Reproductive Rights

We’re Winning One War on Women, But Losing Another

by Carole Joffe · February 21, 2012 · 2 comments

In the last ten days or so we have seen Republicans and their religious allies wage a war against contraception–and bungle it badly. With poll after poll showing that a majority of Americans support contraceptive coverage in health reform, and with the 98 percent statistic (the proportion of sexually experienced American Catholic women who have ever used contraception) endlessly repeated in the media, the Republicans nonetheless push ahead with this attack, providing a welcome gift to the Obama reelection campaign ...Read More

Education

Girls in Pearls, Guys in Ties?

by Avital Norman Nathman · February 17, 2012 · 23 comments

A Virginia school district is currently considering a new type of clothing ban that would impact more than 14,000 students. While most schools across the country do tend to have some sort of dress code, from banning T-shirts with offensive slogans to requiring skirts to be a certain length or forbidding baseball hats and pajamas, the Suffolk school board is attempting to take things one step further. The district wants to prohibit students from wearing clothing “not in keeping with a student’s gender” ...Read More

Politics

Women On Your Marks, Get Set, RUN!

by Jessica Clem-McClaren · February 15, 2012 · 1 comment

Throughout the world, woman hold–and have held–the titles of president and prime Minister; currently there are 19 women in the top seat of power, from Liberia to Germany to Trinidad to Iceland. Yet in the United States, we’ve still to see a woman at the very top. And it’s not much better on the rungs below the U.S. presidency. Making up more than half of the U.S. population, women represent only 17 percent of seats in Congress, 12 percent of the state governors and 23 percent of state legislators. ...Read More

Books

Iron(ing) Man

by Meg Waite Clayton · February 15, 2012 · no comments

Is there anything more appealing than a man at an ironing board? Hilma Wolitzer, in her delightful new novel An Available Man, takes it one step further, though: Edward Schuyler begins ironing after his wife Bee’s death, not to tend to his own life but to reconnect with her. “At first, he only pressed things of hers that he’d found in a basket of tangled clean clothing in the laundry room,” Wolitzer writes. And when his ironing is disturbed by the ring of the phone–a woman wanting to comfort him–he ...Read More

Men

“Neutering American Male” is Same Old, Same Old

by Caryl Rivers and Rosalind Barnett · February 14, 2012 · 4 comments

The Neutering of the American Male, a new book by Jim Wysong, delivers a rotten Valentine to aspiring, achieving women who also take a healthy interest in having a good sex life. If men can’t be in charge, warns Wysong, a self-described Christian writer, their erotic feelings disappear. But don’t rush out and read this for yourself. Spend time instead with that special someone in your life. Women don’t need another book that says men have to be dominant for the sex to be good. Andrew Hacker already ...Read More

Work

Study: Restaurants Feed on Exploited Women’s Labor

by Michelle Chen · February 13, 2012 · 3 comments

Next time you plunk down some change on the table before leaving a restaurant, think about what might be behind that service with a smile. A new study warns that when Americans eat out, they feed into an industry fueled by exploitation and rampant discrimination against women. The report, published by the labor advocacy group Restaurant Opportunities Center United (ROC) in partnership with a coalition of labor and women’s rights groups, details the restaurant industry’s secret recipe for fattening profits: low wages, ...Read More

Ms.cellany

NEWSFLASH: Virginia Women Rally Against Anti-Abortion Bills

by Ms. · February 21, 2012 · 3 comments

Between 1,000 and 1,500 women stood arm-in-arm yesterday at the Virginia state Capitol in Richmond to silently protest two anti-abortion bills scheduled for votes by the state’s General Assembly. One is a “personhood bill,” sponsored by Delegate Bob Marshall ...Read More

Queering Black Herstory: Janelle Monae and Gladys Bentley

by Shantala Thompson · February 21, 2012 · 1 comment

When I began to research Harlem Renaissance pianist and singer Gladys Bentley a little over a year ago, I was struck by her similarity to Janelle Monae, who had then just released her second album,“ArchAndroid.” Monae’s gender-queer look–black tuxedo, black-and-white ...Read More

Black Herstory: Black Women in the White House

by Barbara McCaskill · February 20, 2012 · 2 comments

To mark Black History Month, President Obama has been asked to recognize the role of black people in building the White House. Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY) requested that the president formally acknowledge the work of the enslaved carpenters, bricklayers, stonemasons, and other ...Read More

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