Top Controversies: When 18 Million Cracks Isn't Enough

by Jen Nedeau

Published October 04, 2008 @ 04:17PM PST

The women's rights movement has a plethora of issues at hand. Here are a few of the top controversies currently taking stage in the movement.

Electing Female Officials: 18 Million Cracks Isn't Enough

Despite Hillary Clinton's effort to become the first woman President of the United States, women are still waiting to elect a female to the position of Commander-in-Chief. Despite the "18 million cracks" in the glass ceiling, Hillary did not win the Democratic nomination. This has reminded women of the need for a continued effort by groups such as EMILY's list and The White House Project to direct financial resources and leadership training toward electing women into federal, state and local offices. With a potential wait of eight years for another woman President(a) of the United States, women's rights groups will focus their efforts not only in raising female leaders who could be President one day, but also improving the ratio of women in Congress and the Senate - who currently make up less that 30% of the legislature despite being 50% of the population.

Resources:

1. "A Thank-You for 18 Million Cracks in the Glass Ceiling"
2. Emily's List
3. The White House Project: Vote, Run, Lead

Women and the Economy: Equal Pay for Equal Work

Women still make 77 cents to the man's dollar. The hope of equal pay for equal work continues to haunt women in the United States and women continue the struggle of balancing the choice between having a career and raising a family.

When the economic outlook is grim, it is women who are most affected - in particular single mothers. Despite a bi-partisan claim of success, the percentage of poor single mothers has actually grown since the 1996 federal welfare entitlement overhaul. Thirty percent of single women now live without income from a job or public assistance. Additionally, economic downturns hit women the hardest because they statistically earn less then men; are more likely to work part-time; are less likely to be eligible for unemployment insurance; are less likely to have health insurance; and are more likely to leave their jobs because of care giving responsibilities, domestic violence, or harassment.

Resources:

1. NOW Economic Fact Sheet
2. Building a Better Future for Women and Their Families
3. Paradigm Shift

Global Feminism: Fighting for Women's Rights Abroad

Democratic nations like Chile, Argentina, Germany, and Ukraine have elected female presidents and prime ministers. And while many countries have surpassed the United States in equality of the sexes when it comes to the political landscape, the global feminist movement to forward the rights of women around the world, particularly in developing countries, continues to define the Third Wave. Conquering misogynistic cultural practices such as honor killings, genital mutilation, and human trafficking are all concerns of global feminists.

Global institutions such as the United Nations and global pacts like the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) try to combat these offenses and help raise the profile of issues that are often considered cultural taboos at home.

Even with their efforts to forward women's rights through activism and legislation, some feminists worry that fighting for the rights of women in the Third World is ultimately undermined by the consumerist tendencies and high platitudes of women in the First World. For example, a women right's activist who wears a diamond ring is not only participating in an advertising strategy by jewelry companies such as Tiffany & Co, which capitalizes on feminine stereotypes, but also contributes to the controversial global diamond trade. Likewise, women who buy items produced by manufacturers that use sweatshops inadvertently contribute to the malevolent acts committed against women in developing nations.

Resources:

1. International Female Heads of State: Michelle Bachelet, Cristina Elisabet Fernández Wilheim de Kirchner, Yulia Tymoshenko, Angela Merkel
2. Damaging Cultural Practices Against Women: Misogyny, Genital Mutilation, Human Trafficking
3. United Nations International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women
4. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women

The Global Gag Rule: Thwarting Reproductive Choice

Freedom of choice encompasses preventing unintended pregnancy through sex education and improved access to birth control, defending a woman's right to bear healthy children, defending the independence of a nation's laws and courts, and addressing the inequities in reproductive health care. However, on January 22, 2001, the official start date of the Bush Administration and the 28^th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, George W. Bush issued an executive order reinstating the "global gag rule," which bars family planning programs outside the U.S. that receive federal aid from using separate, private monies for abortion counseling, services, referrals, and lobbying activities targeting their own government.

Under this policy, international family planning programs that provide a wide range of resources, including gynecological exams, AIDS prevention and treatment, and contraception, are forced to lose a large percentage of their operating costs. With no other option, young women in developing nations often turn to illegal abortions, which can lead to death as a result of serious infections and improper medical care.

Within the U.S., the Bush Administration monopolized the Department of Health and Human Services by drawing up Draft Regulations on Women's Health that made it increasingly more expensive and difficult for women to acquire birth control.

Therefore, improving access to birth control is at the forefront of efforts of organizations such as NARAL and Planned Parenthood. The next appointment to the Supreme Court will be crucial to preserving Roe v Wade, and the stakes have never been higher for protecting and defining a woman's right to choose and protect herself from unwanted pregnancy in the United States and abroad.

Resources:

1. Feminist Majority: Roe v. Wade: Legalizing Abortion
2. Access Denied

Defining the Third Wave vs. the Post-Feminist Era

Some second wave feminists were criticized by their peers for focusing too much on the concerns of well-off heterosexual white women, while women of color, the Gay-Lesbian-Bisexual-Transgender community, as well as working class women were often ignored.

The Third Wave has added racial, social, and sexual identity issues into the Feminist movement. With a diverse group of participants all crowding the stage - queer feminists, girlie feminists, pro-sex feminists, global feminists and power feminists - the Third Wave stepped in where the Second Wave left off. At times it seems that the Third Wave is a catch-all term for various activists movements in which there is little in common except that women are the main constituents. Additionally, part of the controversy of the Third Wave is that many third wavers feel left behind by the Second Wavers and their success, which has made it difficult for third wavers to advance the movement on their own terms.

Many younger women also believe they live in a post-feminist era and that the radical stigmatization attributed to feminists is only going to thwart the collective progress of women, rather than encourage it. The term, post-feminism, however was created as a reaction against the womens rights movement and serves as a counter movement to equality for women and other minorities.

Overall, defining the major goals of the Third Wave movement as well as helping those who believe in a post-feminist era find new clarity about the state of women's rights are the major focus of feminists today.

Resources:

1. Third Wave Feminism
2. The Third Wave Foundation
3. Manufacturing Post feminism