This week I finished reading All the Single Ladies by Rebecca Traister. There is so much in the book, it’s hard to focus on just one aspect of the subject, but Traister, a writer for New York Magazine, begins with a trend for women (and men) to marry later, after having lived on their own first. She looks at the institution of marriage and of women who have lived other kinds of life before this trend, who became workers for political and social causes, writers and artists. She examines women’s friendships, which are often the sustaining relationships even for married women, especially before marriage was supposed to be based on emotional/romantic feeling rather than economic benefit. She looks at literature, interviews many women of different social, economic, and racial backgrounds, examines lives of unmarried women throughout history, both the never-married, and those who married late in life. She considers economic life, sexual life, social life, motherhood, and the separating of marriage from women’s sexual and maternal lives.
She begins with the Clarence Thomas hearings and Anita Hill, which happened when there were only two women in the Senate, and considers the motivations and fears behind the vicious attacks on Hill, which went undefended: Hill was professional, 35, and unmarried — and how she, and other unmarried women, are vilified and pathologized because they threaten all assumptions of male superiority. This of course in the same thing we see in rape trials, where victims become the accused. I lived in Massachusetts during those hearings, and remember watching Ted Kennedy’s pathetic attempts to defend Hill, knowing that he was off to Florida after the hearings to testify for his nephew, who was standing trial for rape — and thinking that he could not see the relationship between the two events.
But it was on class and economic differences that the book really spoke to me. Everything in our economic life is set up to keep women subservient. Women’s pay goes down when they have children; men’s pay goes up when they become parents. Women are the only or major breadwinner in increasing numbers of households, yet are not compensated accordingly. And Traister is clear that all this is deliberate, that our economic and legal structures support male superiority and women’s dependence, that purposeful political acts maintain these structures.
I don’t do Hallmark holidays, but all this seems related to Mother’s Day. We sentimentalize motherhood, but continue to make caring for children more difficult with everything from pay structures to insufficient child care to housing policies to school hours. The war on women is also a war on mothers. But since it is Mother’s Day tomorrow, and we are therefore inundated with hearts and flowers, let’s not forget that our relationships with our mothers — or our children, or lack of children — are complicated and often difficult or even toxic things. There is no one correct way to feel.
Now on to the news, with thanks to cinnamon68, Tara the Antisocial Social Worker, officebss, and Besame.
Reproductive Health
From the State Legislatures:
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org… Florida judge tells state to withdraw case against abortion clinic.
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org/... Iowa budget in includes funding for PP clinics under Medicaid.
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org… Missouri case about revoking PP license.
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org… New Jersey bill would give pharmacists the ability to dispense oral contraception without prescription.
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org… Doctors protest Utah fetal anesthesia law.
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org… PP sues Kansas over withdrawal of Medicaid funding.
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org… Colorado budget signed that includes LARC program.
go.nationalpartnership.org/… Pennsylvania anti-abortion bill delayed in House.
The Economics of Reproductive Health Care
http://msmagazine.com/blog/2016/05/03/for-women-seeking-non-hormonal-birth-control-an-exhausting-quest/ Why it’s so hard to get non-hormonal contraception in the US.
http://www.vox.com/2016/5/2/11531780/military-birth-control-iuds Women in the military can have trouble obtaining long-acting contraception. Now a non-profit manufacturer of the IUD Liletta is offering a steep discount to the military to see if that will help.
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org/… Conference discusses relationship between reproductive rights and economic well-being.
Other Reproductive Health News
rewire.news/… Oklahoma prefers spending money defending unconstitutional abortion ban to using that money for schools, public health, child abuse prevention — things like that.
www.womenshealthpolicyreport.org/… Doctor who advocates for abortion files suit because she was told she could not do so, or would have to give up her fellowship.
www.nytimes.com/… same story
rewire.news/… Choice/LESS episode
action.aclu.org/… A petition from the ACLU to require Catholic hospitals to provide all necessary health care to women patients.
https://rewire.news/article/2016/04/29/hearing-accused-planned-parenthood-shooter-anti-abortion-views/ Violent rhetoric against abortion providers has nothing to do with the Colorado Springs clinic shooting, like Donald Trump’s hateful rhetoric has nothing to do with the violence against protesters at his events. An article about the competency hearing of Robert Lewis Dear.
http://www.trappeddocumentary.com/ New documentary about the real effects anti-abortion laws are having on women’s lives.
https://rewire.news/article/2016/05/03/department-justice-lawyer-argues-angel-dillards-letter-posted-true-threat/ Anti-abortion activists use the argument of free speech far too often to get away with seriously threatening language and behavior. One of the conclusions in the book Living in the Crosshairs is the idea that such threats need to be considered in the context of very serious violence against providers. In Kansas this week, a jury considered whether a letter sent by anti-abortion activist Angel Dillard to a doctor who was training to provide abortions in Wichita after the murder of Dr. George Tiller constituted a true threat. Rewire has three articles on this page which should be read together to understand the complexities of the case.
http://www.salon.com/2016/05/02/the_dark_road_to_criminalizing_pregnancy_why_everyone_should_care_about_the_feticide_conviction_of_purvi_patel/?source=news The case of Purvi Patel comes up for appeal this month. Patel is the woman who is serving 20 years in prison for feticide, the first woman to be so convicted in this country. From this article:
Both the March for Life and the National Right to Life Committee released statements in the wake of Donald Trump’s appalling remarks saying hat they didn’t believe that women who seek abortions should be punished. Neither of those organizations have issued a statement on Ms. Patel’s case. Neither responded to my inquiry as to why not, or whether they were planning to.
Violence Against Women
actionnetwork.org/… Petition to grant woman asylum in Canada. This is a Pakistani woman who was living in Japan with her husband. He was abusive and finally she left him. Now she is seeking asylum in Canada. If she is returned to Pakistan, she is at risk for honor killing by both her husband’s and her own families. And Japan has said she should return to her husband; apparently Japan is tolerant of domestic violence.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/03/us-muslim-woman-sues-police-for-removing-her-headscarf/ A California Muslim woman files suit against police whom she says forcibly removed her head scarf, telling her that police are "allowed to touch women."
http://wgntv.com/2016/05/03/viral-video-woman-turns-camera-on-store-voyeur/ A woman filmed a man who approached her in a store and spoke inappropriately, and when it went viral, other women he had harassed also came forward.
http://thinkprogress.org/education/2016/05/03/3774535/lgbt-sexual-assault-survivors/ A brother’s open letter to Kenyon College about how they dealt with his sister’s sexual assault, including the troubling issue of ignoring her sexual orientation (lesbian) when it came to the matter of consent.
http://www.athensnews.com/news/campus/ohio-university-hosted-rape-crisis-center-no-longer-considered-confidential/article_bd7943a0-0d77-11e6-a32b-8b2538d A rape crisis center based at Ohio University now has to send identifying information to law enforcement if the victim gives them that information, because of the university’s reading of reporting laws. They are recommending clients remain anonymous.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/spanish-artist-seeks-to-bring-attention-to-the-dreadful-practice-of-stoning_us_5721092ee4b0f309baef7ba6?cps=gravity_5020 A Spanish artist has sculpted a piece to show the horrors of stoning, a punishment that still is used in some countries, mostly against women.
International News
http://womensenews.org/… In India, the popularity of “Daughter by Court Order,” a novel by Ratna Vira in which the heroine fights for her property rights against the wishes of her family has sparked greater awareness of Indian women forfeiting their inheritance rights to avoid fighting with their families, and the risk of being ostracized or facing reprisals.
http://womensenews.org/… In the UK, London’s Feminist Library faces eviction. For 41 years, this volunteer-run library has collected women’s liberation movement literature, especially second-wave materials from the late 1960s to the 1990s. Now they face eviction by the local Southwark Council, which is raising their annual rent from about $17,000 USD to $43,000 USD.
http://www.bbc.com/… Iran elections: Rouhani notes record 6% women elected.
http://bit.ly/… Closing the socio-economic gaps means reflecting the realities of the lives of women and girls in development statistics.
Cultural and Economic Matters
www.washingtonpost.com/… famous quotes in women-in-meeting speak.
www.nytimes.com/… Why women apologize.
theslot.jezebel.com/… A look at some of the presidential campaigns’ employment practices and pay equity.
www.facebook.com/… Samantha Bee’s hilarious tweet puts school dress codes in perspective.
http://www.afropunk.com/m/blogpost?id=2059274%3ABlogPost%3A1355021 An interview with Djamila Ribeiro, Brazilian black philosopher.
http://viralwomen.com/post/chris_christie_just_vetoed_equal_pay_for_women Apparently it’s unfriendly to business when you are friendly to women, at least in the mind of Chris Christie.
http://mashable.com/2016/05/02/kickstarter-womans-card-trump/#Vp9nrSMnL5q9 Do you remember Zach Wahls, who so eloquently spoke truth to power, telling about being raised by two mothers? Well, he’s back. When Donald Trump spoke of Hillary Clinton playing the “woman card,” Zach and his sister decided to create a deck of woman cards — all with pictures of powerful women. Now they are raising money to expand the enterprise.