But we aren’t there yet. Women and girls do so many things wrong. Our clothing is too tight, short, and revealing, or it’s long, unacceptably loose, and covers up too much. Everyone knows women aren’t good at science and math. Too emotional. Unsmiling. We murder zygotes for our convenience when it is “perfectly simple” to not get pregnant in the first place. And if we choose pregnancy and all doesn’t proceed normally, we can be forced to bear a baby destined to die within moments of birth. Even our hair is wrong, especially for Black women. The way it grows naturally must be subdued, but subdue it “properly,” don’t use lots of little braids. That’s also unacceptable. When we designate a women-only space to celebrate or to discuss issues that endanger us, we are mocked by those who rarely feel endangered (heterosexual white men with money).
Perhaps this is one main reason why women are leading the resistance in the US, particularly middle-aged women. In everyday life, we are accustomed to opposing power and affirming our rights. We teach our daughters to resist patriarchial authority. Women also are moving beyond resistance, saying it is time to be radically disruptive. We won’t go back. We won’t give up the fight for parity in government, policies, society, and art, and for autonomy over our bodies, even our hair.
Imagine a future when women have equal rights, when we don’t have to dodge the manipulations of those who wish to define, manage, use, restrict, and marginalize us.
In our feminist future, we’ve overcome Troubling social issues
- Dude-Life-Crisis is so urgent and distressful that three times more television shows feature (mostly white) men than women for the fall 2017 season.
For the broadcast networks this fall, women need not apply [...] Of approximately 36 new series, just 11 have a first-billed female. Last year there were 41 new shows, of which 20 had a female lead.
Blame might go to a handful of trends on this year’s schedules: More military-themed dramas led by tough guys, a rise in male-dominated sci-fi and comic book shows, and a TV trend that IndieWire has dubbed “Dude-Life Crisis.
- But let women dominate a movie and have a women-only screening and the manbabies cry digital tears. Alamo Drafthouse NYC is showing the new “Wonder Woman” movie for an all women audience (women and people who identify as women), only Alamo’s women staff are working, and proceeds go to Planned Parenthood. The first women-only show at Alamo sold out in the first hour tickets were available, so Alamo opened up others that also sold out fast. Male snowflakes had fits. “Not Fair, we want to donate to PP, too!” (So, what’s stopping you? Just donate.) “But if someone held an all-male event, we’d be labelled sexist.” (Oh sure, this analogy really works.)
Women are woefully under-represented in movies, and as the misogynist backlash against last year’s “Ghostbusters” reboot revealed, there are plenty of people who resent it when women celebrate efforts to create empowering figures in our pop culture zeitgeist. [...]
“We asked ourselves, ‘How do we create a land of Amazonian women? Well — we just hold a women’s only screening . . . After all, she lives on a women’s only island and comes from a land of women. This makes perfect sense.” Indeed it does.
My opinion — we are in an time when CHASMs (Christian-hetero-anglo-saxon-males) learn what women, POCs, and other non-CHASMs always knew.
- Here’s an idea for a profitable retail theme: famous sexual predator. (The restaurant apologized and removed the drink from the menu after the article linked in the tweet was published.)
- Because one isn’t enough - West Coast Fearless Girl Statue
The California Democratic Party is paying tribute to Wall Street's Fearless Girl with their own commission of a similar statue, the group revealed Friday.
The 5-foot-8, 400-pound bronze figure, which is perched atop the recently reinforced roof of the Democratic Party headquarters in Sacramento was created for the organization's party convention this weekend. The statue's $16,000 cost was covered by two anonymous donors.
- Although not exclusively a women’s issue, the Central American Art Twitter account was created to show the beauty of Panama, Belize, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica, and Guatemala. It combines art, culture, and social awareness. This is my favorite tweet.
Repeatedly, we see photos of the Republican all-male commissions created to address women’s health and other female issues along with scornful comments. It gets worse for women of color who have lower wages and opportunities compared to white women. Women of color are among those hardest hit by Trump administration policies and they “must be at the forefront of movements to beat the inequities and injustices of the nation’s oppressive systems, which are riddled with sexism and racism.”
The report, titled “Justice Doesn’t Trickle Down: How Racialized and Gendered Rules are Holding Women Back” comes as Black activists and community leaders are calling on the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to more intentionally support Black women’s political leadership. . . the deep inequities women of color face, in economics, education, safety, and health, to “an outgrowth of a web of racialized and gendered rules—policies, institutions, and practices—that have emerged from the United States’ long history of racism and sexism.”
a Feminist future doesn’t have Assaults on women’s reproductive rights and health
The frequency of mothers dying has doubled in the U.S. over the last 20 years, making it the worst as compared to every other developed nation. African-American women are three times as likely to die from pregnancy and childbirth as white women.
There is one specific contributor to maternal death that does have a potential solution—but is stalled in implementation.
Postpartum hemorrhage, the loss of more than 500 mL of blood after delivery, is a leading cause of maternal morbidity and mortality in the United States. It is an obstetric emergency that occurs in 4 to 6 percent of all deliveries within 24 hours. And its frequency is increasing.
- Community Health Clinics (CHC) are pointed out as the source for women seeking birth control when Planned Parenthood (PP) clinics are forced to close as funding dissipates (due to the clinics also offering abortions). Buta study found that CHCs cannot replace PP. Not all CHCs have reproductive care, and even those that do often don’t offer a full range of birth control options. The average CHC offering birth control serves 320 contraceptive patients per year. The average PP clinic serves 2,950.
- Big benefits to receiving a year’s worth of birth control all at once and why short-term Rx’s handicap women. (I added emphasis below.)
Research shows that providing women access to a year’s worth of birth control at a time can be a game-changer for their health. A 2011 study of 84,401 women featured in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology found that dispensing women a one-year supply was associated with a 30 percent drop in the likelihood of conceiving an unintended pregnancy and a 46 percent drop in the likelihood of abortion compared with dispensing one-month or three-month supplies.
equal rights at work and in government are normal in the feminist future
The DoL has accused Google of systematically underpaying women, and the court battle centers on the company’s refusal to hand over salary data the government has requested.
The motion for a dismissal – which a judge rejected, in part citing the first amendment – sheds light on Google’s aggressive efforts to end the case at a time when the tech industry is facing increasing criticisms over sexist workplace cultures, gender discrimination and widespread pay disparities. Critics said it appeared that Google was attempting to limit media scrutiny with unusual tactics that raise free press concerns and seem to contradict the corporation’s public claims that it is committed to transparency and accountability in its efforts to promote equal pay.
violence against women is viewed as unacceptable without any caveats in our feminist future
People who are marginalized know that there's no such thing as a safe space, not really. They're reminded of just how unsafe they are any time they walk down the street and a stranger comments on their breasts or they're prevented from using the correct bathroom at school.
And for people who face that kind of discrimination or danger on a regular basis, there is often no disconnect between ideological and literal safety—or lack thereof. Studies on domestic abusers, for example, show that regressive men are the ones more likely to hit women. Someone who is willing to participate in hate speech online may be more likely to commit violence in real life: This week the murder of black Maryland student is being investigated as a possible hate crime after authorities found that his killer was a member of a racist Facebook group.
To men like Stephens, an issue like rape can be an abstract notion, but women don't have the privilege of sexual violence as a thought exercise. It's easy to mock the idea of safety when it's not something you have to think about on a daily basis.
Hundreds of protesters, most of them men, have marched in the South African capital, Pretoria, over rising levels of violence against women and children.
One of the organisers, Kholofelo Masha, said men had to take collective responsibility for the increase in beatings, sex attacks and killings.
South Africa has one of the highest rates of sexual violence in the world.
Police figures showed that 64,000 cases were reported last year.
- Women Under Siege: 10 do’s and don’ts on how to interview sexualized violence survivors
This is meant as an informal guide for journalists who cover sexualized violence or want to, mainly in an international context. Over the years I’ve consulted with dozens of experts: psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists, doctors, NGO staffers, journalists who’ve long covered this topic, and many others. This is the fruit of those discussions. It is also the product of years of my own reporting in war zones. During this time, I’ve seen and experienced a lot of awful interactions between survivors and journalists, as well as some that have gone extremely well.
I’m sure there is much missing in my discussion here, so please note that this is an incomplete, and personal, guide. My hope is that it may help even one journalist better tell a story of rape, or one survivor confide it without being retraumatized.
in the future, women artists are valued for their talents & not labeled by gender
- Souls Grown Deep Foundation explores the styles and significance of Gee’s Bend QuiltMakers and has images of historic and contemporary quilts from the women.
The women of Gee’s Bend—a small, remote, black community in Alabama—have created hundreds of quilt masterpieces dating from the early twentieth century to the present. Resembling an inland island, Gee’s Bend is surrounded on three sides by the Alabama River. The seven hundred or so inhabitants of this small, rural community are mostly descendants of slaves, and for generations they worked the fields belonging to the local Pettway plantation. Quiltmakers there have produced countless patchwork masterpieces beginning as far back as the mid-nineteenth century, with the oldest existing examples dating from the 1920s. Enlivened by a visual imagination that extends the expressive boundaries of the quilt genre, these astounding creations constitute a crucial chapter in the history of African American art.
- It’s not that she’s a woman, it’s that she’s a hero and a bad ass.
some women are living as feminist futurists right now
- Beyoncé is a modern fertility goddess.
Beyoncé is winning at Insta-pregnancy by turning herself into a kind of modern fertility goddess. While the push party images are designed to work for social media – bright colours, celebrity friends – they are also part of a Brand Bey game plan. The star is exploring imagery from different African countries and the African diaspora. During her performance at the Grammys in February, bump already in evidence, she was a vision in gold, complete with crown. Some likened the look to a madonna in a religious icon painting. Others pointed out allusions to Oshun, the Yoruba orisha (spirit) said to protect women during pregnancy.
webinar to help Create the future - women Learn How to Build Campaigns for Renewable Energy
…women play a pivotal role in the movement to stymy climate change and expand the use of renewable energy—and that their work will literally save the world.
Now, we want to help equip our community members—leaders like you—to bring that fight home.
Ms. is hosting a free webinar for our community members on how activists across the country and around the world can build and sustain movements to boost renewables and combat climate change. In our interactive webinar, our editors and writers will join leaders from grassroots environmental groups Mothers Out Front and the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition to walk through some of the organizing models and strategies and actions women-led groups are taking to push for renewable energy in their community. There will be plenty of time for Q&A!
The webinar is on June 4 at 1 p.m. EST. Register Now!
in memorium — roxcy bolton moved us towards the feminist future
Feminist Crusader for Equality, Including in Naming Hurricanes, Dies
She established the first rape treatment centers and pushed for ratification of the Equal Rights Amendments, among many feminist actions. Thus, her crusade to stop using only female names for hurricanes may seem frivolous now, decades after the change had the first male-named hurricane (Bob) in 1979. But before then, weather forecasters discussed hurricanes “flirting” and called them “temperamental” and Bolton was offended at aligning women as disasters. The patriarchal powers didn’t want to name hurricanes after men saying that people wouldn’t take the threats seriously.
Roxcy Bolton, a pioneering and tempestuous Florida feminist who was credited with founding the nation’s first rape treatment center and who helped persuade national weather forecasters not to name tropical storms after only women, died on Wednesday in Coral Gables, Fla. She was 90. [...]
Ms. Bolton’s crusade for the Equal Rights Amendment, which would have guaranteed constitutional equality for women, was unsuccessful. But she was instrumental in elevating the prevention and treatment of rape into priorities for law enforcement and health professionals; persuaded National Airlines to grant maternity leave to pregnant flight attendants rather than firing them; and pressured Miami department stores to eliminate the men-only dining sections in their restaurants. (She reasoned that “men and women sleep together; why can’t they eat together?”)
She also played a role in persuading President Richard M. Nixon to proclaim Women’s Equality Day in 1972 and in recruiting Senator Birch Bayh, Democrat of Indiana, to introduce the Equal Rights Amendment.
until this wonderful future arrives, here’s some advice on coping with all the patriarchal crap
- Feminista Jones — Inspired a Dialogue About Agreeing With Men’s Compliments and confirmed that even when women agree with men, we can be wrong.
focus
feel all the hard things, then
look for the truth &
reveal the fierce urgency of now
We are not giving up and not going back
