Creating a culture where women are regarded as humans rather than sex objects on this male-dominated planet can't be easy. But when a country frees itself from male-domination, some very startling changes clearly ensue, like Iceland's legislative assault on the sex industry, which has outlawed lap-dancing and strip clubs.With a lesbian head of state and women making up almost half the nation's legislators, Iceland's many women and girl friendly laws should be no surprise. Here in the U.S., equality means that women get to join the men in exploitation by going to strip clubs as paying customers. Women get to go to war and kill and be killed right alongside the men. Growing up steeped in cowboy ideology, it can be hard to imagine a better way. . . a better way, as envisioned in Iceland, is where the first thing girls learn in puberty is NOT that girls are sex objects:
[T]he Nordic state is the first country in the world to ban stripping and lapdancing for feminist, rather than religious, reasons. Kolbrún Halldórsdóttir, the politician who first proposed the ban, firmly told the national press on Wednesday: "It is not acceptable that women or people in general are a product to be sold." When I asked her if she thinks Iceland has become the greatest feminist country in the world, she replied: "It is certainly up there. Mainly as a result of the feminist groups putting pressure on parliamentarians. These women work 24 hours a day, seven days a week with their campaigns and it eventually filters down to all of society."
Jónsdóttir says the ban could mean the death of the sex industry. "Last year we passed a law against the purchase of sex, recently introduced an action plan on trafficking of women, and now we have shut down the strip clubs. The Nordic countries are leading the way on women's equality, recognising women as equal citizens rather than commodities for sale."
Jónsdóttir is confident that the law will create a change in attitudes towards women. "I guess the men of Iceland will just have to get used to the idea that women are not for sale."
“Once you break past the glass ceiling and have more than one third of female politicians, something changes. Feminist energy seems to permeate everything.”
-- Kolbrún Halldórsdóttir
Politics Feminist News Gender
