Technology

Octavia Butler Saw This Coming

PUBLISHED 12/9/2025 by

The Huntington Library, located in San Marino, Calif., launches a new exhibit, Stories from the Library: From Brontë to Butler, on Dec. 13, 2025. This collection is especially renowned for its extensive archive on the personal writings and stories pertaining to science fiction author Octavia Butler, who died too soon at age 58 in 2006 due to a fall outside her home. The prolific writer and MacArthur Grant recipient leaves behind several series of novels and other works of fiction.

Janell Hobson spoke with Black feminist scholar and Butler biographer Susana M. Morris, who relied on the vast archive available at Huntington for her latest book, Positive Obsession: The Life and Times of Octavia E. Butler, which came out earlier this year.

“With Octavia Butler, we get cautionary tales. We could have just listened to her.”

Toward More Connected, Caring and Equitable Online Classrooms: Groundbreaking Anthology Advances Feminist Approaches to Remote Teaching

PUBLISHED 12/8/2025 by

An exciting new anthology, Feminist Pedagogy for Teaching Online synthesizes decades of experience and pushes forward dynamic conversations about feminist pedagogy and remote learning, offering a meaningful and much-needed contribution to this area of research and teaching.

Overall, the collection strives to explore how online education can “align more thoughtfully with intersectional feminism and practices of social justice education.”

Feminist Pedagogy for Teaching Online, in print and as an electronic book, was preceded by the FeministsTeach.org website. The website went viral in August 2020 when large numbers of college professors were grappling with how to teach online. Two of the anthology’s coeditors compiled resources for colleagues at the Newcomb Institute at Tulane University for online teaching.

Six Ways Masculine Stereotypes Are Still Limiting Boys

PUBLISHED 11/24/2025 by

Rigid norms of manhood—based in manly confidence and toughness, emotional stoicism, disdain for femininity and dog-eat-dog banter—are influential among boys and young men.

Between one quarter and one half of boys and young men endorse these norms. Over half feel pressure from others to live up to them, believing most people expect them always to be confident, strong and tough.

These are some of the findings from a new Australian survey of adolescents aged 14-18 years, conducted by The Men’s Project at Jesuit Social Services.

In a climate of heightened concern about boys and young men and violent masculinity, this study provides invaluable data on boys’ and young men’s own views. This includes the pressures they feel to live up to stereotypical masculine norms and the profound impact of those beliefs.

International Telehealth Provider ‘Women on Web’ Vows to Keep Abortion Pills Flowing to the U.S., No Matter What

PUBLISHED 11/17/2025 by

As Republicans push the FDA to restrict mifepristone, the international online abortion service Women on Web is reassuring Americans that they will continue to support access to abortion pills in all 50 states, no matter what. Women on Web has served over 130,000 people worldwide since 2005 and began serving the U.S. in July 2024.

Venny Ala-Siurua, executive director of Women on Web, was recently named to the Top 100 Canada’s Most Powerful Women by the Women’s Executive Network Academe. Ms. spoke with Ala-Siurua about how their service connects people with pills, how they’re removing medical gatekeeping, and how they’re defending abortion access against digital censorship.

“We’ve always focused on countries where there are high restrictions on abortion. Unfortunately, the situation in some of the states in the U.S. qualifies now. … Many pharmacies and providers have stepped up internationally to support the U.S. and found ways of dispensing and shipping medicines really, really fast. …

“We are receiving around 30 requests per day from people in the U.S., though that number can rise during major political moments—for example, when Trump was elected or took office. Our U.S. care seekers live primarily in states with abortion bans. Globally, we currently handle approximately 4,000 requests each month.”

A Game-Changing Approach: Providing Anonymous Hotel Check-Ins for Domestic and Sexual Violence Survivors

PUBLISHED 10/24/2025 by

Safe Stays by ReloShare partners with hotels nationwide to protect survivors’ identities and expand access to secure housing.

“When guests check in, hotel staff often insist on seeing their identification and recording their full name. Because hotel staff members are not trained advocates, she said, they probably won’t be on high alert if an abuser calls or walks through the door,” said Ruth Glenn, the former chief executive and president of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence. And “leaving is often the most dangerous time for survivors of abuse,” according to the National Domestic Violence Hotline.

Paige Allmendinger, Safe Stays by ReloShare’s chief product officer, told Ms., “First, we needed the ability for a guest to check in under a fake name, with no ID required at check-in. If the survivor’s real name isn’t tied to the reservation and an abuser calls the hotel searching for them, there won’t be any record that the survivor is in-house, giving the survivor a degree of protection at the very time they need it most.

“Second, we needed hotels to forego the usual requirement for a credit card from the guest or agency at check-in. Credit-card transactions can expose location putting survivors at risk. While social service organizations may have funding to pay for hotel stays, many have limited credit lines for upfront payment or can’t send staff in person to present a card at check-in.”

From Dobbs to Bitcoin: The Economy of Control

PUBLISHED 8/4/2025 by

We now have a president enriching himself with cryptocurrency, so I have to wonder: Why and how did our real dollar’s value go down by 10 percent during the first six months of Trump’s term—and yet our mainstream media is not screaming at us, like the Body Snatcher’s guy: “You fools! You’re in danger! They’re after all of us!”

Today’s economic absurdities reveal just how far power will go to silence women and automate thought.

‘No More Shame!’ The Transformative Lesson of Gisèle Pelicot, the French Survivor of Mass Rape

PUBLISHED 7/15/2025 by

A phone call one autumn morning from local police requesting that Dominique Pelicot, then 67, husband to Gisèle, also 67, report to the local station interrupted their daily routine. A surprised Gisèle listened as her husband told her not to worry: “It won’t be pleasant, but by noon we will be home,” he said. But the next time she saw him was at his trial.

Like many countries, France has a protective privacy act guaranteeing anonymity for crime victims. Gisèle’s lawyers warned what would happen in a public trial—the intense media attention that would surely follow every development in the case, the probable attacks on her testimony in court and possible threats to her life. Undaunted, Gisèle chose to waive her right to anonymity.

“When you’re raped, there is shame, and it’s not for us to have shame,” she told the court. “It’s for them.”

Her insistence that her trial be public surprised both her lawyers and the presiding judge—and transformed Gisèle into a feminist hero and icon.

How Reshma Saujani Makes the Invisible Work of Motherhood Impossible to Ignore

PUBLISHED 7/1/2025 by | UPDATED 7/7/2025 at 12:25 P.M. PT

Most women are taught to make motherhood look effortless. Reshma Saujani wants you to see that we were never supposed to do it alone.

In a country that still treats caregiving as a personal responsibility rather than a public good, Saujani is changing the script. Not by asking for sympathy, but by exposing the architecture of the lie—and building something better in its place.

“I come from a long line of rule-breakers,” she told me. “My parents fled a dictator. They landed in Chicago with nothing. I grew up surrounded by refugees who were just trying to make it work. That kind of survival teaches you two things: one, that struggle is constant—and two, that silence is dangerous.”

She was a rule-breaker long before she was a movement-builder—always challenging authority, always in detention. “I’ve never been good at following the script,” she said. And that’s exactly what makes her effective.

I Asked Top Election Experts About 2024 Tampering Claims. Here’s What They Said.

PUBLISHED 6/27/2025 by | UPDATED 7/2/2025 at 9:16 A.M. PT

In recent weeks, a wave of rumors has surfaced online suggesting the 2024 election may have been “stolen” or, more specifically, tampered with due to faulty machines. While many of these claims remain vague or speculative, some are beginning to gain traction across social media platforms and alternative news sites. 

In the interest of democracy, transparency and election security, I reached out to a group of leading experts—many of whom work at the intersection of voting rights, cybersecurity and public trust—to share two examples of the kinds of articles I’ve seen on this topic, and ask for their take.

What follows are responses from some of the country’s most experienced voices on election integrity. Their insights are a valuable reminder that while election systems are not perfect, there is currently no credible evidence supporting claims of widespread vote manipulation in 2024. Instead, these experts highlight what’s real, what’s theoretical and where our attention should actually be focused as we work to protect democracy.