Black Women

Black women experience a unique intersection of patriarchal and white supremacist oppression, leading to statistics like disproportionate maternal mortality in the U.S. and foundational feminist theory like the writing of Audre Lorde. Black women are not a monolith, however, and include women from all around the world who are a part of the African diaspora. They have often led social movements for a wide variety of causes because of the intersectional oppressive structures on their lives.

Looking to Black and Indigenous Foremothers to Resist Erasure

PUBLISHED 7/2/2026 by

Free Black women and Indigenous women are the foremothers of generations of African Americans. Yet they remain largely absent from the official story of American freedom. Their lives, contributions and descendants have been systematically erased—from colonial records and legal classifications to public memory itself.

That erasure began in the earliest colonial records. The 1620 Virginia census recorded “four Indians in the service of several planters,” alongside 15 Negro men and 17 Negro women, reducing people to categories that obscured their identities, families and histories. Over the centuries, laws, court decisions and public institutions repeatedly reinforced that disappearance.

The best celebration of 250 years of American freedom—after the fireworks and celebrations by a newly blue-painted Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool are over—could be a visit to a cool, air-conditioned archive. In the quiet, anyone can search the records for the full story, of the enslaved and freeborn, Indian and African. Anyone can defy censorship and erasure with an open mind and a pencil, no fees required. 

The Equal Rights Amendment and the First Amendment: A Roadmap for a Feminist Future

PUBLISHED 7/1/2026 by

Donald Trump’s jingoistic whitewashing of the 250th anniversary of the founding of our country will no doubt celebrate the 1773 Boston Tea Party, where the Sons of Liberty protested oppressive British import taxes. But throughout American history, women activists—the Daughters of Liberty to suffragists, journalists and civil rights advocates—have been making patriarchal governments tremble, by taking full advantage of the precious rights protected by the First Amendment: freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to peaceably assemble, and the right to petition the government for redress of grievances. 

That same spirit must now drive the final push to secure the Equal Rights Amendment. Although the ERA has been ratified by the required 38 states, it has yet to be officially recognized as part of the Constitution.

The First Amendment gives us the tools to change that: by speaking out, organizing, protesting and demanding that elected leaders make constitutional equality a national priority.

The Ranked Ballot Is the Pro-Women, Pro-Voter, Pro-Democracy Reform America Needs

PUBLISHED 7/1/2026 by

For 250 years, the story of American democracy has been a story of expanding who holds power and who gets to decide who yields it.

The 15th Amendment, the 17th, the Voting Rights Act, the 19th Amendment and the 26th—each was a structural intervention, a deliberate redesign of the rules to bring more people into the democratic process. And at each iteration, a bet was made on the same proposition: Democracy works better when more people have real power within it.

We are overdue for the next chapter.

Women make up 51 percent of the American population and hold fewer than 29 percent of seats in Congress. That gap is not a product of insufficient ambition, inadequate candidates or a thin pipeline of viable women. It is the product of an electoral system that was designed before women could vote, and has never been fundamentally redesigned since.

Ranked-choice voting changes that. The ranked ballot is the single most powerful, best-documented structural reform available for advancing women’s political participation, and it serves every voter, at every level of government, on every ballot.

In a ranked-choice voting election, voters rank candidates in order of preference—first choice, second and third—and if no candidate wins a majority outright, the candidates with the fewest votes are eliminated and their votes are redistributed until someone reaches a winning threshold.

Under this system, voters can express a genuine preference without fear of wasting their vote on a candidate who can’t win, and qualified women candidates can run without fearing splitting the vote.

(This is part of a new series FEMINIST 250: Democracy’s Feminist Future, a special Ms. series examining the next chapter of U.S. democracy through a feminist lens. As the nation approaches its 250th anniversary, the series explores how women and marginalized communities have shaped democratic progress, what lessons history offers for the challenges ahead, and how a more inclusive, representative and equitable democracy can be built for the next 250 years.)

TV Still Has a Lot to Learn About Abortion

PUBLISHED 6/25/2026 by

Four years after Dobbs, television has become more willing to acknowledge the legal and political barriers to abortion care—but too often, it still reinforces harmful myths.

While shows like Grey’s Anatomy have depicted the devastating consequences of abortion bans, others continue to fall back on familiar tropes. In And Just Like That, the show largely sidesteps abortion as a normal, legitimate choice—especially for an affluent married mother in New York. And recently, the critically acclaimed Margo’s Got Money Troubles builds its entire premise around a young woman rejecting abortion despite pressure from those around her.

Those storytelling choices matter. Research shows that accurate abortion storylines can increase public understanding, reduce stigma and even help people feel more confident in their own reproductive healthcare decisions.

Yet television still rarely reflects the reality of abortion today—from the fact that most abortion patients are already parents, to the widespread use of medication abortion.

In an era of widespread confusion and misinformation, TV has the power to inform millions of viewers, but only if it moves beyond outdated narratives and portrays abortion as the ordinary healthcare decision it is for so many people.

Four Years After Dobbs, Women’s Healthcare Is a Scarce Resource

PUBLISHED 6/24/2026 by and

This week marks four years since the Supreme Court revoked the federal right to abortion, catapulting the nation into an era of state-sanctioned deprivation of bodily autonomy for American women.

On this anniversary, we write to take stock of one of the underreported outcomes of Dobbs: the growing number of individuals and families for whom access to healthcare is diminishing because of a rise in medical deserts.

It’s common sense—there is no reason for highly mobile professionals to remain in places where they find themselves increasingly facing the prospect of personal risk for practicing medicine.

Not surprisingly, medical deserts are prevalent in conservative and rural states; the downstream pressure suggests it soon will become an issue for blue states, too.

The impact on America’s unconscionable maternal and infant mortality rates cannot be overstated. The United States has the highest maternal mortality rate of any wealthy country; as rates continue to drop worldwide, they climb higher here, with Black women more than three times more likely than white women to die in childbirth. Infant mortality has risen specifically in states that enacted abortion restrictions since 2022, again with impacts worse among Black infants.

I’ve Spent My Life Caring for Others. Who Cares for Caregivers?

PUBLISHED 6/18/2026 by

Front & Center amplifies the voices of Black women navigating poverty—highlighting their struggles, resilience and dreams as they care for their families, build careers and challenge systems not built for their success. Now in its fourth year, Front & Center is a collaboration between Ms. and Springboard to Opportunities, a nonprofit based in Jackson, Miss., working alongside residents of federally subsidized housing as they pursue their goals.
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“I have always been a caregiver. That’s just who I am.

“I care for my grandkids now—three of them, ages 6, 3 and 7 months—and I’ve cared for a lot of family members over the years. My daughter works at the post office, so I watch the children when she’s at work, when they get out of school and sometimes at night if she needs me. They keep me on my toes, but I love every minute of it.

“Before that, I cared for my grandmother, who raised me. And that was tough, because this was when I had just had my own kids. They were going to a sitter so that I could go and care for her. She had cancer and I had to learn how to help her with everything, including her colostomy bag.

“People act like it’s simple, but it’s not. It costs money. It takes time. And when the people who need care also have to work, that puts families in a tight spot. My daughter looked into daycare, and it was expensive. So she asked me to help, and then she paid me. That worked better for all of us.

“Getting guaranteed income helped me too. It gave me some breathing room. I was able to help with gas, help around the house and take care of little things that come up. That kind of support matters because caregiving does not stop just because the bills keep coming.

“I still believe in taking care of people. Babies can’t help themselves. Kids can’t help themselves. Older adults can’t either. We all get to a point where we need somebody. So I keep doing what I do, because this is my purpose. I care for my people, and I do it with love.”

Join Ms. Magazine and Get Our Landmark FEMINIST 250 Print Issue for This Pivotal Moment in American History

PUBLISHED 6/16/2026 by

As the U.S. prepares to mark its 250th birthday on July 4, 2026, questions loom over the celebration: Whose America gets remembered, whose gets erased—and how do we imagine and build a democracy that includes all of us? 

In the Summer issue of Ms., we revisit the nation’s founding through a feminist lens, reclaiming the stories too often left out of the official narrative: women who challenged the authors of the Declaration of Independence and later the U.S. Constitution for deliberately writing women out of America’s founding documents, Black women who resisted oppression from the start, Indigenous societies built around women-led governance, queer lives in revolutionary America, Asian women’s struggles for belonging and the long fight to make disability visible in our history.

We also look back at 54 years of feminist reporting from the pages of Ms.—proof that the battles for bodily autonomy, equality and democracy did not begin yesterday—and forward to the bold new ideas that could shape a freer, fairer future for the next 250 years.

Get a year of Ms. for just $20 (a 43 percent discount off our usual price) when you join today!

‘Nope, You’re Fine’: This Black Doctor Nearly Died After Giving Birth in Reno

PUBLISHED 6/16/2026 by

A first-person account from Dr. Bayo Curry-Winchell, a Black family physician and the medical director for Saint Mary’s Urgent Care Group in Reno, Nevada. Curry-Winchell nearly died after giving birth by C-section at her own hospital after repeated warnings that something was seriously wrong were dismissed. Her story—shared with writer Bonnie Fuller—underscores the stark realities of America’s maternal mortality crisis, which disproportionately endangers Black women regardless of education or income.

“I was 38 and had just delivered my second baby, a little girl, at the Reno hospital where I was a medical director at the time. …

“I remember holding my new daughter in the recovery room, then being wheeled into my hospital room. That’s when I started feeling like something wasn’t right. I didn’t feel like myself. I was having a hard time talking, and I was in a lot of pain. …

“I wasn’t capable of using my medical training in that moment. But I had to do something. I handed my phone to my husband, James, and told him to call my OB-GYN right away. … Dr. Jack believed him and came right back to the hospital. …

“It turned out that I still had retained products, including placenta and fetal tissue, in my uterus. Unfortunately, this can happen sometimes, especially after a prior C-section. I also was bleeding internally. I had lost so much blood, I had to have a transfusion. …

“American Black women have a very high maternal mortality rate, and I lived it myself. If my doctor had not believed my husband and me and returned to care for me, I would have been like other Black women you hear about passing away after giving birth.”

Texas May Eliminate a Critical Tool for Preventing Maternal Deaths

PUBLISHED 6/11/2026 by and

Texas is considering whether to continue one of its most important tools for preventing maternal deaths.

The state’s Maternal Mortality Review Committee (MMRC), which investigates pregnancy-related deaths and identifies ways to prevent them, is currently undergoing Sunset review—a routine process that determines whether state programs will continue operating. If lawmakers fail to reauthorize the committee, Texas will lose a critical source of information about why mothers are dying and what can be done to save lives.

The stakes are especially high for Black women. In Texas, Black women are nearly four times more likely than white women to die from pregnancy-related causes. Texas’ maternal mortality rate also exceeds the national average, and approximately 80 percent of pregnancy-related deaths are considered preventable.

As public health researchers who have studied women’s health and health disparities in Texas for decades, we know that meaningful progress depends on understanding what is driving these deaths and holding systems accountable for addressing them.

Maternal mortality review committees are one of the most effective tools states have for doing exactly that.

Keeping Score: Threats Against Abortion Clinics Doubled in 2025; Sounding the Alarm on ‘Horrible Conditions’ of Delaney Immigration Center; Pride Celebrations Around the U.S.

PUBLISHED 6/10/2026 by

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:
—”Trump only seems to have the capability to fire female secretaries,” observes AOC.
—Two-thirds of abortion clinics reported violence or harassment in 2025.
—The TAKE IT DOWN Act (Tools to Address Known Exploitation by Immobilizing Technological Deepfakes on Websites and Networks Act) took effect last month. It requires social media sites to take down non-consensual sexual imagery within 48 hours.
—Members of Congress visited the Delaney Hall Immigration Detention Center after detainees started a hunger strike to protest inhumane conditions.
—The Trump administration announced an investigation into E. Jean Carroll, who Trump sexually abused and defamed.
—Harvey Weinstein’s New York rape trial resulted in another mistrial.
—A North Carolina bill would allow deadly force against patients seeking abortion care.
—Healthcare premiums have skyrocketed, forcing 21 percent of HealthCare.gov enrollees to lose coverage.
—Women freelancers charge an average of 19 percent less per hour than men.
—Americans are struggling to access disability benefits after cuts to the Social Security Administration.
—Social media platforms are enabling anti-LGBTQ hate and censorship.
—Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) reintroduced the Federal Death Penalty Prohibition Act to ban the death penalty at the federal level. Last month, the DOJ announced they would bring back firing squads and potentially electrocution and lethal gas for executions.
—A comprehensive calendar shows all the Pride parades this month, across the country and globe.

… and more.