Posts Tagged: workplace rights
#WhatWomenNeed, Valentine’s Day and Beyond
I loved All Above All’s Valentine’s Day twitter campaign. The simple #WhatWomenNeed was a great way to raise awareness about abortion coverage. It got me thinking about the big picture. What women need, for Valentine’s Day and beyond. Narrowing the list down to 5 was difficult. This is certainly not comprehensive. But I think it’s a good place to start. 1. Sexual assault needs to be taken seriously: Sexual assault is an epidemic. Ms. magazine reports that “1 in 5 women will experience a rape or an attempted rape at some point during college.” Activists, students, women and their allies have been campaigning for decades in the hopes of getting the public and our government to take sexual assault seriously. There have been many articles and books and blog posts written… Read more »
What Obama Failed to Mention in the State of the Union Address
President Obama had his State of the Union address earlier this week and tackled a lot of pressing issues at the top of the agenda. However, despite a bill that eliminated abortion coverage in insurance passing in the House just a few hours before, there was no mention of reproductive rights. Anti-choice legislation on the state level is passing at an alarming rate, yet it’s not considered a hot topic worthy of being addressed. On the other hand, Obama is receiving praise for his speech that highlighted workplace rights for women. “Today, women make up about half our workforce. But they still make 77 cents for every dollar a man earns. That is wrong, and in 2014, it’s an embarrassment. A woman deserves equal pay for equal work. She deserves… Read more »
ENDA May Not Mean the End of Job Discrimination
The fight for same sex marriage has consumed the public’s mind in the past few years. With the ruling on DOMA and California’s Proposition 8 this past summer many people have gotten tunnel vision, focusing all their efforts to marriage equality. I’ll be the first to admit that there isn’t anything wrong with this. Marriage equality is an issue very dear to many people, both queer and heteronormative. But another issue looms on the horizon for the queer community and that is job protection.
Interns in the United States: Unpaid and Unprotected
No benefits, long hours, random tasks, and all for the sake of “experience” on our résumé. As if unpaid internships weren’t already terrible enough. It’s basically free labor for employers in a competitive job market where purse strings are tighter than ever. The pressure to accept an unpaid internship is way too familiar for college students and youth attempting to remain competitive in a dog-eat-dog job market. Besides lacking benefits that paid employees receive, unpaid interns are now denied basic workplace protections.
4th Annual Women 2 Women Conference: Engaging and Supporting Farmworker Women
Last Saturday I had the pleasure of attending this conference, the 4th of its kind, and hearing about it is nothing compared to actually being there. From the moment I entered the church where the event was housed I heard hearty laughter and bustling conversation, it was never dull, and was truly the best way I’ve spent my Saturday in a long time. The conference was put on by the Florida Farmworker Association of Florida (FWAF) and Maria Santana, director of the Women’s Studies Program at the University of Central Florida (UCF). Through contributions and donations they were able to provide both lunch and a full dinner to the attendees, but what was most spectacular about the day was the variety of workshops offered, and how the event seemed to… Read more »
Lean In but Don’t Fall Out!
I was reading an article by Courtney E. Martin on Women’s Media Center, and the theme of the article stuck with me. The title proudly proclaimed, “Leaning in Can get you Laidout,” and described how women lean so far in, and ignore their own health, they don’t recognize the cues that the body gives to warn people to de-stress and slow down. The idea of “leaning in” was originally written about by Sheryl Sandebrg COO of Facebook. This seemed like such a remarkable idea because it was so uncommon to hear this type of advice. The advice that permeates in my world with graduation nearing is that we must stand out, be different, and make ourselves well- rounded and our resumes diverse so that we as young people may transition… Read more »
Reproductive Justice and the Workplace, is it under attack here too?
Currently we live in a country where many women choose to take on the role of mother and worker, but what is still baffling to me and increasingly alarming is that the United States is still one of the only developed countries that don’t provide universal maternity leave to its citizens. Maternity leave is instead provided by employers, but the qualifications are vast and many women are punished for utilizing this necessary time to bond and care for their new born babies. I think there are a lot of fucked up things going on in this country but this is definitely high up on my list of fucked up bullshit. Women are the creators of life and politicians always seem to want to control women’s bodies and their access to… Read more »
My Rights are Everyone’s Rights: Five Reasons Why Queers Should Give a Damn About Reproductive Justice
It’s a common question in LGBTQIA groups: Why hop on the reproductive justice bandwagon when I don’t need birth control? Homosexuals cannot even have kids. Remind me what this has to do with us again? Why is this our responsibility? As gender and sexual minorities (GSMs), we’re skeptical. I know I was. As humans, we are highly connected to one another’s oppression. We all have mothers, sisters, and female-identified friends whose rights to healthcare and liberty are constantly being challenged. Additionally, as LGBTQIA individuals, we have unique experiences with the way systems of oppression work. Knowing what we know alone is a call to action. To quote the feminist poet Emma Lazarus, “Until we are all free, we are none of us free.” We at Choice USA believe that reproductive justice… Read more »
