Members of Rev. Fred Phelps’ Westboro Baptist Church, known for their fierce anti-gay rhetoric and hate speech, arrived at the Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire on Monday to an unwelcoming community of students, faculty and Exeter-area ministers. Followers of Phelps held up “Thank God for AIDS” signs outside the school in protest of […]
A Florida National Organization for Women lawsuit challenging the Constitutionality of state license plates bearing the phrase “Choose Life” will finally see a courtroom in January of 2001. The lawsuit, filed in 1999, argues that “Choose Life” license plates convey a political message and are therefore unconstitutional because the state of Florida should not sponsor […]
Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala accepted the presidency of the University of Miami this past weekend. Shalala formerly served as president of Hunter College in New York and chancellor of the University of Wisonsin, Madison. As Secretary of Health and Human Services, Shalala has supervised health and welfare policy, including many measures […]
The inflammatory Westboro Baptist Church visited Maine this past weekend, and plans to visit Vermont and New Hampshire in the next few days, says the Boston Globe. Westboro Baptist Church members, with the infamous Rev. Fred Phelps, traveled to Kennebunk Maine, picketing outside several churches who supported the recent ballot measure to extend anti-discrimination protection […]
On November 17, the Center for Reproductive Law and Policy (CRLP) petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down South Carolina’s Regulation Number 61-12, a measure that imposes “medically unnecessary” regulations on abortion providers. CRLP classified Regulation 61-12 as a “Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers” (TRAP), a “wave of regulations intended to make abortion prohibitively […]
Danco Laboratories LLC, a women’s health pharmaceutical company that has been granted an exclusive license from the Population Council to manufacture, market and distribute the early abortion pill known as Mifeprex in the US, announced Thursday that it will begin the distribution of the pill immediately. The initial batch of pills will go to centers […]
On November 10, Pakistan’s Interior Ministry closed its borders to Afghan refugees after a month-long influx of 30,000 people, raising the number of Afghans living in Pakistan to 2.1 million. Pakistan, population 140 million, has been the sole harborer of Afghan refugees since 1995 when the United Nations ceased providing food and shelter relief to […]
Amidst the lawsuits filed by Florida residents and members of both political parties, the National Right to Life Committee filed their own lawsuit over the hand recount of Florida votes. The anti-choice group is seeking a restraining order to stop the hand recount. A federal district court judge rejected the anti-choice group’s suit, stating they […]
Today, the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR) released a study on the status of women in the United States, a state-by-state analysis of women’s political and economic status and statewide policies affecting women. “The Status of Women in the States: Politics, Economic, Health, Demographics” reveals that the size of a woman’s paycheck, her access […]
Suspected bomber Eric Robert Rudolph has been indicted by a grand jury in connection with two abortion clinic bombings. Rudolph faces more than twenty counts in Atlanta, Georgia and Birmingham and is on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted List for a 1997 double-bombing at an abortion clinic in North Carolina and the 1998 Birmingham bombing […]
The Siebert Financial Corporation, headed up by early women’s rights supporter Muriel Siebert, has purchased two websites, wfn.com (Women’s Financial Network) and herdollar.com to form a powerful women’s financial website. The new site will address the financial needs and interests of women, including online investing, trading, retirement planning and small business financing. Siebert, a long […]
The Los Angeles Police Department Rampart scandal, which broke over a year ago and revealed deeply rooted corruption in the LAPD, including framing innocent people, fabricating evidence, and covering up physical abuse by police officers, has produced three convictions of LAPD officers. Of the four officers charged with conspiracy, Sgt. Edward Ortiz, Sgt. Brian Liddy, […]
Yesterday, 110 members of a gay and lesbian rights group called Soulforce, Inc. were arrested during a protest outside the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in DC where 300 U.S. Catholic bishops held their annual meeting. The group was protesting the Church’s condemnatory stance on homosexuality, and had staged similar peaceful protests in the […]
Questions teens submit to a popular sex education website sponsored by Rutgers University suggest that young people lack basic information on sex, pregnancy, and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), says www.sxetc.org program manager Danene Sorace. Teens submitted questions on the symptoms of STDs, whether diseases are transmissible by oral sex, the “rhythm method” of contraception and […]
When women from the six Tewa-speaking pueblos of northern New Mexico decided to do something about the rape and sexual violence in their communities, they turned to their cultural roots of peace and respect for the earth. “Violence against women is not distinct from that against the poor or Mother Earth,” says Kathy Sanchez, director […]
The Bush campaign failed in its efforts to mute the impact of gender gap issues such as abortion rights and gun control in the presidential campaign. Concerned about the power of women voters, Republicans tried to hide Bush’s opposition to women’s rights issues and to appeal to women on the basis of his “compassionate conservatism.” […]
A decision by U.S. District Judge Denise Page Hood could end the lengthy court case against Dow Corning, manufacturer of silicone breast implants. In June 1999, Dow Corning, a joint venture between Dow Chemical and Corning Inc., agreed to pay a total of $3.2 billion in settlements to more than 170,000 women who sued the […]
Women’s rights and gay rights activists interrupted the annual meeting of U.S. Catholic bishops over the weekend, demanding a change to the Church’s stance on women ordination and gay Christians. According to the Washington Post, Janice Sevre-Duszynska of the Women’s Ordination Conference cut short the meeting, asking the bishops to address “the wrong done to […]
Women voters favored Gore in all major demographic categories with an overall 12-point gender gap (54 percent of women and 42 percent of men voted for Gore). The largest gender gaps were between unmarried women and men and college-educated women and men. Unmarried women were among Gore’s strongest supporters. Gore won 63 percent of the […]
On a weekend marked by the Canadian Remembrance Day, which historically has been marred by abortion clinic violence, a new Massachusetts state law that creates an 18-foot buffer zone around abortion clinics endured its first test. Two hundred pro-choice and anti-choice demonstrators met at a Planned Parenthood Clinic in Allston, MA, on Saturday, one day […]
