The Ms. Q&A

Questions from Ms.; answers from trailblazing feminists and equity leaders.

From Maine to Georgia in 40 Days: Tara Dower’s Fastest Known Time on the Appalachian Trail and the Community that Got Her There

The fastest known time (FKT) on the Appalachian Trail has never been held by a woman, until now. Just minutes before midnight on Sept. 21, Tara Dower became the fastest known person to hike the Appalachian Trail, reaching Georgia’s Springer Mountain 39 days, 18 hours and 5 minutes after she began her journey in Maine. 

Averaging 54 miles a day, Dower crossed 14 states and hiked 2,189 miles with 465,000 feet of vertical gain—dropping 13 hours off the previous record set in 2018. 

Ms. spoke with Dower about being a woman in ultra-endurance sports, her recent FKT and love for the Appalachian Trail.

What Renee Bracey Sherman Wants You to Know About Liberating Abortion and the People Who Make It Possible

Renee Bracey Sherman and Regina Mahone recently released their co-authored book, Liberating Abortion: Claiming Our History, Sharing Our Stories, and Building the Reproductive Future We Deserve. In it, they offer a new perspective on the history of abortion and imagine a future where reproductive justice is realized.

Bracey Sherman and Mahone ask us to build a better future that begins with building community around abortion and reproductive freedom now.

Ms. sat down with Renee Bracey Sherman to discuss her new book, Liberating Abortion, the history of abortion and where we go from here.

Abortion Is Popular. The Antiabortion Movement Is Still Set on ‘Punishing’ Women Who Get Them—or Aid and Abet Others

In her new book, Abortion: Our Bodies, Their Lies, and the Truths We Use to Win, Jessica Valenti argues that abortion is not in fact as controversial as abortion ban lawmakers would like their constituents to believe. As noted on the back of Abortion, 81 percent don’t want government regulation of abortion or pregnancy at all.

A week before the election, Valenti, feminist reporter and founder of ‘Abortion, Every Day,’ sat down for a conversation about her new book with moderator True North Research’s Ansev Demirhan, also in conversation with Karen Thompson of Pregnancy Justice; and Anoushka Chander, youth activist and host of the Ms. magazine podcast, The Z Factor.

Immigration Is an Opportunity, Not a Problem: The Ms. Q&A with Tolu Olubunmi of ‘How to Speak American’

Naturalized citizens made up one in 10 U.S. voters in 2020. Yet, there are few organizations dedicated to supporting this growing segment of the electorate.

Tolu Olubunmi, who grew up undocumented in the United States, is trying to change that by sharing her story and encouraging civic participation of immigrants through her new organization, How to Speak American. Olubunmi’s advocacy is premised on the idea that immigration presents an opportunity rather than a problem and that this often-ignored group could make a measurable difference in protecting our democratic ideals.

“I went to an immigration lawyer who said, ‘You’re a pretty young thing. Find a nice young man and get married,’ because that’s the only path available,” Olubunmi said. “I decided to help change U.S. law instead.”

How Care Became a Key Issue This Election

In response to voters’ needs and demands, the issue of care has been receiving outsized attention during this year’s election season. 

“If there’s no one to work because there’s no one to care, then we have a problem,” said Ai-jen Poo, founder of Caring Across Generations.

“If the lack of affordable and accessible childcare is what’s holding women back from reaching their economic potential, then we should make childcare affordable and accessible,” said Reshma Saujani, founder of Moms First. “As we head into the final weeks of the election, one thing is clear: The conversation has shifted. Childcare has finally been elevated into the national conversation.”

Kamala Harris and the Political Power of Black Women: The Ms. Q&A with Kimberly Peeler-Allen

As we stand poised to potentially elect our first female president who is also a woman of color, we know this moment builds on a long history of other women and Black women trailblazers who have helped to pave the way.

Kimberly Peeler-Allen is the co-founder of Higher Heights, the nation’s leading organization dedicated to building Black women’s collective political power from the voting booth to elected office. Higher Heights has helped drive the national narrative about the power of Black women voters and has inspired countless Black women to step into their power whether as voters, activists or elected leaders. We discussed what it would mean to elect our first woman president who is multi-racial, why it is important to elevate Black women’s leadership, what issues are mobilizing Black women in this election, what biases and barriers women candidates face, the significance of the ERA on the ballot in New York and more.

Half a Century After Title IX, Universities Are Still Failing Survivors: The Ms. Q&A With Nicole Bedera

Ms. spoke with Bedera about her research for her newly released book, On the Wrong Side: How Universities Protect Perpetrators and Betray Survivors of Sexual Violence, and how Title IX has fared in the 52 years since its passage.

Her findings are appalling.

“The average college expels just one perpetrator of sexual assault every three years.

“One of the administrators … told me that he hesitated to consider something as rape unless it involved ‘a stranger jumping out of the bushes.’ Survivors’ experiences were consistently misunderstood and minimized.”

Evangelical Power, Spiritual Warfare and the Christian Right: The Ms. Q&A With Talia Lavin, Author of ‘Wild Faith’

Journalist Talia Lavin’s second book, Wild Faith: How the Christian Right is Taking Over America, reports that a huge swath of the U.S. body politic—at least 10 million people—subscribe to the Evangelical notion that spiritual warfare is necessary to create God’s kingdom on earth.

A deep distrust of secular authority, she writes, coupled with rigid ideas about gender, sexuality, and power has led many Evangelicals into conservative political activism.

Lavin spoke to Ms. reporter Eleanor J. Bader several weeks before the book’s October 15 release.

Addressing the Sexism and Racism Aimed at Kamala Harris, Transcending Leadership Stereotypes and More: The Ms. Q&A with Anita Hill

I first interviewed Anita Hill over 10 years ago for my book What Will It Take to Make a Woman President?: Conversations About Women, Leadership and Power, where we discussed the various factors involved in why the U.S. had not yet elected a woman president and what could be done to move us closer to this milestone, as well as pave the way for more women leaders.
Now, as the U.S. is poised to possibly elect Kamala Harris as not only its first woman president but its first Black and South Asian woman president, I wanted to talk to Hill again to get her insights on this potentially history-making moment.