Category: Women’s sex-based rights

FIST to host Zoom Forum March 25th on Strategies for Winning Back Abortion Rights

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Feminists In Struggle continues its series with a forum on abortion rights: “After Dobbs and the continuing threat to women’s reproductive rights, how do we develop a strategy to regain and secure the right to abortion nationally?”  Tickets on sale now!

FEMINIST FORUM: STRATEGIES FOR WINNING BACK WOMEN’S ABORTION RIGHTS Tickets, Sat, Mar 25, 2023 at 1:00 PM | Eventbrite

Here is our exciting panel of speakers:

Andrea Gabay is a grassroots activist who first volunteered in 2020 while living in New York City. She was an active volunteer doing food drives and composting at GrowNYC environmental program to empower New Yorkers to secure a healthy environment. She also supported many marches throughout NYC, including many BLM movements and was involved with Women’s March in Manhattan. Andrea brought her activist work back with her to San Diego, where she organized a march/rally in January 2023 as part of the national Women’s March.

Wendy Murphy , J.D. is an impact litigator specializing in women’s and children’s civil and constitutional rights. She won landmark Title IX cases against Harvard, Harvard Law, and Princeton between 1992 and 2010 that led to the revolutionary 2011 Dear Colleague letter; and sued the Trump and Biden Administrations in federal court to advance women’s rights. She also won landmark cases to improve privacy rights for women crime victims and testimonial rights for disabled crime victims. She is adjunct professor of sexual violence law and law reform at New England Law Boston where she directs the Women’s and Children’s Advocacy Project under the Center for Law and Social Responsibility. She is well known for her legal advocacy in support of the Equal Rights Amendment.  See our ERA-FIST brochure, “Why We Need the ERA” on which Wendy collaborated, and her book, From Suffrage to Inequality.

Ann Menasche is a San Diego civil rights attorney, grassroots activist, lesbian, and long-time feminist who is a founding member and co-coordinator of the national radical feminist organization, Feminists in Struggle. She is also co-chair of the Green Alliance for Sex-Based RIghts. She has fought for access to safe legal abortion in the years before Roe and in the decades that followed. In the 1980’s she led a landmark case against an anti-abortion center or “fake clinic” for consumer fraud and won. She also helped organize Marches for Women’s Lives in San Francisco that drew tens of thousands of people. Ann was recently fired from her civil rights job for asserting that abortion bans harm women as a sex and has filed a wrongful termination law suit against her previous employer as a result.

JOIN US FOR THIS IMPORTANT DISCUSSION!

FIST’S Ann Menasche Files Suit Against Former Employer for Wrongful Discharge, Discrimination, and Retaliation

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On January 26, 2023, Ann Menasche filed suit in San Diego Superior Court against her former employer, Disability Rights California, for wrongful termination, sex and sexual orientation discrimination, and retaliation.  She claims she was fired for declaring that “safe legal abortion is a life-and-death issue for women as a sex”  and for supporting the maintenance of sex and sexual orientation as protected characteristics under law.  For this she was labelled a “TERF” and a bigot and a few days later and without warning, fired.

Feminists in Struggle and allies have initiated a Justice for Ann Committee that is working with others on getting media and garnering support for Ann’s case.   The case is the first in the U.S. to challenge in court the silencing and no-platforming of feminists through targeting their livelihoods.  In the U.K. there have been several cases including that of Maya Forstater and Allison Bailey that led to successful outcomes for the women and helped lessen the fear women have of their gender critical views becoming known.

To get more details about Ann’s case, go to defendfeminists.net where you can view the summary of the Complaint, or sign on as an endorser of the Statement of Solidarity.

FIST Speaks at Abortion Rights March in San Diego

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On January 22, 2023, the 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, Ann Menasche, member of the Coordinating Committee of FIST, spoke at a San Diego rally for abortion rights.  Ann framed the abortion issue as one of women’s rights, called for the restoration of abortion rights in all 50 states and that women rely on ourselves and not the politicians to win back our rights.   She was well received by the crowd. The spirited demonstration of a few hundred was organized quickly by grassroots feminist activists when the Women’s March failed to organize anything locally. FIST also distributed 60 half page flyers with our statement on abortion rights on one side and our thirteen principles on the other.  The rally was followed by a march through downtown San Diego.   San Diego FIST members and supporters look forward to future local feminist work.

Building Hope for the New Year

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It’s been a tough year for women’s rights.  We lost abortion rights (even though access had been eroded for years) when the decision in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health was issued this past June with our reactionary Supreme Court overturning Roe vs. Wade and 50 years of precedent to give a green light to states to outlaw abortion.  Now 13 states ban all or virtually all abortions and only 17 states and the District of Columbia broadly protect abortion rights. No doubt, many women’s lives and liberty now hang in the balance.

Meanwhile, the Biden Administration has continued to fight in the courts against adding the Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution, even though already ratified by the requisite 38 states. See Maura Casey’s article, Publish ERA, let skirmishes begin and watch Equal Means Equal’s video: Joe, Do It!

The ERA would establish sex as a protected category, with the same weight as race, which would make it far easier to challenge all kinds of discriminatory practices in every state in the union, including jobs discrimination, violence against women, and yes, abortion bans. See and share our Why We Need the ERA brochure.

And then the coordinated worldwide effort to deny the existence of sex, and to remove sex-based protections including the ability of women to organize against our oppression and to even have language to talk about ourselves, has continued apace in 2022.  California passed two horrific bills this year, SB 923 and SB107 and would respectively indoctrinate the medical and mental health professions in gender identity ideology and make the state a magnet for minors seeking sterilizing and mutilating so-called “gender affirming care.”  See our post about these dangerous bills.

Indoctrination in our schools and universities is endemic.  Feminists are losing jobs and livelihoods and facing civil rights complaints for refusing to deny the existence of two biological sexes. A lesbian in Norway was even facing criminal charges and up to three years in prison for supposed “hate speech” for stating that men could neither be lesbians or mothers.

And most recently, Scotland passed a gender self-ID law, the Gender Recognition Reform Bill, that will allow any male, including convicted sex offenders, to enter women’s spaces and programs simply on his say-so, disregarding concerns about women’s safety.

So, there is plenty of reason to despair.  But there is also reason to hope.

Women can and are fighting back.  Women in Scotland protested and sang a rendition of Auld Lang Syne outside of parliament during the vote, “women’s rights are human rights.”  Their struggle is not over.

Rise-Up for Abortion Rights has done amazing organizing in response to the overturning of Roe.

Two women who challenged their sacking in the UK for their gender critical views were vindicated in court:  Allison Bailey  and Maya Forstater.

Our Duty, a non-partisan group of parents opposing child medical transition, organized a successful “First Do No Harm Unity Rally” of 100 people in Anaheim California in front of a national convention of pediatricians.  The central organizer is a mother, lawyer, and liberal Democrat.  The Tavistock Gender Clinic in the UK has been shuttered following the investigation headed up by Dr. Hilary Cass revealing dangerous invasive procedures being recommended for gender dysphoric youth with little screening or oversight.

And then there are the women of Iran, who are leading a struggle against an extremely repressive and misogynist fundamentalist regime.  In response to the death of a young woman, Mahsa Amini, in custody of the morals police for not wearing her headscarf properly, and at great risk to themselves, our Iranian sisters have poured out into the streets again and again.

The song, Baraye, has been the anthem of the protests:

For the sake of dancing in the street

For the fear felt in the moment of kissing

For my sister your sister, our sisters

For changing the rotten minds

For shame, for pennilessness

For the yearning for an ordinary life

For the sake of the children that mine the garbage and their dreams…

For women, life, liberty

 

For women, life, liberty!  If they can do it, we can do it!

Happy New Year, sisters!

JUSTICE FOR ANN MENASCHE – SIGN THE SOLIDARITY STATEMENT!

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Ann Menasche was fired from her job of 20 years for asserting that abortion bans harm women as a sex.  Find out more about her story here: Justice for Ann Menasche – Defend Feminists!

We urge everyone to sign a Statement of Solidarity in support of Ann and share it with everyone who supports maintaining sex as a protected category under law, and the rights of employees to their own political opinions and activities independent of their employer.

 

Ann Menasche comments on sex-denialism

Forum on the New McCarthyism Targeting Feminists’ Jobs and Livelihoods, Saturday Dec. 10th

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THE NEW McCARTHYISM: THE ATTACK ON FEMINISTS' JOBS AND LIVELIHOODS

THE NEW McCARTHYISM: THE ATTACK ON FEMINISTS’ JOBS AND LIVELIHOODS is the title of our next Feminist Forum, which will be held on Saturday, December 10th at 1:00 p.m. Pacific Time, 4:00 Eastern on Zoom.

In the 1950’s it was “the Red Scare.” In the second decade of the 21st century, the methods are the same but the target is different: feminists and others who do not agree with gender identity orthodoxy that conflates sex and gender and denies the existence of biological sex.

JOIN US FOR THIS IMPORTANT DISCUSSION ON HOW WE CAN PUT AN END TO THIS WITCH HUNT SO THAT WOMEN CAN STATE OUR OPINIONS AND FIGHT FOR OUR SEX-BASED RIGHTS WITHOUT FEAR!

SPEAKERS:

Christy Hammer is a sociologist with a 35-year university teaching career, and currently an associate professor of education at the University of Southern Maine. After telling her graduate students that there were only two biological sexes (with variations), students walked out of her classroom, demanded she recant, and sought to get her fired all in the name of “restorative justice”. One trans-identified student who felt personally attacked, filed a Title IX sexual harassment/discrimination complaint against her, which was summarily dismissed by the University counsel. Christy has a long history working in LGBTQ youth advocacy, and in promoting anti-racism in schools. What happened to Christy was described by others as an example of the “woke attacking the woke.”

Ann Menasche is a radical feminist, Leftist, lesbian, and founding member of Feminists in Struggle (FIST).  She was fired without warning last May from her job of 20 years as a Civil Rights attorney at Disability Rights California for asserting that abortion bans harm women as a sex, and for her FIST activity outside of work. The executive director had issued a statement opposing the threatened overturning of Roe and asked for staff feedback. DRC’s statement had mentioned every group that could be harmed by illegal abortion except women. After stating an obvious truth, Ann faced an onslaught of name-calling and slurs, and was condemned in absentia as having opinions “inconsistent with the values of the agency”.  For more on this story, see Defend Feminists

Everyone, women and men, are welcome to attend this forum!

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Update on the Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights #Riverside8

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We have learned that some of the defendants targeted by the Riverside Police and D.A. have had the charges dropped against them for felony vandalism (for writing a message in chalk!), and that the charges have been reduced for the others.  It is still imperative that Mike Hestrin, Riverside D.A., hear from us.  Please call him at 951.955.5400 and tweet him @DA_MikeHestrin and @RivCoDA and demand that these outrageous charges against peaceful protesters expressing their First Amendment rights be dropped!

Drop the Charges Against the Abortion Rights Demonstrators in Riverside!

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This letter was sent to the District Attorney in Riverside on October 3, 2022:

Mike Hestrin
Office of the District Attorney
County of Riverside
3960 Orange Street
Riverside, CA 92501

Dear Mr. Hestrin:

We are writing to you on behalf of the national feminist organization, Feminists in Struggle (FIST), to demand that all charges be dropped against those arrested at a RiseUp4AbortionRights demonstration on July 30, 2022, in Riverside, CA and who will be arraigned on October 6.

These arrestees were protesting nonviolently for the basic human right of women to control their own bodies and access abortion, and against the recent outrageous decision by the Supreme Court to overturn this Constitutional right guaranteed by Roe v. Wade.

Women throughout the country are watching the disposition of these cases and are alerting local politicians in your area as to the importance of these charges being dropped. Our right to peacefully protest is guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution and we expect that right to be respected by your office.

Thank you for your immediate attention to this urgent issue.

Sincerely,

Ann Menasche
For Feminists in Struggle

WE ASK EVERYONE TO CALL THE RIVERSIDE DA’S OFFICE AT  951.955.5400 AND TWEET THEM @DA_MikeHestrin and @rivcoda TO DROP THE CHARGES AGAINST THE #RIVERSIDE8!!  You may also email the DA’s office at: inquiries@rivcoda.org

Why We Need the ERA!

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The ERA would end women’s second-class citizenship by finally giving women equal standing in the federal CONSTITUTION, thus would ensure women’s equal TREATMENT under all laws, regulations, and policies of state and federal governments.

The ERA would afford women equal treatment under the DUE PROCESS CLAUSE and the EQUAL PROTECTION CLAUSE, which affect all other rights including everything from obtaining a dog license to the First Amendment, LIBERTY, etc. These fundamental constitutional rights ensure that all people enjoy the most basic freedoms: autonomy, self-determination, authority over the self,  bodily integrity, etc. Without the ERA, women cannot be assured that any rights will apply equally to them.

The ERA would require courts to use strict scrutiny when reviewing claims involving different treatment of women. Without the ERA, courts are allowed to use only intermediate scrutiny, which, unlike strict scrutiny, permits infringements on rights.

The ERA would protect abortion rights and literally save women’s lives by making it clear in the text of the Constitution, for the first time in history, that women are fully equal persons who can no longer be subjected to unequal treatment under any laws, including abortion laws.

The ERA would allow us to fight and reverse any sex discriminatory state or federal law, regulation or policy. The ERA specifically states that the Congress may pass legislation to enforce the ERA, which would mean Civil Rights laws would be amended to ensure women’s equal legal stature. Without the ERA women do not enjoy equal treatment under civil rights laws. For example, aside from employment, women are excluded from Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. ERA would fix this

Under the ERA and strict scrutiny, women would still enjoy separate spaces and sex-based preferences that serve a compelling state interest, such as a need to address a history of discrimination.

The ERA would allow women to sue the government for unequal enforcement of rape and domestic violence laws, bias against women in family court, and courts enforcing laws requiring equal pay for women would have to construe the word equal to mean actually equal. Without the ERA courts can interpret laws requiring equal treatment to mean something less than fully equal. The ERA would enable women to assert stronger legal arguments against the commodification of women by surrogacy, pornography, prostitution, and sex trafficking.  

According to Wendy Murphy, attorney for Equal Means Equal, “The ERA is more desperately needed in 2022 than ever before because of Dobbs” (the decision that overturned Roe). “Women’s pervasive status as second-class citizens enabled the Supreme Court to cavalierly take away all personhood rights of pregnant women. Women are literally the lifeblood of this nation, yet they are vulnerable to dystopian court rulings solely because they lack basic equality in the Constitution. The only solution is to fix the Constitution. The ERA does that.”

The ERA was ratified by the 38th state in January of 2020 and is now the law of the land, but, just like the Trump Administration, the Biden Administration is blocking the ERA from being published in the Constitution. Biden is also fighting against the ERA in federal court the same way Trump did.    #PublishERANow!

Four lawsuits are currently pending in NY, MI, RI and DC that seek to validate the ERA. The DC case is scheduled for oral arguments at:

DC Circuit Court of Appeals on September 28th.

WHAT YOU CAN DO: 

  • Come to DC and help us protest Joe Biden’s opposition to Women’s equality. WE DEMAND EQUALITY NOW!!
  • Call/text the White House Comment Line: 800-456-1111
  • Tweet #PublishERANow!  @SCOTUS and @JoeBiden
  • Call your Senators and urge them to demand Biden publish the ERA!!

Distribute our ERA-FIST brochure

Title IX Proposed Rule to Include “Gender Identity” as a Protected Class

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Feminists in Struggle opposes the Department of Education’s proposed regulations to include “gender identity” as a protected class.  Here is our comment that we posted on the DOE site:

Agency: DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION (ED)
Document Type: Proposed Rule
Title: Nondiscrimination on the Basis of Sex in Education Programs or Activities Receiving Federal Financial Assistance
Document ID: ED-2021-OCR-0166-0001

Comment:
We concur with the points made by the Green Alliance for Sex-Based Rights, comment tracking #l7q-x20e-f2rc. “Gender identity” is an entirely subjective experience that has no objective reality, is based on the mistaken notion that one can change one’s sex, and militates against the rights of women and girls to define themselves as a class based on sex. Recognizing “gender identity” undermines the entire purpose of Title IX, to ensure parity and fairness in academics and sports for females. Allowing “gender identity” to be a protected category essentially allows males to “identify” their way into women’s and girls’ spaces and programs, defeating the purpose of addressing disparity between males and females, making females, the underclass, bow to the demands of the privileged class (males), and disregards females’ particular needs for safety, privacy, and dignity by allowing males to invade locker rooms, bathrooms, and other spaces women and girls need in order to be safe from the male gaze and from harassment and assault. It is unconscionable to put females in this position in order to appease the demands of a vocal minority.

For more information, see:  Senator Condemns Biden’s Proposed Title IX Rule and AG O’Connor opposes U.S. Dept. of Education’s proposed regulations redefining “sex”