Whose House? Our House!

Source: Boston Globe

I am so in love with this photo of Senator-elect Elizabeth Warren and Senator-elect Tammy Baldwin as they attend their orientation session at the Capitol.

The only orientation I'm familiar with is my first-year orientation at Wellesley, so in my head Elizabeth and Tammy are spending the week making up chants and marching around yelling them, swimming in lakes, staying up late chatting through the night, and calling their moms every night to dish about their day.

Hooray!

Between Obama, Elizabeth Warren, Maggie Hassan (the only female Democratic governor in the country), Tammy Duckworth (the first female combat veteran elected to Congress), Tammy Baldwin (the first openly gay senator), New Hampshire's all-female delegation, and equal marriage in Maine, Maryland, and Washington - I couldn't be happier about the way things went last night!

VOTE!

Source: Uploaded by user via Shannon on Pinterest

Presidential Debate Recap

Judging from my twitter and facebook feed, anyone reading this probably watched the presidential debate last night. But, let me just say, GO OBAMA! And also, wtf Romney?!

There was no trace of Obama's sleepy, almost defeated attitude that was the hallmark of the last debate. He seemed confident, appropriately aggressive, and relaxed. Romney, on the other hand, seemed so aggressive that at one point I feared they might break into a fist fight. And when he wasn't being aggressive (or interrupting the moderator and refusing to obey the rules) he had that silly Cheshire cat grin on his face. He has also developed this fun little strategy where he never really answers a question and instead endlessly recounts his 5 point plan.

To me, there were five key moments in the debate that stood out.

1. Obama's response to Libya.
Romney seemed cheap.

2. Romney's plan for equality in the workplace.
Romney's plan for equality in the workplace basically goes like this: he will make so many jobs with his magical economy that companies will actually be forced to hire women. He also thinks that women should have more flexible schedules, because he knew a woman once who had to go home at 5 every day to make dinner for her kids. Equality means getting to leave earlier than the men so you can make dinner!

Also, when trying to convince voters that he respects and advocates for women, he told a fantastic story about how he had women's groups go find qualified women (they're like unicorns!) and then looked through "binders full of women" before finding some that were adequate. The way he talked about women's rights was nauseating and, not surprisingly, it didn't seem genuine or progressive.

3. Romney says he thinks all women should have access to contraception.
This left me speechless. Romney has said that he is against the contraception mandate that would require all employers, including some religious organizations, to provide insurance coverage for contraception. He called it "an attack on religious liberty." Romney also supported the Blunt amendment, which would allow any employer to deny insurance coverage for contraception based on religious or moral grounds. His running mate, Paul Ryan, wants to criminalize abortion and some forms of contraception. So when Romney stands up there and pretends he believes that all women should have access to contraception - and pretends that he is some champion for women's rights - it is laughable.

4. Romney doesn't think limiting access to weapons would help solve the issue of gun violence. But he thinks more people getting married would totally work! 
When asked about his position on gun violence, and specifically asked by the moderator why his opinion on limiting access to certain types of guns had changed, Romney basically went on a rant about single parents and how they are ruining America. Forget guns! Single mothers are the reason youth violence is an issue!

5. Romney thinks that China is the WORST.
China is at the center of Romney's axis of evil, apparently because they have counterfeit stores there. THE HORROR! We're talking fake ipads people! I almost felt bad for China with all of Romney's anti-China rhetoric last night.

Someone should take Romney to Canal St. so he can spend the next debate talking about how he has found the second worst place on earth.

Miss Representation

Miss Representation 8 min. Trailer 8/23/11 from Miss Representation on Vimeo.

Two weeks ago, I had the opportunity to see a screening of Miss Representation sponsored by the Yale Women's Center. It was fantastic! 

The film Miss Representation explores depictions of women in the media. The thesis of the film is aptly stated by comedian Margaret Cho, who says, "The media treats women like shit." Utilizing depressing examples of contemporary media, interviews with journalists, politicians, academics, actresses and high school students, and director Jennifer Siebel Newsom's own personal narrative, the film argues that the media depicts women as passive sex objects and teaches women and girls that their value lies solely in their beauty and sexuality.

The thesis of the film should not come as a shock to any woman or man who has ever watched television for more than five minutes. But the compilation of sexualized media images, coupled with some shocking statistics and brutally honest interviews makes the film incredibly powerful. I teared up when listening to girls talk about their eating disorders, laughed out loud after one expert labeled female superheros "flying fuck toys" and cringed at the clips of female journalists, who have to look like supermodels (hello Fox News barbie!). 

Newsom identifies patriarchy and capitalism as the forces that drive our sexist and sexualizing media. She argues for increased media literacy, encourages everyone to speak out against and not support companies/shows/films that use harmful and misogynistic depictions of women, and tells women that they need to stick together and support one another. While some viewers may feel that the film doesn't give enough direction to move forward, I felt that a call for increased awareness and media literacy, and a call to boycott negative media or companies that promote/use negative images in their media is actually a helpful (and in reality difficult) plan of action.

Screenings of Miss Representation are followed by discussions, and our discussion was very rich and thought provoking. Some of the issues we discussed were:

-- White women "experts" got more air time than women of color. 

-- The film hinted at, but didn't explicitly address, issues of race and sexuality. 

--The media is certainly harmful, but when addressing issues like the number of women in politics, the film failed to mention other systems and factors that perpetuate women's oppression, such as assumptions about caretaking responsibilities and lack of access to maternity leave or child care. 

-- Women should support each other! But the film uses Twilight's director, Catherine Hardwicke, as a  success story. Twilight is a film with a weak female lead and very problematic gender roles. Films aren't good-- or more accurately, feminist -- just because a woman directs or writes it.

-- A portion of the film devoted to women in journalism examines the way female journalists are expected to look like sexy supermodels. I felt at times it bordered on slut shaming. Women shouldn't be expected to be sexy or valued solely for their looks, but if a woman is smart and sexy that shouldn't be a problem. It shouldn't make her less of a serious journalist because she is sexy, and we shouldn't spend our time criticizing anyone for wearing a short skirt or a low-cut top. 

Critiques aside, I thought Miss Representation was a great film. I highly encourage everyone to go see and support it if you haven't already! And if you have seen it, what did you think?

Republicans Decide People with a Uterus Should Have No Say on Issues of Birth Control and Religious Freedom

Yesterday, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform assembled a panel to discuss the birth control mandate (which I've written about here, here, and here). The goal of the panel was to determine whether or not the mandate violates religious freedom.

Since I last wrote about the birth control mandate, the Obama administration has offered a compromise to help protect people who, for religious reasons, think birth control is evil. Instead of requiring religious employers to subsidize the cost of of birth control, the insurance companies providing the institution's health care plan will have to subsidize the cost. But even with this compromise, religious extremists, including the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, are unhappy and feel that Obama has declared war on religion.

I think many feminists knew all along that the outrage over the mandate had nothing to do with religious freedom, and had everything to do with controlling women. Religious extremists, including the USCCB, think it is bad and dangerous that women have the ability to have sex without getting pregnant, to have fewer children, or to delay having children, even if they're married. And many believe that taking hormonal birth control is the equivalent of having an abortion, despite that thing called science which tells us otherwise. Jill over at Feministe writes:

So fine, compromise time: Catholic organizations, even those that are not really all that religious and instead serve the public, won’t have to pay for contraception. Instead, insurance companies will have to cover contraception. Bam, women are covered, and no one is forced to violate their strong moral opposition to birth control by covering it for their employees. Good, right? Everyone’s happy?

Nope! Because, wait, this is just about a handful of celibate men wanting to control women’s reproductive freedoms? And it’s not really about religious freedom at all? It’s just about hostility to women having the ability to prevent pregnancy? Oh. Who could have possibly seen that coming?

So despite the fact that no religious employer even has to subsidize the cost of contraception, a panel was organized to see if the fact that women have access to contraception at all interferes with religious freedom (newsflash: it doesn't).

California Republican Darrell Issa was in charge of the panel, and he rejected requests to have women on the panel saying, "the hearing is not about reproductive rights and contraception." Instead, he composed a panel of five men from various religious traditions. Not only did he decide that it was silly to include people who have a uterus or actually take birth control, he also decided that women don't have religious consciences. He could have included one of the 98% of Catholic women who use contraception. But apparently their religious conscience doesn't count. It is the religious conscience of the celibate men we should be worried about! Their religious freedom matters, not women's.

This video shows Representatives arguing against the panel because it only includes people who disagree with the mandate and only represents a small portion of religious institutions (for example, Catholic charities that support the mandate were not invited. Neither was Catholics for Choice). They also argue that it does not include women, who will be primarily affected if the mandate is overruled. They literally plead to allow a woman to participate. Reps. Carolyn Maloney and Eleanor Holmes Martin walked out in protest. As Maya over at Feministing writes, "This is democracy in action ladies and gentlemen: Women actively barred from speaking about an issue that directly affects us, our health, and our lives." I'd also like to add that if this is actually a legal issue about separation of church and state, where are the legal scholars? None of the people on this panel have any great legal knowledge.



If this isn't enough, in Issa's opening statement he said that "a man's conscience" should guide laws in America (emphasis mine). Then Bishop William Lori compared insurance companies subsidizing the cost of contraception to Jewish delis being forced to serve pork. Does he know that not eating pork isn't exactly a public health issue, or that not having access to pork doesn't mean you'll wind up pregnant? Does he know that Jewish delis, or Jewish hospitals/schools for that matter, don't run around actively trying to bar other Jews, and especially non-Jews, from eating pork. They're not upset that some of their hard-earned tax money might end up supporting pig farmers or the meat industry, thus violating their conscience. In addition to being a ridiculous analogy (although not as ridiculous as an analogy I heard from another Catholic man, who said the birth control mandate is the same as telling Catholic doctors that they have to shoot their patients), comparing bacon to birth control and women's health is incredibly demeaning and insulting. Erin Gloria Ryan, from Jezebel, writes, "The comparison of birth control to cooked pig parts was effective in one way, though— it showed that the Church utterly devalues women, and views their health care as a recreational afterthought. Want to have some honey glazed ham? Wanna keep from getting pregnant? Same thing!"

The fact that access to birth control is compared to access to bacon is infuriating. The fact that no one on the panel was a woman, supported the mandate, or had a background in law or medicine is infuriating. But the most infuriating thing is that in 2012, we're actually having congressional hearings about access to birth control.

Picture from the Congressional Hearing. Where are the women?

I love Elizabeth Warren!

and this Karl Rove-backed anti-Warren ad makes me laugh.



Wtf is up with the whole "they attack police" bit? As if it isn't the police that have been attacking OWS protestors all over the country. And I'm pretty sure OWS is happening in part because there are no jobs, not as some sort of separate, distracting issue.

You are awesome Elizabeth Warren. I hope you run for President someday soon!