Moment in Herstory: Kagan Confirmed & Sworn In

This past Thursday, August 5th, supreme court justice nominee Elena Kagan was confirmed as the 112th justice and 4th woman appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court. On Saturday, August 7th, Kagan was sworn in twice, once before friends and family and again before the media, by Chief Justice John Roberts who told Kagan, "We look forward to serving with you."

A former Harvard Law School dean and most recently, U.S. solicitor general, Kagan will succeed John Paul Stevens as she makes history by bringing the number of women serving at one time to three of nine seats for the first time.

Kagan's presence on the U.S. Supreme Court is not expected to cause a shift in the supreme court's ideology because Stevens had a reputation for being the "leader of the liberals," but the feminist community excitedly awaits her formal installment as a justice on October 1, 2010.

Photo Credit: Boston Globe

Fem News Episode 3

It's Fem News Friday! Please enjoy the following video on the Elena Kagan Hearings for Associate Justice of the Supreme Court!

Elena Kagan + No answer = Ex-Gay?!

Supreme Court nominees are often criticized for their views on issues like abortion, the death penalty and so on. In the case of Elena Kagan, there is talk about her possibly being a lesbian because former Harvard classmates claim that they knew her to be a lesbian. While her decline to answer the media's questioning her sexual orientation has caused people to share their ideas about her sexuality, one individual's hypothesis stands out...
Greg Quinlan, President of Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays (PFOX), recently claimed that Kagan should come out as an ex-gay. As an ex-gay himself, Quinlan suggests that if Kagan is a lesbian she would have come out because President Obama supports LGBT individuals and BECAUSE she has not stated her sexual orientation, she must not be a lesbian! He proposes two possible reasons for her refusal:
1. She is worried that denying rumors could imply that she discriminates against LGBT people-- Quinlan states that to prove her heterosexuality she would need to marry a man which would "be a step backward, and not forward, in liberal gender politics"-- OR,
2. She is an ex-gay!
Oh, really? Refusing to share her sexuality with the media means that she must be or was at one time a lesbian? Sorry, but that's bull. First of all, I must point out that just because she doesn't divulge her sexual orientation does NOT mean she is gay or an "ex-gay"-- maybe, just maybe, she would simply prefer to maintain her privacy. Next, I take serious issue with the term "ex-gay" and organizations like PFOX. PFOX and similar organizations use the term "ex-gay" to describe an individual that has been converted-- CONVERTED?!?!-- from being homosexual to being heterosexual. These organizations that claim to support ex-gays and their loved ones are often ran by religious groups that shame LGBT individuals and attempt to convert them.
Specifically, PFOX claims that individuals choose to be ex-gays yet the organization focuses on providing testimonies and resources that encourage individuals to "leave homosexuality." According to Truth Wins OUT, PFOX's "goal was to counter PFLAG by providing the media with parents who claimed to love their children-- while rejecting their sexual orientation. Ironically, the group has never been lead by a person who is actually the parent of an ex-gay individual."
Um... Not anti-gay? I disagree-- PFOX's goal is to counter a prominent pro-gay organization! How can an organization whose primary goal is counter a pro-gay organization not be anti-gay?
However, this organization's aggressiveness toward PFLAG doesn't surprise me. After all, the organization's founder, Anthony Falarano, claims,

"Satan uses homosexuals as pawns. They're in, as you know, key positions in the media, they're in the White House, they're in everything, they're in Hollywood now. Then after he uses them, he infects them with AIDS and then they die."

This group has been against LGBT individuals from the start. You're not fooling me PFOX. Elena Kagan should NOT "come out" as an ex-gay nor should anyone else.

Interested in learning more?

• Check out Ted Cox and contact him at ted.m.cox@gmail.com to let him know that you're interested in having him speak about his undercover work at on your campus.
• Stay up to date on the ex-gay movement at Ex-Gay Watch.

Friday Funday: Justice Sotomayor!

Congratulations to Sonia Sotomayor on her Senate confirmation as the newest US Supreme Court justice!

After a contentious hearing, it was smooth sailing through the floor vote. The Senate approved her nomination 68-31, and Sotomayor will be sworn in Saturday. She'll have her hands full right off the bat - in a few weeks, the court will begin selecting cases for the new term.

We are confident she will bring much-needed balance to the court, and wish her the best of luck for a long career on the SCOTUS bench.

Have a great weekend and catch you next week!

Photo credit: keithpr on Flickr.

Sotomayor, Suits, Sexism

Cross-posted with Princeton University's Equal Writes blog.

I can't wait for the day when an accomplished, powerful woman appears is made completely irrelevant by the contents of her brain and of her résumé.

I thus find Robin Givhan's article in the Washington Post yesterday - in which she accused the SCOTUS nominee of exhibiting little obvious femininity and of dressing "in the manner of a 1980s lady power broker" - disturbing. Not only do I believe Sotomayor's fashion choices were completely unobjectionable, I'm left wondering why Givhan even cares.

The justice's ensembles reflect her awareness of the climate of her hearing. Racism and sexism - from implications that her Puerto Rican heritage would hinder her ability to make decisions to bogus controversy over her involvement in the Belizean Grove - were obvious players in the questioning and surrounding media speculation, but Sotomayor remained calm and unshaken. Aware of our nation's ever-present biases against Latinos and against women (and especially against Latina women), she was careful not to let her demeanor or statements give the committee any reason to doubt her level-headedness or her "fidelity to the law."

It makes sense, then, that she chose "simple and bold" colors and "virtually no visible jewelry." I'm not alarmed that she wore "sheer black pantyhose." I understand why her nails gave "no hint of the cherry-red manicure that she has, on occasion, worn." In Givhan's own words, she was trying to "leave [her] gender at the door" and let the hearing focus on her accomplishments, knowledge, and experience.

If she "embraced that period in fashion when femininity had no place in the executive suite," as Givhan asserted, she was being careful not to offend the Senators of the Judiciary Committee (of which 17 out of the 19 members are white males) who haven't yet come to terms with the possibility of an assertive, intelligent Latina woman.

But aside from this article's unwarranted criticism of her fashion choices, I'm concerned with why the criticism is being doled out in the first place. Women should wear whatever they want, period. Whether or not Sotomayor chose to abide by what Givhan calls the "new gospel of women's power dressing" that encourages wearing accessories, ditching the pantyhose, and favoring sheath dresses over shoulder-padded suits, her fashion sense has nothing to do with how she's going to perform on the bench.

Givhan's article thus elevates a superficial and should-be unimportant issue: the clothes that a strong and intelligent woman just happens to be wearing.

Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/talkradionews.

The Word for Today: Can We Say PRIVILEGE???

Ok, so I said to myself that I wouldn't give some of these conservative pundits and intolerable commentators sipping on their haterade the time of day. But dammit, I just can't resist. What's up with this week's media frenzy around, dare I say it, the supposedly vulnerable political and social power of white men (gasp)! PLEASE! Give me a break.

First, we have a roundup of conservative hoopla taking Supreme Court Justice nominee Sonia Sotomayor's statements about her identity impacting her role as a judge out of context and slandering her as a "reverse racist":



Oh, let's not forget Gordon Liddy & Rush Limbaugh's attacks. Those are pretty classic:





Then we have a debut of yet another boys club, this time at University of Chicago, "Men in Power":



I mean, really, what is the deal with all this sappy "woe is me, I'm a white male minority" nonsense. If you ever needed a reason as to why feminist and racial dialogue is imperative to the overall change in our society, well now you've got ONE!

Because issues of race and gender have been so conveniently appropriated lately, individuals who continue to gain further strides due to historical political, economic and social privilege tend to challenge anyone or any ideology that conflicts with that history of privilege. More than ever before, we have women, lesbians and gays, and people of color taking on influential positions in our society and this power shift seems to be a threat to the status quo. I feel that it's very cowardice and absurd that many of these conservatives would make racial and sexual indictments against masses of people when the nation as a whole is seeing for the first time true diversity being exemplified.

If Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) can dismiss such arguments, then surely people, we must do better.