The Top 10 Feminist Moments of 2014
(again, please feel free to add your own moments to this list)
The Top 10 Feminist Moments of 2014
(There’s no denying that feminism is having a moment right now. From celebrities “coming out” as feminists to major legislative victories for women, the f-word has been on everyone’s lips in 2014. Revel in our big year with the top 10 most memorable moments!)
1. Mo’ne Davis proved girls can do anything boys can do
We fell in love with rockstar Little League pitcher Mo’ne Davis of Philadelphia’s Taney Dragons this year after she became the first girl to ever pitch a shutout and win a Little League World Series game. Look out for her memoir, due to hit bookstores in March.
2. California said “Yes means yes”
Fact: 1 in 5 college women will be raped during the course of their post-secondary education, and virtually none of those women will ever see justice. But in September, California took action to help turn the tide on those harrowing numbers. The state declared that individuals must obtain “an affirmative, conscious and voluntary agreement” to have sex before engaging with a partner, making “yes means yes” the law of the land.
3. Malala Yousafzai won the Nobel Prize
Malala Yousafzai’s Nobel Peace Prize win came as no surprise, but we were certainly proud to see the Pakistani activist get the recognition she deserves. After surviving a shooting to the head in 2012 at just 14 years old, she went on to champion every girl’s right to an education. “I’m proud I’m the first Pakistani and the first young woman or the first young person who is getting this award,” she said when she found out she’d won the prize. “I decided I would not leave my school [to celebrate winning the award], rather I would finish my school time.”
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6. Emma Sulkowicz stood up for rape survivors everywhere
After she was allegedly raped in her dorm room, Columbia University student Emma Sulkowicz turned the pain of the experience—and the utter failure of the school’s disciplinary board—into a performance art piece with a message. In “Carry That Weight,” she lugs her mattress everywhere she goes on campus and says she’ll continue to do so until her rapist is kicked out of school or leaves on his own. (Ms. honored Sulkowicz for her work to end rape culture with a Wonder Award earlier this year).
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10. The U.S. did right by domestic-violence survivors seeking asylum
Over the summer, the Board of Immigration Appeals—the nation’s highest immigration court—decided that a battered Guatemalan woman who had entered the U.S. without proper documentation could be eligible for asylum as a victim of persecution. Said Karen Musalo, director of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at the University of California’s Hastings College of the Law, “Women who have suffered violence in these cases can now rely on the legal principles established in this ruling. A judge can no longer say, ‘I believe these horrible things happened to you but this is just a criminal act, this is not persecution.’”
http://msmagazine.com/blog/2014/12/31/the-top-10-feminist-moments-of-2014/
