Brankica Jankovic, Commissioner for the Protection of Equality, strongly condemns sexist and misogynic statements and attitudes of Dušan Marić, a columnist in Afera Magazine.

Kurir daily newspaper published parts of the article „Serbian gynecologists have murdered  a city as large as  Belgrade in 10 years“, originally published by Afera weekly magazine, where author accused women for „using men for sex and/or material possessions“ and for not wanting children, using difficult economy situation as an excuse.

Having in mind that women are greatly exposed to discrimination, faced with obstacles in almost all segments of life, especially in the area of labor and employment, such statements are intolerable, although very typical in our public sphere.  All participants in public and political life need to be more responsible for every word they speak in public, so it is necessary for them to demonstrate highest level of responsibility in order to prevent and decrease discrimination of women and dispel gender stereotypes and prejudices.

Commissioner had already warned the public on discriminatory and sexist articles written by Dušan Marić last year, when he minimalized and relativized the problem of intimate partner violence stating that women are “falsely reporting violence” in a situation when there is a growing number of gender based violence cases with fatal outcome over the years.

Foto: Media Center Belgrade