[[link removed]] Ms. Memo: This Week in Women's Rights
September 27, 2023
From the ongoing fight for abortion rights and access, to elections, to the drive for the Equal Rights Amendment, there are a multitude of battles to keep up with. In this weekly roundup, find the absolute need-to-know news for feminists.
The Supreme Court’s Blindness to Gender Violence [[link removed]]
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Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) announces a joint resolution to affirm the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment on Jan. 31, 2023 in Washington, D.C. In April, she also filed a discharge petition, which seeks to compel the House of Representatives to vote on H.J. Res. 25 to remove the arbitrary deadline for ratification. (Drew Angerer / Getty Images)
BY VICTORIA F. NOURSE |If you thought the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade was the end of the Court’s war on women, think again. Now gender violence laws are under attack. Case in point: last term’s decision in Counterman v. Colorado striking down a stalking conviction as unconstitutional. This upcoming term, the Court is poised to deal another blow to domestic violence laws, in a case about guns: United States v. Rahimi.
Though the Court drapes its opinions in the language of liberalism—of free speech and rights—the result is the same: The Constitution somehow becomes the enemy of popular laws devised to protect women. The only way to push back against these Court rulings is for Congress to take the steps necessary to affirm the Equal Rights Amendment.
The petitioner in Counterman, Billy Raymond Counterman, sent at least hundreds of Facebook messages to C.W., a local musician in Denver whom he had never met. Some of the messages were deemed “prosaic” by the Court, like when he wrote, “Good Morning Sweetheart.”
Then there were messages showing Counterman was surveilling C.W.: “Was that you in the white Jeep?” and “A fine display with your partner.”
And then there were the death threats: “Fuck off permanently”; “Staying in cyber life is going to kill you”; and “You’re not being good for human relations. Die.”
Not surprisingly, a Colorado jury convicted Counterman of stalking.
But the Supreme Court reversed Counterman’s conviction based on the First Amendment. Traditionally, the First Amendment has had an exception for “true threats.” Many laws criminalize threats: Threaten the president, for example, and that is a federal felony. No one thinks those laws violate the First Amendment. Most of our laws against hate crimes, along with civil rights laws, employ the legal standard of true threats (for instance, a white supremacist saying, “We will kill you if you vote”). Yet the Supreme Court found Colorado’s stalking law unconstitutional because it would “chill” speech.
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A Government Shutdown Would Be Deadly for Hungry and Food-Insecure Americans [[link removed]] As Abortion Returns to the Supreme Court, It’s Critical to See the Bigger Picture [[link removed]]
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Texas’ Voter Suppression Law Is on Trial [[link removed]] New England Advocates Build a Regional Model for Abortion Rights [[link removed]]
What we're reading
Because it's hard to keep up with everything going on in the world right now. Here's what we're reading this week:
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[link removed] [[link removed]] Tune in for a new episode of Ms. magazine's podcast, On the Issues with Michele Goodwin on Apple Podcasts [[link removed]] + Spotify [[link removed]] .
Fifty years ago, hip-hop emerged from a party in the rec room of a Bronx building—and a new sound was born: one with roots in African music, but with its own vibe and messaging. Since its first iterations, women have played significant roles in the creation and evolution of hip-hop: as rappers, DJs, producers, breakdancers, graffiti artists, scholars, journalists and more. Michele Goodwin , Drew Dixon and Janell Hobson break down the past, present and future of hip-hop, and the crucial role of women.
We hope you'll listen, subscribe, rate and review today!
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