Daily Feminist News: This Week

Michigan Supreme Court Denies Health Insurance to Same-Sex Partners

5/9/2008 - The Michigan Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that local and state institutions cannot provide health insurances for partners of employees in same-sex relationships. The Associated Press reports that the decision was a result of Michigan’s 2004 ban on same-sex marriage.

Tom Patrick, one of the plaintiffs filing a suit with the American Civil Liberties Union against the ruling, told the Detroit Free Press, "I think it’s a sad day in Michigan when we decide which children and families are valuable enough to cover."

Many public employers, such as University of Michigan and Michigan State, affected by the court’s decision have revised their health benefits policies to avoid having to cut benefits to same-sex couples.

Detroit Police Department's Pregnancy Policies Determined Discriminatory

5/9/2008 - The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) recently upheld Officer Tisha Prater's complaint against Detroit Police Department's pregnancy policies. Pregnant police officers in Detroit are forced to go on unpaid leave when they reveal their pregnancies and are denied light-duty work.

The Detroit News reports that Officer Prater was forced to hide her pregnancy by wearing a girdle and by saying her morning sickness was the result of late nights drinking. After capturing a suspect following a foot chase at three months pregnant, Officer Prater said she could no longer hide her pregnancy for fear of harming her baby.

Officer Prater decided to file a complaint with the EEOC instead of submitting to unpaid leave. The EEOC found that Officer Prater was "forced to take a leave of absence because of her sex," reports the Daily Women's Health Policy Report.

Officer Terry Hardy, Officer Prater's scout car partner, told the Detroit News, "I was just so glad when she took it up in her mind to go ahead and fight. It's just not fair that women want to have families and they have to be stressed out about where their paycheck is coming from."

Similar cases of pregnant police officers, such as Officer Sonia Henriques in New Jersey, being denied light-duty work are the result of the lack of women-friendly policies in police departments.

Anti-Affirmative Action Ballot Initiative Defeated in Missouri

5/8/2008 - The campaign to place a ban on affirmative action on Missouri's November state ballot failed to produce enough signatures by the required deadline on Sunday. The so-called "Missouri Civil Rights Initiative," would have banned affirmative action for women and people of color in public education, public employment, and public contracting.

"I think Missourians spoke loudly and clearly and rejected this initiative, and rejected the politics that it represents. I think this taught us that real grass-roots efforts can yield results even in the face of well-financed, monied interest," said Brandon Davis, a spokesman Working to Empower Community Action Now, a coalition of labor unions and worker advocates that began organizing last year against the initiative, reports the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Missouri is one of five states that Ward Connerly targeted with anti-affirmative action ballot initiatives. The measure has also been defeated in Oklahoma. It was approved for the ballot in Colorado, and the campaigns continue in Nebraska and Arizona, according to Inside Higher Ed.

Feminist Candidates Win Key Victories in Primaries

5/8/2008 - Feminist candidates won key victories in the Indiana and North Carolina primaries this week. In Indiana, Jill Long Thompson won the tight gubernatorial Democratic primary against Jim Schellinger. Thompson is a 3 term former congresswoman for Indiana's 4th District, and was a US Under-Secretary of Agriculture from 1995 to 2001. She will face Republican incumbent Governor Mitch Daniels in a race which is touted as a toss-up.

In North Carolina, Bev Perdue won the gubernatorial Democratic primary with 56.1% of the vote against two male candidates. Perdue is currently serving as Lt. Governor of North Carolina. Prior to her election as Lt. Governor, Perdue served in the North Carolina House of Representatives for two terms and the North Carolina Senate for five terms. She will face Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory (R) in the general election.

Kay Hagen won the Democratic primary for the US Senate race in North Carolina, collecting 60.2% of the vote. Hagen served five terms as a member of the North Carolina State Senate. This race is considered to be in the top 10 most competitive Senate races for the 2008 election. She will face conservative Republican incumbent Elizabeth Dole.

Pregnant Police Officer Request to Go on Light Duty Granted

5/8/2008 - Officer Sonia Henriques's request to be assigned to light duty due to her pregnancy will be granted, ending days of controversy. Ocean Township Police Chief Antonio Amodio originally denied Henriques's request, even though office jobs were available at police headquarters. Office Henriques was told to either continue working as she always has or take an unpaid leave of absence, reports the Associated Press. The decision caused outrage on the behalf of the decorated officer and calls for more reasonable maternity policies in police departments.

Dr. Fabrice Czarnecki of the Police Policy Studies Council wrote a report about the hazards that could affect pregnant police officers. She writes, "The work of pregnant officers should be adapted to decrease the risk for trauma, whether it results from assaults or accidents, which would expose the mother and the fetus. Typically, the patrol position is the most vulnerable position and should be avoided during pregnancy."

Outdated policies or the lack of policies concerning pregnancy and policing stem from the fact that policing is a male-dominated profession. The National Center for Women and Policing, a division of FMF, reports that in order to obtain higher levels of recruitment and retention of women, police departments must have more women-friendly policies, like pregnancy policies.

Karen J. Kruger, senior assistant county attorney in Harford County, Maryland, calls for favorable pregnancy policies in her article (see PDF on pregnancy and policing, writing, "It is critical, then, for the continued success of the profession that law enforcement agencies recruit and retain women to serve as police officers."

Officer Henriques was awarded a medal of valor for diffusing a violent situation in December.

Kansas Supreme Court Limits Grand Jury’s Power in Dr Tiller Case

5/7/2008 - The Kansas Supreme Court determined guidelines today to limit the power of the grand jury investigating the case of Dr George Tiller, a late term abortion provider from Wichita. Dr. Tiller has been fighting the grand jury subpoena of private medical records of some 2,000 of his patients.

The Center for Reproductive Rights issued a press release in which Bonnie Scott Jones, lead attorney on the case and senior staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights said, "We are extremely pleased that the court protected the patients' privacy rights and ordered the lower court to control the citizens-petitioned grand jury. The legal system should not be hijacked by abortion opponents as a tool of harassment against an abortion provider. The lower court must now balance the grand jury's need for records against the profound intrusion upon Dr. Tiller's patients. If the court finds that the grand jury is justified in obtaining some of these records, there are a number of protective steps that absolutely must be taken before those records are turned over."

The Associated Press reports that the Kansas Supreme Court did not quash the subpoenas or strike down the law allowing Kansas citizen’s to convene a grand jury. However, it did rule that the grand jury cannot engage in a "fishing expedition" into women's private medical records.

Feminist Videos on YouTube

5/7/2008 - Videos from the Ms Forum on International Family Planning are now available on YouTube. The Feminist Majority Foundation's YouTube Channel now features videos from last week's Forum, as well as FMF's This is What a Feminist Looks Like video and archive video from the 2007 National Young Women's Leadership Conference.

The Feminist Daily Newswire is also expanding to Twitter. News stories will be posted daily on the Feminist News Twitter page.

Women's Group Holds Bike Ride for Peace across the Middle East

5/7/2008 - Hundreds of women activists are participating in a 12-day bicycle ride across the Middle East to campaign for peace. Follow the Women, a group of 500 women from over 40 countries devoted to supporting peace and ending violence in the Middle East, are hosting the 2008 Pedal for Peace in the Middle East fro May 3 to May 14 this year.

The bike ride began in Beirut, Lebanon, and will ride to Syria, Jordan, and Palestine, visiting Iraqi and Palestinian refugee camps along the way.

Detta Regan, a U.S. citizen participating in the bike ride, told DPA, "We are here to tell the women in the region that we want them to live with their families in peace."

The Associated Press reports that this is Follow the Women's fourth annual bike ride for peace.

Anti-Choice Groups Launch Deceptive Campaign against Oral Contraceptives

5/6/2008 - Anti-choice extremist group the American Life League launched a campaign against oral contraceptives that will culminate with protests on June 7 outside clinics that distribute birth control. The Pill Kills Babies falsely labels oral contraceptives as abortificants, claiming that oral contraceptives are the same as abortion except that it "kills a preborn baby" earlier.

Reproductive Health Reality Check points out the disturbing lies that the campaign proclaims. The American Life League falsely claims that the pill is dangerous to women's health because it causes breast cancer, cervical cancer, infertility, birth defects, and "much more."

The anti-choice extremist groups chose June 7 as the protest day because it is the anniversary of the 1965 Griswold v. Connecticut case that overturned a Connecticut law banning the use of contraceptives on the basis of marital privacy.

According to RH Reality Check, the anti-choice extremists claim that "attempting to prevent abortion is abortion too."

Students Protest University Honoring Notorious Anti-Feminist

5/6/2008 - Students at Washington University in St Louis are organizing in protest of the University's plans to honor notorious anti-feminist Phyllis Schlafly with an honorary doctorate degree at the school's commencement ceremony May 16. Students have set up a Facebook group protesting the decision titled No Honorary Doctorate for Anti-Feminist Phyllis Schlafly, which 1,219 people have joined since the University announced the plans last week.

Faculty members, graduate and undergraduate students, and community members met on Monday to begin plans for protesting the decision, raising student awareness of Schlafly's extremist views, such as her claim that married women cannot be raped, and informing the community and media of dissatisfaction over the University's decision, reports Student Life.

"The University has completely disregarded the concerns about anybody who cares about full and equal rights for women, who cares about the intellectual quality of feminist debate, and who cares about women’s desire to enter the work force," said Mary Ann Dzuback, director of Women's and Gender Studies at Washington University, reports Insider Higher Ed.

Malaysia Rejects Plans of Travel Restrictions for Women

5/6/2008 - The Malaysian government rejected a proposal on Monday that would require women traveling outside of the country to have a letter from their parents or employers verifying the women's reasons for traveling. Women's groups denounced the proposal as an infringement of human rights. Their outcry prompted Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to announce that the proposal for the travel restrictions will not be implemented.

Ivy Josiah, executive director of Malaysia’s Women’s Aid Organisation told Al Jazeera, "The underlying assumption here is that women are weak and incompetent. It is a condescending idea and an unfair approach towards protecting women. The focus should be on creating awareness on the dangers of drug trafficking instead of singling out women and restricting their movement."

According to The Malaysian Star, the proposal was suggested to combat drug trafficking. Reuters reports that of 119 criminal cases of Malaysian women abroad, 90 percent of those were linked to drugs.

Home Minister Syed Hamid Albar told the Associated Press, "How can we ask an adult person to report to the mother or to her parents? They have to lead their own lives."

Kansas Senate Attempted Override of Anti-abortion Bill Veto Fails

5/5/2008 - An attempt by Republican lawmakers in the Kansas Senate to override Governor Kathleen Sebelius's veto of an anti-abortion bill failed last week. Sebelius vetoed a measure that would have imposed more restrictions on abortion providers, and would have allowed family members of patients to sue if they think a doctor had performed or was about to perform an illegal late-term abortion. The bill would have also endangered patient privacy, allowing prosecutors to access medical records in order to investigate reports of alleged violations of abortion law.

The Kansas Senate voted 25-14 in favor of overriding the Governor's veto, two votes shy of the two-thirds majority required, reports the Associated Press.

"We are delighted that women's health and safety has been upheld in Kansas and that women will be able to make those health care decisions for themselves," said Julie Burkhart, chief executive for ProKanDo, a leading state pro-choice group, according to the Wichita Eagle.

Appeals Court Maintains Injunction on Emergency Contraception Access

5/5/2008 - In a split decision last week, the Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals denied requests from state officials, women’s and civil rights groups to block a preliminary injunction allowing pharmacists in Washington to continue to refuse to fill prescriptions for emergency contraception while they appeal the decision. The injunction suspended a state Board of Pharmacy rule that established a duty for pharmacies to fill prescriptions for EC and other prescriptions.

Two pharmacists and a pharmacy owner filed a lawsuit against the rules last July, claiming that requiring pharmacies to dispense EC is a violation of civil rights. Under the injunction, pharmacists and pharmacies can continue to refuse to sell EC because of so-called "religious objections." Some pharmacists still refer to EC as an "abortive agent" even though research shows it will not affect a woman who is already pregnant.

The court did grant the motion to speed up the appellate proceedings; oral arguments will be heard June 3 in Seattle, reports Reuters.

UN Official Says Women Hold Key to Solving Global Food Crisis

5/5/2008 - United Nations Deputy Secretary Genreal Asha-Rose Migiro said last week that women can contribute the most to finding a solution to the global food crisis. The UN News Service reports that Deputy Secretary-General gave voice to women’s importance to solving the global food crisis in an address to the Women’s Foreign Policy Group in New York.

According to a UN press release, food prices have risen 55 percent from June 2007 to February 2008, including an 87 percent increase in the cost of rice in March. The increase is a result of many factors including higher oil prices, harvests harmed by increasingly severe weather, and biofuel production. Women have been among the hardest hit by the increase in food prices in part because they represent between 40 and 80 percent of farmers in the developing world, reports Women's eNews.

Women's access to land, capitol, and technology is very limited, contributing to the effects of the global food crisis. A study released April 21 by the UN Food and Agriculture Association revealed that women cannot profit from biofuel production, one of the causes of the food crisis, because of their lack of access to land, capitol, and technology. If women did have access, according to Women’s eNews, the worst effects of the global food crisis could have been prevented.

Deputy Secretary-General Migiro told the UN News Service, "We need to do much more...to empower women. Women can drive the Green Revolution in Africa. They hold the key to breaking out of the food crisis; to educating the young; to peace, progress and prosperity."