Five Defining Key Moments in the Assault on the Rights of Females in This Past Year.
A year ago, women’s rights organisations were preparing for a return of Donald Trump to office. Few were prepared for. The sheer number and rapid pace of White House mandates issued from the White House were viewed as a calculated strategy to paralyze through overload. In many ways it worked – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as agencies hastened to fill the gap left by a freeze on international development funds. But this was only the precursor.
The Washington leadership has been the primary force, aided by relentless activism by religious fundamentalist networks exploiting the situation to strengthen global ties with ideological partners.
The anti-rights movement refers to a global network of policymakers, doctrinal establishments, and activist outfits as well as affluent financiers and clans that seek to undermine advances on numerous fronts. These include reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They accomplish their goals by advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.
We look at five instances that impacted the safety, dignity and lives of girls and women.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In early spring, shortly after a major US aid agency is halted, causing widespread distress, a senior US official announces that the lion's share of the body's projects will be terminated. US diplomats, ex-presidents and aid and medical specialists condemn the news, stating that lives will be lost. Rights defenders say that the demise of the agency is more than a funding crisis, it is a savage attack on human rights and birth control and maternal healthcare. A multitude of agencies say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by diminishing aid, especially in war zones. As the year ends, data shows how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from illness, famine, inadequate obstetric services, and violence against women, with many more millions at risk. Another pair of leading funders follow with their own cuts. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a choice to reduce international development funding is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Faith-Based Activists Mobilize at UN Conference
In March, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a two-day conference held alongside the UN's flagship gender equality meeting. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to oppose what they term a UN overreach. They are in buoyant mood as they applaud changes in American foreign policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the UN secretary general opens the women’s summit with a grave caution that “the poison of patriarchy” is back, after a study indicates that anti-rights actors are systematically eroding established norms on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the summer, a series of conferences in Africa focused on the traditional family and national sovereignty sparks alarm among human rights defenders. In early May, a president and first lady open a significant conference to push back on what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A few days later, another continental gathering on traditional morals is held. Both events are attended by leading Western campaigners against gender ideology, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker urges African NGOs to push back against “radical global social engineering” of international organizations. In June, a prominent church hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in an African nation, an event that pro-choice campaigners say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Advocates remark that the level of external participation has increased markedly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As health facilities across Africa report they are running out of contraceptives, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in July plans to destroy a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A major reproductive health federation states that their elimination will deprive a huge female population from access to birth control, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “an intentional act of reproductive coercion”. A international emergency medical charity calls it “callous and reckless”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US declines every proposal. The situation remains unresolved as local authorities will not allow the destruction of viable medicines.
‘Global Gag Rule’ Expanded
Reviving the global gag rule, which prohibits Washington's support for groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It came as no surprise when the policy was restored in January. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to expand the global gag rule to include sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to cover diversity programmes. Further specifics about the expansion of the rule are likely forthcoming. A director of a major health partnership says broadening the policy will have “devastating consequences”. Pro-choice activists fear that new US aid packages being negotiated with countries in Africa will become dependent on agreeing to the broadened restrictions.
