Chronicles
GGWW publishes regularly on the Medium.com platform in an effort to expand our audience and reach inquisitive and thoughtful minds.
We hope you will read our posts and send links to family, friends, colleagues, and legislators. Additional content is published regularly, so check back and see what we’ve added. If you would like to read new commentary as soon as it is published you can follow GGWW on Medium.
Harrison Butker Speaks
In one of the never-ending cascades of ways to oppress and shame women, Harrison Butker delivered a commencement speech at Benedictine College that was arrogant and self-righteous. There are multiple lanes for each and everyone and Butker’s notion that there is only one lane for women is mired in sexism and misogyny. Women don’t need Butker’s permission or direction to do anything. Women don’t need Butker to speak for them or at them about what their aspirations and goals are or should be.
Law Enforcement Continues to Land Epic Fail
When law enforcement deliberately fails to enforce the law, they must be accountable. They have committed a betrayal to the community and citizenry and a fraud on taxpayers. When a victim can’t provide ALL the details because she was drugged and traumatized is used as an excuse not to investigate and prosecute, it demonstrates the profound lack of understanding of violence and trauma. It's rape when you don't consent and it's rape when you can't consent.
Santa Claus is Not a Saint in Miami
The pervasive absence of respect for girls and their bodies is so ingrained in every moment that violations go unnoticed, and even become twisted into victories. This is a gargantuan problem: the lack of safety for girls and the accolades for men who are only doing the bare minimum. And in this case, Santa wasn't doing even the bare minimum, which is to keep his hands off someone, and a minor at that, who didn't want contact with him.
Sandra Day O’Connor
Justice Sandra Day O’Connor began serving on the Supreme Court in 1981, unanimously approved by the Senate, and becoming the first female justice in history. She was known for her meticulously researched opinions, defying the sexist stereotype that women are “too emotional”, irrational, or not analytical enough to serve in high positions. We often overlook, diminish, or may not be at all aware the route that successful women have had to take, and the persistence and creativity involved.
Barbie and Ken’s Great Adventure to the Real World
The Barbie movie doesn't bash Ken or men. It highlights and questions the misogynistic system of patriarchy. It does it in a way that suggests men can opt in or opt out of the existing system. It's hopeful in that a choice is laid out, showing that feminism is not the enemy that will emasculate men, but that women have important contributions that strengthen society.
Kunis and Kutcher Fail Miserably
After Danny Masterson was convicted, Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis wrote letters of support to the trial judge before Masterson’s sentencing. The letters were an attempt to influence the judge with a characterization of Masterson as a good person. How does the idea to do this even come to mind? But if it does, why isn’t it immediately dismissed as lacking any sense?
Internment of Girls and Women in Afghanistan Must End Now
The Taliban has barred women from higher education and from working with national and international humanitarian organizations. This is a human rights violation and deprives girls and women of their autonomy and opportunity. Female humanitarian workers deliver essential health care to tens of thousands of Afghan women in remote areas. GGWW stands in solidarity with the people of Afghanistan and calls for the Taliban’s end to the oppression of girls and women, who are half the population and contribute to Afghanistan’s development, economic growth, and stability.
Marines Claim to be Proud
The assumption that abuse of girls and women by military personnel is some sort of one-off aberration is also flawed but common, and feeds the habit of downplaying the response by law enforcement, whether military or civilian. These actions reveal a pervasive attitude of misogyny in the military. If military personnel weren’t indoctrinated to this philosophy, perhaps members of the corps would not act with violence with the expectation of impunity.
VICTIM/SUSPECT
The betrayal of bait and switch by law enforcement needs to stop. Believing girls and women who report doesn’t mean women are saints and men are scum. It means that when police are pursuing justice, protecting and serving, the odds are overwhelmingly in law enforcement’s favor that they will be right when victims are believed.
From Survivor to Transcender
Language is vitally important in understanding others’ experiences. It shapes our perception and response. Language prompts thoughts, evokes emotion, and has the power to instigate action. One size fits all language is problematic, in that there are stages and a progression toward a new way of being after traumatic experiences.
Education Without Violence is Not Part of the Deal
After a rape conviction in July, a Billings High School student attended school and played on the football team until October. School districts everywhere continue to ignore the fact that many girls are not able to make learning the first priority in school. Trying to avoid being harassed or assaulted comes first, learning is second.
Idaho Supreme Court Judges on the Road to Oz
An institution that should be functioning with the highest expectation of reason has made an egregiously unreasonable ruling. While claiming to protect rights the Idaho Supreme Court has ignored that girls’ rights are human rights. We keep saying children are important. And we also keep undermining their welfare. The contradictions are so outrageous and yet, they continue unchecked.
Child Marriage
Our piece on girls being forced into marriage focuses mostly on the prevalence in the United States and we need to support legislation that bans marriage under the age of 18, with no exceptions, but child marriage happens around the world and we need to support all efforts to end it.
Going to School Can Be Dangerous
Jaelynn Willey was killed while in school in March 2018 and the most important element of the story of Jaelynn’s murder is not how she was killed, but why. Millions of girls go to school every day and many of them will go with a lot more to do than just learn. We need to make schools safe places for girls. They need to know that their focus can be on learning.
Violence Against Women
There are several pieces published about the legal system that does not support girls and women who experience violence. Rape kit evidence is not processed and rape reports are not investigated.
Justice
And another huge betrayal of justice is the making of deals with serial predators.
Judicial System
There are occasions when the judicial system gets it right. It’s important to shine a light on that also, so that we can require specific standards of process. This also relates to the Weinstein convictions and sentencing.
Not Just The Wounded Are Healers
Racism and misogyny require the same response. Action.
Abuse of Children is an Industry That Needs to Be Disrupted
The gravity of child pornography is almost always understated, both as a series of vile criminal acts and as a business. It’s time to punish more severely, go after the money, and disrupt the industry.
Ruth Bader Ginsberg
Ruth Bader Ginsberg spent her lifetime working for true equality. Many times she represented men in an effort to create precedents that would be gender blind. Her strategy was brilliant, persuasive, and effective. Girls and women look to RBG for inspiration in their own pursuit of equality. And a jabot (collar) has become an important statement.
Native Mothers, Sisters, and Daughters Are Missing
On GGWW’s Resource page we list organizations that advocate for the rights of Native women. A disproportionately high number of Native women experience violence while the rate of investigation and prosecution is disproportionately low. The faces of some of these women are here.
Sometimes It’s More Than Entitlement: The Case for Hate
It’s a difficult reality to admit: sometimes women are hated for no other reason than they are women. A larger number of men than most are aware or would like to acknowledge have a hateful view of women based on an entitled and pathetic position that men are victimized by the presence of women. It’s important that women are not intimidated by this and that men who do not agree are part of the force that squashes this belief.
Our Government as a Cesspool of Bullies
In the last few years more women than ever have run and been elected to local, state, and national political offices. All those in elective office encounter some adversarial situations at times and opposing views on policy are to be expected. Women face an additional challenge, and experience vicious and vulgar attacks, not because of a political position but because of their gender.
Who Exploits the Opportunity of the Super Bowl and Other Large Events?
Human trafficking occurs everywhere in the world, and it’s important that community members are the eyes and ears for law enforcement. Individual citizens can make a difference and save those who are trapped in violent and exploitative situations.
Wheeler’s Playbook Includes Strangulation
Choking and strangulation are types of assaults particularly directed at women. Intentionally squeezing the breath, the life, from someone is attempted murder. It should not be dismissed as anything less. Here is some straight talk about men choking women.
Abuse in Sports is Predatory
The slew of criminal charges against coaches, team doctors, organizations, and institutions who fail to report and act is not an indictment of sports programs but an indication of the rampant systemic and cultural lack of protection of children. Predators’ narcissistic entitlement with desire and intention to harm is only stopped by permanently removing them from their targets.
NCAA and Its Miserable and Embarrassing Fail
Sedona Price posted a TikTok video on Twitter of the one rack containing 12 dumbbells that was the extent of the weight training equipment provided to the NCAA Women’s Basketball Championships athletes. Were it not for the exposure and expediency of social media, this gross and flagrant discrimination would have likely gone unrecognized and without remedy.
Women and the Military
The experience for many women in the military ends up being very different than what they expected, and certainly very different than what any recruiter may have told them. In April 2020 Vanessa Guillén disappeared from the base; her dismembered body was found in June, having been murdered with a hammer by another soldier. The US is claiming a superior military but with a monumental record of betrayal.
What Were You Wearing?
Victim blaming and the assumption of provocation, leaving the perpetrator without accountability, persists up to this very day. Clothes are not the problem, it’s the perpetrator.
The Crimes of Josh Duggar Multiply
Josh Duggar is a conservative Christian who finds gratification in harming children. His wife supports him. Special Agent Gerald Faulkner described the over 200 images on Duggar’s computer as “the top five of the worst of the worst that I’ve ever had to examine.” This is no time to be fooled by hypocrisy.
Looking Up is Only Good if You’re Using a Dictionary
Many women and girls are photographed or recorded on video without their knowledge or permission and those images are often sent to others or uploaded to porn sites where men profit from their sale and distribution. These spy cam images are illegal, and they should be taken far more seriously. It’s not “boys will be boys”, it’s criminals will be criminals.
Abusers Exploit the Opportunity of a Pandemic
Violence against girls and women increases in times and areas of stress, conflict, and confinement. A pandemic is the ultimate situation to provide opportunity for abusers and increase the frequency and severity of abuse.
Protect a Predator For He May Be Eaten?
As is almost always the case in reporting about violence against girls and women, the account is softened. The media has a habit of trying to make reprehensible crimes more palatable. The betrayal or severity was not less because it was within the family; for that reason, it is even more.
Girls’ Team Delivered a Big Win and Award is a Monumental Fail
A girls’ softball team from Oviedo, Florida was undefeated for their summer season and won the Florida State Babe Ruth Softball Championship. The message of inequity and diminished value was so glaringly obvious that it’s impossible to understand how even one person could think it was a good idea to give the champions goody bags.
Who Celebrates the Birth and Value of a Girl?
Many cultures around the world believe a girl child is second best. The people of Piplantri are actively working to dispel the cultural myth that a girl child is a burden and less of a joy than the birth of a son. Every community could create a custom and practice that provides daily reminders of their intention and commitment to create equity and defy misogyny.
Wealth Equity and Opportunity is in the Land
The UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights includes the right to be equal before the law and not be discriminated against, the right to own property, and the right to an adequate living standard — these are tied to land. Tiny and incremental changes over centuries is unacceptable. There is no excuse for long-winded debate with some minor concession as the result. There must be widespread, monumental, and sweeping reform.
Jackie Redmond Speaks on the Assault of Kyle Beach
In some sports there have been major disruptions to the organizations that have shielded predators, usually brought on by the bold and persistent actions of girls and women. But many remain cloistered and unwilling to act. Jackie Redmond, a female sportscaster working in two male dominated sports, has brought a fearless commentary on the shameful inaction in the NHL.
Targeting Girls in School is Mainstream
The worldwide culture of misogyny doesn’t get put on hold when students walk in the door of a school. Girls are entitled to an education free from harm, without fear, and without the threat of retaliation if they disclose an assault. We need to create a new school culture: one that includes safety and equity for girls.
Spotlight on Parliament Reflects World at Large
Houses of state leadership should not have the culture of a rabid frat house. The example and expectation of safety and respect should come from the top down. One of the most impactful ways we could see a shift in the culture of misogyny would be to see leaders behaving with dignity and espousing regard for the rights of women to work without threat of harm.
Looking For a Thesis on Misogyny?
The coverage of the Depp v. Heard civil suit was massive. Numerous small and large incidents of bias and aggression littered the trial. The trial didn’t determine that Depp didn’t abuse Heard, as many have claimed. It clearly confirmed that he did. The outcome says she is not permitted to talk about it.
50th Anniversary of Title IX
While the passing of Title IX was a significant step in bringing about participation opportunities and recourse in cases of assault there is clearly a gross lack of compliance. There has been some media attention to Title IX violations at elite universities however it’s important to recognize that violations occur at all levels: middle schools, high schools, tech and community colleges, small and large public and private universities, and college post season tournaments and championships.
Equal Rights are Human Rights
Equality isn’t complicated. It just appears that way because there is such a large gap between the opportunities and rights afforded to men versus those to women. All girls’ bodies should be left intact and every girl could attend school for 12 years if governments assured access and child marriage is illegal. Every woman should have the right to inherit land and property, and embracing women as peacemakers assures their rightful place as leaders and representatives of their community. Vigorously prosecuting gender-based war crimes may not end rape as a weapon of war, but it would bring a shred of justice. Ending human rights violations is the only route to gender equity.
The Myth of War as Between Men
As one of its priorities, GGWW is vigilant about bringing the atrocities of war to light. Women and their children are on the front lines. War is not simply a conflict between men and governments. While it is almost always men in power who initiate wars and predominantly men who participate in armed conflict, war has just as much impact on women and children in the region.
Systemic Disregard for Women’s Justice is Gaslighting on an Epic Scale
Silencing women who report violence and harassment is the ultimate gaslighting. The act of excluding reality from discovery renders a girl’s or woman’s experience as unknown. An intense practice of eradication: Erase the experience, erase the person. Being deaf to violence isn’t a neutral stance.
Department of Justice Fails — Twice
The Department of Justice released its decision not to prosecute the two FBI agents who failed to act on the reports of abuse by Larry Nassar. This decision, initially made in October 2021, was reviewed after Nassar’s victims and members of Congress were outraged that the Justice Department’s inspector general determined the agents had lied numerous times to investigators in order to conceal their deliberate inaction. It was an outrageous decision the first time and now the DOJ is doubling down on INjustice.