More Than A Magazine, A Movement
President Biden is doing what no other president has: recognizing what it takes for true equal participation in the workforce. He is investing in 3- and 4-year-old pre-K, making child care accessible and affordable, and ensuring we can take paid time off for family illness without losing our jobs. Now that’s a real jobs plan.
It’s time that Republicans in Congress get on board and join the 21st century. Women and families are counting on this help. Let’s get it done.
“The U.S. talks a good game on ‘family values,’ but just does not deliver. It’s time to change course,” writes Representative Jackie Speier (D-Calif.), co-chair of the Democratic Women’s Caucus, on the need to invest in child care.
“Women can’t wait any longer for policy to catch up with reality. We must address the needs of working women—otherwise this she-cession will usher in nothing more than a he-covery.”
Front and Center highlights the success of Springboard to Opportunities’ Magnolia Mother’s Trust, which this year will give $1,000 per month for 12 months to 100 families headed by Black women living in federally subsidized housing.
“I really think the government needs to have some kind of program to make sure that essential workers are taken care of if there’s another pandemic.”
In film and in daily life, mothers are expected to sacrifice themselves for their families—so much so that it has become socially acceptable for women to be torn apart by sharks if that is what is required for modern families to function.
“Instead of focusing on the magical connection between octopus and human found in ‘My Octopus Teacher,’ we could focus on the fact that only through a mother’s demise was a father able to connect with his own child in a new way.”
During my congressional campaign, I petitioned the Federal Election Commission and became the first woman in history to receive federal approval to spend campaign funds on child care. Since then, 51 federal candidates have used their campaign funds to pay for child care. But this decision does not apply to state and local candidates.
A spate of recent articles notes that, rather than an anticipated COVID-19 baby boom, demographers are predicting a “baby bust.” One such article in this magazine argues that this is a good thing—for the climate, the environment, and women’s empowerment.
Not so fast.
Front and Center aims to put front and center the voices of Black women who are affected most by the often-abstract policies currently debated at the national level. The series highlights the success of Springboard to Opportunities’ Magnolia Mother’s Trust program, which this year will give $1,000 per month for 12 months to 100 families headed by Black women living in federally subsidized housing.
“The governor just announced that Mississippi is going to cut us off from extra unemployment benefits so I’ll be losing that $300 a week. It will be tough. I’m a good saver, but it is not going to be easy.”
The first study in 15 years to analyze per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in breast milk from mothers in the United States indicates that both legacy and current-use PFAS now contaminate breast milk, exposing nursing infants.
We can no longer position worried moms as the front line of defense between their child’s health and the chemical industry. We need a government that regulates chemicals.
When I became a mom, I wondered how my own child might form his own ideas of what the world should look like. The answer to my question? Books, always books.
Here are some of my favorite books, some old, some new, to build your own first library of feminist books for any child.
The landmark ruling in Roe v. Wade greatly improved the lives of generations of women across the U.S. in the last decades of the 20th century and early in the 21st, giving them previously unknown levels of freedom, autonomy and control over their lives.
