More Than A Magazine, A Movement
The Supreme Court of Texas notched itself into a troubling tapestry of U.S. legal history when it overturned a district court ruling that allowed Kate Cox, a 31-year-old Texas woman, to end her nonviable pregnancy. The state is committed to forcing Cox to remain pregnant, against her will and medical recommendations.
Women in Texas are living in a new Jane Crow.
More than half a century before the COVID-19 pandemic normalized working from home, Lillian Vernon (1927-2015) launched what would eventually become a multi-million-dollar catalog business from the kitchen table of her modest home in Mount Vernon, N.Y. Her accomplishments as a pathbreaking entrepreneur were recently recognized with the installation of an exhibit: “Lillian Vernon, Kitchen Table Millionaire,” at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.
In the many tributes written since Rosalynn Carter’s death on Nov. 19, one word often is used to describe her: trailblazer. Indeed, Rosalynn Carter was like no other first lady. She testified before Congress on mental health issues; made policy proposals on caregiving and established the Rosalynn Carter Institute for Caregivers in 1987; worked to advance women’s rights; and helped in the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment.
Carter’s own words are the most powerful about her belief and commitment to equality. “Although there has been progress, women still struggle to take their full, rightful places in politics, the media, business and athletics. … I would like for people to think that I took advantage of the opportunities I had and did the best I could.”
Both a product (albums! cassettes! posters!) and a destination (rallies! concerts! festivals!), women’s music fused feminist politics, woman-staffed sound production and grassroots folk traditions to create a bold new recording and performance network. When we had no rights at all, women’s music was also the sound and site of the lesbian revolution. This year we celebrate the musicians and producers who, across five decades, gave us the soundtracks and spaces affirming our lives.
Abortions are sought by a wide range of people for many different reasons. There is no single story. Telling stories of then and now shows how critical abortion has been and continues to be for women and girls. (Share your abortion story by emailing myabortionstory@msmagazine.com.)
“I made a decision that deeply challenged my ‘values,’ yet was absolutely the most ethical and moral choice I could make.”
“I realized that I wasn’t the only one going through this, even though abortion stigma can oftentimes make us feel that way. … Your abortion is not a taboo or a deep, dark secret; abortion is healthcare.”
When Ms. was founded in 1971, the vast majority of publications for women were about homemaking, parenting advice and fashion and beauty tips. Ms. was far from that, created with the intention of giving a national voice to the feminist movement of the ‘70s—and railing against the idea of the perfect homemaking housewife that was perpetuated by many of the other “for women” publications.
It’s a setting that doesn’t seem too foreign. “The levers of power are very imbalanced still to this very day, not only on sex but also race and ethnicity,” said Kathy Spillar, Ms executive editor. “Ms. has played a major role in constantly putting that in front of the public so that people understand.”
(This essay is part of the “Feminist Journalism is Essential to Democracy” project—Ms. magazine’s latest installment of Women & Democracy, presented in partnership with the International Women’s Media Foundation.)
“Ms. has always broken the silence on issues that mainstream media barely touched or refused to cover.”
(This essay is part of the “Feminist Journalism Is Essential to Democracy” project—Ms. magazine’s latest installment of Women & Democracy, presented in partnership with the International Women’s Media Foundation.)
The first mass shooting of the modern era occurred in Austin, Texas, on Aug. 1, 1966. Before police killed him, Charles Whitman would be responsible for the murder of 17 and the wounding of 31. But the tower murders weren’t the beginning of the carnage.
The night before, while his mother and wife were sleeping, he had already stabbed them to death. Coverage of the campus massacre virtually eclipsed the women’s stories. But Unheard Witness: The Life and Death of Kathy Leissner Whitman, by Jo Scott-Coe, aims to change that.
More than 300 years after the Salem witch trials, a class of middle schoolers helped exonerate the sole remaining woman legally classified as a witch.
Originally expected to be a simple class project, the path to clearing Elizabeth Johnson Jr.’s name took three years and the help of a Massachusetts state senator, Diana DiZoglio (D). Unwed women were viewed with suspicion at the time of the trials, and many individuals convicted were later exonerated by their own descendants. With no descendants to clear her name, Johnson’s wrongful conviction remained in place—making her the last remaining witch in Salem history—until Carrie LaPierre’s class came to her aid.
Filmmakers Annika Hylmö and Dawn Green tell this story in their upcoming documentary, The Last Witch.
When I heard the title of Elizabeth Silver’s new book, The Majority, I knew the lone word in the title held layers of resonance.
The novel’s main character is reminiscent of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, or “The Notorious RBG,” and the reader follows her arduous, yet steady, ascending legal career. The novel reveals an intergenerational weave of feminists still trying—sometimes in impossibly constricted ways—to break down doors, laws and spaces to effect change. In this book, we see a composite of personal and professional challenges that reflect the path of one character but represent so much more beyond just her.
