Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Women in Ukraine
Cynically speaking, women have been one of independent Ukraine's biggest tourist at-
tractions. Combine their legendary beauty, devotion to personal grooming and sometimes
outrageous, sexualised fashion sense with a relatively impoverished society and you were
always going to have fertile ground for online 'dating agencies', 'marriage agencies' and
straight-out sex tourism. Sex trafficking of Ukrainian women remains a serious problem,
too.
Gender Roles & Discrimination
Traditional gender roles are quite entrenched in Ukraine's paternalistic society. Even the
country's many young career women unashamedly place greater emphasis on their looks
than some of their Western counterparts would. Ukrainian women face job discrimina-
tion, with age, appearance and family circumstances often excluding them from roles
they are professionally qualified for.
Boxer Vitaly Klytschko's political party is called Ukrainian Democratic Alliance for Re-
form (UDAR), which in Ukrainian means 'hit' or 'punch'.
Sextremism - the Femen Phenomenon
Founded in 2008 in Kyiv by former economist Anna Hutsol and a group of student activ-
ists, the Femen movement has become Ukraine's most controversial political export,
known to many around the world. This group of radical feminists engages in topless
protest, an approach which certainly caused a kerfuffle and much tabloid sensation on the
streets of Kyiv in the late noughties and early teenies. Early targets for their naked wrath
included Euro 2012, the Orthodox Church, Party of the Regions MPs, prostitution,
people trafficking and sex tourists.
In 2012 Femen went international, opening loosely affiliated branches in several coun-
tries and a European headquarters in Paris (established by group member Inna Shevchen-
ko, who was forced to seek asylum in France after death threats in Kyiv). The group
stripped off at the World Economic Forum meeting at Davos, protested against the im-
prisonment of Pussy Riot, got very close to President Putin, went topless against Belarus
president Lukashenko (which nearly ended very badly for some members of the group)
and prepared a bare-breasted welcome at Boryspil International Airport for Moscow Pat-
riarch Kirill.
Though activists were regularly arrested and fined (and occasionally served short jail
sentences) for the Soviet catch-all offence of 'hooliganism', the Femen phenomenon was
