-Remember when America was female?
-Will Jack Johnson finally be pardoned from his Mann Act conviction?
-A disabled feminist talks back.
-A look inside the Hull House exhibit.
-Hysteria and modern medicine.
-The 16-Inch Waist Of Émilie Marie Bouchaud.
-Using your sperm in a grad school art project is probably not a good idea.
-Which area of the U.S. has the highest HIV infection rates? (Hint: The same region that lacks adequate sex education curriculum).
-The Holocaust just got more shocking.
-Screw the stereotype: Why feminists need to stay angry.
-A love letter between two WWII soldiers.
-Battered skulls reveal Stone-Age women lived in a violent world.
About damn time! Despite its bi-partisan support from its inception in 1994, the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) lapsed in 2012. Republicans and Democrats engaged in an intense debate on the terms of the bill as did the rest of the country. But on February 28, 2013, the House of Representatives renewed it. Not the watered down one. They passed the all-inclusive VAWA that provides resources for Native American, immigrant, and LGBT victims. Now we can continue the fight against domestic violence without regressing decades in the larger campaign for women’s rights. While most agree much more has to be done to end the violence, governmental intervention through VAWA is crucial to solving the problem.
-Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is not amused by your 19th-century parlor games.
-1960s Playboy Bunny recruitment brochure.
‘-Downton’ house may reveal lost history.
-Why black dolls matter.
-Back when Catholic universities supported birth control.
-Which state has the highest anti-depressant use?
Prompted by the UN Committee against Torture in 2011 to set up an inquiry, the Irish government has released a report on State collusion with the Catholic Church in the treatment of girls and women in the work houses known as the Magdalene Laundries. These Laundries were run by four Roman Catholic orders of nuns.
The laundries were institutions started by the Catholic Church in 1922, in which thousands of vulnerable women were incarcerated. While in reality those sent to the laundries were products of poverty, homelessness, and dysfunctional families, the myth of the “bad girl” and “fallen woman” sent to the laundries to reform has persisted. Those that were sent to these institutions spent months or years in hard labour, with no access to education, little respect and in many cases lived in constant fear. Work included doing laundry for hotels, hospitals and prisons.
-Syphilis and prosthetic noses.
-Early-twentieth century crusade against kissing.
-The ideal women circa 1926.
-A new SARS-like virus?
-Nineteenth century Mormon courtship.
-A very fun time-lapse drawing of the history of music.
-Did Shakespeare have syphilis?
-Poverty in 1960s Appalachia.
-Twitter can help track diseases.
-Identity of famous 19th-century brain discovered.
-FDR didn’t have polio!?
-The biggest poisoning in history.
-16th century warfare apparently included cats . . .with bombs attached to their backs.
-America’s long and complicated history with guns.
-Is an antibiotic apocalypse imminent?
-We can now encode Shakespeare in DNA (How cool and weird is that?).
-Scientists tell us: Sex with condoms is pleasurable.
Today is NARAL’s annual Blog for Choice day, which falls this year on the 40th anniversary of the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade. One this day, NARAL invites bloggers and activists to get people to talk about reproductive rights online. By participating in Blog for Choice day, we join NARAL’s mission to “let readers and the mainstream media know that a woman’s right to choose is a core progressive value that must be protected.” NARAL’s deliberate decision to retain the word “choice” is quite a contrast to Planned Parenthood’s commemoration of Roe’s 40th anniversary. In advance of this event, Planned Parenthood launched a new campaign, Not in Her Shoes which seeks to move beyond labels in the abortion debate:
Some political observers have pointed out how President Obama’s second inaugural address contained plenty of memorable lines. The President’s affirmation of women’s rights, civil rights, and gay rights, via his Seneca Falls, Selma, and Stonewall allusions, does not just stand out as an impressive use of lyrical alliteration; it represents the acknowledgement of Obama’s electoral coalition. Also, Obama’s nod serves as a ringing validation of the same manifestations of “identity politics” that some critics have chided while lamenting the fate of the U.S. Left after the 1960s. Obama’s adoption of the rhetoric in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution highlights feminists’, civil rights advocates’, and gay rights activists’ efforts to expand democracy by forcing the nation to live by its own creed articulated in the founding documents.