More Than A Magazine, A Movement
Celeste Blair landed in prison after a series of abusive relationships. She hopes the #MeToo movement saves younger women from a similar fate.
“They literally degraded me to the point that I felt like I was a convict and nothing more. … I’m hoping my granddaughter and my nieces are living in this new world where a girl has a lot more say.”
Dr. Bandy Lee—who warned the country about Donald Trump—calls the family court system another threat to our democracy.
Lee had been in touch with Catherine Kassenoff, the New York mother and attorney ended her life through assisted suicide over Memorial Day Weekend because she couldn’t fight for custody of her daughters any longer. “What family courts have enabled is the ability of abusers—through the accusation that the other parent is alienating them from their children—to reverse the victim and offender,” Lee said. “It is an abuser’s dream come true to be labeled the good one and to accuse their victims of their own guilt and own crimes—and also to call the healthy person mentally ill.”
Since news of New York attorney and mother Catherine Kassenoff’s reported assisted suicide in Switzerland, her husband’s former employer—the law firm Greenberg Traurig—has been in the hot seat. Late Sunday night, the law firm released a statement announcing Allan Kassenoff’s resignation. In her goodbye letter, Catherine singled out the firm as one of the ways her husband allegedly dominated their court case: “The more I fought to show these materials to the public and to the Courts, the more I was punished for daring to make such accusations against a rich, white man and Greenberg Traurig shareholder.”
Many of Catherine’s supporters applauded the decision, but the victory is bittersweet. “It is sad, but no one helps us while we are alive,” said Elizabeth Harding Weinstein, Catherine’s friend and a court reform advocate.
U.S. patriarchal authoritarianism is on the rise, and democracy is on the decline. But day after day, we stay vigilant in our goals to dismantle patriarchy at every turn. The fight is far from over. We are watching, and we refuse to go back. This is the War on Women Report.
This month: Jane’s Due Process is now providing travel funding for Texas teens accessing abortion; states continue to face anti-LGBTQ legislative attacks; Donald Trump was found liable for sexually abusing and defaming E. Jean Carroll; Indiana’s medical licensing board fined Dr. Caitlin Bernard; and more.
No-fault divorce aims to provide a fair and equitable approach to marital dissolution by removing the need to assign blame or prove wrong-doing in order to obtain the divorce.
As a society, we recognize that not all relationships are forever. Now, conservative leaders in states like Louisiana, Texas and Nebraska want to get rid of no-fault divorce, in some cases introducing bills that would transform us back to the world of fault-based battles. What many people don’t understand is this would be absolutely catastrophic—especially for women.
More and more women have joined the ranks of the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UAF) since the country’s large-scale mobilization rapidly rolled out this past year, switching up the traditional wartime narrative that portrays women, and mothers with children especially, as victims of war instead of as agents of change.
(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!)
Brittni Silva found out she was pregnant after filing for divorce from Marcus Silva in May of 2022.
Marcus recently sued his wife’s friends for helping her obtain an abortion. The man has a long history of coercive control—a type of domestic abuse that can include isolation, manipulation, monitoring, intimidation and verbal, legal, physical and sexual abuse. The Silva case illustrates how this state coercion adds another weapon to an abuser’s controlling arsenal.
Soldiers charged with crimes ranging from going AWOL and smoking marijuana, to rape and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, can request to leave the Army rather than go to trial.
Across India’s Bihar and Maharastra states, married couples are joining together to reach young couples with modern contraception.
“Initially, when we went to villages,” said Mithlesh, “we weren’t even allowed to enter. They thought we were here to sterilize people. So, we developed a strategy, to communicate with key leaders in the communities. We discussed what we were doing, that we were there to share information and provide family planning options. The leaders listened, and supported our efforts.”
In her book, Storming Caesars Palace: How Black Mothers Fought Their Own War on Poverty, Annelise Orleck not only shares the history of Clark County Welfare Right Organization’s (CCWRO) ascent and activism but also provides an insightful guide to community organizing.
“I loved the CCWRO’s insistence that poor women are experts on poverty and can run their own programs better than so-called professionals. And they did! … They demanded to know why a state that took tax revenue from gambling and prostitution was considered morally acceptable, but mothers trying to feed their kids were called cheaters. They were fearless.”
