Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc) didn’t major in psychology, so maybe that’s why he turned Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs on its head when he pontificated at the Conservative Political Action Conference on March 6 about the U.S. providing food for hungry children: The left is making a big mistake here. What they’re offering people is a […]
Watching 12 Years a Slave, winner of the best picture Oscar Sunday night, it was almost as if I were there at Edwin Epps’ cotton plantation in the 1840s, walking past the gorgeous white mansion in the lush, green Louisiana landscape. Surrounded by cypress trees, I could hear the cicadas, and very nearly feel the […]
If I had to pick a couple of myths about the women’s movement that are most wrong, I think two might be tied for worst place. One is that this movement—also known as women’s liberation, feminism, womanism, mujerista!, grrrls and more—is only for white middle-class women. The second myth is that women of the ’70s […]
Though black feminists have wielded social media to make willful strides into public consciousness, black feminism is nothing new. The challenge of being doubly oppressed as a black woman has always colored feminist conversations, and minority women rarely have the luxury of fighting solely on behalf of their gender. The question of intersectionality predates hashtags […]
The Virginia Senate has passed a repeal of its law mandating medically unnecessary ultrasounds before abortions, which went into effect last year. The Democrat-controlled Senate was in a 20-20 tie, until Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam voted for the repeal. It will now be considered by the Republican-dominated state House. Virginia’s then-Republican-controlled Senate had originally attempted […]
This week, women competed in ski jumping at the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. Germany’s Carina Vogt took home the gold with 247.4 points and a distance of 97.5 m (320 feet), followed by Austria’s Daniela Iraschko-Stolz and Coline Mattel from France. The three American competitors—Jessica Jerome, Lindsey Van and Sarah Hendrickson—finished 10th, 15th and […]
“Girls and guys notice different things (boys: motion; girls: bright colors and people).” No, this isn’t a line found in a science textbook from the ’60s; this is what Somerset Middle School in Somerset, Wisc., used as evidence to support its sex-segregated classrooms. The ACLU has now filed a complaint with the federal Office for […]
The young college students who have sat in Professor Lois Banner‘s women’s studies classes are lucky to be living at a time when the field isn’t as stifled and doubted as it was when she began teaching women’s studies in the late 1960s. The Women’s Movement was still in its nascent stages then, having freshly […]
Last year, the Ms. Blog reviewed the Top Five Sexist Super Bowl Ads after the big game. This year, you can be the judge and scorekeeper. You’ve probably heard of the Bechdel Test for judging movies, which has become increasingly popular and well-known since it was put forth by cartoonist/graphic novelist Alison Bechdel in her […]
On this day in 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its landmark decision affirming a woman’s right to an abortion, a momentous leap forward for women’s health. Despite this hard-won victory, Roe v. Wade is under constant attack, with anti-choice activists chipping away reproductive freedoms at the state level. States have passed more laws restricting […]
