better. But also, none of that is going to change super soon, so you've got to own what you actually have control over, and that's managing the money that you do have (however little it may be).

When my kids were little back in the early 2000s, my husband and I were living on one not-at-all-amazing income. I had been raised quite frugally, so I was comfortable penny-pinching as needed, but I was looking for more creative ways to stretch our dollars.

I had no idea how much one book would change my entire view of saving money—or how much money it would actually save me over the years.

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