Strong of Song: The Women’s Music Movement Turns 50

Both a product (albums! cassettes! posters!) and a destination (rallies! concerts! festivals!), women’s music fused feminist politics, woman-staffed sound production and grassroots folk traditions to create a bold new recording and performance network. When we had no rights at all, women’s music was also the sound and site of the lesbian revolution. This year we celebrate the musicians and producers who, across five decades, gave us the soundtracks and spaces affirming our lives.

He Was Dancing to Beyoncé. He Never Knew It Would Be His Last Dance: A Dancer’s Perspective

On July 29, 2023, O’Shea Sibley, a 28-year-old Black, gay, professional dancer, was fatally stabbed in his heart while he and his friends were voguing to Beyoncé outside of a gas station. His murderer shouted, “Stop dancing, stop dancing, stop dancing”—as if dancing is a crime, an assault on life, a blasphemy to the living.

Black Mamas Reclaim Their Space in Reproductive Justice

Forward Together’s 13th annual Mamas Day campaign “Black Mamas Reclaiming their Space in the Reproductive Justice Movement,” celebrates Black mamahood and the Black mamas who continue to push the work forward—since Black mamas are the founders of the reproductive justice framework and are the foundation of our movement.

Visit MamasDay.org to send a card to the mamas in your life.

Ms. Global: Iran Installs Cameras for Veil Surveillance; The Vatican Allows Women to Vote; India Debates Same-Sex Marriage; Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Criticizes Hungary’s Anti-LGBTQ+ Stance

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 time with news from Iran, Colombia, the Vatican, India, Zimbabwe, Luxembourg, and more.