Geneva Week 5
The 5th Week in Geneva
Life is getting busier as the internship draws closer to the end. Two things I want to share this week are 1) discrimination against women; and 2) our gathering at IBJ's founder--Karen's house.
1) When I was translating a new module about how to defend for female suspects for IBJ’s e-Learning program, I found the language and content are quite discriminatory. For example, it characterizes women as emotional and sensitive; “women are more likely to commit crimes when getting in troubles from relationships.” “Women are easily inclined to revenge when being hurt in a relationship. When women breed the spirit of revenge, they are more likely to resort to extreme behaviors, such as murdering, deliberately injuring others, defaming, stealing, drug abusing……” “When suffered in domestic violence, women would lose patience and tolerance. Very often the only solution for them is to have the abuser disappeared, for which killing is their best choice.”
After I contacted IBJ’s staff in Beijing office, we all agreed that these descriptions are not proper and decided to not use this module. However, what surprised me is that this kind of description the typical description of female suspects and criminals in China. This module is written by a senior legal professional. I’m appalled by how discriminatorily women are viewed in criminal cases, and I’m glad to have found this mistake. I want to pay more attention on gender study and discrimination against women in the future legal study and practicing.
2) As 4 interns are leaving IBJ next week, we had a gathering at Karen’s house on Wednesday evening. Several other interns who left IBJ but are still in Geneva also came. Meeting and working with these interns from around the world in the office is one of the biggest gifts I get from this internship. It would not be exaggerating to say their mere presence in the office enriches the working environment. I enjoy talking to them and hearing their sharing of their experiences and talking about their countries. Before I came to IBJ, my world was mainly about two centers—China and America. But Hey, the actual world is big and has other countries that share the same earth!
Playing Marfia after dinner is always a good idea.