Ms. Foundation Gathers Grantees Against Backdrop of Penn State Tragedy

Against the backdrop of the tragedy at Penn State University, the Ms. Foundation for Women convened our grantees working to end child sexual abuse last week in Minneapolis. Nearly 20 leading organizations from diverse regions of the country and a wide range of fields – including sexual assault, child abuse prevention, domestic violence, arts, faith, and policy advocacy – came together to discuss short- and long-term strategies.

The network represents an emerging movement to end child sexual abuse that aims to raise consciousness about the root causes of abuse and offer innovative strategies for prevention. With its ambitious goal of eradicating child sexual abuse, the network is evaluating strengths and gaps in current approaches and establishing a framework through which alternative solutions can be developed.

The network includes CONNECT, Darkness to Light, Stop It Now!, generationFIVE, Kingsbridge Heights Community Center, Massachusetts Citizens for Children’s Enough Abuse Campaign, Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault, Oregon Abuse Advocates and Survivors in Service, Peace Over Violence, 1 in 6, Ping Chong & Company, Prevent Child Abuse America, Prevent Child Abuse Maryland, Prevent Child Abuse New Jersey, Prevent Child Abuse North Carolina, Samaritan Counseling Center, Tewa Women United and Teach Our Children. (Clink the links to read their responses to the abuse at Penn State.)

While the Penn State crisis has brought renewed attention to the child sexual abuse epidemic, network members agree that a shift in priorities to more prevention-centered solutions is necessary. We can’t turn back the clock at Penn State, but it’s not too late to prevent child sexual abuse in communities across the country. Now is the time to support this emerging movement!

Sexual Harassment Begins Early

More than half of all girls in grades 7-12 experienced sexual harassment during the 2010-11 school year, according to a survey released by the American Association of University Women. The study included student-on-student sexual harassment experienced in person or electronically through texting, email or social media.

Among the harmful effects of sexual harassment, one-third of the victims said it made them feel sick to their stomachs, affected their study habits or made them reluctant to go to school. Let’s repeat that: The harassment was so upsetting that it made the victims physically ill.

Yet, only 9 percent reported the incident to an adult at their school.

Julie Zeilinger thinks she knows why. As founder of the FBomb, a blog written for and by young feminists, Julie has her finger on the pulse of teenagers. At the “Sex, Power and Speaking Truth: Anita Hill 20 Years Later” conference, which the Ms. Foundation co-sponsored, Julie spoke about the gender conditioning the younger generation has experienced. Despite all of the progress our society has made, many boys still feel entitled to demean girls sexually. And many girls, for their part, simply shrug it off.

Thirty-nine percent of perpetrators in the AAUW study said they were just trying to be funny. But there isn’t anything funny about sexual harassment, whether it’s in the schoolyard, on the street or in the corporate environment.

Until we focus on the underlying culture that permits casual sexual remarks in our own adult daily lives, we won’t be able to protect our daughters from the attacks that so physically sicken us all.

Women as Public Intellectuals: Jane Jacobs Forum Nov. 8 in NYC

Can you imagine New York City with a huge elevated expressway cutting through the East Village and Lower East Side? Well if it had not been for Jane Jacobs and a pioneering group of urban planning activists downtown, New York would now exist in the shadow of an elevated highway. The grassroots collective took on the might of Robert Moses and City Hall and successfully campaigned to preserve their neighborhood and safeguard the fabric of a living and vital city.

Jane Jacobs was an urban thinker, a public activist, and a grassroots organizer. She used her personal experience as an engaged citizen to change the way Americans think about cities, society, and neighborhood activism. Her legacy has influenced urban planners, architects, designers, engineers, activists and artists -- pretty much anyone who thinks about public space and collective responses to bureaucratic policy.

We are pleased to invite you to celebrate this fantastic legacy -- and the legacy of other similarly engaged citizens, Rachel Carson and Betty Friedan -- at the 2011 Municipal Art Society Jane Jacobs Forum, Women as Public Intellectuals. The November 8 event will feature a discussion among journalist and urban critic, Roberta Brandes Gratz; professor and MSNBC commentator, Melissa V. Harris-Perry; author, Sally Helgesen; and activist, Urvashi Vaid. The panel will be moderated by Robin Pogrebin, arts and culture reporter for the New York Times.

Without courageous women like Jacobs, Carson and Friedan, public life and activism would be a very different beast. We all owe a debt of gratitude to these intelligent, impassioned and inspiring women.

Event details:

Tuesday, November 8
6:30-8:00pm
The Elebash Hall
CUNY Graduate Center
365 Fifth Avenue
New York City

Learn more and RSVP.

Fighting Anti-Choice Legislation In Mississippi

This year, women across the nation have experienced a record number of attacks on their health. In the first six months alone, states enacted 162 new pieces of legislation related to reproductive health and rights, 49% of which specifically restrict access to abortion.

One of the most frightening tactics is the so-called “personhood” constitutional amendment, which grants a fertilized egg all the rights of a person. Unsuccessful in their attempts to ban abortion using this strategy in other states, anti-choice zealots have honed in on Mississippi, where the amendment will be put before voters on Nov. 8.

Not only would this extreme legislation ban abortions –without exceptions for rape, incest or the life or health of the mother – but it also would have broad medical and legal consequences. An article in today’s New York Times asked, “Could a woman taking a morning-after pill be charged with murder?” In fact, Initiative 26 (as it’s called in Mississippi) could ban access to common forms of birth control, as well as in-vitro fertilization, creating a murky legal scenario for women.

Mississippians for Healthy Families, a Ms. Foundation partner, has spearheaded the opposition to this dangerous attack on women’s health. With campaign offices in Oxford, Jackson, Hattiesburg and Gulfport, they’re mobilizing pro-women volunteers across the state in a strategic grassroots effort to defeat this legislation.

You can help, too! Visit http://www.votenoon26.org/get-involved to find out how you can donate, volunteer or join the social media movement against Initiative 26.

Anika Rahman honored by the South Asian community

We are so pleased to announce that this week Ms. Foundation President and CEO Anika Rahman will be honored by two different organizations representing New York's South Asian community.

Tonight Anika will be honored at the fifth annual South Asian Bar Association of New York's Leadership Gala (SABANY), where she will receive the Legal Trailblazer Award. SABANY is an organization dedicated to representing the legal rights of New York's South Asian community, while also offering mentorship, leadership and training opportunities for South Asian individuals in the legal professions.

Anika will be honored alongside some fantastic professionals -- including Gitanjali Gutierrez, Senior Staff Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights, Indrani Franchini Chief Compliance Counsel, Vice President & Assistant General Counsel, Global Pharmaceuticals Pfizer Inc., and Jayant W. Tambe, Partner and Practice Leader Financial Institutions Litigation and Regulation, Jones Day -- who have taken their skills and knowledge of the law into diverse and exciting fields.

Tomorrow night Anika will honored by South Asian Youth Action (SAYA) -- a social justice organization committed to helping South Asian youth realize their fullest potential -- at their annual gala "Celebrating 15 Years of Transforming Lives." Here again she will stand beside two amazing honorees, Former Prime Minister of Pakistan His Excellency Shaukat Aziz, and President of the Cooper Union Dr. Jamshed Bharucha.

Anika's South Asian cultural heritage and background has uniquely informed her life, career and beliefs. The understanding that inequities don't just face women in the global world but are viscerally present for many women right here in the United States, has led Anika to the Ms. Foundation for Women and redoubled her commitment "to advancing the solutions of women in the United States – especially those from the most marginalized communities – to problems that they – and our country – face."

Anika is so pleased to be recognized by both SABANY and SAYA and is happy to accept these gracious tributes on behalf of women across the U.S. of South Asian descent; on behalf of immigrant women, women of color and low-income women across the nation; and on behalf of all women throughout the world struggling to live lives free from inequity and discrimination.

Delegation of Women Leaders Fights Anti-Immigrant Bill in Georgia

Tomorrow a delegation of women leaders from over two dozen national human rights organizations -- National Domestic Workers Alliance, National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum, MomsRising, and many others -- will travel to Georgia to protest the state’s new anti-immigrant bill (HB 87), copycat legislation of Arizona’s controversial and costly SB1070, and speak out as part of the growing resistance to anti-immigrant legislation nationwide.

The We Belong Together Delegation will connect with those most gravely affected by Georgia’s new law with other regional immigrant activists for a day of story-sharing (September 28) and a press conference in front of the state capital building (September 29, 10:30am).

As we have noted before these laws are exceptionally harmful for women who are often most deeply affected when their families are torn apart, or they fail to report crimes such as domestic violence and sexual assault out of fear of deportation or detention, and find their bodies and children demonized in the increasingly hostile rhetoric. Read NAPAWF executive director Miriam Yeung's moving blog post about why this delegation and this movement is so important to her as an immigrant, a mother and an activist.

The need to fight these laws is why the Ms. Foundation supported a similar delegation of women's rights and immigrant rights activists who traveled to Washington in June of last year following the adoption of Arizona's SB1070 and gave voice to women whose lives and livelihoods were threatened by the legislation.

We are pleased to see Ms. Foundation grantees lead the way once again, advocating for dignity and respect for immigrant women and their families and advancing the rights of us all. We will share updates and photos in the next week so stay tuned. Let's all pledge to make sure our country is welcoming and safe for everyone.

For more information on the delegation please visit NDWA, NAPAWF or MomsRising.

 Immigrant Rights March photo © Elizabeth Rappaport and the Ms. Foundation for Women.

Marking a Time for Reflection and Renewal

As Jews in America observe the beginning of a new year with reflection and renewal, we mark the occasion with best wishes to all communities that form the fabric of the United States.

The Ms. Foundation is also taking stock and looking towards the future. As we move from reflection to renewal ourselves we are inspired by the power of humility and compassion, combined with commitment and action, to repair our world.

In this new year we wish our many partners -- women igniting change in communities across the country and those who work with them -- renewed determination and the ability and support to move us toward a just nation.

Together we can ignite change,

Anika Rahman
President and CEO