More Than A Magazine, A Movement
In her new book Consent Culture and Teen Films: Adolescent Sexuality in U.S. Movies, independent filmmaker and scholar Michele Meek challenges the idea of consent as a straightforward concept and questions the messages about consent and teenage sexuality reflected in films of the last 20 years.
In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.
This week: 16 states (and counting) pass bans on gender-affirming treatment for trans kids; FDA updates its policy on gay and bisexual men donating blood; Colorado bans “abortion pill reversal” groups; Hey Jane is first telemedicine abortion provider to accept insurance; New York SUNY and CUNY students will have guaranteed access to medication abortion; Manhattan jury finds Trump guilty of sexual abuse; New York launches successful gun buyback initiative; and more.
Ideas about men and manhood have been evolving for more than 50 years, but Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) has not gotten the message. His new book, Manhood: Finding Purpose in Faith, Family, and Country ignores the realities of today’s men—more and more of whom are abandoning traditional expressions of masculine culture. Support among younger men for women’s reproductive rights, for gay and trans rights, for voting rights, is especially on the rise.
Fifty years ago, Hawley may have sold a lot of books. Today, I’m betting they’ll be remaindered by the Fourth of July.
Assaults on women’s and LGBTQ+ rights—and attempts to put women “in their place”—constitute a backlash against feminist progress expanding women’s full inclusion in public life.
As women’s participation becomes more prominent in domestic and international politics, here’s why political sexism and gender policing are also becoming more virulent—and what to do about it.
(This essay is part of Women’s Rights and Backsliding Democracies project—a multimedia project made up of essays, video and podcast programming, presented by Ms., NYU Law’s Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Network and Rewire News Group.)
Where voters are allowed to have a say, they give a resounding “yes” to abortion rights. Instead of adjusting their politics accordingly, the GOP just makes it harder for voters to vote.
There is a direct relationship between authoritarianism and opposition to abortion rights. After all, what is more authoritarian and more a rejection of basic individual freedoms, than believing the government should be able to force you into pregnancy and motherhood?
(This essay is part of Women’s Rights and Backsliding Democracies project—a multimedia project made up of essays, video and podcast programming, presented by Ms., NYU Law’s Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Network and Rewire News Group.)
The tenets of reproductive health, rights and justice—and those of a healthy democracy—are not only inextricably interconnected, but essential to our nation’s promise.
(This essay is part of Women’s Rights and Backsliding Democracies project—a multimedia project made up of essays, video and podcast programming, presented by Ms., NYU Law’s Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Network and Rewire News Group. This story also appears in the Summer 2023 issue of Ms. magazine. Join the Ms. community today and you’ll get the Summer issue delivered straight to your mailbox!)
As our rights backslide, so too does our democracy—which is why feminist concerns are always and inevitably democratic concerns. This is a point we need to reinforce over and over and over again as this country gears up for the 2024 presidential election—the first since the Court stripped core rights away in Dobbs.
(This essay is part of Women’s Rights and Backsliding Democracies project—a multimedia project made up of essays, video and podcast programming, presented by Ms., NYU Law’s Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Network and Rewire News Group.)
As an obstetrician and gynecologist providing abortion care in the Midwest, I’m fervently hoping mifepristone will remain available—not only for my patients seeking to end a pregnancy, but also for those who have miscarried.
“One thing that we see now, even with all of the challenges of a totalitarian government and of the Taliban dictatorship, is that the people on the frontlines of this fight are the women of Afghanistan. It is incredible that they are coming into the streets to fight for fundamental freedoms. I think this is a big lesson for all of us, even for those in the United States and others in the international community, to see these women now.”
(This essay is part of Women’s Rights and Backsliding Democracies project—a multimedia project made up of essays, video and podcast programming, presented by Ms., NYU Law’s Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Network and Rewire News Group.)
“We always knew that it was never about state’s rights. It was always about banning abortion in every single state in every possible way.”
(This essay is part of Women’s Rights and Backsliding Democracies project—a multimedia project made up of essays, video and podcast programming, presented by Ms., NYU Law’s Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Network and Rewire News Group.)