Five Critical Significant Developments in the Attack on the Rights of Females in the Past Year.
In the previous year, organisations advocating for women's rights were steeling themselves against a new Trump administration. Few were prepared for. The torrent and swiftness of White House mandates coming out of the White House were viewed as a deliberate tactic to paralyze through overload. The tactic proved effective – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as groups rushed to compensate for the loss left by a sudden aid suspension. But that was just the beginning.
The US administration has been the primary force, supported by vigorous campaigning by far-right organisations using the moment to forge international alliances with like-minded governments.
The movement against gender equality describes a worldwide alliance of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as affluent financiers and clans that work to dismantle gains in a variety of areas. This covers reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They pursue this agenda via pressuring states, backing lawsuits, disparaging UN work to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.
We analyze five moments that shaped the security, respect, and well-being of women and girls.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In March, shortly after a key American development organization is frozen, causing widespread distress, a senior US official confirms that over eighty percent of the organization's initiatives will be axed. Career diplomats, ex-presidents and aid and medical specialists denounce the action, stating that fatalities will ensue. Activists say that the closure of the organization is not just a financial shortfall, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and birth control and maternal healthcare. Many organisations say females will bear the brunt by shrinking assistance, especially in war zones. As the year ends, reports confirm how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from illness, famine, inadequate obstetric services, and violence against women, with many more millions at risk. Additional key contributing countries initiate similar reductions. A leader of an international advocacy group says a choice to reduce international development funding is a move to appease a political ally.
Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting
In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a biannual gathering held in parallel with the international conference on women's rights. 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 world's top diplomat opens the global conference with a grave caution that “the venom of male dominance” is back, after a study indicates that groups opposing progressive rights are actively undermining established norms on fundamental freedoms for women around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the summer, a series of conferences in Africa focused on the conventional household and state autonomy sparks alarm among human rights defenders. In early May, a head of state and partner open a significant conference to push back on what they label external influences undermining local norms. A soon after, another regional summit on traditional morals is held. Both events are attended by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to stand up to “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of global institutions. In June, a major religious institution hosts a family strengthening conference in the region, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. 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 emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in July plans to incinerate millions of dollars worth of contraceptives held in a storage facility in Belgium. A major reproductive health federation states that their destruction will deny a huge female population from family planning options, and lead to a public health crisis of unwanted pregnancies. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about forcing a conservative worldview globally” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “callous and reckless”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can be distributed to those in need, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains at a standstill as local authorities will not allow the destruction of viable medicines.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Reviving the global gag rule, which prohibits Washington's support for groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is standard practice for certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the rule was reinstated in January. The administration also signed onto a conservative consensus document. But in October, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. More details on the policy's widened application are likely forthcoming. A expert in child welfare says broadening the policy will have “unimaginable effects”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that new US aid packages being arranged with states on the continent will become dependent on agreeing to the expanded global gag.
