A century after women’s suffrage we have seen a number of waves of feminism amidst great social upheaval and progress concerning women’s rights. Today, Lierre Keith and Melinda Hughes join me to discuss the topic of feminism and women’s human rights, as they carry the ideas and practices forward in hopes of a better future for women, for children, and for all.
The current social milieu in the United States is of great concern as a cultural war has escalated and with serious consequences for society such as violence towards women, including lack of control over their bodies and reproduction, an opioid crisis that affects almost everyone, political upheaval, and an increasing ecological crisis along with international war. These conditions make it difficult, if not impossible at times, for the most important topics to get through and to reach the national dialogue.
Currently, there is also an additional insidious matter concerning how women are labeled or categorized, not based on biology, but on personal feelings. The consequences for women objectively can be dire as biological males can assume a gender identity and then move into normal women’s areas of society and functions including bathrooms, sports and others.
Overall, I think during these kinds of social upheaval, there is typically an overall epistemic crisis of ignorance mixed with hate as power shifts within a society, and particularly in the U.S. driven by extremes in wealth and inequality and great power.
As social media entered society in the 2000s and began to spread, the landscape of discussion has changed dramatically, or transformed, as a large number of the world’s population have digital access and participate in social media. Some of the positive outcomes have been to raise awareness such as #MeToo and have empowered women to be able to speak about their lives and experiences and demand changes in society. This discussion went to global dimensions and made significant advances to regulate power dynamics. Also, technology has enabled misogyny to spread and for those views normally censured to coalesce into gross distortions of free speech including threat, where anti-feminism and fear-mongering are gaining traction.
Lierre and Melinda discuss the real outcomes of such online organizing by misogynists as they recount the threats and subsequent violent attacks on their group when they were organizing to speak at a library in Portland, Oregon.
A member of their group suffered a broken hand, others were sprayed in their eyes with chemical spray (bear mace perhaps), and they were beaten. An elderly woman not associated with the activists was knocked to the ground and library employees were attacked. While adjusting some tactics, the activists remain firmly resolute, even empowered in their commitment to challenge such violence directed at women in society and working on education for the dismantling of harmful social structures arrayed against women. Progress is being made as some of their work has been quoted as part of legal proceedings in court and they hope that the issues make it to the US Supreme Court eventually.
Lierre Keith and Melinda Hughes also take a perspective from ecological feminism challenging not only society but also human ecology in its current state and have been significant in educating us about the Great Acceleration or the Anthropocene and the potential outcome of civilization. Ecofeminism is at the forefront of feminism today showing the connections between patriarchal systems in civilization and subsequent environmental exploitation. We can hope that the bridges of dialogue can be built and the amplification of women’s voices can be heard and heeded where systemic and individual change can occur.
Lierre Keith is the author of Bright Green Lies (Monkfish Publishers) and a long-time activist. She is the founder of the Women's Liberation Front.
Melinda Hughes is a nurse working in psychiatric medicine and a long-time activist for women's human rights.
Layne Hartsell, MSc, PhD is a member of the Korea IT Times Board and is currently a research professor at the Asia Institute, Berlin/Tokyo. He has been a research professor at Sungkyunkwan University and the Advanced Institute of Nanotechnology, Sookmyung Women’s University, and Chulalongkorn University where he focuses on energy, economy, and environment.
