SlutWalk Toronto took just six weeks to organize, and now a dozen protests are planned worldwide. Is the Middle East next on the slut map?

Without exception, every major human rights organization, from Amnesty International, the World Health Organization, and World Pulse to the Association for Women’s Rights in Development point to the clear connection between women’s rights and the advancement of sustainable, safe and successful civilization. The International Women’s Health Coalition’s stance is unequivocal on this.

“The right of women to control their sexuality—the basis for sexual rights—is an indivisible part of their human rights, and that without it, women cannot fully realize their other human rights. This notion has been reaffirmed at several subsequent international meetings, but in practice, few countries’ laws and policies provide women with effective protection against coercion, discrimination, and violence, and fundamentalist states and movements all over the world consistently target women’s sexual and reproductive autonomy.”

While exact numbers are hard to come by, untold numbers of women and girls in the Middle East living under totalitarian regimes encounter rape, virginity tests, domestic abuse, honor killings, mutilation and other forms of gender-based violence on a regular basis.  Efforts from within their respective countries, and from abroad, are aimed at alleviating these injustices. How far does that envelop have to be pushed in order to create real and abiding change? Because what’s good for women is clearly good for Mother Earth.