Women

In April, I spent several days at the Planned Parenthood Federation conference in Washington, D.C. What a marvelous experience.

President Obama joined us and spoke. The only sitting president to have done so. His remarks remind us all of basic human rights for women.

At the conference, I met women and men who provide excellent healthcare around the United States…from breast exams to birth control, testing for sexually transmitted infections, quality science-based education for youth, and abortions.

Over and over, research proves that Americans want comprehensive sex education. Over and over, research proves that Americans want to plan their families and know the full range of options. Over and over, research proves that when women control their own sexuality – including choosing when to have children – families are stronger economically.

And Planned Parenthood is always here…celebrating 100 years in 2016! Planned Parenthood cares no matter what.

Did you know that it was clergy of many faiths who joined up with Planned Parenthood back in 1916 to help women? Yes, the clergy. And at the PPFA conference, various clergy speakers said such beautiful things:

• Religious freedom does not mean stopping others from choosing. Government cannot privilege one religion over another. (And here’s my comment: The conservative, fundamentalist religions promote laws – government intervention – from birth control to marriage equality. I thought we had a separation of church and state in the U.S.)
• The New Testament talks about the beauty of sexuality and spirituality. We must exercise our own sexuality wisely. And, because life is previous, let’s not create it carelessly.
• For people of faith, it’s time to reclaim churches, mosques, and synagogues. It’s time to take back god from the fundamentalists.

And here’s one of my favorite statements from a religious leader speaking at PPFA: Our society – each of us – must commit to the moral agency of women.

So why are we fighting this battle again?! And the battle seems more aggressive and vicious. State by state, pockets of elected officials and radical citizens are adopting laws that reduce women’s rights. State by state, fundamentalist officials and citizens seek to control my life and yours.

A colleague said to me this week, “This is the last breath of a dying culture.” Fighting against birth control and abortion (and fair pay and so much more) is an attack against the basic civil rights of women. Fighting against marriage equality is an attack against the basic civil rights of our gay and lesbian community members.

The last breath of a dying culture. A culture that still believes in patriarchy. A culture that believes in passé traditions like male dominance, white supremacy, heterosexual primacy. An old fashioned culture with old fashioned beliefs that just don’t work anymore. And these are beliefs that the majority of Americans do not accept.

That’s right, the majority of Americans support birth control and access to abortion, equal pay for women, no more patriarchy, marriage equality. Our younger community members have no problem with interracial marriage and life partners.

But that old culture…it’s gasping. The vicious attacks – the viciousness of the attacks – is a last gasp. Know that, you who fight so viciously. Know that you are in the last throes of an old culture. You are losing. The rest of us will win.

Martin Luther King Jr. was right. That the arc of justice – while moving painfully slowly sometimes – does move towards justice.

Basic human rights for women will triumph. Basic human rights for people of color will triumph. Basic human rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered friends and neighbors will triumph.

Always, there will be people and movements that will fight for social justice.  Planned Parenthood is one of them. We provide extaordinary healthcare. And we fight for social justice. Forever.

This is an amazing video. For your personal and professional life and for my personal and professional life. I collected so many important tidbits… About the purpose of research. About the the concept of connection … which is, of course, relationship building … which is an essential part of fundraising and board development and nonprofit management and life.

Ms. Brené Brown describes herself as a research storyteller. She studies vulnerability, courage, authenticity, and shame. Her work has been featured on PBS, NPR, and CNN.

Her research and her stories can help us understand how and why people do or don’t connect. Her research and stories can help us as human beings – which helps us as professionals, which helps us as fundraisers… By the way, you’ll find a number of YouTube videos from Ms. Brown.

Today, January 22, is a very important day for many of us around the world…the day of the U.S. Supreme Court’s momentous ruling in Roe versus Wade. A triumph for so many U.S. women and their families.

I’ve been a donor to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America for years and years and years. I’m a proud board member of Planned Parenthood of Southern New England (PPSNE). And my life partner and I just changed our will to include PPSNE.

“Care. No matter what.” That is the promise of the Planned Parenthood movement worldwide. It’s a promise made every day to the women, men, and young people who rely on their personal right to make their own decisions.

Family planning is a deeply personal and often complex decision. None of us knows the personal situation of another. As we in the Planned Parenthood movement say, “I am not in her shoes. Ultimately, decisions about whether to choose adoption, end a pregnancy, or raise a child must be left to a woman, her family, and her faith, with the counsel of her doctor or health care provider.”

An issue yesterday, still today…and tomorrow, too.

• Watch this 90-second animated video, Not In Her Shoes. The video gives some great tips about how to encourage people to have an authentic conversation about difficult issues.
• Watch Forty Years Safe and Legal.This 4-minute video honoring the 40^th anniversary of Roe v. Wade features archival footage, historical photos, news clips, and new interview footage with Sarah Weddington and Cecile Richards.
• Read Gail Collins’  great column in the New York Times. Watch this episode of the  NBC show Parenthood, which prominently and sensitively featured Planned Parenthood. Read the Salon article about the amazing Parenthood episode. Read this MSNBC article about the public’s strong support for abortion rights. And read this eye-opening report by the Guttmacher Institute about restrictions on abortion access across the United States.

Save and legal is the key. That’s what the U.S. Supreme Court decided on January 22, 1973. Thank you for that decision.

And now what? Continued vigilance. Continued commitment. Safe and legal forever and everywhere.

Sexism: I’m the founder of the Women’s Fund of Rhode Island…leveling the playing field for women and girls. Despite progress, it’s still a disadvantage to be a woman in every country in the world, including the United States. In fact, the most gender equitable country in the world is Iceland.

Check out the commentary on this article, “11 Qualities of a Perfect Woman.”  Check out the film “Miss Representation,” which explores how the media’s misrepresentations of women produce underrepresentation of women in positions of power and influence. Read Gail Collins’ 01-10-13 column in the New York Times, “The Woes of Roe.” Ask yourself – and your legislators – “What Happened to the Violence Against Women Act?”

All this is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. We have to keep fighting to level the playing field for women and girls. It’s called social justice and basic human rights!

Gun control: I am so tired of guns in the U.S. I’m so tired of the ranting and raving about “protecting myself” so I’m gonna have a gun. And if everyone had had a gun in the Aurora cinema, everyone could have stopped that guy. Really? With all your training from the NRA, you could distinguish the good guys and the bad guy? Or would there be some innocents shot, too?

I subscribe to Reader Supported News, a great compiler of news articles in the U.S. and elsewhere. Check out Juan Cole’s article “Gun Murders vs. Terrorism by the Numbers.” Read Bill Moyers’ commentary about guns. Read Robert Reich’s article “Debt Ceiling and Guns, “Using Presidential Authority.” Go for it even more, Mr. President! How about Tom Engelhardt’s article “The Pentagon as a Global NRA.” By the way, apparently the NRA was not always so ridiculous about gun control. Check out Jill Lepore’s article in The New Yorker, “Battleground America.”

Always remember, the U.S. spends something like 7 times more money on defense than multiple other countries combined. Golly gosh… I am so pleased that we can kill so many more people so many times – and destroy entire countries and societies. Thank heavens we can! Yippee!

By the way, reading Cole’s article reminds me: how about ending this stupid war on terror. Wars are supposed to have an end. Enough with the war. Terrorism won’t end. It’s with us forever. Consider it a police action. And enough with the absurd theatre of airport security and screening. What a bunch of crap. Let’s not forget “The Colossal Blunder That is the Iraq War.”

And let’s end another war, the war against drugs. Oh please. All the research says that the war on drugs didn’t work, isn’t working, doesn’t work, and won’t work. How ironic is it that the U.S. provides the guns (gun control anyone?) for the cartels to fight the war for drugs? And U.S. prisons are full of marijuana smokers or small sellers. And most of them are not white. Racism anyone? By the way, why is President Obama so bothered by decriminalizing marijuana? Read Naomi Wolf’s article in the U.K.’s Guardian.

One final thought…all the secrecy about security. Check out this RSN article by Daniel Ellsberg, “Secrecy and National Security Whistleblowing.” Another by the way: Daniel Ellsberg is one of my heroes.

Okay, it’s Friday night. Close to 8 p.m. in my office and home. I’m stopping now. I’m thinking of dinner and some frivolous movie. Family time. Personal time. And since I’ve ranted and raved in this blog, maybe I won’t do that with Tom this evening.

Please can we fight for change? This is the war need to fight – here at home…the fight for social justice…the war against the war against women…racism…the fight to protect without guns…and so much more.

For those of you who read my blogs, you know I listen to NPR. So here’s what I heard last week:

1/2 of women in the U.S. live in 26 states hostile to abortion. In the past two years, 25 states have adopted legislation that restricts the ability of women to end an unwanted pregnancy. And even worse…Some U.S. states – and male elected officials – are fighting against birth control. Can you imagine? Limiting a woman’s ability to decide if she wants to become pregnant. Limiting a woman’s ability to choose to get an education and care for the children she has. Limiting a woman’s ability to work.

What else did I hear on NPR? Honoring James Meredith’s astounding battle to win admission to the University of Mississippi. Integration. A battle this man won with the help of the U.S. Supreme Court and the soldiers sent in by John F. Kennedy. 50 years ago last week. Thank you, Mr. Meredith, for fighting this fight. How sad that segregation is growing dramatically in public schools in the U.S. And not only in the southern states.

Visit unfaircampaign.org. “Racism: Ignore it and it won’t go away…. The Un-Fair Campaign was developed to look at racism and to encourage a community dialogue about the causes and solutions.” Can you talk about this with your colleagues at work? How about with the board? If we don’t talk, we have no chance.

Visit “The Well Written Woman.” Some powerful headlines. Some great insights. Check this out.

1. “Remember Thomas Jefferson’s Betrayal,” a piece by Bill Moyers in the July 2, 2012 issue of Reader Supported News, an online compilation service. Jefferson penned those immortal words, “All men are created equal.” But he didn’t free his slaves, even those he fathered with his slave Sally Hemmings.” As Moyers says, “So, the ideal of equality Jefferson proclaimed, he also betrayed.” Jefferson wrote about “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” But he denied it to others. Moyers writes that Jefferson “lived it wrong, denying to others the rights he claimed for himself.” And so, “Jefferson came to embody the oldest and longest war of all – the war between the self and truth, between what we know and how we live.”

2. “What’s Sex Got to Do with It?” asks Kavita N. Ramdas in the Summer 2012 issue of the Stanford Social Innovation Review. “Girls are hot. Reproductive rights are not,” she starts out. And she ends with: “…if we want our daughters to grow up with confidence, courage, and competence, we must make sure that they grow up with knowledge about and access to contraception. We should build schools, fund libraries, encourage teacher training, and support free tuition, but we also need to push for comprehensive access to sex education for both girls and boys, not just aborad, but right here in the United States. The words of Margaret Sanger are as prescient now as they were when she first uttered them: ‘No woman can call herself free who does not own and control her body. No woman can call herself free until she can choose consciously whether she will or will not be a mother.’ If the future freedom of the world depends on the freedom of women, it must include sexual and reproductive freedom. If not, their ‘freedom,’ to paraphrase Janis Joplin, will be just another word for ‘nothing left to lose.'”

3. I just read Nora Ephron’s 1996 commencement address at Wellesley. This is a must-read for women and men. “Don’t delude yourself that the powerful cultural values that wrecked the lives of so many of my classmates have vanished from the earth…. Don’t underestimate how much antagonism there is toward women and how many people wish we could turn the clock back.” Thanks to dear friend, Alene.

Read more »

1. “Court martialing the military,” Molly M. Ginty, spring-summer 2012 issue of Ms. magazine. Nearly 2 in 3 women are raped during their service in the U.S. Military. That’s what the Veterans Affairs Administration says. A dirty little secret that is, finally, receiving the attention it deserves. Leon Panetta is now interested. And lots of this has to do with Kirby Dick‘s documentary “The Invisible War.”

2. Celebrate the 40th anniversary of Title IX…the activists who fought so hard for women’s equal educational opportunities (and that includes sports)…the benefits to all the young women…But still, it isn’t perfect and there are too many challenges. Check out Erin Buzuvis’ article in spring/summer 2012 Ms. magazine.

3. There is a war against women. Just read #1 and #2 above. And now check out Beth Baker’s article, “Fighting the War on Women,” in spring/summer 2012 Ms. magazine. The attacks on women’s health (which directly relates to economic security for women and families), grows and grows in the U.S. What happened to our democracy?

I very much appreciate the elected women who are making fun of the male-dominated laws against women. If these war-waging men want to require that women undergo invasive, unneeded procedures to access healthcare, then let’s offer some invasive, unneded procedures for men.

By the way, check out YouTube: The Human Rights Channel. “Film it. Share it. Change it.” It turns out that “nonprofits and activism is one of the rastest-growing categories on YouTube,” says the New York Times. Thanks to www.theagitator.net for this news bit.

Read more »

For such an advanced nation, the U.S. is behind many others when it comes to women’s rights. For example, the U.S. is about 82nd in the world when it comes to the number of women in our national Congress. 82nd. Can you name 81 other countries?

Newsweek recently published a cool little graph showing the # of women in the presidential cabinets of the G8 countries. France is the best: 50% of President Hollande’s cabinet are women (17 of 34). Then comes Germany with 37% (6 of 16). The U.S. is 3rd with 25% (4 of 16). Canada – 23%. UK – 22%. Italy – 17%. Russia – 7%. And Japan – 5%.

I’m so bored with these lists showing the poor position of women – especially in the U.S., my home, the supposedly-better-than-any-other-country country.

By the way, I’m the founder of the Women’s Fund of Rhode Island…a social justice organization committed to leveling the playing field for women and girls.

A wonderful and beautiful, sad and inspiring column by Providence Journal writer Bob Kerr. I called to thank him and we talked.

“Civil unions are a fraud. They are a low-rent, out-the-back-door way of saying ‘Yeah, we care but not all that much.’ Civil unions attempt to confer the impossible status of being a little bit equal. They tell gays and lesbians they can have some of the rights but not all of the rights of other citizens.”

How can we do this to people – this separate but equal absurdity? Embarrassingly, immorally, the U.S. tried that with race. And the U.S. is trying separate but equal again with marraige.

If your religion or beliefs are anti marriage equality, fine. I don’t agree but you can live your life your way. Just don’t impose your personal beliefs – your religion – on the rest of us.

The right to marriage equality is a secular issue, a public issue, a basic human right. Marriage equality is a civil right.

Read more »