Tag: Title IX

Keeping Score: Senators Push to Protect Pregnant Workers; Supreme Court Threatens Affirmative Action; Legal Abortions Down 6 Percent

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in in this biweekly round-up.

This week: Supreme Court cases threaten the future of affirmative action; senators push legislation to protect incarcerated pregnant women and pregnant workers; Social Security Administration will allow transgender people to indicate their correct gender on documents; Hawaii high school discrimination case puts Title IX to the test; Italy swears in its first woman prime minister; 4.6 million Americans are disenfranchised due to felony convictions; and more.

#MeToo, Five Years Later

In the five years since it took off like wildfire, the #MeToo campaign has made widespread sexual abuse in the U.S. visible for the first time and inspired a record number of sexual harassment lawsuits against employers. It exposed how our decades-old workplace anti-harassment laws were outdated and often ineffective. In the last five years, 22 states and the District of Columbia passed more than 70 workplace anti-harassment bills in the last five years—many with bipartisan support.

Even still, U.S. rape culture persists and creates an environment where women and girls are disbelieved, survivors are discouraged from reporting abuse, and male abusers are forgiven—or even rewarded—for sexually abusive behavior. Congress must do more.

Survivors Face Backlash For Reporting, 50 Years After Title IX. What Does Justice Look Like For Them?

Title IX created much support for survivors of sexual harassment and sexual assault on the basis of sex discrimination, requiring institutions to address such harms in the workplace and in schools.

Ms. spoke with Alexandra Brodsky, civil rights lawyer and co-founder of Know Your IX, about the new backlash survivors still face coming forward, and the new ways activists are fighting for change and survivor-informed support.

The Congresswoman Who Authored Title IX and Her Personal Fight Against Sexism

This year marks the 50th anniversary of Title IX, the landmark law that prohibits sex discrimination in education. Rep. Edith Green (D-Ore.) authored, introduced and guided the bill through the House. She worked closely with Sen. Birch Bayh (D-Ind.), who shepherded his version in the Senate. Green and Bayh also worked hand-in-hand with an extensive network of committed feminist activists.

The following excerpt from my book, We Too! Gender Equity in Education and the Road to Title IX, provides a glimpse into the patriarchal ecosystem that pervaded Congress during Green’s tenure in office.

Women Will Be Playing Hardball on TV This Season

“There’s no crying in baseball,” says Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own. But the film’s more subtle theme is that there are no lesbians in baseball. The 1992 film made no mention of the fact that many of the athletes in the All American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) were gay.

But last Friday, Amazon Prime Video unveiled an eight-episode series, also called A League of Their Own, that includes openly lesbian AAGPBL players.

Fifty Years After Title IX, a Look at Billie Jean King’s Activism

This year marks the 50th anniversary of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, the law that opened all educational programs, including sports, to girls in the United States.

Tennis legend Billie Jean King has done more than any other athlete to make the promise of Title IX a reality. She also won a record 20 Wimbledon titles, 13 US titles, four French titles, and two in Australia between 1961 and 1979.

‘If Not for Them’: Brenda VanLengen’s Journey to Document Women’s Basketball

Brenda VanLengen is a TV sports analyst and play-by-play announcer for college women’s sports. “I’m so fortunate that [Title IX] happened when it did,” she told Ms. Without it, she explained, “I wouldn’t have the life that I do or the career that I do.”

This year, she’s embarked on a new venture to produce a docuseries about the women who grew the sport of women’s basketball before Title IX, If Not for Them.

War on Women Report: Indiana AG Goes After Dr. Caitlin Bernard, ‘Paints Providers With Violent Lies’; Pro-Abortion House Democrats Arrested

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 week: State lawmakers come for abortion providers; Texas sues the Biden administration over HHS guidance; more than a dozen House Democrats get arrested at an abortion rights rally; The House passes landmark legislation; and more.

Preserving Our Legacy: ‘An Important Piece of Feminist History Is at Risk of Being Lost’

In the early ’80s, Martha Albertson Fineman launched the Feminism and Legal Theory Project at University of Wisconsin Law School. For decades, the project has brought together scholars and activists from the U.S. and abroad to explore the most pressing contemporary legal issues affecting women. In multiple-day sessions, organized around specific, evolving sets of issues, feminists presented working papers and debated women’s legal rights.

Fineman recorded and preserved these groundbreaking conversations, as well as the working papers and other written material prepared for these sessions. But she is now struggling to find a home for this invaluable archive of the first generation of feminist legal thinkers.