(by Jolene)
According to the Business Times:
Last November, Ms Lau led the marketing team in a DBS credit card campaign which supported the evangelical Christian organisation Focus On The Family (FOTF).
That credit card promotion where DBS said that it would donate money to FOTF, 'a charity dedicated to helping children and families thrive', led to calls to boycott the bank from members of the gay and lesbian community.
FOTF in Singapore is an affiliate of a US-based organisation of the same name founded in 1977 by evangelical Christian James Dobson who campaigns against gay rights.So Josie Lau, AWARE's new President, supported an initiative which gave money to Focus on the Family (FOTF).
You may remember the FOTF saga - we covered it here, here and here. In summary, FOTF Singapore is part of an international evangelical network, headquartered in the United States. Its activities in Singapore have included promoting rigid, traditional gender roles which hurt girls and women, and distributing homophobic pamphlets. Internationally, Focus on the Family has pushed for damaging public health policies, including the disastrous American 'Global Gag Rule' which hurt millions of women and men worldwide.
Either Ms Lau knowingly assisted an organisation steeped in these values, or she was totally clueless about what she was doing. Either option inspires grave doubts about the direction in which she and her team might take AWARE.
Does Ms Lau agree, as FOTF does, that it is acceptable to treat a woman who doesn't dress "modestly" as "a piece of meat"? Does she support pushing young girls into conforming to gender stereotypes, as does the FOTF Singapore programme Ladies be Ladies, in quite literally mediaeval terms? Is that the vision of "gender equality" the new AWARE leadership has in store?
If these folks have credentials as pro-woman activists, they are certainly hiding them well.
More via Sam and Ovidia.