Standing Together for Freedom: A Commitment to 14 Democratic Principles

PUBLISHED 3/28/2023 by

As people around the world stand up for democracy and human rights, dictators are learning from one another how to suppress challenges to their rule more effectively. That’s why this week’s second Summit for Democracy could not come at a more critical time. Led by the United States, the Netherlands, Zambia, South Korea and Costa Rica, this meeting of leaders from more than 100 governments provides a global policy stage to build stronger democratic alliances and double down on commitments to address the summit’s three themes: respect for human rights, combatting corruption, and countering authoritarianism.

Freedom House, along with the Bush Center and the McCain Institute, led a coalition of organizations from around the world in drafting a Declaration of Democratic Principles in the run-up to the summit.

Celebrating the Women of the Cherokee Nation

PUBLISHED 3/27/2023 by

As a matrilineal tribe, Cherokee Nation reveres and prioritizes women in our homes and cultures. Throughout history, women have played a critical role in moving the Cherokee Nation forward.

There are countless stories of women who have, through the sheer force of their will, pushed Cherokee Nation onto a better and more prosperous path. This Women’s History Month, let us honor them and the example they have shown us. They are trailblazers who have earned our recognition, most especially for the impact they have had on opening new pathways to opportunity for young indigenous girls across the United States. 

Dr. Hannah Croasdale, Dartmouth’s First Tenured Woman Faculty Member: ‘Tell Them to Be Quiet and Wait’

PUBLISHED 3/27/2023 by

In 1935, Dr. Hannah Croasdale started a new job at Dartmouth College—before the college accepted women. Despite her Ph.D., Croasdale started as a lab technician. To women of that generation, the whole world was a boys’ club. She finally received tenure—the first woman to do so at Dartmouth—almost three decades later.

I came to know Croasdale’s story my first summer at Dartmouth. I was never asked to be grateful for admission to a school like Dartmouth, even though I was in the first 50 classes of women.

Groundbreaking Exhibition on Minerva Parker Nichols, America’s First Independent Woman Architect

PUBLISHED 3/27/2023 by

A new groundbreaking exhibit at the University of Pennsylvania Architectural Archives recovers the story of a 19th-century architect named Minerva Parker Nichols (1862-1949). She was one of the country’s first woman architects, practicing in Philadelphia in the 1880s and 1890s. Over her lifetime, she designed over 80 buildings across the country, but Nichols has been largely forgotten.

The exhibit hopes to change that. It runs from March 21 to June 17 at University of Pennsylvania’s Architectural Archives and will then travel to University of Massachusetts, Amherst next year.

Nebraska Filibuster Over Trans Rights Echoes Wendy Davis’ 2013 Abortion Standoff

PUBLISHED 3/27/2023 by

State Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh ground Nebraska’s legislative body to a halt for three weeks, stonewalling every bill regardless of whether she personally opposed it. In eight-hour stretches, she fulfilled the promise she made to her colleagues last month: to “make it painful” for the statehouse to target trans youth—even if it meant sleeping on the hardwood floor of her office between committee hearings.

Her use of the filibuster to keep a bill from being quietly slipped through the legislature echoes another one-woman statehouse stand from 10 years ago. Both Wendy Davis and Cavanaugh took advantage of tools available to them as the minority party in their statehouses—and used it to amplify dry procedural politics into a powerful rallying cry. 

The ‘B’ Is Silent: How Skepticism About Bisexuality Harms Women’s Health

PUBLISHED 3/24/2023 by

Among straight women, the prevalence of rape is 18.7 percent, but among bisexual women it soars to 46.1 percent. Hypersexualization of bi women is so widespread that it’s barely noticed—unless, of course, you’re a bi woman. And hypersexualization isn’t the only threat facing bi women. Myths and stereotypes give rise to discrimination against bi women in the workplace, in school and in other arenas.

(This article originally appears in the Spring 2023 issue of Ms. Join the Ms. community today and you’ll get the issue delivered straight to your mailbox!)

‘Yellowjackets’: A Tale of Cannibalism and … Feminism?

PUBLISHED 3/24/2023 by

Another season of the award-winning Showtime series Yellowjackets compares female empowerment then and now, contrasting girls of the 1990s with the women they are today.

There’s a lot going on in this brilliantly suspenseful show, including some spectacular deconstructions of stereotypes—good and bad—but what really stands out to me are the questions it asks about competition. For this viewer who came of age in the ‘90s—benefiting from a lot of self-empowerment messaging but not much feminism, let alone intersectional feminism—Yellowjackets really hits.

Weekend Reading on Women’s Representation: Remembering Women Civil Rights Leaders; Toni Morrison’s New USPS Forever Stamp

PUBLISHED 3/24/2023 by

Weekend Reading for Women’s Representation is a compilation of stories about women’s representation. 

This week: 15 women who were key figures in the Montgomery bus boycott; the U.S. Postal Service features writer Toni Morrison on a new forever stamp; what motivates women to consider running for office, and the systematic barriers they face; and more.

Ms. Global: Polish Reproductive Rights Activist Convicted; Dance as Protest In Iran; Spain Announces Gender-Parity Law

PUBLISHED 3/23/2023 by and

The U.S. ranks as the 19th most dangerous country for women, 11th in maternal mortality, 30th in closing the gender pay gap, 75th in women’s political representation, and painfully lacks paid family leave and equal access to health care. But Ms. has always understood: Feminist movements around the world hold answers to some of the U.S.’s most intractable problems. Ms. Global is taking note of feminists worldwide.

This week: news from Poland, Iran, Spain, Cameroon, and more.