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Briefing Biden for Bold Action on Reproductive Rights

Reproductive rights under Biden: what will it look like?

Since the Biden/Harris team clinched the US Presidency, feminist advocates and policy makers have begun to discuss the massive reclaiming of women’s rights that must occur to recover from the last four years of Trump-era regressions. To dig deeper into this mandate, leaders from several high profile organizations gathered recently online to make explicit what must happen to begin the recovery of rights for women and girls around the world.

Leaders gathered recently online to examine the necessary steps for the Biden administration to take to restore reproductive, sexual and health rights for women around the world. (Image credit: December 10, 2020 webinar)

Author and Attorney Jill Filipovic moderated the discussion, which featured Serra Sippel, President of the Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE), Anu Kumar, President and CEO of Ipas, and Akila Radhakrishnan, President of the Global Justice Center.

WMC Doubles Down on Ecofeminism with New Climate Channel

December 14, 2020 WASHINGTON — To celebrate the fifth anniversary of the Paris Agreement, the Women’s Media Center today launches a new digital channel — WMC Climate — that highlights how the climate crisis affects the lives of women, indigenous people, people of color, and others whose needs and welfare tend to come last around the world.

women's media center climate — *Catherine C. Flowers and Jane Fonda at a Fire Drill Friday demonstration in November 2019. (Image Credit: Fire Drill Fridays)*

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s annual Arctic Report Card, released on Tuesday, found that the average air temperature from October 2019 through September 2020 was the second-highest recorded in at least 120 years: Temperatures were 3.4 degrees Fahrenheit above the baseline average for 1981-2010. And with the rise in temperatures comes a widening gap in who lives and who dies, and who lives well vs. who is left behind.

New Impact Strategy: Ms. South for Women and Girls of Color

MS. FOUNDATION LAUNCHES “MS. SOUTH” GRANT TO BENEFIT SOUTHERN ORGANIZATIONS LED BY WOMEN AND GIRLS OF COLOR

Nation’s oldest women’s foundation plans to strengthen financial sustainability and leadership development capacity of women and girls of color in the U.S. South

NEW YORK (December 10, 2020) –Today, the Ms. Foundation for Women announced the launch of Ms. South, a multi-year grantmaking strategy to support the sustainability and leadership of organizations led by women and girls of color (WGOC) in the southern region of the United States.

“We are living in a historic moment,” said Teresa C. Younger, President and CEO of the Ms. Foundation. “The COVID pandemic has exacerbated a crisis amidst an existing one, and our ability to support the leadership of women and girls of color in the South is more critical than ever. Our sisters of color in the South represent the future of this country, and we must shine a light on their enduring struggle and strength.”

Sharing Power to Unlock Collective Giving Growth and Systems Change

Editor’s Note: The following Op-Ed is by Sara Lomelin, executive director of Philanthropy Together and Sudha Nandagopal, chief executive officer of Social Venture Partners International and Reimagine Giving.

2020 has been a year of crises on top of crises. Yet despite millions being out of work and the COVID pandemic raging, Americans are civically engaged like never before—whether through the elections, protests for Black Lives Matter, forming mutual aid groups or giving in record numbers.

sharing power — *Sudha Nandagopal, chief executive officer of Social Venture Partners International and Reimagine Giving* (Image Credit: Sudha Nandagopal)

Indeed, donations during the coronavirus crisis quickly surpassed amounts given following the September 11 terrorist attacks. And giving to racial justice organizations, civil rights groups, and bail funds reached unprecedented levels following the murder of George Floyd.

Groundswell Pledges $100 Million to Women, TGNC People of Color

Groundswell Fund is a leading funder of electoral work led by women of color, and the largest funder of the U.S. reproductive justice movement. Its 2020-25 Blueprint promises to move $100 million to grassroots organizing and electoral efforts led by women of color, transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) people of color.

According to the Blueprint, “Groundswell strengthens U.S. movements for reproductive and social justice by resourcing intersectional grassroots organizing and centering the leadership of women of color – particularly those who are Black, Indigenous, and Transgender.” It does so through grants providing general and long-term support, capacity-building for grantee partners to help in organizing and engagement, and fund-raising assistance.

Olivia Wells: Quality Support for Women Survivors in Conflict Zones

Editor’s Note: This interview in our Feminist Giving IRL series features Olivia Wells, Director of Programs and Communications for Nadia’s Initiative, a nonprofit founded by Nadia Murad that supports “community-driven and survivor-centric sustainable development programs.”

1. What do you wish you had known when you started out in your profession?

Bureaucracy; you learn about it in school, and you begin to see it when you enter the workforce but you don’t realize how many bureaucratic impediments there are to humanitarian work until you’re in the thick of it. You naively think that at the end of the day, we all want the same thing – to help those most vulnerable – so we should streamline processes to get those in need the help they deserve as soon as possible. Unfortunately, this is often not the case. The humanitarian sector is still saturated with top-down approaches to development. Many government and private funders insist on funding large organizations like the various UN entities, rather than investing in local NGOs. Local NGOs have a direct line to the communities they serve and are often able to implement projects more efficiently and for less money. These are the organizations we should be investing in.

Dance Equity: Extra Tough Times for Women Dancers in COVID

Northfield, IL | November 19, 2020 Dance Data Project® (DDP) today announces the social media campaign, Connecting the Dots – #YesThisIsAnArtsStory, designed to draw attention to the catastrophic effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on women in dance and the performing arts in general. The campaign will begin on Monday, Nov. 23 and run for three weeks, ending on Friday, Dec. 11.

*Dancers Terez Dean Orr and Ben Warner perform Poetry of Being by Nicole Haskins. (Photo by Keith Sutter, courtesy of Smuin Contemporary Ballet)*

“While NPR, and business publications such as the Wall Street Journal and Forbes have documented the asymmetric impact of the pandemic on women economically, we haven’t seen similar work by arts reporters, looking at the industry as a whole,” said DDP President and Founder Liza Yntema. “Our campaign is designed to ‘connect the dots’ between layoffs and furloughs at the lower tier of performing arts not for profits where women typically work, the already existing gender pay gap, and the crushing pressure women feel due to child and elder care duties resulting in what is being termed the ‘Shecession’.”

Karen Morales on The Love of Marketing to Fight Disease

Editor’s Note: This interview in our Feminist Giving IRL series features Karen Morales, Founder of Marketing Magnet and Board Member of Cure Rare Disease.

1. What do you wish you had known when you started out in your profession?

I never knew I would be a marketing agency owner. I never dreamed I would be self-employed. In my early days, I wanted to be a pediatric oncologist to bring hope to sick kids. In later years, I wanted to fight oppression as an ACLU lawyer.

*Karen Morales, Founder of Marketing Magnet and Board Member of Cure Rare Disease*, discusses her path to success.

Neither dream materialized, as the path to get there – medical school and law school, seemed like too high a hill to climb.

Hunt and Justice Leaders Discuss US History of Racism, Sexism

On Thursday, November 19^th, 2020, at 6:30 pm, The Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture held a one-hour event with guest speakers Dr. Helen LaKelly Hunt, Matrice Ellis-Kirk, and Jerry Hawkins. The discussion was centered on Hunt’s book, And the Spirit Moved Them: The Lost Radical History of America’s First Feminists.

women's history — Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD. (Image Credit: Dallas Institute Webinar)

Larry Allums, Executive Director of the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, welcomed viewers and discussed the auspiciousness of the event, given that this year is the Centennial anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment, granting women the right to vote. He described Helen LaKelly Hunt as an important “discoverer and chronicler of the connection between abolitionist and women’s rights movements in American history.” He acknowledged Hunt as a “dear friend” to the Dallas Institute and recognized her contributions as part of an early group of women donors funding gender equality, noting that Hunt co-founded the Texas Women’s Foundation, the New York Women’s Foundation, the Women’s Funding Network, and Women Moving Millions.

(Liveblog) What Does Feminism Look Like in Biden-Harris Future?

Feminists, the fight is not over.

This week has been a celebration for many around the country–we’ve won a massive victory against fascism and racism in the United States. However, it’s important not to lose sight of our end goal. In order to truly work toward racial, gender, and social justice in the US and around the world, we cannot let up on the pressure on our administration. Joe Biden has a lot of work to do.

On Veterans Day 2020, Code Pink, the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, MADRE, and Women Cross DMZ co-hosted a conversation on the role of feminists in the 2020 Presidential election, as well as what we still need to do to ensure the Biden administration takes us in the right direction.

Category: Activism