It’s been a year … to say the least. We’re a month-plus out from the election, and Ms. readers are still working through the stages of grief: shock, depression, anger. The truth is, we need it all. But the feminist community is also here for each other, and as we go through a collective healing, a fierce feminist resistance is also taking shape. (Expect relentless reporting on this in the new year!)
Every day of 2024, Ms. writers and editors set out to create content that empowered, informed and infuriated readers. We sought out the truth, sounded alarms, asked tough questions, mourned feminist losses (and feminists we lost), looked to gender justice advocates abroad, and handed the microphone over to experts. Dear reader: As we enter a new year and a new era of the movement, we promise you more of this.
Below, explore the 30 most popular articles published this year on MsMagazine.com—the articles feminists most clicked, shared, studied, bookmarked and passed out at marches.
Fourteen States Deny Abortions to Over 65,000 Rape Victims Since Dobbs
PUBLISHED 1/26/2024 by Carrie N. Baker
Abortion bans are having a devastating effect on rape survivors who become pregnant, research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association shows.
- In the 18 months after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, there were more than 500,000 reported and unreported rapes in the 14 states that have outlawed abortion throughout pregnancy, resulting in 65,000 rape-related pregnancies.
- Nine of these states have abortion bans that do not have exceptions for rape.
- Five of the states have abortion bans exceptions with narrow exceptions for rape, but apply stringent gestational limits and require survivors to report to law enforcement, which only 21 percent do.
States that have bans with no exception for rape include Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee and Texas. There were 58,979 rapes in these states. Ten or fewer legal abortions per month occurred in each of these states.
Of all the states, Texas had the highest number of rape-related pregnancies: 26,313—which was 45 percent of the total rape-related pregnancies in the 14 states evaluated. Vice President Kamala Harris condemned the restrictive abortion laws in Texas, which she described as “immoral.”
“Women across our nation should not be subject to extreme and oppressive laws that dictate what they can do with their bodies, including and especially after surviving a violent crime,” said Harris.
The Number One Movie in America Is a Safe Firearm Storage PSA
PUBLISHED 8/22/2024 by Ashbey Beasley
During its opening weekend in early August, It Ends With Us surpassed $80 million globally. Based on the book by Colleen Hoover, the film stars Blake Lively as flower shop owner Lily Bloom. Lily meets and marries charming neurosurgeon Dr. Ryle Kincaid played by director Justin Baldoni. The film follows their relationship from its passionate beginning to Ryle’s devastating physical abuse of Lily.
It’s natural to hate Ryle for the monster he unleashes on Lily, but it’s also important to remember that the 6-year-old boy who had to cope with killing his brother and best friend is also a victim. Unintentional shooting incidents—like the one that changed the trajectory of Ryle’s and Lily’s lives—are preventable if gun owners practice safe firearm storage.
What Kamala Harris Means to Me as a Young Indian American Woman … and her Nov. 7 follow-up: What Kamala Harris *Still* Means to Me as Young Indian American Woman
Vice President Harris is no stranger to being the ‘first,’ and with every barrier she breaks, she ensures more women, people of color and women of color like me will follow.
I’ve watched Vice President Harris make masala dosas alongside Mindy Kaling, tell her mother’s story, and speak to leaders in the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. I am proud to see her embrace her Indian roots on the national stage. It is a new and exciting feeling to see myself in a presidential candidate.
—July 24
In her concession speech, Vice President Harris spoke of an old adage: “Only when it is dark enough, can you see the stars. I know many people feel like we are entering a dark time, but for the benefit of us all, I hope that is not the case. But here’s the thing, America, if it is, let us fill the sky with the light of a brilliant, brilliant billion of stars.”
Hearing this after Diwali, the Hindu celebration of the triumph of good over evil, of light over dark, gave me chills.
—Nov 7
Survivor Trauma Cannot Be Treated as Just Another Bar in a Rap Battle
PUBLISHED 5/14/2024 by Celeste Faison
In the rap battle between Kendrick Lamar and Drake, serious accusations of violence against women and girls were repeatedly reduced to punchlines in these diss tracks.
We don’t deserve to see our experiences, especially our most painful ones, turned into punchlines.
Japan’s Far-Right ‘Jokes’ About Forced Hysterectomies as Trump’s Authoritarian Playbook Goes Global
PUBLISHED 11/18/2024 by Wakaba Oto
As Americans grapple with the shadow of Trump’s second term, they’d do well to watch what’s happening in Japan, Hungary, Brazil and beyond. When satire is weaponized as a tool for authoritarianism, it’s not just rhetoric—it’s strategy.
Japan’s Conservative Party leader Naoki Hyakuta sparked outrage on a Nov. 11 YouTube broadcast with “solutions” to Japan’s declining birthrate that sound more like a dystopian nightmare than public policy. His proposals—banning women from university after the age of 18, legally preventing women over 25 who are single from ever marrying, and, most chillingly, surgically removing the wombs of women once they turn 30—were framed as “science fiction by a novelist” intended to “spark debate.” But in a country still grappling with gender equality, many Japanese citizens see through the thin veneer of satire.
Women & Democracy
Women & Democracy is Ms. magazine’s online forum that focuses on key issues impacting full and fair representation in our democracy, spearheaded by Ms. executive director for partnerships and strategy, Jennifer Weiss-Wolf. Several times a year, Ms. publishes a new multimedia package landing page on a single issue, together with a dedicated partner, that focuses on key issues impacting full and fair representation in our democracy. Past partners have included the Brennan Center for Justice, Center for Reproductive Rights and Supermajority, among others.
- The Youth Vote Is Essential to Democracy
- Feminist Philanthropy Is Essential to Democracy
- The ERA Is Essential to Democracy
How the Far Right-Wing Plans to Obliterate More of Our Constitutional Rights
PUBLISHED 3/13/2024 by CJ Spencer
In the last decade, the Convention of State Action (COSA) has become the fastest-growing Article V movement.
COSA advocates are pushing for Congress to call a convention to ratify a number of constitutional amendments which threaten the fabric of our democracy. If states have immediate standing to challenge the constitutionality of any enactments by Congress and the executive branch, the lives of women would be at risk.
Abortion Bans Are Empowering Abusive Men—and Prominent ‘Pro-Life’ Activists Are Representing Them
PUBLISHED 5/8/2024 by Jill Filipovic
The very foundation of an abortion ban is an assumption that a woman’s body does not belong to her. Abusive men agree.
In the United States, it is legal to cross state lines for medical care, including abortion. But the antiabortion movement wants this long-standing legal allowance to end.
Kamala Harris Is Older, Wiser … and Cooler
PUBLISHED 7/26/2024 by Jennifer Weiss-Wolf and Sharon Malone
Kamala Harris has rapidly assumed the mantel of cool, youthful candidate. Among Gen Z, she is “brat,” with Charli XCX, Olivia Rodrigo and Beyoncé lining up fast for the cause. Among the older crowd, longstanding debate over whether the vice president qualifies as a Baby Boomer—born in 1964, she is just on the cusp—rages on. It is apparently a hill Gen X is prepared to die on, citing her penchant for Chuck Taylors as proof.
Either way, at nearly 60 years old, Harris has achieved what might have seemed impossible before this moment: She has changed the perception of what it looks and sounds like to be a vibrant and capable “older” woman. We see a woman who radiates from the certainty of age and of knowing herself. Quite frankly, it is a gorgeous sight.
Chromosome Count: Who Gets to Decide Which Athletes Are ‘Feminine Enough’ to Compete?
PUBLISHED 8/12/2024 by Alison Carlson
At the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, a right-wing media firestorm spread disinformation that Imane Khelif of Algeria was transgender. As this article from the October 1988 issue of Ms. reminds us, sex testing in women’s sports is nothing new—and its origins are blatantly unscientific.
“Sports are not democratic. They’re elitist. The tallest play basketball. The shortest are jockeys. The ultimate would be to break the Olympics into biological classes and run them like the Westminster Dog Show.”
A Young Woman Almost Died Due to Texas’ Abortion Bans. Now She’s Battling to Save Other Women.
PUBLISHED 1/12/2024 by Bonnie Fuller
“I can’t carry a pregnancy again,” Amanda Zurawski said sadly, but matter of factly.
The Austin, Texas, resident will never be able to carry a pregnancy again because she was refused a necessary abortion in her state after her water broke at 18 weeks, long before her baby would have been viable.
….
“How is it pro-life that they had to be carried to term, and then they suffered for hours after being born and then slowly suffocated to death?” she continued, referring to Samantha Casiano, a fellow plaintiff whose baby suffered from anencephaly, a condition in which a baby doesn’t develop part of its brain and skull, and died shortly after birth. Casiano was denied an abortion and was forced to give birth to a daughter, Halo, who was born gasping for air and died within hours.
Mexico’s Next President Is the Country’s First Woman, First Jewish President—And a Feminist
PUBLISHED 6/3/2024 by Jennifer M. Piscopo
Mexico just elected its first woman and first Jewish president: former Mexico City Governor Claudia Sheinbaum.
She bested her opponent, Xóchitl Gálvez, winning between 58.3 percent and 60.7 percent of the vote, according to the National Electoral Institute. Gálvez had between 26.6 percent and 28.6 percent.
Thanks to three decades of political innovation in Mexico, Sheinbaum, Gálvez and hundreds of other women received the chance to run for and serve in office.
Antiabortion Extremist Sentenced to Prison for Harassing NYC Planned Parenthood Staff and Patients
PUBLISHED 7/26/2024 by Roxana Behdad
“This is going to be a wonderful day. We are going to terrorize this place. And I want the manager to hear me say that. … More people are coming … and we’re going to make sure we terrorize you guys so good.”
These words were shared on a Facebook livestream by antiabortion extremist Bevelyn Beatty Williams as she prepared to invade and harass a Planned Parenthood clinic in lower Manhattan in June of 2020.
On Wednesday, July 24, Williams was sentenced to 41 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Jennifer L. Rochon for violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act—a 1994 federal law that “prohibits violent, threatening, damaging and obstructive conduct intended to injure, intimidate, or interfere with the right to seek, obtain or provide reproductive health services.”
The Life of the Mother, The Grief of Her Child: What Abortion Bans Take From Us
PUBLISHED 10/1/2024 by Ava Blando
A 6-year-old boy faces life without his mother, Amber Nicole Thurman, because of an abortion ban. Candi Miller died at home with her 3-year-old daughter beside her, after her teenage son watched her suffer for days, because she was too scared to seek follow-up abortion and miscarriage care. And in Indiana, Taysha Wilkinson-Sobieski, a 26-year-old mom of one, died after she could not access timely reproductive healthcare for an ectopic pregnancy.
As someone who lost my mother as a teenager and who worked with grieving children as a volunteer, I implore you to imagine the powerless feeling of watching your mother’s last moments, wishing you could save her. Imagine the rage you would feel if you knew she could have been saved, but some politician did not care enough about her life to write a clear, evidence-based law that protected it.
The Perception Paradox: Men Who Hate Feminists Think Feminists Hate Men
PUBLISHED 4/11/2024 by Amber Wardell
For far too long, opponents of feminism have claimed that our movement is rooted in misandry—the prejudice, contempt or hatred against men. Men who have not bothered to educate themselves about what feminism stands for declare loudly and proudly that, if possible, feminist women would subjugate men, destabilize civilization, and summon forth the end of humanity.
A 2023 study measured levels of hostility toward men among feminists, non-feminists, and other men. Interestingly, across six experiments conducted in nine nations and almost 10,000 participants, the results revealed that feminist women show no more hostility toward men than both non-feminists and other men. It turns out that just about everyone, including men, has a fair amount of hostility toward men.
The Paradox of JD Vance’s Misogyny
PUBLISHED 8/8/2024 by Chloe Nazra Lee
The collective female rage in response to JD Vance using the “childless cat lady” archetype as an insult is driven by shared hurt at the mockery that reduces us to our reproductive capacity in a political context where women are already devalued. It demeans our dreams and aspirations outside motherhood. It seems small, but those three words carry so much emotional weight for us.
The fight is exhausting and there will come a time when I stop. But I pray that other women fight. All of us—intentionally childfree, mothers, delayed in motherhood, deprived of motherhood, stepmothers, more—certainly have a stake in the future: a hope that we may be cherished, not for the services our bodies offer men and society at large, but merely for our humanity and the women we are.
It’s Been a Year Since Catherine Kassenoff’s Assisted Suicide. Has Anything Changed in Family Court?
PUBLISHED 5/28/2024 by Amy Polacko
After she lost custody of her three daughters in a divorce proceeding that labeled her behavior “harmful” and unhinged, Catherine Kassenoff decided to end her life in a Swiss assisted suicide facility on May 27, 2023.
“She couldn’t live without her children and the court was saying she couldn’t live with her children,” said Wayne Baker, the executor of Kassenoff’s estate, “so where did that leave her?”
Many in the family court reform movement thought the dramatic death of an astute legal mind like Catherine—who still couldn’t win in our backward system—would finally mark a watershed for reform. One year later, what has changed?
New Ad Creates ‘Permission Structure’ for Men to Support Harris
PUBLISHED 11/1/2024 by Jackson Katz
Among the most memorable ads of the political season are a pair of 30-second spots with explicitly gendered themes featuring voiceovers from two of America’s most beloved movie stars. The ads each play on the idea of “permission structures,” the assumption that voters sometimes need to be given permission to vote for a candidate or party that is not popular with their social group.
Post-election follow-up:
Male grievance, especially white male grievance, is the beating heart of Trumpist populism.
Kamala Harris ran a truly impressive campaign under extraordinarily difficult circumstances. It would be reductive and absurd to say that her campaign’s decision not to put her on The Joe Rogan Experience is why she lost. But it does point to a Democratic Party mindset that needs to change.
If Democrats want to win future presidential elections, they need to communicate more effectively with men, including blue-collar white men and young men of all ethnic and racial backgrounds, whose vote for Trump was less a vote for his policies or against those of Kamala Harris than it was the loudest and angriest statement they could make that we still matter.
—”White Men Elected Donald Trump, Again,” Jackson Katz, Nov. 15, 2024
The Best Autistic and Autistic-Coded Characters in Animation
PUBLISHED 4/30/2024 by Red Rosenberg
Three years ago, I wrote a piece for Ms. about Hollywood’s blatant and continued exclusion of Autistic people, as well as the ableist tropes film and TV have continued to push in its depiction of Autism. Since the article was published, I have seen more positive strides taken in terms of Autism representation in the media, with many of those strides coming from the world of animation.
As we wind down World Autism Month, here are some of my favorite Autistic and Autistic-coded characters in animation.
Women, Your Vote Is a Secret, Says New Guerrilla Post-It Campaign
PUBLISHED 9/18/2024 by Roxanne Szal
In a world where the political gender gap is growing as women move left, a clever grassroots campaign is reminding women of a fundamental truth: Their vote is private. This guerrilla movement uses a simple yet powerful tool—Post-It notes—to reach women whose partners may disagree with their political choices.
The premise is simple: small, brightly colored notes discreetly placed in public spaces, like bathroom stalls, libraries, cafes, dorm buildings, workplace lounges, doctors’ offices and community boards. Each note carries the message that every woman has the right to cast her vote freely and privately.
Misogynist Manifesto
A three-part series about the 900-plus-page right-wing “misogynistic manifesto,” Project 2025:
- Project 2025 Says Yes to ‘Biblically Based Marriages’ and No to Reproductive Rights
- Project 2025’s Plans to Gut Women’s Rights in the Workplace and Classroom
- Fighting Project 2025’s Plans to Dismantle Democracy as We Know It
What Does 90 Look Like? Just Ask Gloria Steinem
PUBLISHED 3/25/2024 by Lori Sokol
Today, as Gloria Steinem, herself, turns 90, I will not flatter her with compliments about how she still doesn’t look her age, or how considerate, clever and courageous she remains. What I’d like to do, instead, is celebrate her and the feminist movement she continues to devote her long life to, enabling me, and countless others of my generation to, as she once put it, “Live out the unlived lives of our mothers, because they were not able to become the unique people they were born to be.”
Tradwives Are Doing Conservatives’ Work for Them
PUBLISHED 7/16/2024 by Oliver Haug
We’re living in the era of the tradwife: Pick up your phone and she’s there, in a cute apron, waking up at 6 a.m. to make a perfect loaf of bread for her son’s breakfast. Or maybe it’s laundry day, and she’s bleaching her husband’s whites between dropping the kids off at school and giving us a look at her grocery haul.
I’ll admit it—I watch her too. There’s something both morbidly fascinating and deeply satisfying about peeking into the lives of tradwife influencers: women who film themselves working in the kitchen or garden, or caring for their carefully coiffed, shiny (and usually white) children. They espouse a world where men were made to be dominant and protect and provide for the family, while women were made to be subservient and care for the home. It’s not that they think men are “better” than women, some insist—these are just their “natural” roles, as god intended.
Plenty of cultural critics have pointed out the sinister alt-right leanings of the tradwife and how they mirror the current political climate around women’s rights. But as the November elections grow closer, I think we could pay closer attention to the role the tradwife plays. The figure of the tradwife isn’t just advocating for a cultural shift—she’s pushing a political agenda, whether she intends to or not. And it’s one we can’t afford to ignore.
Why the ‘Tradwife’ Life Is More Dangerous Than Ever Before
PUBLISHED 4/10/2024 by Amy Polacko
They were soulmates. At least that’s what Olivia thought—and Brad said. When they reconnected over a decade later, it seemed like fate.
Brad was charismatic. Within a couple years, Olivia was pregnant, and Brad wanted her to stay home. “He didn’t use the term ‘tradwife’ but that’s what he wanted,” she said, referring to the social media trend glorifying the traditional wife of the 1950s who tends the home and has no financial independence. “I felt like a slave. He expected me to keep the house clean while caring for our baby. … If I didn’t wear makeup and have my hair done, he would ask why. … The only thing with my name on it was a joint Costco card.”
After he cheated multiple times, they got divorced and she got no alimony. Brad lives in a comfortable home thanks to his well-paying job. Olivia lives in a trailer.
“If you refrain from building your own success, it’s very dangerous,” she said. “Being a ‘tradwife’ is like playing Russian roulette.”
California Becomes First State to Enshrine Intersectionality in Law, Recognizing the Amplified Harms of Overlapping Discrimination
PUBLISHED 10/11/2024 by Carrie N. Baker
Thirty-five years ago, Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw coined the term “intersectionality” to explain how multiple forms of discrimination interact to exacerbate each other, resulting in amplified forms of prejudice and harm. Last week, California became the first state to explicitly recognize intersectionality in discrimination law.
Read Sonia Sotomayor’s Dissent: ‘The President Is Now a King Above the Law’
PUBLISHED 7/1/2024 by Roxanne Szal
“With fear for our democracy, I dissent,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor concluded in a scathing dissent, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.
Rest in Power: A Running List of the Preventable Deaths Caused by Abortion Bans
By Roxanne Szal
Porsha Ngumezi.
Josseli Barnica.
Yeniifer Alvarez-Estrada Glick.
Nevaeh Crain.
Amber Nicole Thurman.
Candi Miller.
Taysha Wilkinson-Sobieski.Today, 21 states ban abortion or restrict the procedure earlier in pregnancy than the standard set by Roe v. Wade. These states are failing women and their families, causing preventable deaths and irreparable pain and heartbreak for their families—leaving children without mothers, parents without their daughters, and spouses without their partners.
Out of Touch on Menopause: Experts Respond to The Lancet’s ‘Over-Medicalization’ Claims
PUBLISHED 4/15/2024 by Dr. Mary Claire Haver
Menopause is gaining attention in the media and highest levels of government, including the White House—but we still have a long way to go to ensure women get the support they need. A recent series issued by a respected journal, The Lancet, proves this point.
The series claims to promote an “empowerment model for managing menopause.” To us—more than 250 obstetrician-gynecologists, family medicine physicians, cardiologists, internists, urologists, medical oncologists, psychiatrists, orthopedic surgeons, nurse practitioners and licensed therapists—this was an unexpected and welcome opportunity.
The series was awash with misstatements that do not reflect the lived experience of women in this stage of life or our clinical experience in treating them.
The 22 Scariest Lines We Found in Project 2025’s 900-Page ‘Mandate for Leadership’
PUBLISHED 7/16/2024 by Livia Follet, Rachel Lonker, Abigail Ramirez, Clara Scholl and Roxanne Szal
Project 2025, the extremist blueprint for the next Republican president, maps out the permanent reversal of more than 50 years of gains for American women and LGBTQ+ people. The authors of Project 2025—80 percent of whom served in the first Trump administration—paint a picture of a nation where women are fundamentally second class citizens.
Project 2025 contains an 887-page policy agenda. We read the whole thing, so you don’t have to. Here are the most terrifying things we found.
Christian Nationalism’s First Item on the Agenda: Repeal Women’s Right to Vote
PUBLISHED 11/29/2024 by Emma Cieslik
Trump supporters’ calling for an end to women’s suffrage may be the canary in the coal mine for further drastic changes to the electoral system.
Readers, rest up—we need each other. See you in the new year!
