2014 was described as a watershed year for women's rights, by newspapers such as The Guardian . It was described as a year in which women's voices acquired greater legitimacy and authority. [2] [3] [4] [5] Time magazine said 2014 "may have been the best year for women since the dawn of time". [1] However, The Huffington Post called it "a bad year for women, but a good year for feminism". [6] San Francisco writer Rebecca Solnit argued that it was "a year of feminist insurrection against male violence" and a "lurch forward" in the history of feminism, [2] [7] and The Guardian said the "globalisation of protest" at violence against women was "groundbreaking", and that social media had enabled a "new version of feminist solidarity". [3]
Denise Balkissoon, writing in The Globe and Mail , disagreed with and criticized the view that 2014 marked a "watershed" moment and that "some collective 'we' has finally had enough", citing her ongoing concerns regarding a "broken system" with respect to violence against women. [8] United Nations' Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Rashida Manjoo, said that violence against women "is acknowledged as a pervasive and widespread human rights violation" and that as of 2014, "no single country can claim that there is progressive elimination occurring". [9]
Marlene Leung of CTV News described 2014 as "the year women joined forces online and the Internet listened". [4] The Twitter campaign #YesAllWomen, offering examples of sexism and harassment, attracted over one million tweets within four days in May. The hashtag was created after the Isla Vista killings in California, a killing spree in which the killer's misogyny was cited as a factor. [4] [7] [10]
The street harassment of women was highlighted when actor Shoshana Roberts was hired by Hollaback! to walk through the streets of New York City. Their two-minute video, 10 Hours of Walking in NYC as a Woman , filmed over a period of ten hours, showed 108 instances described as harassment, including comments from men regarding Roberts' appearance. She received online threats after the video aired. [11] [12] [13] In June, the Egyptian government criminalized sexual harassment, though campaigners questioned whether the law would be enforced. [14]
Responding to the heightened awareness of rape in India after the 2012 Delhi gang rape and the 2014 Badaun gang rape allegations, Prime Minister Narendra Modi advised parents, during his Independence Day speech in August, not only to ask where their daughters are going, but to check on their sons, because "a rapist is also somebody's son". [16] [17] Another Indian politician, Mulayam Singh Yadav, opposing the introduction of the death penalty for rape, said in April "boys will be boys ... they commit mistakes", gaining considerable notoriety, [18] [19] [20] while in June politician and former actor Tapas Paul said he would send his "boys" to rape women from an opposing party. [21]
Krishna Majumdar of the National Federation of Indian Women wrote in July that the Delhi and Badaun attacks were "nothing less than landmarks for women in India – landmarks in their consciousness of what men do, and can do, to them", and that "the machismo of the male, sexual assault or the fear of it, will not let women be truly free". [22] The comic book Priya's Shakti (December 2014) featured a female Indian rape survivor as its hero; Priya is banished when her family learns about the rape, but with the help of the Hindu goddess Parvati, she rides back on a tiger and is victorious. [23]
First Lady Michelle Obama delivered the weekly presidential address in May to highlight the Chibok schoolgirls kidnapping in Nigeria, in which around 270 schoolgirls were kidnapped by an Islamist group. She argued that it was not an isolated incident: "It's a story we see every day as girls around the world risk their lives to pursue their ambitions." [24]
Women's allegations of assault or harassment at the hands of prominent men – including Bill Cosby in the United States and Jian Ghomeshi in Canada – added to the debate about the abuse of women by men in power, and the difficulty of reporting it and being believed. [2] [25] [26] [27] Scotland Yard's Operation Yewtree in the UK, an investigation triggered by the Jimmy Savile sexual abuse scandal, led to convictions for the sexual assault of women or girls against Max Clifford, Rolf Harris and Dave Lee Travis, all well-known men in the media and entertainment industry. [28]
American football player Ray Rice was suspended by the NFL (later reversed) after video surfaced of him punching his female partner, and there were protests in the UK against soccer player Ched Evans being hired by another club after serving a jail sentence for rape. [3] Australia, the UK and Singapore barred US-based dating coach Julien Blanc, after complaints that his aggressive techniques amounted to abuse of women. [29] [30] [31]
In college campuses in the US, the idea of affirmative consent to sex was promoted, referred to as "yes means yes". In January, President Barack Obama launched the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault, [32] and in September, California Governor Jerry Brown signed SB 967, [33] legislation requiring colleges to adopt affirmative-consent policies. [34] The new law defined consent to sex as an "affirmative, conscious, and voluntary agreement to engage in sexual activity"; lack of protest and silence would not constitute consent. [35] Affirmative consent was criticized by Cathy Young who said government involvement in sexual activity was a "terrible idea" and that she did not believe this would protect against sexual assault. [33]
In September at Columbia University in New York, art student Emma Sulkowicz began carrying a mattress with her on campus, in what she called Mattress Performance: Carry That Weight , in protest to the university's alleged mishandling of a rape complaint she had filed, where the student she accused was found "not responsible". [36] [37] The following month students at several universities in the US and Europe joined her protest against campus sexual assault, carrying mattresses on their campuses. [38] [39] [40]
Online threats of violence against women were highlighted during Gamergate, a controversy about the treatment of women in video gaming. [16] American video-game developers Zoë Quinn and Brianna Wu were forced to leave their homes after threats, as was media critic Anita Sarkeesian, who researches sexism in video games; Sarkeesian cancelled a lecture at Utah State University because, for legal reasons, it could not screen attendees for concealed weapons despite the threat of a school shooting if she spoke there. [41]
On Facebook, women in Iran posted images of themselves without veils in a movement known as My Stealthy Freedom. [42] In Saudi Arabia in December, two women involved in the #womentodrive movement were arrested. [43]
In August, France passed what a New York Times editorial described as the most comprehensive law on gender equality in that country to date, Loi pour l'égalité réelle entre les femmes et les hommes. [44] The law allows for abortion on demand in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. Women previously had to be "in distress" to obtain an abortion. [45] Provisions were changed to encourage more men to take paternal leave and requiring workplaces to improve gender equality or face fines. [44] There are also several provisions to strengthen the fight against domestic abuse. Beauty pageants were forbidden for girls under 13 years of age, [46] and the media was forbidden from portraying women in a sexist or demeaning way. [44] The law also mandated gender quotas for the boards of sports organizations and public companies. [47]
In September, Spain's Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy, announced that the government would abandon a proposed law to strengthen the abortion law in Spain which would have banned abortions except in cases of rape or to protect the health of the mother. The proposal, which was introduced by the People Party's cabinet in December 2013, had been met with large protests through 2014. [48] [49]
In December 2014, Canada changed their prostitution laws to follow the Swedish model, which focuses prosecution on those who purchase sexual services. The purchasing and advertisement of sexual services became illegal (except for the advertisement by individual sex workers), while selling sex remained legal. [50] [51] The move was supported by a coalition of women's rights groups, the Women's Coalition for the Abolition of Prostitution, but was criticized by Human Rights Watch and the Feminist Coalition, who argued that it would force sex workers into isolated environments. [52] [53] [54] A similar proposal was approved by the French National Assembly in 2013, but the Senate in 2014 did not pass the bill. Rosen Hitcher, a former prostitute and abolition advocate, walked 800 km (500 m) from Saintes, in southwestern France, to Paris to protest the Senate's decision. She was supported by Pascale Boistard, minister for women's rights, and the mayors of several cities, including Anne Hidalgo, the mayor of Paris. [55] [56]
The World Economic Forum's 2014 Global Gender Gap Report, measuring the allocation of resources between women and men in health, education, economy and politics, ranked Iceland, Finland, Norway, Sweden and Denmark highest on their Global Gender Gap Index, while Yemen, Pakistan, Chad, Syria and Mali were among those ranked the lowest. Globally, the health and survival gap was 96% and the educational attainment gap was 94%, with some countries closing the gap entirely. However, the gap related to improvement for women in the workplace was found to be 60%, having closed by only 4% since 2006. Although it showed the most improvement, the political empowerment gap remained at just 21%. [57] [58] [59]
During a visit to the UK in April, the United Nations' Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Rashida Manjoo, criticized the country's "boys' club sexist culture". She argued that sexism in the UK was more "pervasive" and "in your face" than other countries she had visited, which included Algeria, Italy, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Azerbaijan, India and Croatia. She cited issues such the sexist portrayal of women in public, including the female nudity on Page Three of the Sun newspaper, bullying of girls in schools, and harassment in public spaces. Laura Bates, the founder of the Everyday Sexism Project, commented on Manjoo's criticisms calling them "a wake-up call to recognise the depth and severity of the problem. We still have gender inequality in the UK [yet] we are so quick to point the finger at other countries and suggest women [here] are equal." [60] [61] [62]
In a July meeting with activists and journalists at the end of an investigatory visit, Manjoo heard complaints and criticized the Mexican government's record on gender inequality in public agencies, describing verbal harassment and sexual harassment as forms of violence against women. [63] She said that violence against women "is acknowledged as a pervasive and widespread human rights violation" and that "no single country can claim that there is progressive elimination occurring". She said that two UN reports on the US in 2014 highlighted a disproportionate level of violence experienced by women from ethnic and racial minorities, mirroring findings in her own report of 2011 and similarly urging that the government do more to address the issue. [64]
In June, UN special envoy Angelina Jolie and William Hague chaired the Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in Conflict in London, [65] and the following month UNICEF and the UK government hosted the first Girl Summit, aimed at ending female genital mutilation and child marriage. [66] UN Women Goodwill Ambassador Emma Watson launched the HeForShe campaign in September at the United Nations in New York, inviting men to sign up as advocates for women's rights. [67]
The BBC reported that the role of women within the UN was increasing. As of November 2014, there were 31 female permanent representatives, and six seats (Argentina, Jordan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Nigeria and the United States) out of fifteen on the Security Council were held by women. Most of the senior positions remained with men, including the current and all previous secretaries-general. [68]
Several women moved into prominent positions traditionally held by men. In January Mary Barra became the first female CEO of General Motors, [69] in February Janet Yellen the first woman to chair the US Federal Reserve Board of Governors, [3] in July Adm. Michelle J. Howard of the United States Navy the first female four-star admiral, [70] and in December Libby Lane was the first woman chosen as a Church of England bishop. [71]
In August, Iranian mathematician Maryam Mirzakhani won the Fields Medal for mathematics, the first woman to do so. [1] Maj. Mariam al-Mansouri, the first female fighter pilot in the United Arab Emirates, led a mission in October against ISIS targets in Syria, though she became the target of sexist remarks in some American media. [72] [73] Malala Yousafzai, a 17-year-old Pakistani woman who was shot by the Taliban for her efforts to secure education for girls, shared the Nobel Peace Prize in December. Yousafzai is the youngest person ever to receive the award. [1]
Radical feminism is a perspective within feminism that calls for a radical re-ordering of society in which male supremacy is eliminated in all social and economic contexts, while recognizing that women's experiences are also affected by other social divisions such as in race, class, and sexual orientation. The ideology and movement emerged in the 1960s.
Sexism is prejudice or discrimination based on one's sex or gender. Sexism can affect anyone, but primarily affects women and girls. It has been linked to gender roles and stereotypes, and may include the belief that one sex or gender is intrinsically superior to another. Extreme sexism may foster sexual harassment, rape, and other forms of sexual violence. Discrimination in this context is defined as discrimination toward people based on their gender identity or their gender or sex differences. An example of this is workplace inequality. Sexism refers to violation of equal opportunities based on gender or refers to violation of equality of outcomes based on gender, also called substantive equality. Sexism may arise from social or cultural customs and norms.
Sex-positive feminism, also known as pro-sex feminism, sex-radical feminism, or sexually liberal feminism, is a feminist movement centering on the idea that sexual freedom is an essential component of women's freedom. They oppose legal or social efforts to control sexual activities between consenting adults, whether they are initiated by the government, other feminists, opponents of feminism, or any other institution. They embrace sexual minority groups, endorsing the value of coalition-building with marginalized groups. Sex-positive feminism is connected with the sex-positive movement. Sex-positive feminism brings together anti-censorship activists, LGBT activists, feminist scholars, producers of pornography and erotica, among others. Sex-positive feminists believe that prostitution can be a positive experience if workers are treated with respect, and agree that sex work should not be criminalized.
Catharine Alice MacKinnon is an American feminist legal scholar, activist, and author. She is the Elizabeth A. Long Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School, where she has been tenured since 1990, and the James Barr Ames Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. From 2008 to 2012, she was the special gender adviser to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court.
Violence against women (VAW), also known as gender-based violence and sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), is violent acts primarily committed by men or boys against women or girls. Such violence is often considered a form of hate crime, committed against persons specifically because they are of the female gender, and can take many forms.
Dorchen A. Leidholdt is an activist and leader in the feminist movement against violence against women. Since the mid-1970s, she has counseled and advocated for rape victims, organized against "the media's promotion of violence against women", served on the legal team for the plaintiff in a precedent-setting sexual harassment case, founded an international non-governmental organization fighting prostitution and trafficking in women and children, directed the nation's largest legal services program for victims of domestic violence, advocated for the enactment and implementation of laws that further the rights of abused women, and represented hundreds of women victimized by intimate partner violence, human trafficking, sexual assault, the threat of honor killing, female genital mutilation, forced and child marriage, and the internet bride trade.
The role of women in Egypt has changed over time, from ancient to the modern era. Early archaeological records show that Egyptian women were considered equal to men regardless of marital status.
Julie Bindel is an English radical feminist writer. She is also co-founder of the law reform group Justice for Women, which has aimed to help women who have been prosecuted for assaulting or killing violent male partners.
Campus sexual assault is the sexual assault, including rape, of a student while attending an institution of higher learning, such as a college or university. The victims of such assaults are more likely to be female, but any gender can be victimized. Estimates of sexual assault, which vary based on definitions and methodology, generally find that somewhere between 19–27% of college women and 6–8% of college men are sexually assaulted during their time in college.
Feminist views on sexuality widely vary. Many feminists, particularly radical feminists, are highly critical of what they see as sexual objectification and sexual exploitation in the media and society. Radical feminists are often opposed to the sex industry, including opposition to prostitution and pornography. Other feminists define themselves as sex-positive feminists and believe that a wide variety of expressions of female sexuality can be empowering to women when they are freely chosen. Some feminists support efforts to reform the sex industry to become less sexist, such as the feminist pornography movement.
Women in Trinidad and Tobago are women who were born in, who live in, or are from Trinidad and Tobago. Depending from which island the women came, they may also be called Trinidadian women or Tobagonian women respectively. Women in Trinidad and Tobago excel in various industries and occupations, including micro-enterprise owners, "lawyers, judges, politicians, civil servants, journalists, and calypsonians." Women still dominate the fields of "domestic service, sales, and some light manufacturing."
Rape in Egypt is a criminal offense with penalties ranging from lifetime sentence to capital punishment. Marital rape is legal. By 2008, the U.N. quoted Egypt's Interior Ministry's figure that 20,000 rapes take place every year, although according to the activist Engy Ghozlan (ECWR), rapes are 10 times higher than the stats given by Interior Ministry, making it 200,000 per year. Mona Eltahawy has also noted the same figure (200,000), and added that this was before the revolution.
Traditional gender roles in Egypt are prevalent and clearly defined. These roles are largely associated with traditional Islamic family structures, wherein women's roles are closely tied to the domestic sphere and men's roles tied to the public sphere. Gender roles are based on assumed biological differences between the sexes and can lead to dramatically different life experiences as well as opportunities and outcomes for individuals. Consequently, when looking at a number of indicators, women often find themselves disadvantaged relative to men.
#YesAllWomen is a Twitter hashtag and social media campaign in which users share examples or stories of misogyny and violence against women. First used in online conversations about misogyny following the 2014 Isla Vista killings, the hashtag was popular in May 2014, and was created partly in response to the Twitter hashtag #NotAllMen. #YesAllWomen reflected a grassroots campaign in which women shared their personal stories about harassment and discrimination. The campaign attempted to raise awareness of sexism that women experience, often from people they know.
Rashida Manjoo is an Emeritus Professor at the University of Cape Town in Cape Town and a social activist involved in the eradication of violence against women and gender-based violence. Manjoo was the United Nations' Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women from June 2009 to July 2015.
Gender equality is the notion that each gender should receive equal treatment in all aspects of life, and that one should not be discriminated based on their sex. Gender equality is a human right, which is recognised under the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Janet Elizabeth Halley is an American legal scholar who is the Eli Goldston Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Her work is influenced by critical legal studies, legal realism and postmodernism.
#MeToo was a social movement and awareness campaign against sexual abuse, sexual harassment and rape culture, in which women publicize their experiences of sexual abuse or sexual harassment. The phrase "Me Too" was initially used in this context on social media in 2006, on Myspace, by sexual assault survivor and activist Tarana Burke. The hashtag #MeToo was used starting in 2017 as a way to draw attention to the magnitude of the problem. "Me Too" is meant to empower those who have been sexually assaulted through empathy, solidarity and strength in numbers, by visibly demonstrating how many have experienced sexual assault and harassment, especially in the workplace.
Carceral feminism is a critical term for types of feminism that advocate for enhancing and increasing prison sentences that deal with feminist and gender issues. The term criticises the belief that harsher and longer prison sentences will help work towards solving these issues. The phrase "carceral feminism" was coined by Elizabeth Bernstein, a feminist sociologist, in her 2007 article, "The Sexual Politics of the 'New Abolitionism'". Examining the contemporary anti-trafficking movement in the United States, Bernstein introduced the term to describe a type of feminist activism which casts all forms of sexual labor as sex trafficking. She sees this as a retrograde step, suggesting it erodes the rights of women in the sex industry, and takes the focus off other important feminist issues, and expands the neoliberal agenda.
The ley del solo sí es sí, in full the Ley Orgánica 10/2022, de 6 de septiembre, de garantía integral de la libertad sexual is a Spanish law approved by the Cortes Generales on 25 August 2022. It is also known as the ley Montero for its promotion by Minister of Equality Irene Montero.
Josh Halliday, "Max Clifford sentenced to eight years for his crimes and contempt of women", The Guardian, 2 May 2014.
Peter Walker, "Rolf Harris jailed for five years nine months for indecently assaulting girls", The Guardian, 4 July 2014.
Paul Gallagher, Paul Peachey, "Dave Lee Travis is found guilty of indecent assault", The Independent, 23 September 2014.