Recently in Women of Color Category
I wish I was shocked by this.
A prominent South Carolina Republican killed his Facebook page Sunday after being caught likening the First Lady to an escaped gorilla.Commenting on a report posted to Facebook about a gorilla escape at a zoo in Columbia, S.C., Friday, longtime GOP activist Rusty DePass wrote, "I'm sure it's just one of Michelle's ancestors - probably harmless."
When taken to task for the racist comment - and after killing his Facebook page - DePass said, "I am as sorry as I can be if I offended anyone. The comment was clearly in jest."
Yeah - ha fucking ha.
Marilu Morales has filed a federal lawsuit after being allegedly shackled while giving birth at Cook County Jail in Chicago.
...Morales was eight months' pregnant when she was incarcerated in April 2008, according to the lawsuit. It could not be immediately determined on what charges Morales was being held.When she went into labor three days later, she was taken to Stroger. A sheriff's deputy shackled a hand and foot to the hospital bed, the lawsuit alleged.
Morales was in labor for four hours before a physician ordered the deputy to remove the shackles shortly before she gave birth, the lawsuit said. The shackles were allegedly put back on immediately after the baby was born.
This is the fourth lawsuit that Flaxman has filed against Sheriff Tom Dart's office regarding a pregnant prisoner had been shackled while giving birth. Unbelievable.
Related posts: Judge jails HIV positive woman to "protect" her fetus
New report: Mothering in Prison
Woman gives birth in jail cell, alone
Bureau of Prisons bans shackling pregnant inmates
Critical Resistance: Prisons as a Tool of Reproductive Oppression
Moderator Isobel Coleman begins by pointing out that there is some controversy over the title of the panel itself. She asks: "Is this a new agenda? Who's agenda is it?"
The first panelist to speak is Lamia Karim (pictured right), from the Department of Anthropology at the University of Oregon. She speaks to all of the various human rights discourses, many of which she obviously doesn't think are complex or ethical. "What I am most interested in is grassrooots, indigenous, human rights movements organized, not around an individual human, but much more on a group rights basis.This is taking up these rights discourses but trying to renegotiate with the realities on the ground."
"As feminists we need to really go beyond the rhetoric of the empowerment of women and ask carefully, 'What does it take to empower women? Is money enough? What does it mean to give women access to capital without giving them skills training?' This is the Grameen Bank model--based on neo-liberalism."
Larnia has a book coming out through UC Press in spring 2010 which she describes as "a radical critique of this model, this particular model. I wanted to put it out there because this has become a very innovative way of framing how women, especially in the global south and very poor women, can be economically and socially empowered." Can't wait for that!
Isobel turns to Jill Lester next, who is the ED of The Hunger Project, to ask her what her reaction is to the radical critique of micro lending.
"Unfortunately, I think we're going to be in violent agreement." [audience laughs]
"The Hunger Project believes in an integrated approach to poverty. Part of that is having a micro finance facility. We ask the community to form a micro finance committee of 100% women to set their own agenda."
Next up is Radhika Balakrishnan (pictured left), of the Marymount Manhattan College:
"Rather than talking about the crisis as if it something that fell from the sky, we're calling it the 'manufactured crisis,' caused by deliberate changes that the government made in the regulatory framework."
"We're trying to turn human rights around on them. You want to oppose human rights all over the world? What about the human right violation right here. What about the TARP legislation? There's no transparency. That's public money. This is our institution. Therefore there's a human rights obligation on the state."
Cynthia Enloe (holy amazing) jumps in as the pinch hitter:
"One has to be able to think analytically in order to act. I've hated the theory-practice divide. It's stupid. Anyone who acts, especially if you try to act collectively, if you try to mobilize beyond your best friend, it means you've done some causal thinking. You are an analyst. Out of your action come new analytical understandings. It works and you think why did it work? Or it didn't and you have to go back to the drawing table. We are all analysts. We are all thinkers who think thinking matters. Thinking is in handshake with action."
"If we've learned something from feminist thinking from around the world, it is that you have to think big in order to think small--the guys say that of course--but you also have to think small in order to think big. It works both ways and it's really one of the great strengths of feminist thinking for action."
"We are at a moment now where we've got a pool of schools and an understanding of what needs to be acted upon, some people call it an agenda, and we are at a moment, not just because we have a new president of one country, not just because the institutions of capitalism are wobbly (they're not as wobbly as we'd liked)."
"We really are at a moment amongst all of us, and I mean all of us who aren't in the room, where we have the capacity to think as if it matters and the capaity to know what needs to be acted upon. This is a very, very exciting moment. We shouldn't let cynicsm let that moment pass."
"Think as if it matters and then act as if it affects our thinking."
Last week, I wrote about Quinta Layin Tuleh - a 28 year old woman from Cameroon sentenced to 238 days in federal prison because she is HIV positive and pregnant.
Today, Margo Kaplan from the Center for HIV Law and Policy has a piece on RH Reality Check analyzing just how terrible the judge's decision was.
Judge Woodcock's decision ignores the complex factors involved in a pregnant woman's medical treatment decisions - as through being HIV positive makes one incapable of reasonable decision-making - and glibly equates being HIV-positive and pregnant with committing a crime. When reading the sentence, he makes clear that his sole reason for keeping Tuleh in prison was that she was HIV-positive and pregnant, and that, had she been pregnant and not HIV-positive, he would release her with time served. He reasons that he could keep Tuleh in jail "to protect the public from [her] further crimes."...While some states do, indeed, criminalize HIV exposure, Judge Woodcock does more than this - he imprisons a woman for the mere possibility that she might transmit HIV in the future. His reasoning essentially criminalizes being HIV-positive and allows the state to jail anyone with HIV simply because they have HIV and are capable of transmitting it to another. It classifies anyone with HIV as a threat to society who can be incarcerated at the whim of the state to protect public health.
Make sure to check out the whole piece, Kaplan does a great job linking the paternalism, discrimination and misogyny that are so rife in this case.
A woman from the African nation of Cameroon could give birth in a federal prison because she is HIV-positive.U.S. District Judge John Woodcock last month sentenced Quinta Layin Tuleh, 28, to 238 days in federal prison for having fake documents. Woodcock said the sentence would ensure that Tuleh's baby, due Aug. 29, has a good chance of being born free of the AIDS virus.
"Judges cannot lock a woman up simply because she is sick and pregnant," said Zachary Heiden, legal director for the Maine Civil Liberties Union.
"Judges have enormous discretion in imposing sentences, and that is appropriate. But jailing someone is punishment -- it is depriving them of liberty. That deprivation has to be justified, and illness or pregnancy is not justification for imprisonment."
Yet that's exactly what Woodcock did - using the paternalistic justification that he is looking out for the best interest of Tuleh's unborn child, who he apparently thinks will benefit from the stellar prenatal care given in prison.
"My obligation is to protect the public from further crimes of the defendant," he said at Tuleh's sentencing, "and that public, it seems to me at this point, should likely include that child she's carrying. I don't think that the transfer of HIV to an unborn child is a crime technically under the law, but it is as direct and as likely as an ongoing assault."If I had -- if I were to know conclusively that upon release from imprisonment a defendant was going to assault another person," Woodcock said, "I would act in a fashion to prevent that, and similar to an assault, causing grievous injury to a wholly innocent person. And so I think I have the obligation to do what I can to protect that person, when that person is born, from permanent and ongoing harm."
I agree with Jess: I fail to see how Tuleh's inability (if that really is the case) to procure affordable, decent healthcare is an "assault" against her fetus, rather than the system's assault of Tuleh. And of course, one wonders if Woodcock's decision would have been the same had Tuleh been from Denmark or Italy, not Cameroon...though you don't have to wonder long. (70% of cases involving prosecuting pregnant women are brought against women of color.)
For more information on the U.S.' long history of persecuting pregnant women (and what you can do about it) check out the National Advocates for Pregnant Women, the Women and Prison project, and the Rebecca Project for Human Rights.
Related posts: New report: Mothering in Prison
Woman gives birth in jail cell, alone
Bureau of Prisons bans shackling pregnant inmates
Critical Resistance: Prisons as a Tool of Reproductive Oppression
NY Times: A Judge's Own Story Highlights Her Mother's
What Tami Said: Sonia Sotomayor: How did she get in here? Or...The more things change; the more they stay the same
Think Progress: G. Gordon Liddy On Sotomayor: 'Let's Hope That The Key Conferences Aren't When She's Menstruating'
Feministe: Racism, Sexism and Sotomayor, in a few easy-to-read bullet points.
Post Bourgie: A word on empathy
F.R.I.D.A.: "On the Bench, With Fairness and Empathy"
Broadsheet: Sotomayor and abortion
RH Reality Check: Fair and Balanced: Weighing Sotomayor's Opinionse
Slate: Republicans won't beat Sonia Sotomayor by attacking her as too darn human.
Gender & Sexuality Law Blog: "Justice Sotomayor" - A View from Columbia Law School
What's the best thing you've read so far on Sotomayor's nomination?
Also, I know there's been a lot of non-Supreme Court news this week, too. What have you all been reading and writing?
Today Obama announced his pick to replace Justice Souter on the Supreme Court: Sonia Sotomayor. Conservatives are already calling her a "judicial activist."
Conservatives argue Sotomayor has a "hard-left record" and believes that judges should consider experiences of women and minorities in their decision-making.
Sounds pretty awesome to me. Although the road to confirmation is likely to be rocky, I hope Sotomayor is indeed confirmed. I was also heartened to see that all of the names on Obama's short-list were women. Yes, Sotomayor's record and experience should be first and foremost when we discuss her as a possible justice, but her identity is not insignificant. I'm looking forward to returning to an era of two women on the court -- because it's pretty damn appalling that "consider(ing) the experiences of women and minorities" is not something we expect of all members of the current Court.
For more on Sotomayor's legal opinions, SCOTUSblog has a detailed rundown in four parts: I, II, III, IV.
(Again, we're at our retreat right now, so sorry for the brevity. More on Sotomayor and her record to come...)
And this report tells us why. Some interesting tidbits via New America Media,
The result shows that women immigrants' main challenges are helping their children succeed and keeping their families together. The obstacles are formidable. 79% of Latin Americans, 73% of Vietnamese, 70% of Korean and 63% of Chinese acknowledged speaking little or no English. They also confront anti-immigrant discrimination, lack of health care and low-paying employment.Bendixen said that this is something that shakes the perception that immigration is always about economics and dollars. In fact, many of the women start out in low-paying jobs even though they may have held professional positions in their home countries. In the United States they might work as a hotel maid, waitress, house cleaner and textile worker.
These results indicate that women may be putting devotion to the well-being of their families ahead of personal job status and pride in choosing to emigrate.
Also, on the racist assumption that women immigrants are somehow submissive, not only to the men in their families but also in the work environment,
Among other findings the poll showed that their roles change within their households. The overwhelming majority--Latin American (81%), Chinese (71%), Vietnamese (68%), African (66%) and Arabic (53%)--said they had become more assertive at home and in public after coming to the United States."We cannot assume that they are submissive back in their countries. They come from smaller towns where you are very close to your family, they want to make sure everyone is okay. And when they get here, they also want to make sure they have a better living. Sometimes they face domestic violence, but that also happens here in the United States," said Silvia Henriquez, Executive Director for the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health.
Thanks to Neela for the link.
We are happy to announce the launch of ¡PRESENTE! an online organizing effort to support and make powerful voices of the Latin@ community. From their introduction letter,
Our goal is to create a broad-based online community of Latinos and our allies strong enough to make the United States honor its promises and protect our people. We're starting with immigration, but we won't stop there--we'll provide you with ongoing opportunities to make change on the issues that most affect our communities.
Get more information here and retweet and re-post widely.
Today Congress will unveil a new bust of Sojourner Truth in the U.S. Capitol. She's the first black woman to be honored there. This is a far cry from the last time Congress proposed "honoring" a black woman, Melissa Harris Lacewell writes:
It is important to remember that Truth is not the first black woman for proposed to be enshrined on federal land. In 1923, Mississippi senator, John Williams proposed a bill seeking a site for a national Mammy monument. The Richmond, Virginia chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy was prepared to pay for the statue, which would stand on federal land "as a gift to the people of the United States . . . a monument in memory of the faithful colored mammies of the South." The statue would have been in the shadow of the Lincoln Memorial, which had just been dedicated a few months. The "mammy bill" passed the Senate in February 1923 just weeks after the Senate defeated the Dyer anti-lynching bill. In other words, even while refusing to protect African American citizens from the domestic terrorism of the lynch mob, the Senate referred the mammy monument bill to the House of Representatives.Whenever I am in Washington, DC I try to imagine the psychic assault I would suffer if I had to walk past a granite mammy statue while on the National Mall. Thankfully, fierce and prolonged resistance to the mammy monument undertaken by the black press, black women's organizations, and ordinary citizens kept this horrifying possibility from being reality.
Black women's organizations defeated the mammy memorial nearly 100 years ago and today they are largely responsible to raising up the bust of Sojourner Truth. The National Congress of Black Women, Inc. (NCBW) worked tirelessly to cultivate donors and supporters for this cause. Because of their efforts, instead of a monument to the mythical figure of a happy, faithful, feisty, loyal black woman slave, America will today memorialize a dedicated, serious, freedom-fighting black woman. In commemorating Truth the nation invests in remembering the deeply human and complicated stories of the lives of black women.
Wow. Certainly puts today's milestone in a whole new perspective, doesn't it?
