On May 9th, thousands of Canadians traveled to the nation’s capital and took part in the ‘Campaign for Life’ - an annual gathering of the anti-choice community to protest Canada’s pro-choice stance. In ‘solidarity’, regional chapters of the Campaign for Life coalition organized similar small-scale protests that will occur throughout the month of May. Last week was [...]
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Coalition: Time for Facebook to take responsibility for gender-based hate speech
*Trigger warning* Starting on May 21, a coalition of more than two dozen organizations — including Led by Women, Action & the Media, The Everyday Sexism Project, and author Soraya Chemaly — are calling on Facebook to end its complicit approval of memes and pages that promote violence against women and gender-based hate speech. As [...]
Because all children deserve ‘Forever Families’: On the Importance of Same-Sex Adoption
I have a ‘forever family’. It consists of a mom, and dad, and me – their adopted daughter. I grew up in a permanent ‘forever home’ with a loving, supportive family in much the same way other children do with their biological parents. And with all this love and support I was able to grow [...]
Vaginas for Human Dignity
As I sat down to write this piece my thoughts turned to the never ending stream of stories about women and girls being used and abused; treated as less than human. As an activist I do what I can to promote organizations working to prevent suffering and to help survivors. That’s why last year, I [...]
Power and Sex: Presumed Consent is Killing Equality.
IN Swaziland, teenage girls are taught about sexually transmitted diseases, condoms and HIV testing information handed out at will as they learn that sex is dangerous and mostly for men. In India, The Justice Verma Committee’s recommendation on recognizing marital rape as an offence under criminal law was hastily swept aside by the Standing Committee [...]
Sympathetic Rape Coverage is Nothing New
In the hours after the announcement of the Steubenville rape case verdict, the coverage has been non-stop. No big surprise in our 24/7 news culture. What should be a surprise, but sadly isn’t, is the sympathetic tone being taken by some reporters about the future of the two boys (or young men, depending on how you classify high school students [...]
Are We Being Too Harsh on Women Execs Like Mayer and Sandberg?
So Marissa Mayer gets attacked for taking a 2-week maternity leave and building a nursery next to her office, yet a short while back Anne-Marie Slaughter was getting taken to task for leaving her executive level position in government because she couldn’t balance work and family? Personally, I am relieved that Mayer is finding ways [...]
Don’t Give Up On Feminism Yet
I feel like a serious debate is beginning, and I have to throw my two cents in. I need to, because I am worried what the consequences could be I stay silent on the subject. Slate recently ran a well-articulated piece by Hanna Rosin called “Marissa Mayer Thinks Feminists Are a Drag. Is She Right?” [...]
#IWD: Educating Girls Is One of The Most Important Things You Can Do Today
Of the estimated 61 million children deprived of basic education globally, 60 percent are girls. But, that’s just the beginning of a dramatic gender gap. According to the Global Campaign for Education: “An additional 100 million girls worldwide that begin primary school do not finish [school]. The numbers are even starker for secondary education, which [...]
Bringing Feminism to Un-Feminist Spaces.
The Visions in Feminism (VIF) Collective is a Washington, DC-based collective working with the common and overlapping goals of social justice and feminism. It is for sure a lofty goal and one we try to achieve in the ‘extra hours’ outside of our day-jobs. Collective members come from all walks of life where careers range [...]