Abortion
ABORTION ISSUE BEHIND BARS: Like all great movements for freedom, the pro-choice movement requires a vast coalition — and paying attention to the most despised groups in society. (7/20/22)
MEDICAL DISOBEDIENCE: “I can’t just sit back and watch us return to 1972,” one doctor has said. How can the law protect doctors who must make hard decisions in their care for patients? (7/1/7/22)
SO YOU’RE PRO-LIFE . . . Can the anti-abortion movement embrace the cause of family and early childhood development? (7/9/22)
THE LONG GAME: The right won on abortion by organizing locally and investing heavily in shaping the cultural dialogue. Your move, liberals … (6/21/22)
SANCTUARY FOR AMERICAN WOMEN: The sanctuary movement, begun in the 1980s to counter the Reagan Administration’s militarism in Central America, has some lessons for women seeking safe haven after Roe‘s overturn. (7/19/22)
WALKING THE WALK: AOC and other congressional activists arrested for protest in front of the Supreme Court. (7/19/22)
WALKOUT: Med students at Michigan refuse to hear anti-abortion rights speaker at annual white-coat ceremony. (7/26/22)
GOING FOR BROKE: After winning their battle against abortion, right-wing activists now target the wall between church and state. (7/26/22)
CHARACTER AND DIGNITY > BODY SHAMING: When Matt Gaetz body-shamed a Texas woman, she decided to play a different game. She has now raised more than $2 million for abortion services. (7/29/22)
BEFORE FALWELL AND REAGAN: Liberal Catholics were some of the early activists against abortion. (7/1/22)
WHAT NEXT FOR THE ‘PRO-LIFE’ MOVEMENT: A roundup of perspectives. (6/18/22)
THE FALLOUT FROM ROE: Harvard faculty join the discussion. (7/28/22) Also: Numbers and diversity will define the next wave of choice activism.
STATE BATTLEGROUNDS: In Michigan and beyond, high-stakes efforts to codify abortion rights. What’s next: statewide referendums. (7/3/22)
REMEMBERING THE JANES: The underground movement for abortion access before Roe offers lessons for today’s patchwork, state-by-state law. (7/2/22)
THE DEATH OF ROE: Protests erupt after the Supreme Court declares Roe unconstitutional (also here) … Calls for a mass movement (here) … Widespread consequences of the decision (here) … The need for policy creativity (here) … A campaign for state ballot measures (here) … Anti-abortion activists won by finding judicial activists who would not evolve, like previous conservative judges and justices (here) … A scholar considers whether protests could turn violent (here) … Just how “pro-life” are Republicans, anyway? (here) Cecile Richards reflects (here)
LINKAGE: The fight for abortion rights and trans rights are bound together–and it all started with resistance to desegregation. (6/3/22)
★ WILL TRAVEL BE A CRIME? As Roe approaches its overturn, activists wonder whether they can help women cross state lines to get reproductive health care. (5/23/22)
WHEN PROTEST IS HARASSMENT: Reflections from an escort for abortion services and health care. (7/1/22)
CUTTING DEALS: The Catholics and evangelicals cut a deal to oppose Roe. Then Trump came and promised a Supreme Court in their image. (5/19/22)
BODY POWER: Activists fill the streets across America to protest against the impending overturning of Roe. Also see this photo essay.
FOLLOWING AN OLD SCRIPT: The anti-abortion movement followed the Suffragist emphasis on state-level action. Also: “America is religious and women are taught to have shame about their bodies, and there’s not a lot of knowledge and understanding of basic aspects of reproduction.” (5/11/22)
HOW CIVIL? Can protests against the overturn of Roe remain peaceful? (5/11/22)
★ IT’S ABOUT POWER: The Roe decision was not just about rights or the law. It was about power. An outcome of the women’s movement, it’s about a woman’s right to determine her own life course. (5/10/22)
★ EVANGELICAL DIXIE AND THE ANTI-CHOICERS: How the movement shifted from the Catholic precincts of the North to the evangelical churches of the South. (5/9/22)
KATE MICHELMAN REMEMBERS: How her humiliation by an all-male hospital board over her request for an abortion sparked her life of activism—and what the overturning of Roe would mean for American life. (5/6/22)
LESSONS FROM SOUTH OF THE BORDER: Pro-choice activists look for insights from activists in Brazil, Argentina, and Colombia” “It took 20 years for us, and we had many defeats. When we succeeded, it was because mobilization was huge.” (5/7/22)
THE NEXT WAVE: Carrie Severino of the Judicial Crisis Network spoke to Christiane Amanpour about the future battles over abortion rights and whether other precedents could be overturned. (5/3/22) Also: How we got here.
LANGUAGE AND POLITICS: The anti-abortion movement got the framing and the buzz words right–then pounded away, for decades. (5/5/22)
★ BUCKLE UP: The end of Roe signals an ongoing war over a wide range of individual rights. Without privacy, what’s left? (5/23/22)
REACTION TO OVERTURNING ROE: Demonstrations in Washington, Los Angeles, Detroit, the San Francisco Bay Area, the Twin Cities, Texas, and beyond. Could it work? (5/4/22)
DISPUTED CLAIMS: Anti-abortion activists say they were given fetuses for “proper burial.” (4/5/22)
THE STAKES: Why Latinas and other minority women will suffer more from the overturn of Roe. (1/26/22)
ESSENTIAL STRATEGY: As the pro-choice movement in Colombia shows, real activism requires careful documentation of issues. That is long, hard work. But it pays off. (4/7/22)
AFTER ROE: What happens to the “pro-life” movement? (3/25/22)
CASE STUDY IN JAX: The long history pro-choice and pro-life movements in Jacksonville. (2/16/22)
IS THIS THE END? Since the Reagan era, anti-choice activists have flocked to the capital for the March for Life. Is this year’s gathering the last one? (1/18/22)
INVISIBLE ACTIVISM: Warren Buffett has donated billions to support abortion services, a conservative publication says. (1/18/22)
MAIL-ORDER CHOICE: With abortion rights under fire, a global nonprofit has expanded its services to get around the Texas ban and any future override of Roe: mail-order pills that induce miscarriage. (1/11/22)
BLOCKING THE ABORTION PILL: With Roe in danger, pro-choice activists have found their best hope in the abortion pill. But right-wing activists have blocked information. (12/27/21)
Abuse
REVOLVING DOOR OR SECOND CHANCE? Protests over a former MIT professor, accused of sexual abuse, possibly moving to NYU. (4/27/22)
#METOO IN THE MILITARY: The death of Vanessa Guillen has sparked a movement to confront the military’s coverup of sexual assault. (12/30/21)
Allies
★ MANSPLAINING FOR GOOD: Men can persuade other men about the need to protect women’s rights, research finds. (5/25/22)
Environment
RETURN OF ECOFEMINISM: The climate crisis makes visible the connections between patriarchy and systems that stress the system. (4/28/22)
INSIDE/OUTSIDE: The climate crisis requires a full-court press, not just protest. (3/23/22)
MOMS LEAD: The new force in the fight against climate crisis. (3/11/22)
Equity
THE HEARD-DEPP TRIAL: Will the verdict against Amber Heard suppress the #MeToo movement? (6/1/22)
GOOOOOOOAAAAAAAL! The U.S. women’s soccer team’s activism has produced a landmark agreement on wage equity. (2/24/22)
HALF THE SKY: Nothing would improve the world as much as fairness and opportunity for girls and women. These activists are working for that. (3/8/22)
TARGET WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIRST: A U.N. report founds that women activists have been targeted during the pandemic. Despite a 2000 U.N. resolution for equal participation, women comprised just 13 per cent of negotiators, 6 per cent of mediators, and 6 per cent in major peace processes. (1/18/22)
History
TITLE IX PLUS 50: It’s been a long saga, full of plot twists, betrayals, and unexpected heroes and villains. Even with equal access to athletic and fitness opportunities a legal mandate, equal opportunity still requires relentless activism. (6/10/22)
BROWN RETROSPECTIVE: Brown and Pembroke alums remember a turning point in the women’s movement: the academic year of 1970-71. (3/24/22)
THE LEGACY: The murder of Angie Noemi Gonzalez Santos ignited a mass women’s movement in Puerto Rico. (3/13/22)
‘TWO SPIRIT’: Remembering Barbara Cameron, the lesbian activist of the Standing Rock Reservation. (3/30/22)
FOUR WAVES: How feminism has evolved over the years, embracing greater diversity and going deeper to understand the bases of sexism. (3/7/22)
Ideas
REMEMBERING BELL HOOKS: One of the most creative feminist thinkers died at age 69. See also this, this, this, and this.
Organizing
ALWAYS DIVIDED: But is that necessarily bad for the feminist movement? (2/27/22)
ERA NOW! Was all that rallying and lobbying worth the wait? Has the U.S. passed the Equal Rights Amendment? (1/27/22)