welcome to DC, rep. kathy hochul!

Posted: June 21, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Unfortunately blurry photo of me, a fellow IWPR intern and new Rep. Kathy Hochul! (camera was malfunctioning, oh well)

I was lucky enough to attend a reception at the PPFA office Monday night welcoming New York Rep. Kathy Hochul to Washington, D.C. as another strong pro-choice voice in the House! Not only were there heavy hors d’oeuvres and free booze, I got to meet Rep. Hochul, who was a smart, funny woman with a strong political background.

She spoke to the crowd, which was comprised of advocates from progressive and women’s interest groups who all contributed to her campaign effort. For the first time ever, Planned Parenthood “embedded” one of its field organizers into a political campaign, ensuring that a reproductive rights expert was advising Hochul on strategy. Hochul said she knew the huge, supportive network of women’s organizations that threw its support behind her was a key factor leading to her important victory, and that she wouldn’t forget that support. “I was getting checks from states I’d never been to before!” she said.

Another grainy photo of Rep. Hochul speaking to the reception attendees.

Hochul recounted her very first vote – rejecting the controversial budget proposal of Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, whom she said still won’t meet her eyes on the House floor.

Hochul was at one time a legslative aide for former New York Sen. Daniel Moynihan and recalled an era when she’d often be sent to Republican Senators’ offices to collaborate with their staffers on bipartisan solutions to policy debates. She said she hoped to use that philosophical mindset to work with all members of the House to achieve compromise. But one issue Hochul didn’t seem willing to compromise on was health care – she ran her campaign on her commitment to protect Medicare and Medicaid, her surprising success in a typically conservative district interpreted by some to be a public referendum on the Ryan budget plan.

I met a fabulous UNC alum at the event, too – she was a policy adviser for PPFA and told me all about her career path (which was definitely indirect) and invited me to stay in touch. Networking is so much easier when you’ve had a couple glasses of wine…

response: “are slutwalkers losing their way?”

Posted: June 19, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

A friend of mine recently forwarded me an op-ed, “Are SlutWalkers losing their way?” written by Victoria Coren, a columnist for The Observer (who usually writes about poker). In it, Coren expresses skepticism about the recent “SlutWalk” movement, which started in Toronto but has since spread across the world. Women have been taking to the streets, often dressed revealingly, in protest of a Canadian policeman’s advice to a group of students in a self-defense class. He suggested they avoid “dressing like sluts” to improve their personal safety.

Implying that a woman could in some way be faulted for having been violently attacked by a man is problematic, perpetuating the myth that victims of rape should be blamed for their rapists’ crimes if they have too much to drink, are scantily clad or are deemed otherwise irresponsible.

This mindset isn’t rare–rape victims are very commonly blamed for their attacks or are questioned as if they’re on trial themselves, and this treatment is likely the reason most rapes go unreported.

But Coren ignores all of this crucial context necessary to understanding the plight of rape victims in a victim-blaming culture. Instead, she asserts “It’s not rapists who think skimpy outfits are a contributory factor. It’s just lazy-minded cultural observers, tutters behind net curtains, knitters at the guillotine. They’re annoying, but they’re not dangerous.” But Coren misses the mark–not only does she underplay the number of people who believe rape myths, she misunderstands their consequences.

I’ve encountered many challenging rape myths through my work as an interpersonal violence prevention activist on my campus. As a peer educator, I often talk with students who perpetuate rape myths. They should not simply be considered “lazy-minded cultural observers.” They’re unknowingly part of a broader culture that supports their views; victim-blaming is prevalent in the media, in the justice system and in traditional attitudes toward gender roles. The saturation of our culture with rape myths isn’t simply “annoying.” It shapes our mindsets–and hurts survivors.

Coren suggests that rather than question the overall culture and call for radical change, feminists should remain content working inside a liberal framework, getting more rapists convicted, even if only for short jail terms. She prescribes “real, practical, legal change to help other women and identify serious villains. SlutWalks are firing at the wrong target, baring arms against an irrelevant enemy.” Coren doesn’t see that the “irrelevant enemy” is our patriarchal society itself, and that calling attention to the root of the problem is essential for progress.

I’m not satisfied with purely legal changes if they don’t come with a parallel culture shift. Until the words “she was asking for it” are completely dissolved from our dialogue surrounding sexual assault, I’ll continue to challenge rape myths and encourage survivors to empower themselves in a society deliberately structured to prevent them from doing so. Coren can stick to Texas Hold’em.

Check out the SlutWalk being planned for Greensboro, NC on August 27 here.

new faces, more voices session 2

Posted: June 19, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Note–this post is long! You’ll probably prefer to skim it; I didn’t try to shorten because I wanted everything here for my own reference later (you know, since I’ll probably lose my actual notes)!

I’ve been meaning to create a post from my notes from the second session of the New Faces, More Voices program for a few days now. The topic of the program, which took place on Thursday, June 16, and was so exciting it inspired me to create this blog, was “Help on the Home Front: Effective Advocacy Strategies for Domestic Women’s Issues” and featured a panel of three fabulous career feminists who talked about their work and current challenges for American women’s rights. I think some of their discussion was awesome and want to share it with folks back in Chapel Hill!

The first speaker was Rachel Lyons, Work and Family Government Affairs Manager for the National Partnership for Women and Families, a group that advocates for U.S. women’s economic justice. The National Partnership is particularly concerned with workplace and work-family balance issues and frequently works with my internship organization, IWPR. Lyons got her start working on Democratic political campaigns before turning her career toward policy. She suggested that campaign work was a great “crash course” for activists because it helps them get a feel for the political dynamics they’re up against.

Lyons explained some of the work the National Partnership has done for specific policy goals. She explained that current workplace policy in the U.S. doesn’t reflect the reality of the work force–even though 50 percent of the work force is now comprised of women, and many of them serve as heads of household, workplace policy still reflects a time when women stayed home caring for children while their husbands worked. This antiquated assumption about the nuclear family as the norm is why the U.S. has embarrassingly sub-par provisions for maternity and sick leave, as well as pay equity, compared to other developed countries.

Paid sick leave is one of the National Partnership’s most important policy areas. It has pushed for the Healthy Families Act, which would allow for seven paid sick days for full-time workers, at the federal level as well as simultaneous action at the state and local levels, a strategic move that allows for smaller “testing grounds” for new legislation before pushing for broader approval. Sick leave was approved in San Francisco in 2006 (and was proved successful) and was passed in Connecticut only a few weeks ago. Ballot initiatives in Seattle, Denver and New York City are pending, as is legislation in Philadelphia.

Lyons also mentioned the National Partnership’s work attempting to expand the Family Medical Leave Act, pass the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act (side note: I met Lilly this year! Maybe I’ll post the photo soon), and collaborate on the Wal-Mart class action lawsuit for pay equity. She said she thought the next battle for women would be against pregnancy discrimination.

Pat Ruess was the second speaker. She’s a lobbyist for the YWCA who served for many years as policy adviser and lobbyist for NOW. Ruess is an expert on the Violence Against Women Act and was instrumental in its passage. Not only is she a trailblazing feminist, she’s a total badass. Ruess described the devastating history of the violence prevention movement and her personal story of radicalization, which started with her advocacy to establish the first domestic violence shelter in Montana. She became a strong anti-violence advocate and worked with the NOW Legal Defense Fund to build a coalition that would help pass VAWA, which would win federal funding for shelters across the country. It wasn’t until then-Senator Joe Biden became interested in violence against women advocacy in the late 1980s (supposedly after someone approached him at a fundraising dinner and told him his daughter was at risk, just like every other young woman in America) that the proposed bill began to make headway. VAWA was originally bipartisan when it was signed under President Clinton in 1994, and it was passed nearly unanimously through both houses.

But now VAWA faces its fourth reauthorization in a hostile environment for women’s rights. Ruess hopes this time to include special provisions for women in ethnic communities, disabled women, older women, teenagers (where are their resources if they’re in abusive relationships that aren’t necessarily domestic?), Native American women (who suffer sexual violence at two times the rate of the general population), women in the armed forces and members of the LGBTQ communities. She hopes these topics will be included in an omnibus reauthorization bill, but since VAWA has unfortunately become a partisan issue in the years following its first passage, her goals may become too controversial for acceptance. You know, because disabled women, old women, young women and lesbian women just don’t quite count much to legislators these days…

The final speaker was Angela Sutton, Senior Health Policy Associate for the Black Women’s Health Imperative. Sutton described her organization’s extensive advocacy for reproductive justice, explaining the intersecting oppressions that must be considered when fighting for justice, as well as its work on maternal health and breast cancer. Black women are four times more likely to suffer maternal mortality and are disproportionately diagnosed with breast cancer.

Right now the Health Imperative is focusing on the budget negotiations and controversial debate regarding the level of the debt ceiling. It also is concerned with cuts to Medicaid, which would severely limit access to family planning and reproductive health services for low-income women. The organization has begun campaigns working to address sociocultural breast cancer disparities (check out “Moving Beyond Pink“) and to combat the negative anti-choice messages recently targeted at black and Hispanic women.

Sutton said one of the lessons she’s learned from the attacks on reproductive rights in recent months is that when the national temperature is hostile toward progressive policies for reproductive health, even if it’s possible to stave off federal attacks, they’ll achieve far more success at the state level.

When asked about how to gain victories in troubling times like these, Lyons said the National Partnership sometimes attempts smaller victories at administrative levels. An example would be the Department of Education’s recent statement to universities on their responsibility to enforce Title IX regulations when dealing with sexual assaults on campus.

Ruess said violence prevention advocates at universities should collaborate on their efforts to identify weaknesses and define need.

Check out the hashtag for New Faces, More Voices at #2011nfmv. I’m trying to get some other members of the program to collaborate on it!

“you can’t be what you can’t see”

Posted: June 18, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Went to a documentary screening at the AAUW convention last night. The film was “Miss Representation” and was a pretty high-budget, two-hour movie about women’s portrayal (or lack thereof) in the media. Lots of amazing, A-list celebrities featured: journalists like Katie Couric and Laura Ling, politicians like Condoleeza Rice, actresses Geena Davis and Rosario Dawson, and some badass feminist super heroes (Jean Kilbourne, Jackson Katz, Gigi Durham, Gloria Steinem, etc.). Also included tons of recent, relevant clips from film and TV. The documentary’s message was undeniable and went into detail about women’s symbolic annihilation on-screen (with important stats to back everything up).

Would definitely be interested in trying to schedule a screening at UNC for the fall semester–the documentary is perfect for “non-experts” and people who don’t have much academic background in feminist theory (i.e. most of the university community!). The only struggle, as always, is getting those folks in the room.

Headed to Adams Morgan afterward to have Ethiopian food for the first time at Meskerem–so good! We got a sampler bowl, and there wasn’t anything I didn’t like. And the honey wine was delicious!

first internship blog post!

Posted: June 17, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a comment

I attended a book talk on Tuesday, June 14 with a bunch of fellow interns & a few staff members and wrote a blog summarizing the author’s main points. Here’s the link to the first blog post I’ve written for my internship. The text is below:

Author Finds Technology a Tool Not a Solution in Bridging Divide

People often describe the “digital divide” in terms of high-income individuals’ having access to cutting-edge technology that helps them thrive socially and economically, while low-income individuals are left out. The divide is often cited as a significant source of economic inequality.

At a recent event at Busboys and Poets, Dr. Virginia Eubanks, author of Digital Dead End: Fighting for Social Justice in the Information Age, critiqued this diagnosis as overly simplistic. The event was co-sponsored by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, Teaching for Change, and DC Jobs with Justice.

Eubanks worked with a group of low-income women who are members of the YWCA community in Troy, NY, and asked the women what they needed. The main problem was not the digital divide. Instead, “more buses, less racism, and fairer employment” were the most popular calls for help.

Eubanks expected these women to have few technological skills. Instead, she found two-thirds of them already working in high-tech jobs, such as data entry or network administration. However, these jobs were low-paying, had few benefits, and were unstable. Technology was ubiquitous in their lives, but they could not use it to improve those lives.

Eubanks realized that simply providing technology and training is not enough to improve women’s lives. Rather, projects need to be designed to account for deeply ingrained racial and gender oppression.

Eubanks, informed by the belief that those closest to problems can best find solutions, worked closely with the women to identify their needs. They created a community technology lab for the YWCA, staffed and sustained by residents, as well as what Eubanks called an “Angie’s List for social services providers,” where the women could provide feedback on their experiences at local assistance agencies.

Even so, access to tech tools was not a high priority for the women. They were more concerned with the basic structural and cultural challenges that affected them on a daily basis—a lack of reliable transportation and workplace flexibility, coupled with racist attitudes.

Eubanks emphasized that technology in itself cannot cure these problems, but it can play a positive role. “We all have a stake in the creation of a more just information age,” she said.

Eubanks noted the creation of new, high-end jobs in technological development—touted by politicians including President Obama as the solution to our country’s economic woes—requires the support of more service industry positions in food service, hospitality, and retail. These lower-income jobs must be fair, provide benefits, and allow for work-life balance to meet the needs of workers.

IWPR has identified other basic benefits that can drastically improve the quality of workers’ lives in the shorter term. For women and their families, guaranteed paid maternity leave (the U.S. is one of only five countries worldwide that doesn’t require employers to provide it) and paid sick days could improve health, well-being, and economic stability.

Pay equity is another problem Eubanks identified. The women would often accept minimal compensation for high-tech jobs, hoping to gain the skills necessary for a higher-paid position. In a society where open discussion of salary is often taboo, these women had little opportunity to identify and express grievances, and only rarely advanced in the workplace.

“Technology is not a destination, it’s another site for struggle,” said Eubanks. In making technological advancements we should consider the quality of life of the workers who perform and enable it. Technology can contribute to a more just society, as long as the privileged consciously use it as a tool to support social justice, and not a ready-made engine of social progress.

Leah Josephson is the Communications Intern at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research.

internship strategy: keep track of your accomplishments

Posted: June 17, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

I’ve decided to start maintaining a detailed Google document that will keep track of all of the tasks I’ve completed at my internship so I can refer to it later when preparing for interviews or updating my resume.

I think it could be easy to forget some of my accomplishments because my position in the communications department, a more administrative role at my organization, doesn’t come with one particular project to complete throughout the summer, so I’ve been helping with a lot of different things in writing and editing, web maintenance, social media and communications outreach.

Just thought I’d share; think this could be a helpful strategy for interns!

much-needed outlet!

Posted: June 17, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a comment

I’m having an amazing time this summer as the communications intern at a policy think tank focused on women’s economic justice. DC is an amazing city–so much to do on an intern budget! Nearly every night I find myself at a new public lecture, concert or happy hour.

I’ve also encountered some inspiring feminist women (who all have jobs I picture for myself in five years…or 30) both at work and after hours, and have come away from several events wanting to share, or at least record, some of my experiences.

If you’re my follower on Twitter or surfed here and don’t know me personally, I’ll tell you that I’m an undergraduate student at UNC-Chapel Hill studying journalism, French and women’s studies. While most of my friends graduated in May 2011, I still have one semester left to go at Carolina. I hope to start a master’s program in social work in the fall of 2012, with the ultimate goal of working in nonprofit management for a women’s advocacy group.

Outside of school I’m mainly involved in feminist advocacy work within my university community, including reproductive rights activism, violence prevention efforts, student journalism and student government.

I hope that I’ll post here throughout the summer when I walk away from a lecture or conversation excited and inspired, wanting to preserve what I’ve learned or observed.

To come: A recap of session 2 of New Faces, More Voices, a feminist leadership training program for interns run by the National Council of Women’s Organizations. I’m attending the program weekly with some of the other interns at my policy research group. This week we heard about domestic advocacy strategies from three powerful leaders in women’s rights activism–looking forward to writing about what I learned from them.