New Clear Vision

LGBTQ Struggles for Equality in Washington State

by Mariah Bell-Stuart, Todd Abrams, and Shalea Semana 

Seattle, Washington is a city of rich culture, activism, and nonprofit work. It is a city of entertainment and arts, and remains one of acceptance. Known for its overall ‘tolerance’, it has the second largest gay community in the U.S., next to San Francisco.

In the 1960s and 70s, Seattle experienced an influx of gay men moving from areas of hate crimes to a more open-minded environment. The greater Seattle Area historically has been accepting of LGBTQ people. One salient way Seattle caters to the community is through bars and other socializing venues that cater to LGBTQ singles and couples.

Seattle political leadership also recognizes the historical importance of the LGBTQ community and is attempting to preserve important sites of historic and contemporary significance for LGBTQ flourishing and wellbeing. These places include bars, stores, community organizations, health centers and other places that specifically cater to the LGBTQ community (Vandenorth 2012). By preserving these places it ensures that Seattle continues to be a leader in equality and protection for the LGBTQ community.

In many other parts of the country tolerance for the members of the LGBTQ community and their own institutions is lacking and in many places open direct hostility and discrimination remain not just evident but in many respects a growing menace. (more…)

V-Day Panel Seeks to End Violence Against Women and Girls

by Diane Lefer

“One billion women violated is an atrocity. One billion women dancing is a revolution.”

That was the statement sent out by the One Billion Rising campaign urging women around the world to dance in the streets on February 14 and demand an end to violence against women and girls.

While “Break the Chain,” the campaign’s music video, screened in the background, three dozen women and a few men in the meeting room of the Los Angeles chapter, National Council of Jewish Women got up and danced before settling down to the serious business of a panel on teen dating violence. (more…)

Recognizing Men’s Roles in Working to Prevent Violence

by Rob Okun

For me, Valentine’s Day is a teachable moment more than a holiday. It’s a perfect time to promote healthy relationships more than romantic gifts and candlelight dinners. Don’t get me wrong. I like a sweet evening out with my honey as much as anybody. I just have a hard time being dreamy-eyed if I’m simultaneously turning a blind eye to the outbreak of domestic and sexual violence still plaguing us. It’s a disorder very difficult to treat.

Domestic and sexual abuse strains have long been resistant to vaccines of chocolate, champagne, diamond brooches, and bouquets of flowers. This year, though, there’s a potent new injection available — One Billion Rising! It carries no live yeast, and was not developed in a pharmaceutical laboratory. It came out of the cauldron of change playwright-activist Eve Ensler (“The Vagina Monologues”) and her cohort at Vday.org devised as a prescription for peace and vitality. It’s one the World Health Organization would be wise to consider including in its protocols. (more…)

Honor and Scandal as Covers for the Wrongs of Militarism

by Robert C. Koehler 

Here’s one take on U.S. militarism and the culture of domination:

“Americans love to fight, traditionally. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle. You are here today for three reasons. First, because you are here to defend your homes and your loved ones. Second, you are here for your own self respect, because you would not want to be anywhere else. Third, you are here because you are real men and all real men like to fight.

“Americans love a winner. Americans will not tolerate a loser. Americans despise cowards. Americans play to win all of the time …. That’s why Americans have never lost nor will ever lose a war; for the very idea of losing is hateful to an American.” (more…)

New Film Focuses on Combating Military Sexual Trauma

by Diane Lefer

After The Invisible War,  a documentary about sexual assault in the US military, screened Thursday evening, a woman stood up from the audience to say she had just celebrated her 80th birthday and that, as a young woman, she’d been raped by a stranger. She wanted everyone to know that today she’s a happy person. Yes, she said to loud applause, “it is possible to heal.”

Healing, being able to move forward with their own lives, is surely what everyone wishes for survivors of sexual violence. But as documentary producer Amy Ziering suggested to the audience during the post-film discussion, in the military, it’s a lot harder to recover if you are far from home, have no support, are called a liar and threatened with retaliation or even death if you tell, and surely worst of all, have to report to your job the next day to the very person who raped you.

Kori Cioca was stalked and harassed by her commanding officer in the Coast Guard for weeks before he attacked her. (more…)

If Not You, Who? If Not Now, When?

by Jennifer Browdy de Hernandez

Was it coincidence that on International Women’s Day 2012, Earth was bombarded by one of the most intense solar flares ever? Could it be that the Sun was urging us on, sending us the pulse of a solar storm to motivate us to action?

March is Women’s History Month, and always prompts me to reflect on where we’ve come in the past year, and where we need to go as women, and as a society.

For one thing, I am tired of women being held hostage on the basis of their reproductive capabilities.

Yes, we are the ones who bear the babies after sex.

Sex happens and we love it.

Babies happen, too.

If a woman doesn’t want to bear the baby that takes root after sex, she has every right to decide what to do about it. (more…)

Morality Is Too Important to Be Left to Politicians

by Michael N. Nagler

Coming as it did in time for International Women’s Day, the decision of legislators in Virginia, to require women seeking an abortion to undergo a vaginal probe and see ultrasound images of their unborn infants has aroused considerable outrage.  And controversy.

Some (mostly Democrats) see it as an invasion of women’s privacy, if not technically a kind of rape, while others (mostly Republicans) say, with the conservative Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, “This law is a victory for women and their unborn children. We thank Gov. McDonnell and Virginia’s pro-life legislators for their work to ensure that women have all the facts and will no longer be kept in the dark about their pregnancies.”

I have a modest proposal that would resolve the issue.  (more…)