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Intersectionality Social Justice

Marching Ahead

One week later, the Women’s March on Washington (WMW) keeps moving forward.  Women and their allies marched in all fifty states and around the world—over 600 demonstrations including an estimated 3 million people. All signifying their opposition to the Trump Administration’s agenda of hate and division.  The organizers have made clear, this movement is just getting started.

I participated in Cincinnati’s Sister March, where I was delighted to see current and former students, members of my church, colleagues, and friends.  We came from different walks of life, but shared a commitment to social justice. Two alums with whom I marched, Rebecca Zemmelman (’16) and Laura Thudium (’16), share their reflections on the March and what should come next below.

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Gender-based discrimination Intersectionality Race Discrimination

Feminism, Whiteness, and the Women’s March

ashton-tuckerGuest Contributor:  Ashton Tucker  (’18)

Suffragettes Frances E. Willard, Susan B. Anthony, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.  21st century celebrities Amy Schumer and Lena Dunham.

What do these women have in common?

They’re all, inexplicably, feminist icons.  Maybe inexplicably is the wrong word.  Although each certainly has advanced or continues to advance womanhood in one way or another, their racism, either intentional or unintentional, often goes unnoticed.  They engage in white feminism – a form of feminism that operates as if the experience of white women is universal and that race and class are just added levels of oppression, as opposed to intermingling with gender.  The Women’s March on Washington has given me hope that women are embracing difference and inclusion in meaningful and powerful ways. 

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Social Justice

Signs of Hope: The Women’s March in Cincinnati

By Kristin Kalsem, Center Co-Director and Charles Hartsock Professor of Lawkalsem-in-author

I wish that I had made a sign.  I was thrilled to learn that a Sister March would be held in Cincinnati at the same time as the Women’s March in Washington D.C. and then I got busy clearing my schedule so that I could go.  I didn’t even think of a sign until I was driving downtown.  But I am so glad that many others didn’t forget.  Passionate and empowering, the signs punctuated the air and the energized buzz of the crowds spilling out of Washington Park.  A mix of funny, angry, shocking, sad, and hopeful, the signs served as icebreakers at this party of allied strangers.