{"id":7610,"date":"2014-08-22T15:49:23","date_gmt":"2014-08-22T20:49:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/?p=7610"},"modified":"2014-08-22T15:51:06","modified_gmt":"2014-08-22T20:51:06","slug":"worried-and-grumpy-but-not-forgetting-to-celebrate-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/2014\/08\/22\/worried-and-grumpy-but-not-forgetting-to-celebrate-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Worried and Grumpy But Not Forgetting to Celebrate"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Unknown\"<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0August 26th is\u00a0Women\u2019s Equality Day. It will mark the 94th<\/sup> anniversary of the final ratification of the 19th<\/sup> Amendment<\/a> guaranteeing women in the United States the right to vote. Lately anti-woman<\/a> political rhetoric, the Hobby Lobby<\/a> Supreme Court decision and various state and national legislative proposals<\/a> that would turn back the clock on women\u2019s rights have left me pretty glum.<\/p>\n

Even the awarding of the Fields Medal<\/a>, the most prestigious prize in mathematics, to a woman<\/a> for the first time in the entire 78 years the Medal has been given has me grumbling. We should be well past \u2018firsts\u2019 of this kind. And what about the fact that the first woman to win the Medal, Maryam Mirzakhani, now a professor at Stanford University, received all her early encouragement and education in Iran before coming to Harvard for graduate work? Are we doing enough to encourage and inspire young women in this country to pursue mathematics? No. The data still show that women in the U.S. are far less likely than men to hold professorships<\/a> in the field. Old dated stereotypes<\/a> continue to pervade K-12 and even college level environments. As Field Medalist Sir Tim Groves<\/a> noted \u201cI am thrilled that this day has finally come\u2026I hope that the existence of a female medalist\u2026will put to bed many myths about women and mathematics, and encourage more young women to think of mathematical research as a possible career.\u201d Yes, me, too. But it sure is a long time coming.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been so grumpy that a friend recently suggested I take a break and get a grip. \u201cIt\u2019s not as bleak as you feel, Susan. Think back to when women couldn\u2019t even vote.\u201d<\/p>\n

And of course, she\u2019s right. Her remark reminded me of my father quoting the old adage, \u2018don\u2019t let the bastards get you down\u2019 when attempting to cajole me out of an adolescent funk because girls weren\u2019t allowed to try out for track. It would take more than decade before Title IX<\/a> began to change sports opportunities for girls, but it did happen.<\/p>\n

Women have made major steps toward equality since the passage of the 19th<\/sup> Amendment. But my gloom is not entirely misplaced. Progress is not inevitable; backsliding surrounds us. The depth of inequality confronting Black Americans highlighted by events in Ferguson, Missouri is but one example of how far our nation has to go before achieving equality for all. Women and girls from every socio-economic level and racial\/ethnic background are part of the continuing struggle for full civil and human rights. We can\u2019t forget this. But the anniversary of the 19th<\/sup> amendment is <\/em>a good time to recall progress, even if we seem smack dab in the middle of a \u2018two steps forward, one step back\u2019 phase of the struggle.<\/p>\n

Too many women and men, girls and boys have no knowledge of the days when women were denied credit cards; few realize that 2014 marks the fortieth anniversary of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act<\/a> giving women the right to credit cards in our own names. Nor are most people aware of a time when dozens of states<\/a> prevented women from serving on juries. The Civil Rights Act of 1957<\/a>, while focused primarily on racial discrimination, guaranteed every<\/em> woman the right to serve on federal juries, but it wasn\u2019t until 1973<\/a> that all fifty states permitted women to serve on state juries.<\/p>\n

Job listings \u2018for men\u2019 and \u2018for women\u2019 and the illegality of birth control are often considered the \u2018the stuff of feminist urban legends\u2019 as one twenty year old recently informed me. And the very real threats to women\u2019s reproductive rights strike some as far-fetched. After all, the Supreme Court decriminalized abortion long ago, way back in 1973<\/a>. Yet today\u2019s reality is that this right is being increasingly curtailed by state actions<\/a>. Even current attempts to limit access<\/a> to the voting booth are less understood than they should be.<\/p>\n

So let\u2019s celebrate and educate<\/em>. Let\u2019s celebrate Maryam Mirzakhani and the many other women \u2018firsts\u2019<\/a> who provide young women important role models in a wide range of fields. But let\u2019s also be sure we remember legislative victories, the struggles involved, the decades required. Sometimes grumbling is both appropriate and necessary, but celebrations are important, too. There\u2019s a long road ahead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0August 26th is\u00a0Women\u2019s Equality Day. It will mark the 94th anniversary of the final ratification of the 19th Amendment guaranteeing women in the United States the right to vote. Lately anti-woman political rhetoric, the Hobby Lobby Supreme Court decision and various state and national legislative proposals that would turn back the clock on women\u2019s rights […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1924,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21114],"tags":[587,461,27732,1870,27728],"class_list":["post-7610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-second-look","tag-civil-rights","tag-human-rights","tag-votes-for-women","tag-voting-rights","tag-womens-equality-day"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1924"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7610"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7610\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7619,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7610\/revisions\/7619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}